Chanyeol’s mind was moving at a different wavelength. At first he’d felt like a lost pup attempting to satisfy his questionings of the universe by joining this resistance. But since when had he ever joined this cause? He couldn’t quite remember. 

Looking at the piece of metal that could have meant a thousand things, could have belonged to a thousand others he knew where he was. He was aware. Present. His mind was shaking, but he was positive that this was Camp Half blood, he was the son of Zues, and his name was Park Chanyeol.

“I…what…”Chanyeol held his head in his hands.

Junmnyeon gathered him in his arms, holding him tight, “It’s okay…you’re okay.”

Even though he knew he had to comfort his friend right now, he also understood the danger of standing in the middle of a war zone. The demigods on either side continued to fight, weapons and canon bombs were still being thrown. He heard the screeching of arrows in the distance.

“Chanyeol, I know your mind is running a million times an hour, but we need to get out of here. It’s too dangerous.”

“I’m-It’s all my fault. I’m sorry, Junmnyeon I didnt-I need to stop this,”

The son of Poseidon’s face fell. Chanyeol looked drained. Terrible. His eye sockets bulging out, his eyes-each vein turning red. 

 Ever since he was a child he’d lost many people, but the worst was losing someone to pure evil. He could see that Chanyeol had just overcome the darkest thing. He was lucky as many people-namely Jongdae-hadn’t survived this type of psychological injury.

Junmnyeon pushed Chanyeol roughly to the side when he heard an arrow.

Then, when a second one was thrown he was too late.

“Argh!” Chanyeol held his shoulder where an arrow had just pierced.

Junmnyeon bit his tongue, “Damn it!” He cursed.

At this point, Chanyeol wasn’t going to move. And if he wasn’t going to move, they’d die in no-man's land.

Suddenly a shadow was cast over them. Junmnyeon looked up and found a familiar face.

“Get out of here. Take him back to the ship. Give me his armor.” 

The demigod grabbed Chanyeol and flung him over his shoulder after they’d stripped him of his armor.

“What are you doing here-I-we thought you-”

“I don’t die that easily, my friend. Now take Chanyeol back. I’ll handle it from here.” 

“Adrian, I-”

“I said go.”

—----------------------------------------------------------------

Baekhyun ran out of the ship holding Pandora's jar tight to his chest. He could feel his nerve jitter at the thought of holding something so sacred in his hands. He stumbled on to the battlefield, missing by inches the sharp blades of his close friends from camp half blood.

At some point, he tripped on a rock and almost dropped the jar. 

Baekhyun sat up and closed his eyes.

He knew what he was doing was dangerous, and perhaps he wasn’t the right person to be even doing this, but he needed to do what was right.

He could see in the distance the familiar bronze armor glittering in the sunlight.

Baekhyun swallowed his saliva as it was beginning to choke up his throat.

Now was not the time to cry.

He wondered if he’d ever see Chanyeol again.

One last time he looked at the son of Zues, slash his sword. 

He could hear in his head Mina’s voice telling him that she’d seen Chanyeol die.

Baekhyun didn’t want to waste another second.

He opened Pandora's jar.

—------------------------------------------------------

Chanyeol wasn’t go to say his shoulder wasn’t hurting. It was on fire. A type of pain he hadn’t experienced in a long time. Now that he was…out of his trance you could say pain was more tangible. He felt all his emotions, all his nerves firing at once.

His brain hurt the most.

“Where-Where are we going?” He asked Junmnyeon.

The son of Posiden clenched his jaw, dragging his friend all the way across the battle field, turning back every few minutes to watch Adrian fight off the rest of the campers.

“You can’t fight anymore. You’re injured,”

“I’m fine,” Chanyeol groaned, “I need to stop what I started.”

“NO!” Junmnyeon raised his voice, “I’ve lost too many people. I don’t know where any of my friends are right now and you will not suffer the same fate as Jongdae!” 

They barged into the ship, making their  way into the first available cabin.

