Chapter Text
“Brother… I’m hungry…” the young girl whimpered, clinging to her brother’s hand. “I know, Estelle, we’ll figure something out.” The boy responded to his sister, gently patting her head. “Percy… why did mom have to leave? Why did those guys wearing blue take Gabe away? I want mommy…” Percy sighed, staring at the gross ground of the street they were walking down, thinking about the chaos that had occurred the past two days. “The police took Gabe away because he’s a bad person, he hurt mom and he hurt us, he can’t hurt anyone else now.” Estelle whined, trying not to cry again as she clutched Percy’s hand tighter. “I want mommy, and food, and I want to go home…” Percy sighed again, looking at his little sister, her eyes and face were red from crying, her long black hair a mess and a few small bloodstains on her teal shirt, clothes dirty despite neither of them having been on the street long. “I know Estelle, but we don’t have a home now, but I’ll figure out something to eat.” Percy didn’t particularly care what happened to himself, but his little sister didn’t deserve to be homeless, she didn’t deserve to be an orphan, she didn’t deserve to have seen their mother die.
He heard a clatter from an alley the two were passing and Percy’s head snapped up, moving to put himself between Estelle and the alley, he saw someone going through a dumpster and as they pulled themself out he could see more of them. It was a girl about his age, with messy and dirty blonde hair and dirt smudged on her face, she had stormy gray eyes, she had an old faded orange shirt that might have once been a camp shirt as well as dirty jeans. She spotted, tensing up as she stepped back and clutched the apple she was holding closer to her chest. “Who are you?” She growled out, Percy carefully put his hands up, stepping back, keeping Estelle close to him. “I’m Percy, this is my sister Estelle, we’re not going to hurt you.” It was then she noticed Estelle, her expression softening slightly. “Why are you two here? She looks young, and why is there blood on her shirt?” She sounded almost worried though she was still very cautious. “It’s… a long story.” Percy answered. “But we’re both newly homeless.” She raised an eyebrow though she didn’t seem surprised. “More homeless kids? Huh, there’s a lot of those in New York. I’m Annabeth.”
That surprised Percy though it probably shouldn’t, there’s other homeless kids? Annabeth seemed to notice his surprise. “There’s a lot of kids with shitty or dead parents here.” That honestly kinda makes sense.” Percy replied. “Anyways, do you know anywhere we could possibly get food?” She scoffed. “Either scavenging through trash or stealing is gonna be your best bet, though if you’re lucky someone might pity your ass and give you some food or money if you’re extra lucky.” Percy blinked. “That’s… not ideal. But then again none of this really is.” Annabeth laughed at that. “You could say that again! Come on, I know a few other kids that might be able to help you two out.” She turned and walked off, expecting Percy to follow, which he did after picking up Estelle.
“So… who are these other kids?” He asked after a few moments. “More homeless kids, though you could probably have guessed that.” She started. “There’s my girlfriend, Piper, she’s badass as fuck. And there’s Leo, he’s small but fast, and good at pickpocketing. Plus his boyfriend Jason, he’s strong but an absolute golden retriever to be honest. Then there’s Will and Nico, those two are so protective of each other. Nico looks scary but he’s honestly pretty nice. And Will is pretty nice usually but he can sometimes be pretty existential, also he’s kinda got a short fuse so don’t piss him off, he’s also surprisingly good with first aid and shit like that, but he does smoke so just be aware. Honestly most of us have one addiction or another, kinda comes with all this shit. There’s more kids, honestly too many to name right now, but these are my friends.” She finally finished.
Percy stared at her for a moment. “That’s… huh. Well then.” Annabeth hummed, there’s this abandoned grocery store that me and my friends turned into a sort of home, more like a base. It’s about ten minutes away.” There was a clatter from another alley and Annabeth tensed up again as she looked over. “Shit… it’s the Hunters. We gotta speed up.” She started to walk faster as Percy followed, confused. “The Hunters? Who the heck are they?” Annabeth sighed as she kept speed walking, looking around occasionally. “Right, you wouldn’t know them. The Hunters of Artimes is what they call themselves, they’re this gang of all girls who often beat people up and steal shit. They’re homeless too, but that’s mostly cuz they chose to be, several of them are adults they just don’t even really try to get a job or anything like that. They’re dangerous.”
That worried Percy, but he couldn’t exactly do anything about it, he just held Estelle tighter as he sped up to match Annabeth’s pace. “It’s just up ahead, the store my friends and I live in.” After a few more minutes the two reached an old Grocery store with boarded up and broken windows, old walls with plants growing up them and cracks in them. In front was a blond boy wearing a dirty orange flannel, white shirt and jeans was talking to a kid a little shorter than him with black hair and wearing a bomber jacket, Annabeth waved to them as she called out. “Will! Nico! Found two more homeless kids!”
The two looked over, the blond kid waved at Percy while the black haired kid narrowed his eyes, the two walking over. “Hey. I’m Will, this is Nico, though Annabeth probably already told you that.” The blond haired boy spoke, he has a bit of a Texan accent. Percy just nodded before speaking. “I’m Percy, this is my sister, Estelle.” Will nodded before speaking again. “Noice. Piper and Jason are out looking for stuff and I think Leo is trying to fix the heaters.” He said good to Annabeth before turning back to Percy and smiling slightly. “Well, I know this situation ain’t exactly ideal but hopefully we can at least make it slightly better, come in, you two are probably hungry.” Percy nodded and put down Estelle, taking her hand before following Will into the building, Annabeth walking next to him with Nico in the back. Will called into the building.
“Hey Leo! Annabeth found more strays!” A boy with messy brown hair and a slight tan popped his head up from behind a counter before standing up sans leaning on it. “Is that so? Well that’s great, just perfect, we needed more mouths to feed.” Leo said it in a way that very much sounded sarcastic yet somehow not rude? Percy didn’t understand how he managed that. Leo had an oil stained gray tank top on and cargo shorts. He nodded at Percy. “Sup. Heard yall talking outside. So you’re Percy? Nice. There’s fruit in the back, you two can have some.” He then returned to whatever he was doing behind the counter.
“He’s…” Percy started before Nico cut him off. “Weird? Rude? A sarcastic little shit?” He has an Italian accent, at least, Percy assumed it was Italian. “Interesting.” Percy finished what he was saying and Nico snorted. “You could say that about most of us. Cmon, I’ll show you where the food is.”