Schoolhouse Cock

And the winner is…

Tell Thalia!

Final Scores:

Option A, Tell her: 45

Option B, Play it safe: 8

I felt like that was kind of a limited choice, and the landslide results backs that up. I'm pretty confident that this week's choice will be much closer, though. Hopefully it'll be the first tight race!

-

Perseus rolled over onto his back. He laced his fingers and rested them on his stomach, staring at the ceiling.

"Thalia, do you remember how certain Annabeth was that I had a away to become a god again?"

"Is this the best time for this?" she asked, voice muffled by the floor.

"I actually think so, yeah."

He heard her shifting. She pulled herself up until she could see him, rolling over to sit more comfortably.

"Can you?" she asked.

"I can," he said.

"How?"

It seemed like, now that she'd accepted they were having this conversation, she was all in. No hesitation left. Perseus wished he felt the same way.

He'd chosen to take the risk, but that didn't magically make him not-nervous.

"There's this quest. I have to sleep with twelve different women, and each of them has to be the daughter of a different goddess. If I can do that, I'll be whisked back to Olympus on a gold-gilded chariot pulled by pegasi. Or something. I don't actually know how it works, just that I have to do it if I want to any chance at returning."

"I guess that's eleven now."

Perseus couldn't place the emotion behind Thalia's voice. He sat up and forced himself to look at her.

"I won't deny that this — that you — helped with that. But it's not… You weren't…"

Thalia raised an eyebrow. Her expression was as unreadable as her voice. Perseus searched for the perfect words, but couldn't seem to find them.

He wasn't used to dealing with this. Had asking for help always been so difficult? And every time he opened his mouth his traitorous brain whispered all the ways what he was about to say could be misconstrued, leaving him saying nothing at all. The longer the silence dragged the faster his heart thudded. He doubted himself, He was confused. He—

Was Perseus. The Perseus, son of the seas and of love itself. What was he doing letting mere words get in the way of his feelings?

"Blast it all to Oceanus' barnacle-filled belly button!" he cursed. "What I'm trying to say is I would sleep with a beautiful girl like you any day of the week, quest or no quest! So don't you dare think this was all about some stupid arbitrary number!"

"Oh, you're giving me orders now?"

Perseus winced, ready to backtrack until he saw the smile forming on Thalia's face.

"I'm kidding," she said. "I'll help you, Perseus."

"You will?"

"I will."

"Just like that?"

"Were you hoping I'd say no?" Thalia asked. "But if you're telling me all this, I assume you want me to fill you in about camp. The cabins. The politics. The girls…"

"Can you?" he asked eagerly.

Thalia snorted and pushed her way to her feet. "Who do you think you're talking to? I'm Thalia Grace. I halfway run this camp. Of course I can explain the basics to an ex-god that doesn't know a thing."

It was a cool declaration, from a cool girl, made less cool by the fact that her wobbly legs immediately gave out. Perseus caught her as she fell across his legs.

"Alright, Thalia, maybe no duels for the next few days," she mumbled to herself. "And maybe walk extra carefully too."

"You're cute when you're embarrassed," Perseus said, observing the blush on her cheeks.

"You're one to talk about embarrassed!" Thalia said. "I saw you stuttering all over the place trying to tell me about this quest!"

Perseus unabashedly groped her perky breasts with the hand holding her up. "You don't have to get upset. Being cute is a good thing."

Thalia groaned. "I'll need a day to set things up," she said, trying to get them back on topic. "After that I'll teach you everything you need to know."

"A day sounds good," Perseus said. "That gives us plenty of time to do other things in the meantime."

He leaned down, capturing her lips. They kissed back and forth for a few moments. Just as he rolled them over to put himself on top of Thalia, her hands pushed him up by the chest.

"I'm helping you now, when you need it," she said. "You can't forget that."

"I won't," Perseus promised.

And even he was surprised by how much he meant it.

It was a very long time before either of them got any sleep.

