Cover Up

by robindrake93

Summary:

Percy asks Rachel to cover up his SPQR tattoo. Rachel agrees.

Notes:

Don't reupload/repost my fics.

Rachel still remembered the first time that Percy had begun to wear a wrist guard. It was after the war against Gaea. At the time, most people had been too afraid to ask him about it. Percy was a hero and a legend, savior of the world twice over, and the gods were indebted to him. The others found this intimidating.

     Rachel was just concerned about Percy.

     Her lover was tense lately, restless in a way that Rachel hadn’t seen before. Percy withdrew from the other demigods, and was outright hostile to the gods. It was like his feelings when they were fifteen had been ramped up to a hundred. Percy just wanted out of the demigod life. He wanted to turn his back on heroism and on the gods.

     Having been the Oracle of Delphi for several years and seen what Percy went through before that, Rachel could honestly say that she felt a similar way. She didn’t want to be the Oracle, hidden away in a cave and at the beck and call of anyone who wanted to know the future or go on a quest to die.

     And oh, did they die. Demigods went on quests and demigods died. When it was a small quest, something that wasn’t about saving the world, the deaths of the demigods were swept under the rug. The excuses were that they didn’t want to come back to Camp Half-Blood, they were too old now and went to college. They were forgotten.

     Percy didn’t forget.

     Neither did Rachel.

     “I want this off of my skin. I don’t care what you put over it, just cover it up so that I never have to look at it,” Percy said, thrusting his bare forearm. The skin was pale where it had been kept away from sunlight for years. “Every time I look at it, I can’t help but think of how they own me.” He touched the hollow of his throat, where a necklace no longer lay around his neck like a collar. “I got rid of one easily enough, but I need help with this one. Please, mi amor, I need you.”

     Rachel touched Percy’s forearm, the SPQR tattoo that forever branded him as another man’s property and another military’s soldier. The trident looked menacing, its tips sharp like it wanted to burrow beneath the skin. The three lines beneath it showed that Percy’s service to the Roman army wasn’t even halfway up. They had trapped him in a contract that he didn’t want, the gods stealing two decades of Percy’s life. Death loomed around every corner but in the meantime, Percy wasn’t enjoying his life.

     At her touch, Percy flinched. “Sorry,” he muttered. “It’s sensitive.” No one had touched his bare skin since he put the wrist guard on because he never took it off.

     “Tattooing over it is going to hurt even more than anywhere else,” Rachel warned, knowing that it wouldn’t stop Percy from getting the coverup.

     As she’d expected, Percy only shrugged. He’s been through far worse for far less than a needle stabbing him thousands of times per second to cover up a mark of ownership. Percy sank to his knees. He pressed his head into Rachel’s side, leaving his arm stretched out over her lap.

     Rachel’s heart hurt when she looked at him. She stroked his hair with one hand and traced patterns on his forearm with the other. “What do you want on it?”

     “I don’t care,” Percy said, his voice slightly muffled. “Put whatever you want. Just get rid of it.”

     “When do you want me to start?” Rachel asked.

     “As soon as you’re ready.”

     Rachel doubled over and kissed the top of Percy’s head. “Alright. Scoot over so that I get my supplies.” When Percy did that, Rachel added, “And go sit in the chair.” She gathered her inks and her tattoo machine. She selected several needles, a few pairs of gloves, a roll of paper towels, and a bottle of antiseptic water with a pump for easy use. Apollo being gracious enough to give her electricity in the cave was a blessing. It would have been nice to live in the Big House like a human being...but Apollo didn’t want her interacting with the demigods too much lest she lose some of her mystique. Rachel thought Apollo could shove his mystique up his ass.

     Percy was waiting for her, his expression blank but his eyes full of anguish. He laid out his right arm on the chair’s armrest and waited for Rachel to make him feel like something other than a tool to be used. He did not flinch when she began to tattoo him, didn’t even react to it despite how he’d flinched earlier when she touched the spot. A glance up at his face told Rachel that Percy was wearing his brave face, the one he wore when he knew that something was going to hurt but he didn’t want anyone else to see him in pain.

