A Pirate's Life For Me

One Chance

Reyna scanned the horizon again for what felt like the 20th time in the past hour.

"Where is he?"

They'd decided to have Frank go for a swim in the direction he'd gone the day he hit the barrier and they'd follow him in their ships.

Frank was supposed to surface when he hit the wall again, but they'd been sailing for hours and he hadn't appeared.

"Maybe something moved it." Piper suggested. In light of their Captain's disappearance, Reyna had chosen her as first mate, a job that she did just as proficiently as every other job she had on the ship. "Or maybe Frank found a hole."

"He would have surfaced if he'd found a hole."

"Not if he didn't realize it was a hole." Piper pointed out. Reyna rolled her eyes.

"Captain!" Someone shouted from on deck. Reyna thought it might have been Mitchell, but he and Leo actually sounded rather similar so she wasn't ever sure.

"What?" She snapped. She didn't like being called captain.

"Frank's surfaced!"

"Drop the sail and the sea anchor!" Reyna barked. Her crew shot to their feet, going to work quickly.

"Signal Nico to stop as well."

Piper nodded and dashed for the edge of the ship, drawing her dagger and glinting the light off of it as if it were a mirror. Moments after, Nico's ship, which had been speeding along behind them, began to slow.

"He's stopping." Piper reported. Reyna nodded and watched as the Stolls reeled in the sails. Sherman hefted the sea anchor into the water, letting it drag the boat to a stop.

Reyna could see Frank now. The son of Ares was swimming towards the ship in human form.

"Zhang, what's going on?" She shouted.

"Lemme get on the ship first!" He shouted back.

Reyna sighed and waited until he had scrambled over the edge of the ship.

"Captain, I've been swimming for too long." Frank reported nervously. "I think it may have moved."

"Why are we stopping?" All three of them jumped. Reyna whirled on instinct and drew her sword.

"Stop doing that!" She insisted as Nico parried her attack, a look of half surprise on his face. "Sooner or later I'm going to decapitate you."

"I forgot." Was his simple response.

"Can we get back to the barrier? Or lack thereof?" Piper asked.

"What about the barrier?" Nico frowned at them.

"It's not there." Frank said.

"It must have moved." Reyna frowned. She was speaking more to herself than to the other three. "Many islands move."

"How are we going to find it if it's never in the same spot?" Piper asked.

"I did have an idea about that..." Frank said quietly. He wasn't as outspoken as the other three in the group, and he usually felt out of place reporting to the temporary captain.

"Well? What is it?" Reyna demanded.

"We decided it's Calypso's island, right?"

"Yes."

Frank spread his hands out. "The island finds people who are lost, so to speak."

"No." Piper had caught on. "Frank that's a bad idea. You can't, not by yourself!"

"I could take someone with me." He defended.

"Like who? One of the Stolls? No. You can't take Sherman, we need one of you on board. I'm not letting you take Mitchell either, and we don't know anyone on Nico's ship well enough to send-"

"I'm not following." Nico interrupted.

"The island finds lost people. So the crew dumps me overboard with something to float on and some food and strands me then goes to a prepicked place." Frank explained. "Once I find Percy, I can Iris Message them at that place-"

"What if Iris messages don't work?" Piper asked.

"I've got something for that, actually." Reyna said suddenly. She'd been abnormally quiet, thinking about what Frank was proposing. "It worked on Circe's Island, why shouldn't it work on Calypso's?"

Piper scowled and turned to Frank again. "You aren't going alone."

"I'll go with him." A voice said from above. The four looked upward.

Leo was lounging in the rigging above their heads. He grinned and scrambled down. "I've known Percy the longest out of all of you, I'll go."

"Leo-"

"It'll be fine, Piper." He grinned. "The only person who might not like it is Frank."

All eyes went to the son of Ares.

"No, it's fine." Frank said. He seemed a little uneasy about Leo, but if he was, he didn't say anything.

"It's settled then. We can decide where we'll land and wait for you tonight, then leave the two of you tomorrow morning." Reyna nodded and marched off.

Piper ran after her. "Captain, do you think it's a good idea to send two of our crewmen out to sea like that? What if they die?"

"They're smart. Well, Frank is. They won't die." Reyna said shortly.

"But captain-"

"I'm not the captain. Percy is. If we have an opportunity to find him, I'm going to take risks, Piper." Reyna said coldly.

Piper sighed. "Yes, ma'am."

[A/N so it's 12:17 on July 9th and I wanna cry because TODAY'S THE DAY THAT A BUNCH OF ACTORS LEAVE THE HAMILTON CAST AND I'M NOT READY. I WANTED TO SEE IT WITH IT'S ORIGINAL CAST DX but Lin said he'll definitely revisit the role. I hope they all do some day, especially Daveed Diggs. Dude is FUNNY. Anyway, enjoy!]