Pompeiian Politics

Christian had made it a point to bring Corinne's attention to everything that was ever relatively modern or unique, especially landmarks. Along the way, the group talked about drills, routines, the quest, and some of the less popular Centurions among the people in the car. Christian felt somewhat at home, though he supposed that was natural; two out of three people were in his Cohort. Still, Christian didn't get ahead of himself. He had a lot going on, and his mind was not fully clear.

When Rowan and Christian had their turn to sleep, Christian didn't get a lick of sleep. He let his head lean against the window, but he only nodded for a few minutes. He wanted the rest; he would need it later, especially with how early he'd woken up to be ready for offering to the gods before drill.

He sat in the passenger seat with Rowan taking the wheel now. It was bittersweet to have her, out of all three of them, as his shift partner. He could still feel the weight on his shoulders, that he hadn't told her the truth yet. "I think so." Christian replied, sheepishly. He was going to ask her what was up, but those weren't the next words to come out of his mouth. Whether he was overtired or just feeling truthful, he couldn't tell.

"I never liked any of the Davenports or Virgos." Christian stated, as though it was an option on a test. "You proved to me just how wrong I was to think of you that way. Maybe Helmer a little too, but mostly you. I'm happy, honored, and relieved that you chose to come with us, Rowan Davenport." Christian said, his eyes still hadn't opened, however, up until now. "I know what you're going to say, and no, I didn't learn that from Carter's instruction manual."

"Nope." Christian replied about if he was this brutally honest. Rowan didn't know the half of it. Hell, no one actually knew the half of it. Christian didn't have a lot of secrets, but the ones he had, he kept sealed tight.

Christian had managed to sneak some painkillers in an old gas station bathroom when they'd stopped. That was hours ago, but he wasn't on edge yet. He felt his chest drop a mile when Rowan brought up what had happened the morning before. He knew it was coming, and he didn't have it in him to lie through this one. If he did, he knew that when the truth did come out, that would be endgame for him, in every aspect.

He looked back to the seats behind them, towards Corinne and Jerome. It was actually a somewhat heart-warming sight, even if just for a moment, to see Jerome's head on Corinne's shoulder. He really hoped neither of them were secretly awake. "Yeah." Christian adjusted himself now, so he wasn't slumped against the window, and sat straight. But he kept his eyes dead-center on the road, even though Rowan was driving. "It's uh, really important, actually."

Christian took a deep breath. Certainty and stability were not words he would use to describe how he felt. Still, he owed Rowan answers, and it wasn't like he could just walk away right now. With a shaky spirit and fearful words, he continued.

"When I was a kid- a really little kid, I went on my way to find Camp Jupiter. On the way there, there was a monster. I was so small, I couldn't outrun him and I couldn't beat him. I ended up crawling through some really tiny makeshift tunnel to get away." Christian's voice reeked of shame and disappointment. "By the time I got away, it was dark. The middle of the night, and I had nowhere to go but to keep heading for California." Christian had never told another soul of the addiction. Those who had found out by other means, they didn't know the origin.

"I was bloody, scared, in more pain than I ever knew, and I thought for sure I was going to die." Christian paused. "This, this is relevant, I promise, it's not just some stupid sob story." Christian confirmed. "My mother, she- she used to tell me that if I was in pain, she could give me medicine to make me feel better. I didn't understand at the time, so when I ran away-" Christian was cut off by the sound of a loud thump against his side of the car, causing a slight swerve. Again, fate had given him a sign that confession was not the answer.

Christian peered up, through his window, it was an evil looking boar, running a hell of a lot faster than its legs should have let it. "Boars! Really fast boars!" He yelled, hoping to snap Jerome and Corrine out of it, if the initial thump hadn't already.

Corinne was running around weaving in and out of the workers. She was a little kid again. Her hair tied in pigtails that danced in the wind. She was giggling and climbed onto the train car. She stumbled into it and saw all the grownups at the table with papers and maps everywhere.

"Rinne, what are you going in here? Isn't miss Hua watching you?" Asked her father looking up fIt's rom the papers he was holding.

"Sorry father." She said as she slowly began to have shame cover her face. "We were playing a game."

"You know it's dangerous around her, get miss Hua to take you down to the lake this afternoon. It's not safe here, especially not this afternoon." Her father mentioned to her.

"Yes father."