Junmnyeon helped Chanyeol lay on the bed. He ran over to the closet, flinging the doors open to find any first aid kit supplies.

Luckily for him the dresser was full of gauze and rubbing alcohol. Junmnyeon set to work, his one goal: keep Chanyeol alive.

“Why…are you doing this,” Chanyeol’s eyes would roll up in pain every time the demigod would dab at his wound. Talking was his way of distracting himself.

“What do you mean?” Junmyeon asked.

“I’m a criminal,” Chanyeol said.

“Chanyeol…you're a victim. Just like everyone else here. You lost your memories. It’s not your fault.”

“Where’s Baekhyun…” 

“I don’t know.”

“Is he alive?”

“I don’t know,” Junmnyeon sighed.

That’s when Chanyeol completely lost it. He began screaming, but it wasn’t the type of scream you let out when you're scared. It was the type of scream you have when you cry. Chanyeol was distraught. Who wouldn’t be? After finding out you were the reason so many lives were being lost right now. That you were the one who led an army to a place you called home.

“Chanyeol, calm down. I can’t fix your wound if you move around.”

“You should have killed me!” He shrieked.

Junmnyeon studied with his friend.

“You should have killed me when you had the chance!” Chanyeol plastered his hands on his face.

“Stop.”

Chanyeol stopped crying. He looked up at his friend.

“I can’t sit here and let you sulk. If you were meant to die, Chanyeol then the fates would have let it happen, but you didn’t. That means you still have a reason to live-you still have a purpose.”

Perhaps Junmnyeon knew that Chanyeol was still in denial, so he pressed a little extra hard this time with rubbing alcohol, making his friend squirm in pain.

“We have to help,” Chanyeol closed his eyes.

Junmnyeon couldn’t possibly understand his pain. Not his physical pain. Emotional. Chanyeol’s fatal flaw was loyalty. He would stand in front of the world to save a friend, but now that he had started an entire war against the people he loved most, it was killing him inside not to run towards danger. 

“I want to let you go. And we will. But your wound is too fresh and I don’t have ambrosia. We need to get to the infirmary without grabbing attention, Chanyeol, because right now most campers want a stake through your heart!”

—--------------------------------------------------------------

They all stood there, wondering if this was even the right thing to do. Mina looked between Kai and Kyungsoo hoping they knew what to do next.

“Well?” She asked, “What do I do?”

Kyungsoo rubbed his temples, “I hadn’t thought this far along-”

Kai laughed, although quite nervously.

“So you brought me all the way here without a plan?!” Mina said.

“O-okay look…there must be some book here in this library that can tell us how to…become the next oracle?”

“You don’t sound too sure,”

“Here!” Kai held up a brown leather book.

On the front it read: A short Condensed History of the Oracle

It looked ancient, but so was the oracle. 

They cracked open the book. Kyungsoo took the lead in reading it while Kai and Mina looked for other books.

This wasn’t really the son of Ares’ strong suit. Tell him to smash a rock with his bare hands, tell him to crack the ground into a pothole-these were easy things for him. But reading…being studios and finding information. 

He wished Adrian was here.

But he wasn’t. And perhaps this was a test from the gods. 

First he scanned through the table of contents. 

When he found exactly what he was looking for he held up the book in triumph making Mina and Kai read what he’d found.

“It says…in order for the oracle to be replaced, that the current one must be dying,” Mina read.

“Okay, we already got that,” Kai said.

“Next…to test the true power of the new oracle they must take a prophecy and read it out loud. If any effect comes from it then they are the next oracle. Note: effect meaning glowing eyes, pale skin, etc.”

Kyungsoo raised an eyebrow. It was only a few sentences. With little to no instruction besides the last line. It wasn’t a great start. But it was something they could work with for now. 

“Okay…grab any rolled up parchment.” Kyungsoo told Mina.

“Are you sure about this,” She asked.

“We have no other choice.”

—-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Baekhyun remembered the pain like it had happened yesterday. Opening Pandora’s jar and subjecting yourself to pain with you fist was one thing, but opening it to attack your entire body was torture.