-

Thalia kicked him out as soon as they woke up. Perseus thought it was far too early to brave the morning considering it wasn't yet eight AM, but she insisted it would be annoying if he was seen leaving her cabin. He was pretty sure that was just an excuse because she was worried that he'd distract her while she prepared his lesson. And she would be right. Sitting quietly in a corner had never been one of his strengths.

Whatever the real reason, Perseus found himself wandering camp early in the day. There was so much of it left to explore. He strolled the shores of the lake and walked the perimeter of the cabins. He poked his head into the training arena. He was going to check out the woods, before a particularly loud roar from deep inside convinced him his time was better spent elsewhere.

Finally, munching a buttered croissant that he snagged from the dining pavilion, Perseus found himself resting in the shade of a tall tree not far from the camp store. A bit further away the strawberry fields were visible, campers toiling along the neat rows, and past that the terrain became hilly and wild.

Perseus took a bite of his croissant, idly watching a group of roughly fifteen campers with mismatched features trudge along the path. He'd always been partial to people-watching. It was his favorite pastime, sex excluded; for his money people were far more interesting than the crap Hephaestus TV showed.

This particularly group was far from the first he'd observed since settling down. In fact, he was only giving them about half his attention until he spotted something peculiar.

As they drew close to the strawberry fields, two at the back slowed and separated themselves from the group. These two — a boy and girl — swiveled their heads quickly from side to side. Perseus finished the last bite of his croissant, licking his fingers clean.

They were lookouts.

Lookouts weren't all that exciting by themselves, but they did imply something exciting was about to happen near them. Perseus leaned forward with interest. The only thing he could see around was the strawberry fields. Even he couldn't guess what was coming next.

As they approached the fields, everyone but the lookouts drew something from their pockets. Perseus was too far to make out what, but the mystery items were definitely pink. There were maybe thirteen demigods total, not counting the two hanging back. That was twice as many as were working in the fields. The one in the lead pulled her arm back, pink object raised.

"Surely they can't be meaning to…" Perseus muttered.

But they did. With one last glance to the lookouts, the group promptly opened fire. They launched their mysterious pink weapons of choice, each of which burst on impact. The demigods working shouted in alarm as pink smoke enveloped the fields. They ran for safety, coughing as they went. When they finally reached safety they hunched over to catch their breath. It was here that things went from bad to worse for them. Lock by lock, tuft by tuft, Perseus watched their hair fall out and flutter to the ground. Soon every single victim had gone completely bald in the course of just seconds.

Perseus scowled. For a simple prank — which was what he assumed he was seeing — this was clearly going too far.

The perpetrators scattered as soon as they were sure it worked. Brazenly, a few even let out whoops and celebratory cries while fleeing. Perseus watched how each of them went a different direction, ensuring they wouldn't be caught together, and decided that this wasn't the first time they'd pulled something like this.

One of them even came toward him. It was a girl with dark hair and a short, athletic build. Even as she sprinted she had her face shielded with an arm. It was pretty smart if she wanted to avoid being caught. Unfortunately for her, it was also the reason she didn't see Perseus's foot right up until the moment she tripped over it.

She ate dirt, sliding a few inches face-first along the ground. When she shoved her upper body up and twisted around to glare, any thoughts of hiding her face were long gone.

"You really shouldn't be running around without looking at where you're going," Perseus said idly.

"You kicked me!" the girl accused.

"I'd argue that you kicked me first, and I was simply better at it," Perseus said.

It was even somewhat true. She had kicked his leg. It was just that he happened to have purposefully left it in her path.

For some reason, his words really got under the girl's skin. She had dark hair with nearly-golden brown eyes and pearly teeth that she gritted as she glared at him.

"Kick me again!" she said, standing up and gesturing for him to come at her. "I'll show you who's a better kicker! Come on! Or are you scared my kicking is so much better than yours that your leg will shatter into a million pieces?"

"I told you, you're the one that kicked me," Perseus pointed out.

He realized immediately after that it may have been a mistake to remind her of that, considering she could have just started kicking as he sat there. He wouldn't put it past this girl. Instead, she heard something and looked down the path. Whatever she saw, she shielded her face again as she turned back to him.