---

"Rinne!" Corinne could hear shouting from where she was hiding. Her hands cupped over her ears as she hid behind a boulder. The tears couldn't help but trickle down her face. The loud noise had caught her off guard and she was scared.

She had run away from the work scene and was off crying. It was only a few minutes more until she felt the warm embrace of her father. He stroked her back trying to soothe her.

"It's okay, Corinne, shh." He said softly.

Before her dreams could continue she was jolted awake as the car had swerved and from there the hatchback started to flip three times until it landed on its back. The glass shattered out of the back window. Rinne was in shock. She had never been in an accident like this before. Cars didn't really go that fast when she grew up.

However, this made her feel the same way she did when she heard explosives for the first time. She wanted to cry, but knew now wasn't the time for it. Rinne groaned and undid her seat belt and crawled out the back.

The first thing she noticed was the glint that came off the piece of glass stuck in Jerome's shoulder. She wasn't sure if she should take it out or leave it for now. She did know she needed to equip herself with a weapon and fast. This meant she had to conjure up an ice weapon for the time being while she bought time to find her pilum or pugio.

The crash was a blur to Christian by the time he was moving again. He should have buckled up, but he made the call that it would be okay either way. All he could hear was intense ringing in both of his ears. Not good, that could mean a concussion, and Christian didn't have the time to go to a hospital. Right now he hardly had time to evaluate himself. Survival training, examine each arm and leg before moving- screw it, Christian didn't have the time. He moved a hand up to his forehead, he didn't feel any pain, but he did feel an absured amount of warm and thick liquid pour onto his hand. He hoped the gash wasn't too low; he didn't want to look disgusting after this.

The pain wasn't present at the moment; adrenaline had kicked in. But he knew after this fight, that with a wound that size, he'd be in intense pain. Christian fumbled the small bag of painkillers from his pocket and swallowed all but two; that would help out later.

All of his full sized pilums were in his weapons bag, along with the rest of his weapons. All he had on him was his pugio, which he never even trained with. It was just a ceremonial thing for being an officer. His head glanced up, and finally got some good focus. The ringing halted slightly, and he noticed that his personal bag wasn't far. He manged to grab it, after a stumbling walk towards it. He fell to a knee, while he grabbed the bag and fished out one of his three mini-pilums.

He heard yelling, but it was feint, he couldn't even begin to imagine what direction it came from. He looked ahead and saw two of them charging towards him. In a moment of panic, Christian whipped his pilum, hitting the one in front, and it turned to dust. He reached his hand in his bag, hastily attempting to fetch his next pilum.

Suddenly, a boar pounced on him, and the noise he heard didn't sound like good news for his body. His bag flew from his hand, off of the nearby elevated road.

His Vicodin was in that bag.

Everything was happening so fast. Everyone else was running around doing what they needed to and even killed a couple of the boars. One of the bigger ones was charging at Rinne and she managed throw her ice knife it, hitting it in the eye. As it squealed in agony that was when she caught glimpse of her bag thrown over to the left. She could reach it, but she didn't know if she'd have time to put her pilum out.

The daughter of Chione began to sprint towards her bag, it was going to only be a couple more seconds until she reached it, but the boar was on her ass. Rinne quickly manage to conjure up enough power to shoot up an ice wall in front of the boar.

Three, two - Corrine was that close when a second boar came up and shot her bag farther back. "Son of a b*tch." She shouted, before she conjured up more energy to drop a hard ice cylinder on the one boar squishing it as she sprinted down the road. She made it to her bag and quickly fumbled with the zipper to get it undone. She found her pilum and just as she turned the boar was right there, and she ended up falling onto her butt. After angling it right she threw her pilum into the boar's throat and it erupted into gold dust around her.

From what little light Christian's wobbly vision could process, he saw a lot of it reflecting off of little particles in the air. That was a good sign, golden dust was good, it meant dead boars, and the only good boars in this case were dead ones. The one that had landed on him was hit with something fast. Christian couldn't tell what, but he assumed it was a pilum or an arrow. Or someone else came to his aid.

The ringing in his ears hadn't stopped. The voices he could hear were distant, as though people from miles away were shouting to him. He struggled, people might need him and he had to be there for them. He wouldn't be able to live with himself if he knew he'd let something happen to his teammates. He managed to get one knee up. It wobbled while he used it to support the rest of his weight. He was standing, though it felt like all of his limbs were asleep; they were simply numb. The blood pouring from his head now further wounded his vision in one eye.