His arms shook violently. A dark black and red smoke oozed out of the jar, encircling him. Then, it was his chest. It was hard to breathe. It was like he was in a fire and the smoke was moving through his entire circulatory system. But there was no way out because it was inside of him. 

Back when he’d opened the jar and put his hand inside, his mind blanked out, almost forgetting the pain. But now he vaguely remembered it.

It felt like a thousand needles shooting through his spine. If he even moved one inch he knew that he’d be paralyzed. 

His breath hitched because the pain only became worse. 

The glassy tears that began to form around his eyes now the entire camp was glossy, blurred. He couldn’t make out anything before him.

All he could think though was what the gods had told him.

“If you withstand the pain of Pandora's jar and all of its evils, then hope will be released.” Athena had advised him.

At the time, he was convinced this was a practical joke. Baekhyun out of all people had to open the jar that nearly killed him a week ago, there couldn’t have been a worse demigod to do the job. Mina, she was more suited. She'd opened the jar and stuck her hand in like it was nothing.

“It is not about who feels the least pain…your mental strength has nothing to do with that,” She’d told him.

Baekhyun could only look at her clueless.

“The more pain you feel opening Pandora’s jar proves how much pain you’ve gone through in this world. You didn’t feel the most pain because you were weak, child…it was because you are strong.”

Although it made no sense in his head then, it was starting to make sense now. He had been the only one to experience the immense pressure and pain upon placing his hand in Pandora's jar back in the underground resistance. Athena had explained to him that if he had kept his hand there longer he would have released the contents of Pandora’s Jar including hope. She told him wisely that the only people who require hope in the world are people who’ve seen the worst-they’ve seen the world crumble and build itself up, they’ve seen their camp destroyed, they’ve seen their friends consumed by evil and yet, every step of the way they find themselves running back for them no matter how impossible. This was Baekhyun. He was hope.  He knew to trust Athena. 

“So you're saying…whoever opens Pandora’s jar and it’s evils is just a manifestation of everything they’ve gone through in life.”

“Correct,”

“I still don’t understand, why do I have to be the one to open it?” Baekhyun had asked.

“Are you not the demigod that came seeking help?” Athena raised an eye brow.

“I apologize, but I just feel that it more fitting for-”

“No.” Aphrodite spoke then, “It is you who will open the jar. The fates are sealed.”

Baekhyun wanted to argue, but he knew not to start another quarrel with his mother.

“I understand.” Was the last thing he said to the panel of Olympians.

Fast forward to now, where he was fighting for his life.

Pandora’s jar when opened eons ago released the worst things known to man. War, famine, disease. And right now, Baekhyun was opening what was left and instead of opening it to the world like Pandora, he was storing it inside himself. Just like he’d always done his entire life. Bottling up his sorrows, closing in his pain.

Hope. Hope and Chanyeol was what kept him going. 

He thought about all the things he could look forward to when this stupid war ended. All his friends, his sisters, his newly mended relationship with his mother and Chanyeol…

He could go out for coffee with his boyfriend. Maybe they’d watch a movie together back in New York.

Oh how he wanted to fling his arms around him and kiss him just one more time.

But before he could do any of that he had to endure this pain just a little longer.

Hope.

Hope.

Hope.

And then…just after thinking of that one word. The pain left his body. Much to his surprise when he looked down at his hands they were still intact. And Pandora’s jar.

It was opened. And now empty. He flipped the jaw over to check if anything till remained, but he slowly realized he’d done it. He’d actually done it-

“Someone’s down!” Yelled a demigod from the crowd. 

Baekhyun’s head snapped up to the sound of a camper. He looked at the crowd of people and  could make out the familiar bronze armor.

—------------------------------------------------

Suddenly, Mina felt a strong pressure in her chest. Her head went numb and dizzy and then within seconds she was on the ground, Kyungsoo and Kai lowered to meet her eyes. They shook her and she slowly got back up.

