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queenpanlda · 4 years

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I had somewhat infrequent contact with the church youth group as a high schooler–I wasn’t a regular attendee, but enough of my friends were that I usually had the lowdown on what was happening. I have a personal policy that I don’t turn down invitations to participate in things unless I have an actual conflict (which is, let me tell you, an interesting, rewarding, and occasionally dangerous way to live your life) so when one of my friends said, “Hey, Hell, the youth group is doing a volunteer project and we need people. You in?” I said sure.

She told me to dress for messy outdoor work, and we’d drive there together on Saturday morning. No other details were provided.

So Saturday morning came, and I found myself standing in jeans, steeltoe boots and a tank top in front of a very, very run-down house with about a dozen other teenagers and a couple adults. The adults had that slightly manic look common to youth group leaders, and matching church t-shirts.

They also had half a dozen sledgehammers.

I had a fantastic feeling about how this day was going to go.

The house, they explained, was condemned. It needed to be demolished.

There were words after that about the who and the what and the why (and, presumably, about why they had decided to recruit a bunch of teenagers to do this In The Name Of Jesus) but I was vibrating at a speed that rendered audio waves impossible to decipher and didn’t catch any of it. Something-something-something-jesus, something-something-something-hit things with sledgehammers, don’t hit the marked support beams, Something-something-something-HELL YOU GET TO WRECK THIS HOUSE was basically all that got through.

They said something that my brain interpreted as “GO!”

I had a sledgehammer in my hand and was swinging through the front door faster than a chipmunk on cocaine. Which was wholly unnecessary; the front door was unlocked. I just wanted to do it.

I plowed a straight line through that house from front door through the back wall just because I could, then doubled back to go for some of the fun tile spots. Around me, a dozen sweaty teenagers were going absolutely feral. The ones with sledgehammers were swinging wildly at anything they could reach, and the ones without were kicking holes in the drywall for no reason and prying apart any surface they could get a grip on.

The adults had cleared out about five minutes in; we were left with our sledgehammers and no inhibitions.

These wholesome christian teens had spent most of their lives being proper and helpful, and now, for what may have been the first time, they were being told to be as destructive as they were capable of being, and it immediately went to their heads. We were a swarm of holy termites. We were sledgehammer-bearing tornadoes. We punched holes in that house until there wasn’t any house left to punch holes in.

Did we take out some of the marked support beams on accident? Absolutely. Was this whole plan deeply, deeply unwise? Sure! But we were having a great time!

The teens with sledgehammers mostly got tired and traded off sooner or later, and a couple of us decided that now was the time to solve some universal mysteries for ourselves, like: can I run straight through a wall if I get a far enough running start? Can I kick a door down like in a movie? If we work together, can we throw John right through that drywall?

The answers to these questions was a shining, reverberating YES.

(John was fine, probably.)

By the time we felt that our work was done, the house was just a few upright studs with a roof on top, sitting in a lake of debris. We straggled out on to the front lawn, dragging our sledgehammers, and watched as the adults hooked chains to the remaining beams. The chains were hooked to the back hitch of someone’s Compensator pickup truck, which was being used for its actual function for probably the first time ever. We watched as the truck pulled away from the curb, the chains going tight–

–and with a sound like breaking toothpicks, the beams broke, and the house pancaked in on itself. We cheered like it was the Second Coming.

I don’t know why they had us do this. I don’t even know whose house it was. I just know that there are few joys purer than the joy of wrecking something bigger than you with nothing but the strength of your own arms, and few euphorias more glorious than the feeling of putting a sledgehammer through a front door for no reason at all.

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queenpanlda · 4 years

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okay, so:

Rachel is literally one of the richest people in the country…all she had to do was say her full name and that chauffeur in botl immediately cancelled on his client to drive her and her friends around. When you add her wealth and status to the fact that she’s very outspoken about her family’s entire business and organizes and promotes multiple protests and does performance art…like. she’s popular online. no doubt.