His head glanced to the left, where a lone boar charged him. He tried to run to the left, but his legs betrayed him and instead of diving, he more or less simply fell over. His body missed the blunt of the attack, but his legs caught the side, and he flew a few feet again, close to the edge of the elevation. Where his bag flew over. He'd do anything for those painkillers back.

He struggled to his feet again, this time with much more urgency. He couldn't hear clearly still, but a blood-churning squeal came loud and clear from ahead of him. He wasn't sure who was where, or what was going to happen. With a shaky hand, he snatched the pugio from its sheath. He hated rodeos.

Still, it was about the only chance he had. Christian stood in position, he didn't pray to any gods, he simply just waited. His legs would either work, and he would live, or they would fail, and at least he would fall to where his painkillers were.

At the last second of the charge, Christian dived to the side, he threw the pugio at it, a weapon certainly not designed with the intent of throwing. Thankfully, it seemed lady Diana decided to let him see another moon, when the pugio pierced the boar. It fell down the elevation, and light remains of golden dust floated up, before blowing away in the wind.

"Is everyone okay?" Christian yelled, after moments of standing on shaky feet. He could only hear muffles of his own voice. They might need ambrosia, but what little he brought wasn't in reach. He could hardly see in any direction, but he felt a pull to the edge. He wasn't going to make it a long time without more painkillers, and even so, he popped his last two right then and there. Slowly, the world was becoming slightly more clear.

The daughter of Chione zipped up her bag, unfortunately this bag was the one that only had her weapons in it. She'd have to find her backpack that had her clothes and other possessions in it. Rinne stood up and walked over to where the one boar was trapped under her ice cylinder and was squealing. She brought her pilum smashing down on the boar's skull and it dissipated to golden dust. Looking around she could see the slight number she did with her powers on the road. She began to manipulate the ice she had created and decreased them into side, eventually they'd probably melt.

She scanned the area, but soon heard Jerome, and jogged over. Upon going over she realized she forgot to tell him. "Shit" She said. "Hold on, let me help. I'm going to have to rip your shirt a bit." Which Rinne did a little bit and iced up her hand and touched it around where the blade was, at least hoping to numb the skin enough to make it less painful. After a few minutes she carefully grabbed the piece of glass and pulled it out.

She quickly slipped off her hoodie and ripped the sleeve off so she had something to put pressure against Jerome's wound. "It's not the greatest, but it'll have to do for now."

Her eyes then shifted to look over at Christian. He didn't look so well either, but she figured, she'd leave that to Jerome. Rinne had limited experience in medical stuff.

"It's just a scratch, you did good! You kicked ass!" Christian said to Jerome, though, it was more like he was yelling. Christian hadn't quite understood what he had said, something about him bleeding. The legacy wasn't aware how heavy his voice was; everything was still being drowned out by ringing. A concussion would be a bad working hazard, but oddly enough, Christian felt pretty good for the moment.

"No! I wasn't wearing my seatbelt!" Christian yelled to Rowan, who he was pretty sure just asked if he was wearing his seatbelt. He tilted his head back towards the cliff-side, the biggest thing on his mind wasn't the car. He'd at least had insurance for that. He'd packed enough Vicodin to last for weeks, and now he didn't have any left. If he ended up in detox, that would be a big problem.

His head focused back to Rowan, so she could finish what she was doing. Little by little, the world was coming back into view. The ringing was once again fading down, and with it, the odd happy feeling that was filling Christian up. He reached a hand up to Rowan's forehead, pushing some blood away from trickling down further. "Thank you, but, it's just a scratch. Save some for yours." Christian said, his voice had died down to an almost normal tone for the situation.

He turned to Corinne and Jerome. "I don't know what one of you three saved my ass, but, thank you. We should get our things and keep moving. Nothing for us here."

As Jerome shifted to start to help Christian, Rinne began to walk around the road trying to find all of their stuff that had been scattered. She picked up some stuff and brought it back over to the group. She still hadn't found her backpack yet. She was growing nervous about it, because she had her dad's pocket watch in there and if anything happened to it, she didn't know what she'd do.