“W-what happened?” She asked groggily like she’d woken from a nap.

“You got quiet after you read the prophecy…then your eyes started glowing a bright blue and then…you passed out.” Kai explained.

Mina instinctively looked at her hands, wondering if she possessed any power now. 

“Do you feel different?” Kyungsoo asked.

“Not really…no.” She shook her head. 

Kyungsoo took a deep breath, “Okay…well I mean the book doesn’t really mention how we can confirm that you’re the oracle…but since the old oracle is currently still turning into dust maybe we can safely-”

Mina jumped. Her head hit the floor and she began to spasm. Making the two demigods who had assumed that was her last episode move their hands our in circles wondering what to do.

“What’s happening?” Kai asked Kyungsoo worriedly.

“I don’t know,”

“Death…” Mina said with a deeper, and grotesque voice.

The two demigods leaned in to hear better.

“Death is upon us.” 

“W-where?” Kyungsoo looked around.

“The field…” Mina trailed off, her eyes changing from a sharp electric blue back to her brown ones every few seconds. It was like she was a mirage and there was another soul inside her begging to come out. 

—---------------------------------------

“No, no, no,”  Baekhyun pushed through all the demigods.

This time, there was a ceasefire. Even Sebastian and Cole who were pretty much the lead fighters had dropped their weapons and approached the fallen body in the middle of no man's land. 

The armor had been blown to shreds. Each part of their body, shoulders, thigh had been exposed. The chest armor had been obliterated. Left with an opening for an arrow to be pierced through.The arrow stuck right up. The body took quiet and shallow breaths.

Baekhyun's voice broke. He knew this armor. He couldn’t mistake it for anyone else.

“Chanyeol-”

“Wait! Baekhyun!” Mina said from behind him.

It seemed that the three of them, Kyungsoo and Kai had returned from their mysterious mission in Alec’s cabin. Alec too, who was tired and exhausted came towards the crowd.

“Guys? What are you doing here?”

“Listen. Remember I told you about my vision. I was wrong, okay. That vision of Chanyeol I was wrong.”

“Someone get him some ambrosia!” And the Apollo kid yelled.

Baekhyun decided that he couldn't really understand what Mina was saying at that moment in time. How was she wrong about her vision? There he was…lying there. His last moments of death. He turned around, walking slowly to the fallen body.

He’d opened Pandora’s jar. And this was the result?

Someone handed over a bottle of ambrosia. Another demigod removed the fallen soldier's helmet. 

Baekhyun’s breath hitched.

He ran to the body searching for the face that he’d been missing from his memory for so long. His hair matted from wearing the helmet for too long. Green eyes. Intelligent and wise visage. Baekhyun was muddled. He’d expected to see Chanyeol’s jaw, he was faced with the visage of someone he hadn’t expected at all. 

“Adrian…what are you doing-”

“Baekhyun, long time no see,” The idiot smiled, “I got lost…when I didn’t make it to the resistance. I’m sorry.”

“Why are you apologizing? Why are you here, you idiot. Why are you wearing Chanyeol’s armor,” Baekhyun held Adrian’s face in his hands.

Tears welled into his eyes. For once, he didn’t care if a hundred campers were watching him cry. He didn’t care for the lousy thing he used to call pride. He watched with the deepest pain imaginable as his friend began to lose blood, the life slowly drained from his face. 

“Because…I felt like I let you guys down,”
 

Adrian looked up at Mina and Kyungsoo who couldn’t help but also cover their mouths and cry. 

“You didn’t let us down. You were loyal. Too loyal-” Baekhyun choked.

And he wasn’t wrong. After all, in order to pass the test to get into the resistance you had to show some form of delinquency to camp half blood. Adrian hadn’t passed. He could never betray the camp. All his life he fought to live in his home and he wanted to return some day. And when he actually did…this was the result.

“Baekhyun…just listen to me…Chanyeol, he remembers everything now. Promise you won’t be too harsh,” Adrian held Baekhyun’s hand weakly.