Piper’s dad is supposed to be like, the hottest guy in Hollywood, and even though those girls from the wilderness school didn’t recognize her, he doesn’t really strike me as the type of celebrity parent to shield her from the media or events- he wants her to enjoy and take advantage of the privilege she has. I’m sure he’s got her plastered all over his social media and takes her as his date to every red carpet premiere. When you take into account she’s a Troubled Youth™, I’m sure gossip mags and anyone who likes celebrity kids is obsessed with her.

Annabeth, since Magnus is ‘’’’dead’’’’, is legally the sole heir to her family’s entire fortune, and technically owns the building that Blitz and Hearth are running that wonderful homeless youth shelter out of. I’m sure that will get her some media coverage.

And then we’ve got…Percy, the kid everyone remembers blew up the St. Louis Arch and I’m SURE there are still debates about whether he was really a hostage or not years later. Frank, who’s grandmother was a wealthy business woman, who hasn’t been seen since his family’s estate mysteriously exploded. Thalia and Jason, who are literally the missing children of a disgraced Hollywood starlet. Don’t you think this could…get messy?

Like…Percy popping up on Rachel and Annabeth’s instagrams, and people who recognize him are just like ‘hey what the fuck’, and internet sleuths who have been obsessed with that case look further into it, and realize Annabeth was also involved in the mysterious kidnapping/terrorist streak, then looking further into her and realizing…apart from her and her nuclear family, everyone she’s related to has died under very mysterious circumstances? Magnus was pulled out of a river with a hole burned into his abdomen. Randolph’s wife and children drowned at sea, Randolph was thrown down a cavern or something, Magnus’ mother was mauled by wolves in her apartment in the middle of Boston…like hello? Then they realize there’s no record of Annabeth like, existing, between the ages of 7 and 12, and…does this bitch even have a birth certificate? Her father’s a notable professor and author, but there’s no mention of her mother anywhere, not even a single picture, and when pressed his life long friends said he just showed up with a baby one day, without even having ever mentioned he was seeing a woman…so this baby just? appeared? one day, with no warning, and now she’s an heiress who owns a homeless shelter in a city she doesn’t live in? what the fuck? The internet sleuths started out trying to crack the mystery of the Arch Bombing and somehow opened up a whole other can of worms.

Oh, right- the bomber! How does Percy Jackson know Rachel Elizabeth Dare?! The conspiracy theorists are worried about that- maybe it wasn’t a kidnapping, maybe the kid really was on a crime spree, and now maybe Rachel is looking to take her protests up to a new level and is looking at this criminal mastermind for help. Some weirdo who knows how to use a facial recognition program and has too much time on his hands identifies them both as being present at the Hoover Dam Riots from a few years ago- the riot that lead to the destruction of those angel statues! The sleuths are then able to pull up an article tying both of them to an explosion at their high school- but with Rachel’s father’s wealth and Percy’s stepfather being a respected teacher there, it’s no wonder charges were dropped! They then find some other weird, buried reports- Rachel stealing a helicopter and flying it into Manhattan? Rachel appearing to have deranged, mysterious ‘episodes’ in the middle of class? Wait, what the fuck- Percy’s school principal reported him as a missing person, and his mother and stepfather were uncooperative with the police investigation? Then Percy showed up 8 months later and claimed his aunt kidnapped him, but wouldn’t give the police any information past that?

So the sleuths start digging into those 8 months- there’s security camera footage showing Percy, looking haggard and homeless, stealing a cop car? around the area of that huge explosion in Rome? spotted all around Greece in the days before the bombing at the Parthenon? What the fuck?

Then, holy shit- they find footage of him and missing teen Frank Zhang getting onto a private plane less than 20 minutes after the Zhang estate was blown up?? These conspiracy theorists aren’t even barely ready for this rabbit hole. The Zhang kid isn’t very active on social media, but combing through Percy Jackson’s pages they’re able to find a few images of him. Recent, post-estate bombing ones. Most of them appear to be goofy selfies with Percy and an unidentified girl that was also spotted on the security footage with them, but there’s one group shot that catches everyone’s eyes- because apart from featuring the weird Chase girl, what the fuck is that Tristan McLean’s daughter????

