Apollo's Hunt

The First Laugh

Ariston made his way over to the white fridge in the massive kitchen. He was in the mood for a Coke. A blue Coke.

"Ariston, get me one too!" Dove called from the living room where the boys were playing video games.

Ariston sighed. What do you want? You know you are not getting any of my blue Cokes, Sam. When ever they were alone in Apollo's palace, they called each other by their original names. Except for Ariston, his name was connected to his past and he had put all that behind him. A new life, a new identity.

"Man, thought I'd get away with that one," Ariston heard Sam mutter under his breath. "Diet Pepsi!" He called again.

Ariston grabbed the soda and made his way back into the living room. He handed Sam his drink after subtly shaking it as much as he could with out getting caught which was easy enough since his eyes were riveted on the screen, watching Luminus, who was Will Solace and Shizzle, who was Leo Valdez compete against each other on what ever game they were playing. Once that was done, Ariston made sure he sat on the other side of the room, grabbing the book he had been attempting to read on the way.

Most of the Hunt were people who were dead but brought back to life from his old life. With the exception of Sam, who was a son of Aphrodite surprisingly. The Hunters of Apollo made the same oath that the Hunters of Artemis made, sometimes even for the same reasons, sometimes to make sure they don't have anyone for enemies to target.

Nico di Angelo, also known as Shade popped his head into the room. "Turn that down guys, I can't hear myself think!" He told them. In response, Leo reached for the remote and turned the volume up further.

Nico rolled his eyes and walked over to Leo, snatched the remote out of his hands and turned the volume completely off. Then he proceeded to walk out of the room and back into the room he was previously in. Before he made it however, there was a loud hiss and Diet Pepsi sprayed all over that side of the room.

Ariston had been keeping a close eye on Sam and he watched as Sam slowly find the cap of the can with out taking his eyes off the screen. The second he opened the can, light brown fizzle sprayed all over him and the three other hunters around him.

There was a moment of silence where Ariston did his best to stay silent and Nico, Leo, Sam and Will tried to figure out what had happened.

The next movement that was made was a very slow raise of the hand by Sam to wipe at the soda that was on his face and an unseen shake of Ariston's shoulders as he tried to keep his laughter in.

Finally, Ariston couldn't keep it in anymore. A roar of laughter boomed through out the palace, shocking the four boys in the same room as him to jump at least a foot in the air. This of course, made Ariston laugh even harder, making the same boys stare at him in amazement. Their faces opened and closed like a fish and set Ariston in another round of laughter.

Nico was the least damaged by the soda, it was Will, Sam and Leo who had taken the brunt of the small prank. Sam couldn't open his eyes for fear of the soda getting into them and had Diet Pepsi dripping down his long nose. He was trying to salvage as much of the soda as possible by licking the sides of his lips. When he heard Ariston's laugh however, he froze. Leo and Will were drenched as well as they were sitting right next to Sam when the can exploded. Yet they could see Ariston very clearly, holding his sides, trying to hold his laughter in.

"Is that...Ariston?" Sam asked hesitantly just as footsteps were heard coming down the stairs rapidly.

"Who is laugh-?" Shooter, or Michael Yew asked but stopped when he saw Ariston practically on the floor, still trying to calm down.

"What-" Phoenix, also known as Luke Castellan started but, like Michael, stopped when he saw Ariston.

Eventually Ariston calmed down but the others still haven't stopped staring at him. No one had heard Ariston laugh since they had been accepted into the hunt. There would be small traces of a smile, occasionally a smirk but never a laugh, not to mention a full drawn out laugh. Leo even saw Ariston wipe tears from his eyes. Ariston picked up his book from the floor where he dropped it and strolled over to the stairs as if that had not happened.

Before he was out of sight though, he turned and pointed in their general direction. Apollo has a meeting tomorrow on Olympus so one of you is going to drive the chariot. He told them.

Immediately, Shizzle, Luminus and Shooter started to fight for the spot. Almost the second after he said that, the three started to fist fight, setting Ariston off on another round of laughter, albeit not as drawn out as before.

As Ariston flew up the stairs into his room, Phoenix glanced at the other six boys in the room. It had been so long, Luke had forgotten what Ariston's laugh sounded like. He always looked as though he were in pain, an almost permanent grimace on his face after being brought back to life. His eyes were always sad, shattered, almost beyond repair. Luke learned that if they did their best to avoid the topic of Camp Half-Blood and his parents then he would go longer with out being in an intolerable mood and he might even chuckle at something funny. But if any thing related to those topics were mentioned then he would close off and give every one the silent treatment for at least a week. Luke knew it was worse than Ariston let anyone see. He could hear his screams at night as Ariston had the nightmares he had every time something of his past was mentioned. He would dwell on it and have flashbacks, Luke didn't know what he would see, but he could tell the dreams were of Tartarus and...Annabeth.

Luke even hesitated to think her name, he just couldn't believe that the girl he thought of as a sister would do that to a guy like Percy. Her and Thalia. They both had been disowned as his metaphorical family by Luke the moment he heard about Percy's betrayal.

Luke was interrupted out of his thoughts as Apollo suddenly burst into the room. "Yo! What happened here? You got my sofa soaked!" He complained.

Luke only realized then that they had been in the same position as they were when Ariston left the room. No one had been paying much attention to the world right then. Gaea could have risen and destroyed the world for all they knew. Nothing could have been as shocking as Ariston's laugh at that moment.

Luke blinked out of his stupor and looked at Apollo, a look of complete shock still on his face.

"Dude, what happened?" Luke asked Sam, Nico, Will and Leo who were still soaked in Diet Pepsi.

"Ariston- he-he went into the kitchen to get a soda," Leo started, "and-"

"-And Sam asked him to get him one-" Will interrupted. "He came back in and handed Sam his drink. He must have shook it or something-"

"-And when I tried opening it, it exploded!" Sam interrupted Will in turn. "It got all of us soaked in soda, including Nico and-"

"Ariston.....laughed," Nico finished.

There was another long silence after that.

"Ariston laughed?" Apollo asked, his eyes widening to the size of saucers. He was too shocked to even think about his living room at that moment.

Sam nodded. "Who knew that such a simple prank would get him to open up like that?" He commented.

"I need to go tell Hades about this," Apollo muttered, walking back out of the room.

So here is a little filler, just showing you how far Percy has gotten healing wise! Hope you like it! Things are going to very quickly change however...