“Why are you-Adrian you’re not dying on me-”

“Even a fountain of Ambrosia cannot go against the fates. A vision…from the great oracle either,” He glanced at Mina.

Baekhyun didn’t have time to decipher what any of this meant. He was losing it. It felt like his entire world was falling apart.

“This is all my fault. I opened pandora’s jar- I did this,”

“No…Baekhyun you did the right thing- Ah-”

Adrian winced. It wasn’t every day you had an arrow jammed in your chest.

“Why!” Baekhyun slammed his fists into the ground.

“Because I know you'd do the same.”

“Adrian…”His voice trailed off as he noticed the blood leaving his friend's face. His lips turned a cold blue.

What remained were his eyes, glowing with what little life he had left.

“I’m going to see him, don’t worry I won’t be alone,”

Adrian closed his eyes one last time.

—--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Baekhyun watched Kyungsoo come from behind him, gently patting him on the back, but even he was too stunned to console anyone at the moment. It was as if the entire camp had stopped fighting. This wasn’t just a loss of a friend, it was a loss of a hero. 

Adrian came from a sad background, having spent almost twenty years in a personal prison made by Zues himself. When he finally got out, it was his chance to have the life he always deserved. Baekhyun always admired Adrian for having no reservations about Zues and quite frankly, Chanyeol himself considered their past. But there he’d been, just in the nick time to save the day. 

Adrian was the hope released from Pandora’s jar.

Baekhyun immediately thought of  Athena and wondered if she had known that one of her sons would perish at the act of opening Pandora’s jar. And if she had known, was it cruel of her? Or had she known from the fates long ago and realized that her son would become a hero from this deed. Either way, there were many things that he wondered and understood that Athena would not answer. 

“He was too good for this world,” Alec came from behind them, offering his hand to lift Baekhyun and Kyungsoo from their knees. When they both stood up, they were shocked to see almost all the campers encircled around them. From the distance even Harmonia looked bewildered. 

After all, Adrian had been wearing Chanyeol’s armor. This was a surprise indeed. 

And that meant..Mina’s vision had been true. Almost.

After a minute, a few Athena kids gathered around and gently placed the lost soul on a wooden stretcher, their expressions pained.

“One man down, we still have a war to fight,” Sebastian spoke then.

The atmosphere became dense. Baekhyun wanted to punch the demigod straight in the jaw. 

“Calm down,” Alec warned him.

“What? Are you on their side now? Is this how it’s going to be. Where is that Chanyeol guy that speaks so highly of pulverizing us? Are we forgetting about him? His mission to kill us all?” He exclaimed.

Some demigods nodded in agreement. Including the rogue ones. Harmonia looked confused as she watched Baekhyun, Kyungsoo, Kai and Mina all stand next to Alec. Her face was telling Baekhyun she’d figured out they’d never been on their side to begin with.

“Chanyeol is not here…then we will not proceed-”

“Actually…”

Everyone turned to the sound of Harmonia who was pointing towards their large ship. From the distance two figures walked-almost limping. One was Junmnyeon holding an injured Chanyeol with one arm. While the son of Zues held nothing but a long pole with a white flag.

“What?!” Sebastian squinted in disbelief, “It can’t be-”

“A truce!” Alec told the campers.

The rogue demigods looked between each other. They knew not to disobey their general. 

--------------------------------------------------------

Authors note: Wohoo!! One more chapter to go. Sorry guys I had all these chapters written before hand and I totally forgot to update this fic. Actually good news I'm still writing fics but now they're on AO3 (Archive of Our Own) . So I have the exact same username and I've written 2 stories up til now. Nothing as long as this series though. I'm planning on completeting this series and eventually migrating it over to AO3. I just like the formatting better, and it has an easy user-inteface. Tell me what you guys think? Though if I do shift it over to Ao3 I'm going to do a huge mass edit and fix up some stuff that I think needs work. Other than that guys! Enjoy the second last chapter. I've linked my Ao3 account below. 

https://archiveofourown.org/users/Breakfastfic