So they start combing through Piper’s pages- she’s more active than the Zhang kid, but apart from posting her mugshots with goofy captions, going on rants about meat-eaters, and posting videos of her dad being weird, she doesn’t have a lot of information. Except…one internet sleuth that joined this internet search party swears she recognizes a boy that pops up in a lot of pics on her instagram. Some more digging and they got it- it’s Leo Valdez, the kid who was accused of killing his mother! He’s got some cousins that have been trying to clear his name for years now, but they haven’t been able to find him because he keeps running from foster homes, they have a whole page dedicated to people trying to track him down! They contact the Valdez family members, and they’re elated to find out he’s alive and safe- but then it becomes a question of how does he know Piper McLean and what was he doing with her, Percy Jackson, Annabeth Chase, and Frank Zhang in Greece around the time of the Parthenon bombing???

They start looking into the other two teenagers pictured with the group in Greece- they can’t find anything on the young girl, other than the Jackson kid referring to her as ‘Hazel’ in some of his posts, but the other boy…

He’s not very active online- just some aesthetic coffee shop pics, a few blurry selfies, and designs for what appears to be an architecture project at his school. But his username is ‘*disgraced*’, he’s called ‘Jay’ and ‘Jason’ in posts by his friends, he’s got blond hair, striking blue eyes, and a very specific scar on his lip…

THE TRUE CRIME COMMUNITY IS FLIPPING THEIR FUCKING SHIT. DID THEY JUST FIND BERYL GRACE’S MISSING SON AFTER 15 FUCKING YEARS?!?!?!

Sleuths completely drop the bomb plot at this fucking point, and put all their energy in finding out if this is The Jason Grace, and- they literally can’t find a record of this person before he suddenly started appearing on Piper McLean’s and Leo Valdez’ media profiles. It looks like all his social accounts were started in August of the year he would’ve turned sixteen. But he’s the right age, he looks close to the computer generated age-up pictures made for the case, and- holy shit someone found a picture on Percy Jackson’s instagram of Jason and a girl called Thalia!

People are losing their minds- this girl looks a lot younger than the 20-something Thalia should be, but Beryl Grace was known for her innocent baby-faced look, so that can explain the difference between her and the aged-up picture. Same striking blue eyes as the boy next to her, same freckle pattern splashed across her nose, same raven hair and sharp smile that made her one of Hollywood’s biggest beauties before she could even talk properly.

She doesn’t seem to have any social media herself, but pops up in quite a few of Jackson’s and the Chase girl’s pictures. Once Beryl Grace’s old friends, who have been searching for her children for years, see the picture of the smiling siblings together, it’s nothing but tears. They’re insistent that these are absolutely the Grace siblings, and are begging the police in charge of their case to track them down. They want to know they’re safe! And the rest of the world wants answers! Where have they been for all these years!

And how are they connected to what appears to be an ongoing bombing/murder/money grabbing plot????

what is going on here?!?!?!

All this information gets dragged up in less than a month. People are going full Pepe Silvia level crazy trying to piece everything together. Netflix has already announced a conspiracy documentary about the hunt for the truth about this band of kids and what their end goal is.

Chiron’s just sitting at Camp Halfblood watching all this shit go down like:

Annabeth’s little brothers Bobby and Matthew are going Full Feral Gen Z online to fan the flames of conspiracy, “oh yeah the first time we met Percy Jackson and Thalia Grace they stole our dad’s car and drove it off a mountain”, “one time Annie stabbed a man in front of us”, they post a tik tok of what appears to be Annabeth and Percy drenched in blood and dust cleaning off weapons??? They set an ABBA song over it??? Everyone’s losing their minds but then one day on a live stream people start asking if they know Why their sister and her friends are like this and they just dead pan, ‘oh, they’re all demigods. the ancient gods are all real and it just gets messy for their kids sometimes, Annie’s mom is Athena-” and everyone is like ah. they’re just assholes feeding us false information. (they still post tik toks like ‘put a finger down if one time your sister took you out for ice cream but then this weird man who would later hold the titan kronos in his body showed up and begged her to run away with him so he could avoid the kronos thing even though she was like 15 and he was an adult and then she pulled out a knife and told him she should slit his throat after all he’s put her through but then he called her out on her bluff but still accepted the rejection and left and then she offered to get you a second helping of ice cream if you didn’t tell your parents about that whole thing and then later the ice cream parlor was attacked by a snake woman’ lmao)

