safe || leo valdez x oc

sixty-eight: literally everybody is confused as fuck and dwarfs don't help

ARUNA

~•♡•~

after another sleepless night, aruna was forced to join everyone at the mess hall.

she'd managed to sneak in a shower beforehand, so hopefully she didn't smell horrible. she'd opted for a plain black shirt and a pair of leo's beige cargo pants, which fit loosely around her legs. her hair was a wet mess, her face still bruised. her cheekbones were sunken in and her skin made her seem like a cancer patient- almost translucent. she looked at the silver cloak in the corner, her face souring.

she left the room, and joined everyone in the mess hall.

she ignored the sight of camp half-blood on the enchanted walls. it was midnight there. originally, leo had enchanted the walls to give them some sort of sense of home, but it only made aruna upset. she'd never considered camp her home, but she'd rather be there than here.

aruna sank into her chair as she realized yesterday had been independence day. she tried not to imagine everyone at camp celebrating- hot dogs roasting, random contests about pie or archery or who can grow the tallest tree in thirty seconds, fireworks blowing up over the lake.

then she realized leo's birthday was only two days away. he'd be sixteen years old on the seventh.

she almost wanted to smile at that. leo was only going to be sixteen years old. he could only then qualify for a driver's license, yet he, was here, flying a greek war trireme across the mediterranean.

leo looked away from the wall, and his eyes landed on his eggs and bacon. with a sad sigh, he pushed the plate over to aruna. she frowned at him, but his glare was sharp enough to cut bedrock. aruna looked away and forced herself to eat the food.

"so," jason began. "now that we're here..."

aruna forced herself to ignore jason taking the 'big seat', as everyone had called it. originally, it belonged to annabeth. now that she was gone, and the second-in-command via relationship, percy jackson, was gone, jason was left being the leader of the quest.

it wasn't that he hadn't been a good leader. jason was a praetor of the legion. but aruna could see the weariness in his gaze, the way his eyes were hollowed in, the way his hair was uncharacteristically messy.

aruna felt leo's eyes burning into her. she tried not to look at him as she sat up straighter, and made it obvious she was eating her food. finally, she stole a glance at him, almost trying to ask him why he had been staring so hard.

leo looked away, his cheeks and ears bright red.

aruna cleared her throat softly as she nibbled on a piece of bacon. the only missing demigod was piper, who was helping coach hedge at the helm.

aruna wished piper was here. she wanted to be charmspoken into feeling alright.

she felt leo's eyes on her again and she managed to look at him. his eyes widened as he looked from her lower half to her eyes, then away once more. aruna looked down, and suddenly remembered she'd been wearing a stolen pair of his pants.

she felt her cheeks flush as she finally zoned back in.

"-the house of hades." jason was saying. "nico?"