"You didn't kick me again, so I win by forfeit," she said. "I'm a better kicker than you. You suck at kicking. Never challenge me again, unless you want to lose super badly."

And with that she spun and sprinted off.

"I'm the best kicker eveeeeeeer!" echoed through the trees in her wake.

A moment later two more girls ran by on the path, heading for the strawberry fields and the unlucky hairless demigods that had been tending them. These two, an Asian girl and a brunette, glanced briefly at Perseus as the shout echoed behind him, but ultimately didn't stop. When they reached their destination, the two bowed their heads in what was clearly an apology, only for the prank's victims to start shouting and gesticulate wildly at them.

Perseus watched it all with a bemused frown. Slowly, he pushed his way to his feet and wandered off, very much feeling like the odd one out as he walked slowly instead of sprinting somewhere in a rush.

Either he was particularly lucky — or unlucky — with his timing, or this place was considerably more wild than he'd given it credit for. If he were a betting man, his drachmas were on the latter.

Well, there was an upside at least. He couldn't imagine his time here wasn't going to be boring.

-

Four in the afternoon. That was the time Thalia gave him to return to the Zeus Cabin. After a day of pleasant but aimless wandering, he was all too happy to comply when it finally rolled around.

When Thalia first told him a day, he'd been certain she was stalling. How could it take so long just to tell him what she knew? As soon as he walked into the Zeus Cabin, that opinion changed.

The previously barren room had been stocked with a minor array of furniture. An old-fashioned green chalkboard on a wooden frame stood beside a posterboard covered with pictures of cabins, girls, and sites around camp all connected by wild chains of red string. Just ahead of these, a wide desk had been set up, complete with a coffee mug, globe, and steaming mug of coffee. A plush chair was tucked into the desk with an "I ❤ ️ learning!" sticker stuck to the headrest.

Across from the desk, facing the chalkboard, another seat had been set up. It looked quite cheap, Perseus noted, with its thin blue Plastic body and spindly steel legs.

"Take a seat."

Thalia herself stood behind her new desk in a miniskirt and a tight-white blouse that only had the middle two buttons buttoned. Reading glasses rested on the base of her nose. With her piercings and short hair she looked like a biker trying to turn her life around with a job at the local high school, but she looked sexy doing it so Perseus wasn't complaining.

He smiled at her and sat himself.

"Very good," said Teacher Thalia. "Welcome, class. It's good to see you here today. You may call me Ms. Grace."

"Hot."

"Thank you for your thoughts. But if you have something to say, please raise your hand," Thalia said with a pointed look.

Pulling a short piece of chalk from her cleavage of all places, Thalia turned to the chalkboard and began to write. In the center she scribbled the number 12, and around it she wrote nine names.

Zeus.

Demeter.

Ares.

Athena.

Apollo.

Artemis.

Hephaestus.

Aphrodite.

And finally, Hermes.

When she was finished, she drew one large check next to Zeus's name.

"As we both well know, you've already completed one," she said. "I've excluded the Hera and Dionysus cabins as they have either no female campers or no campers at all."

Perseus held back a disappointed sigh. He'd been hoping to get a bit of revenge on Dionysus ever since their conversation the day before, but it seemed he'd have to get a bit more creative than he had been with Zeus.

Thalia continued.

"The Poseidon Cabin is also empty and, even if it wasn't, morally questionable. I did include Artemis, but her hunters aren't actually her daughters, and even if you could seduce one I'm not sure the repercussions would be worth it, so… we'll call that one a maybe."

With a flick of her chalk, she turned the period behind Artemis into a question mark.

"That leaves seven options. As you might expect, some of these will prove easier targets than others. In light of this I've prepared a visual presentation on the best targets."

Thalia stepped toward the posterboard. Before diving in, though, she turned to look at Perseus. "Any questions?"

Perseus raised his hand.

"Yes, you in the front."

"Can I fuck you on that desk?" Perseus asked.

"Later. Any questions relevant to this lesson?"

"What about minor gods?" he asked. "Are only children of the Olympians here?"

Thalia winced.