Anyway, desktop detectives keep pressuring the police and the fbi and whoever the fuck to look into this whole thing deeper and make some arrests, but they can’t, because while everything that’s been surfaced is suspicious, it’s all circumstantial. The only ones that actually have arrest records are Piper and Leo( and Leo’s was without evidence, as his cousins are still fighting to get the case reopened!), all charges on Percy and Rachel have already been dropped or overturned, there’s absolutely nothing physically connecting Annabeth and her father to their family’s deaths, Frank was never actually a suspect in his family’s fire and while the footage with Percy was suspicious it wasn’t illegal, and they still haven’t been able to physically produce the Grace Siblings or even get a phone number for either of them, so like….all that plus the occasional intervention of the Mist, even though it absolutely looks like this is a whole criminal master plot…they can’t prove it! Just taking a group picture on a boat in Greece isn’t enough to legally claim they bombed the Parthenon!

This all comes to a head when the Netflix docuseries premieres, full of the online theorists who pieced this whole puzzle together but where unable to find the last piece that would connect the whole plot and make it make sense….

Percy Jackson films a video of him and all his friends who are fingered in the docuseries watching and reacting to it. They think it’s completely hilarious. He posts the video to his youtube channel (which Sally later Murders him for) and it’s the top trending video for like…half a fucking year.

like…the drama. the mess. the conspiracy. I want it.

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queenpanlda · 4 years

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I think we all need to understand that it was not Rick Riordan’s intention to portray these characters in a stereotypical manner. As educated as he tried to be, it wasn’t enough to portray these characters as good as they could’ve been, but it doesn’t make him racist. As a kid, i could see how Leo’s personality and culture didn’t specifically apply to me, a Mexican girl, but I respected his efforts to give a Latino character a good story. Of course, he understands now that having someone of that race check his work to see if anything was offensive or stereotypical would’ve been ideal, but he didn’t and that was his mistake.

The thing is, I want you all to remember what it was like a decade ago when it came to inclusion of races and diversity. Do i think it would’ve been better if he had done it better? Yes. But you have to understand that Latino characters in general were scarce, just like OP said. In this whole wave of wanting to cancel anyone who has “racist” views is superficial enough that an indication of it is treated as evidence. JK Rowling has proven to still be transphobic, and the hate she has gotten is based on solid, recent proof. Rick’s intentions, unlike JK Rowling’s, are ignorant (but towards the positive spectrum of the word). Know that he regrets his mistakes and acknowledges them as wrong and naive.

A queer Mexican girl’s take on Rick Riordan *if you don’t want to read the entire thing, the important bits are in bold*

I’m not in the habit of engaging with with disrespectful people. If you want to yell/name-call/whatever, do so to your heart’s content. I won’t reply. Otherwise, I’d really love to have a discussion with you!

Edit: the point of this post is not to speak over Muslims/Native Americans, only to point out some things I think we all tend to forget.

I try not to deviate from the main focus of my blog too much, because I want this to be a space for sharing a love of learning, books, etc.

However, there are times when I feel it is necessary to speak up, and this is one of those times, because Rick and his books were, and still are, one of the most important parts of my life. So.

First of all, pjo and hoo have had an enormous impact in my life, in two ways. One was Nico Di Angelo. His coming out scene was the first thing that sat my 10-year-old self down and told me that it was okay to be gay, that it wasn’t abnormal, and perhaps most all, that it was also okay to wrestle with it.

