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ix. the power of his touch
at this moment, anything that could go wrong did. okay, maybe that was an exaggeration, but at this point alarms blared in gale's mind screaming, "get the hell out of there!" and he seriously was not having a good time.
the cause of this was hazel fainting out of nowhere, and really, he didn't blame hazel. he remembered fainting while terminus was asking for id (story for another time), and arcana had fainted too many times to count (also for another time), so fainting out of nowhere wasn't a foreign concept to him.
percy had willed the seas to push the boat onto land, and they had moved hazel to solid ground. they were on a cliff that was overlooking the beach, and above them was the night sky blazed with stars, and if he weren't in literal crisis mode right now he would've admired them from afar. from next him was arcana, swearing in latin as she frantically searched her arsenal of magic for a spell or charm that could wake up hazel. to the right of him was percy, who looked at hazel curiously, panic soon setting on his face. and then there was frank. who was probably having an external crisis while shaking hazel like he was holding on for dear life.
this was fun.
"hazel!" frank exclaimed, his voice cracking as he shook hazel's arms. "come on, please! wake up!"
as if on cue hazel's eyes opened with a look of panic as she stared at the sky above them. gale mumbled, "thank the gods," before noticing she was sweating slightly. she sat up groggily before looking at the rest of them with a look of confusion.
"where are we?" she asked.
frank exhaled. "thank the gods you're awake! we're in mendocino, about a hundred and fifty miles north of the golden gate."
"a hundred and fifty miles?" hazel groaned. "i've been out for that long?"
arcana knelt next to her, looking concerned as she placed a hand on hazel's forehead. "yeah, you've been out for that long. are you sure you're okay? you're sweating bullets."
hazel hesitantly nodded, and percy spoke up, the wind blowing through his raven black hair, and his sea green eyes hard to read. "we couldn't wake you. finally we decided to bring you ashore. we thought maybe the seasickness-"
"it wasn't seasickness," hazel interrupted, taking a deep breath and staring at the horizon behind them. "i - i haven't been honest with you. what happened was a blackout. i have them once in a while."
arcana's concern only grew further. "a blackout? i think i've heard of those, somewhere. is it medical, or-"
"why haven't i noticed it before?" frank asked.
"i try to hide it," hazel admitted. "i've been lucky so far, but it's getting worse. it's not medical... not really. nico says it's a side effect from my past, from where he found me."