"The others are here, but they're a bit hard to find right now," she said. "I take it you remember the last Titan War?"

Perseus nodded. Of course he did. It had been less than two years, and it wasn't like you forgot something that important even after hundreds.

"After so many of the minor gods joined the Titans, they were punished when they lost. Many of their children joined the enemy and died in the fighting. The ones that have arrived since… after a while nobody claimed them. Either their parents have given up on them along with the rest of the world, or it was the gods' way of protecting them. As much as I'd like to pretend nobody would've blamed them for their parents' betrayal, that just isn't how people work."

Perseus nodded, his usual easygoing smile absent. None of that sounded farfetched. They would be laying low in the Hermes Cabin then, trying to avoid attention.

He still filed the information away. They certainly didn't make sense as his first target, but if he exhausted the easier options it should be possible to pick out a few members of Cabin Eleven that obviously didn't have the thief god's blood in them.

Snagging a wooden pointer from the desk, Thalia faced the posterboard.

"The Athena Cabin should be left for last," she said with complete confidence. "There's only a couple of them, and they're all naturally suspicious. There's no reason to take a risk on them unless you have to. Usually I would suggest the Demeter Cabin, but they've been having a spat with Cabin Eleven recently. They're pretty paranoid and guarded as a result. The Ares Cabin are so busy right now I'd be surprised if one had enough free time to even sleep with you, not to mention how naturally aggressive they all are. They're also out."

"Busy with what?" Perseus asked once Thalia had inclined her pointer toward his raised hand.

"Keeping us alive," she said bluntly. "The border here at camp has been having problems. Bad ones. Clarisse was always in charge of dealing with any monsters that snuck in before, and she's too stubborn to accept real help now that she needs it. She insists it'll make her look weak, or something equally stupid. The point is, none of them are going to be all that receptive to your advances at the moment."

As far as Perseus had heard, the border that surrounded camp was supposed to be enough to keep it safe. Certainly on Olympus he hadn't heard any talk about failing defenses. He'd have to ask Chiron about it the next time they met.

"What does that leave?" he asked, counting off on his fingers. "Apollo, Hermes, Hephaestus, and… Aphrodite?"

"Not that last one." Thalia shuddered. "Not to start with at least. They're all major sluts, so you won't have trouble seducing one, but once you do the whole camp will know within a day. All they do is fuck and gossip. Besides, aren't they basically your sisters?"

"I can make sacrifices," Perseus said sincerely.

For girls that good looking he could, anyway. When he was a god there hadn't been anything odd about sleeping with his human half-sisters, having no DNA and all, but he supposed it had gotten a bit more complicated in the time since. Something to discuss later, when he'd had more time to think.

"Whatever you say," Thalia said dubiously. "Hephaestus and Apollo are both good options. The girls from the first one don't get a lot of attention, while the second is one of the biggest cabins by numbers. They're promising. But not the best."

Thalia stabbed a photo on the top left corner with the end of her pointer. In it, a young brunette girl with the sharp features of Hermes smiled for the camera. There was a mischievous glint in her eyes. She looked familiar, although Perseus couldn't place why. He must've seen her somewhere as he wandered around camp.

"This is Julia Feingold," Thalia said. "She's been at camp for three years already, ever since her eighteenth birthday. That was long enough to get her a counselor job after the old ones left to live in the real world. I like Julia. Pranks aside, she's a good kid. But she wasn't ready for that much responsibility, and not even her best friend Alice has been able to help her manage it. Her cabin has started acting out, picking fights. She gets blamed for every prank anywhere around camp just because of her reputation. And then, just when everything was going bad for her, her son of Apollo boyfriend dumped her for a chance with an Aphrodite girl. If anybody at camp will leap straight into your bed with a little flirting, I'm telling you it's her."

"Doesn't that seem a little ruthless?" Perseus asked.

He was all for bedding beautiful women. He just didn't make a habit of going for them at their lowest.

"If anything, I'm doing her a favor here," Thalia said with a shrug. "A good night with you might be just the stress relief she needs to relax and break out of this slump. I know I feel more relaxed than I did yesterday. Besides, I think she's still hoping her ex will let her come crawling back. Maybe sex with you will show her how many better options are out there."