The second was Leo Valdez. The amount of times I had seen a Mexican character portrayed in media, let alone children’s media, were very little. I was young when I read the books, so a lot of the things that people are pointing out right now flew over my head. I was too busy being happy finally seeing myself and my culture in my favorite book series. This brings me to my main point:

The representation Rick gave us was not perfect, but it was still really ahead of its time, and it was still well-intentioned. I don’t even think it was bad! Sure, there are many opportunities for improvement, but the characters are still well-rounded and developed. Keep in mind: this is a straight cis white man, living in a society that, at least when pjo and hoo were written, did not encourage that demographic to venture outside their comfort zone and care for minorities (in fact, you could argue it even discouraged it). He was one of the first white cis straight male authors to have that kind of inclusion in their books. The care that he has for his audience is palpable in the stories, starting with the fact that he wrote for his son w/ ADHD. He has always listened to and engaged with readers, on a level that not many authors do. He is not perfect, but he tries and he cares, which at the end of the day, is what being human is all about. I think people tend to forget this-that we’re all human. The world, people, is much more complex than good and evil. We are all in such a rush to spot other people’s mistakes to signal our own virtue that we are holding people-and ourselves-to impossible standards. Whenever an author writes outside of their own voice, there will undoubtedly be flaws. It will never be perfect (which is why Rick actively encourages us to read own-voices authors!!!!!). By pointing fingers and acting “woker than thou” all the goddamn time, all we’re doing is discouraging authors from having diversity in their books by alienating them! Anyone is going to get exhausted and defensive when people are insulting and yelling at them about how what they do is WRONG and how they’re RACIST and whatnot. Rick is human, Rick cares, and Rick wants to learn and be better-so let’s help him do that, let’s cultivate a culture of compassion and learning. He is not a racist. His mistakes don’t invalidate all the good his work has done.

Finally, on a broader point: if we’re constantly attacking and invalidating anyone who makes mistakes, there will be no one left, including yourself. Point that finger at yourself before pointing it at anyone else.

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queenpanlda · 4 years

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Percy Jackson probably has a tiktok account where he posts extremely weird POVs that are about his life and super specific put a finger down tiktoks. The @ is probably like f_theolympians or ariel_is_my_niece. Something weird like that. Everyone thinks he’s just really creative and he tells them that everything actually happens but no one believes him. His responses to comments are also the best

Comment: wasn’t this kid a suspected terrorist that blew up the gateway arch

Percy: i was 12, karen

Comment: i’m convinced percy thinks the greek gods are real

Percy: convinced? bitch i know they exist because they keep ruining my life :)

Comment: if a 14 year old was actually capable of blowing up mt. saint helens, i would die

Percy: the enterance to the underworld is at doa records in california. tell charon i was the cause of your death

Some of his tiktoks include

POV: your ares the god of war after i beat you at a fight when i was 12 years old

POV: your my dad about to smite me because i stood on your throne on olympus

POV: your the fish watching me and my girlfriend kiss underwater

POV: your my emo cousin taking me to bathe in the river styx so i can fight my old camp counselor that is the host of kronos

POV: your my best friend now girlfriend burning my funeral shroud because I was missing for 2 weeks and presumed dead after I crash my own funeral

Put a finger down if you were turned into a hamster when you were 13 and now at 17 you still crave lettuce from the experience

Put a finger down if you were prophesied to die at 16 but no one told you until days before your 16th birthday

Put a finger down if you ever fell into Tartarus with your girlfriend and while you were down there choked the goddess of misery with her own poison and almost died because you killed dozens of arai that inflicted all the curses people wished upon you

Put a finger down if you were ever kidnapped by Hera and put to sleep for a few months and when you woke up you had amnesia and were then trained by the wolf goddess Lupa who sent you off to a camp without telling you the location so you lived on the streets and stole a police cruiser while being chased by 2 gorgons and slid down a hill into oncoming traffic on a serving tray

Put a finger down if your 6th grade Latin teacher and your best friend lied to you for half of the school year trying to convince you that your pre-algebra teacher never existed despite the fact that your Latin teacher gave you a pen that transformed into a sword to kill your pre-algebra teacher after she turned into a Fury hellbent on killing you making you think that you were going insane only to find out that summer that your the son of Poseidon, your Latin teacher is Chiron the centaur, and your best friend is a satyr

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