The daughter of Chione kept bringing some stuff back, even some of the arrows she had found on the road while searching for other things. She came back unable to find her backpack and looked around at the group. The three of them were banged up a little bad, but she knew they still had a lot of fight left in them. Rinne was a little sore from the crash, but she was left unscathed.

"So, I suppose we need a new car." She she said looking back to the one flipped over. "We might be able to get some useful things out of it before we leave it." Rinne said thinking out loud as she walked over to it. As she did she spotted her bag in front of the vehicle and went over to retrieve it.

She dug in her bag to to find her bottle of water. Her hand found it as she reached the group again and she handed it to Jerome. "Drink some water. You're likely dehydrated." The demigod said giving him a small smile and looked over to the rest of the group. "When we find a car again, I can drive and whichever one of you feels more lively can take watch with me."

The world started to come back slowly, when Jerome approached him once more. His vision became whole, his hearing became viable, and he felt very sore. Not to be confused with pain; he only felt guilt that Jerome had wasted his magic on him, and not the others, who were probably feeling the pain real bad right about now. He listened in to the others, and let his thoughts and feelings stew on one another.

"Just don't go dying on me." Christian said to Rowan, but his tone wasn't the usual playful nature it was around her. His words were said with concern. Looking at her, it was like she was shot all over again. He didn't like the wounds he saw on the others. Corinne didn't look hurt much, but even still, he didn't like it. Internal wounds were more deadly than external.

Christian got to his feet, there was no use in moping over trivial things that wouldn't change the big picture. He scooped his dufflebag over his shoulder, and let the straps keep it up. He looped his arm under Jerome's to give him some support. "Hey, you didn't have to do that. But, thank you. You make the Fifth proud. I'm sure you make Apollo proud too." Christian whispered into Jerome's ear, before offering him his shoulder for support.

He hated to admit it, but he missed the fuzzy and desensitized feeling he had just come out of moments ago. The gravity of their situation was beginning to dawn on him. "We just passed Denver, so I'm sure there's a lot of small stops for tourists. I know how to hotwire." Christian displayed in a moment of honesty. "...Science project." Christian shrugged it off, and he took a step forward, urging Jerome to follow his movements. "Let's keep moving."

When Jerome handed back her water bottle and thanked her, she nodded and smiled. "No problem, Sunshine." She said in reply and put the water bottle back in her bag. It was tempting to check her dad's pocket watch, but now wasn't the time to focus on that. She had to just keep going forward.

It wasn't long before the four of them set out on the road again. This time on foot. Hopefully they'd find a car otherwise it'd take quite a bit of time to find their way to Kansas. The daughter of Chione wondered what else they'd encounter on this quest. Surely there was likely worse than giant boars out there, just exactly what, she wasn't sure.

Corinne began to hum a tune she knew from back when she was younger. it was called O Dem Golden slippers, and eventually started aimlessly singing it quietly.

The walk wasn't one walked with urgency. Christian figured that everyone had been effected by their car flipping. Christian loved that old hatchback; it had technically never been his, but he considered otherwise. Whether it was the shards of glass or the impact, Christian was feeling sore, and he was sure the rest of them were too. Still, they found ways to keep the walk light-hearted enough.

The day was still very young, but the sun had shown more than just a glimpse of its face. Christian was guessing they were hitting six in the morning at this point. He didn't want to be on the side of the road when cars would be common, or worse, hit the interstate again. That would attract some attention.

They had passed a lot and opted out; out of the two cars they had passed, Christian was certain neither were a good idea. One was a two-seater and the other one had a warm hood. The engine had recently been running. Eventually, on that backroad, they passed some properties. The sort you would imagine in countrysides and upstate areas. Big properties, and many had several cars.

"Here." Christian insisted. He yanked his pugio from its sheath, and approached a property with a big dirt path. "Older models are better; harder to spot and less urgent to find. Harder to track, and certainly a lot easier to hot wire." He said, in a more hushed tone. He doubted that anyone in the house would be awake, but it was better safe than sorry. Christian placed his hand on the door of what looked like an older Honda Civic. People said these things never died, right?

The sound of an unlock sounded, which was one of the few perks of being a legacy of Mercury. Christian opened up the front door, and got to work. He hadn't done something like this since long before his promotion. His hands were shaky, but he convinced himself he was undergoing placebo. It hadn't been nearly long enough for any withdrawal symptoms.

"You still wanna drive?" Christian asked to Corinne, letting his voice carry out of the car.