Perseus grinned. "What a compliment! I'm blushing over here."

"I'm just stating facts. It is a shame about the personality that comes with your dick, though. If it weren't a package deal…"

Perseus just laughed, and Thalia even cracked a smile herself before refocusing on the mess of photos and threads.

"The difficult part isn't convincing her, but getting her alone. Julia isn't like me with an entire private cabin to herself. The Hermes Cabin is the absolute last place you're likely to get any alone time. There are a few ways around this: fair warning, none of them are perfect."

Her pointer followed a piece of red string diagonally down to a picture of a dull brown building. Percy recognized it as the public bathrooms. He'd been under the impression those were mostly for emergencies or when campers were out and about during the day, since each cabin had a small bathroom built in.

"The Hermes Cabin is simply too big for all of them to use their private bathroom," Thalia said, inadvertently answering his question. "Most of them have to use the public ones each morning. It would be possible for someone from the Poseidon Cabin to be using that bathroom at the same time they arrived. By coincidence, of course. And if a certain counselor was already on board, it wouldn't be hard for her to slip into his shower stall. These hypothetical counselors would have to stay quiet, though. Make too much noise and everyone around will catch on. Who knows, though? Maybe a little danger will make it more exciting."

Thalia jerked her pointer up, following a different thread all the way to the top of the board. This time, it stopped on a photo of his own cabin.

"The next option is the complete opposite," she said. "Just because she doesn't have a cabin, doesn't change the fact that you do. It would be completely private. You'd have the entire night to yourselves. But Julia would have to be back at her cabin before breakfast to do roll-call, and if anyone sees her entering or leaving, rumors will spread faster than a wildfire on the Demeter Cabin."

She jerked the pointer right, over to an image of a dark squat building. White horse heads stuck out through the gaps. Perseus recognized it even before Thalia said—

"The stables. This is a bit of a special case. It's almost as public as the showers, but you don't have to worry about noise."

"Why?" Perseus had to ask.

Thalia pulled a face.

"When they were together, she and her ex would hook up there constantly. It got to the point where we just ignored it. If anybody hears her moaning, they'll just assume the two of them couldn't stay away from each other. Even if he denies it, nobody will believe him or care enough to investigate. The stables wouldn't be as comfortable as your cabin, but it would be the safest by far. To me, it seems like the best of them."

Perseus winced. He could see why it seemed so good to Thalia. With what she knew, it probably was the best. But he was a son of Poseidon, and that came with certain perks for better and for worse. Because his dad created them, he could understand horses just as easily as people, pegasi included. And take it from him who'd had to listen to them for hundreds of years: those winged things never shut up, ever.

The showers had the most people around, but as long as they stayed quiet they could get away with it. His cabin was the most comfortable by far, but if anyone saw Julia rumors would spread. It was less probable to be caught there, but whether it happened or not was totally outside of their control. Then there was the stables. They'd be left alone there, free to fuck on uncomfortable hay to their bodies' content without any interruptions… except for the audience of pegasi inevitably chattering in Perseus's ears. Each choice had its pros and cons, and it was up to him to choose between them.

Thalia was waiting on his answer. She was absolutely certain Julia would be seduced easily. If she was right, the problem of where was the only question left. Perseus took a deep breath.

"Let's go with—"

-

Choice: Where should Percy bring Julia to bone?

Option A: The showers.

Option B: His cabin.

Option C: The stables.

Additional Information: Each of these will have considerable effect on different future plotlines. It isn't just arbitrarily changing a backdrop, but will actually change the scene itself and, in more minor ways, shape the entire story itself.

How to Vote: Write a review which says/includes A or B. You can just write the letter, or feel free to type out all your reasoning. Who knows, you may even sway others to back your vote if you make a really good case.

I will count votes cast across all the sites this story is posted to (see my profile for details) and go with whatever has the majority. Chapters will generally be spaced out by at least a week, to give plenty of time for everyone who wants to vote to get the chance to.