     Rachel created a tree that did not exist anywhere except Percy’s forearm. The branches went up past his elbow and the roots went to his palms. There was nothing woven into the trunk or the winding, reaching branches. The problem with being around gods was that they had claimed just about everything that could be imagined and so it all became symbolism for themselves. Their sacred food, their sacred plants, their sacred animals, their sacred times, their sacred places - everything had been snatched up and divided and used as a way to say that something belonged to them.

     If she wasn’t careful, Rachel could bind Percy to a new god and neither of them would forgive her for that. So, a tree that did not exist, done in so much black ink. Not a hint of a wave or a fish or a pegasus’ wing. Nothing that would tie her lover back to the sea which he could not escape, hating it even as he was a part of it. When she was done with the tree, Rachel began on the background; a sunset in yellows and oranges and pinks and violets. She had seen one on the west coast, so beautiful it took her breath away. Perhaps the background would discourage the gods from branding him elsewhere on that arm. Rachel would draw over every inch of Percy’s skin if he asked, if it meant that the gods couldn’t put their mark on him again.

     The sunset background became ragged stripes, became geometric shapes that meant nothing, all the way up to Percy’s shoulder. Rachel added black over it, ragged stripes that faded into geometric shapes that became the tree’s branches.

     This was not a quick process.

     Doing a whole sleeve on Percy’s right arm, blending the vibrant background colors together, took two days.

     Rachel didn’t pause to eat or drink or sleep.

     Percy didn’t complain about the pain or ask to take a break.

     It needed to be done and done before anyone could stop them. The gods would not be pleased with either of them. This was treason against the gods. Once the gods realized that their favorite toy was standing up for himself and rejecting them, their wrath would rain down on both Rachel and Percy.

     By the time Rachel was finished, her whole body was shaking and she was practically cross-eyed with exhaustion. Her hand was cramped so badly that Rachel worried this was the god’s punishment already being enacted. But it was done. There was no sign of the SPQR tattoo on Percy’s skin. “They won’t be happy,” she said. Her voice cracked with disuse. This was the first time that she’s spoken since agreeing to do the tattoo.

     Percy hissed every time he moved his arm. There was blood all over the seat of the chair and his side where his arm lay naturally. It looked like how he described Luke after that poor, foolish boy stabbed himself in his Achilles’ heel. “They owe me,” Percy said.

     Rachel only nodded. She would stand behind her lover no matter what...even if she doubted that the gods would honor their debts to him. “Let’s get you in the shower, love. We need to wash off the excess ink and the blood.” The water would help him heal faster too and in a more organic way than nectar or ambrosia did. Rachel helped Percy up, holding onto his left arm, and walked with him to the side cave that held her private bathroom.

     Their movements were stiff, joints aching from staying still for so long. It was far easier to undress each other than to undress themselves, so that’s what they did. In the shower, they carefully washed Percy’s tattoo. Then they held each other under the spray.

     “Thank you,” Percy whispered.

     “You’re welcome,” Rachel whispered back. She held onto Percy like the gods were going to come and rip him away from her. They might. Apollo didn’t approve of the Oracle dating but so long as they didn’t have penetrative sex, he seemed content to let their relationship go on. “I love you.”

     “I love you too.” Percy kissed Rachel’s forehead. He trailed kisses down to the bridge of her nose before finally kissing her mouth. His mouth against hers and his arms around her were both comforting things.

     After their shower, they went to bed. The bed was at the very back of the cave, far enough away from the entrance that no one would immediately see it. A curtain kept it even more separated from the rest of the cave.

     Percy lay on Rachel, his head tucked beneath her chin. He held her hand. “I’m going to bargain for our freedom,” he confessed in the dark. “Do you still want to go with me?”

     “More than anything,” Rachel said, and kissed the top of Percy’s head. She held her lover and prayed to anyone who would take pity on them that they would have a future together.

Notes:

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