Chapter Text
Bianca wakes up to a sun god in her face.
It's hot and she's half buried in sand. She doesn't have a mirror but she knows her hair's a mess and the rest of her probably looks worse.
Apollo doesn't seem at all bothered, the moment she'd opened her eyes he'd been sporting an irritatingly wide grin.
(Irritating because she had a headache and her body felt so heavy-)
"You're just not used to being alive. A shock to the system, I'd suppose after being dead for so long." Apollo explains (dear gods even his voice is happy and chipper) as she maneuvers herself up into a sitting position.
From this angle she can see that the god is decked out in dark rags and that they are surrounded by piles of junk.
Wait-she's awfully familiar with these piles of junk. This day, this place had been seared into her memory.
After all one doesn't just simply forget the place they die.
"Wha-" she manages to choke out before bursting into coughs. Her throat is raw and sore. Now that she's thinking about it she's also terribly thirsty.
Apollo hands her a glass of sparkling amber liquid, (she swore he wasn't holding anything a second ago) which she grasps and starts drinking greedily.
She's surprised briefly by the taste (it tastes like the brownies she and Nico would make in the long nights at the Lotus Hotel when they would curl up together in the bed and watch movies until they fell asleep) for it's the first time she's ever had nectar.
"I wouldn't try to talk much just yet. To answer your question, you are not going crazy! This is where you died. Actually to be even more accurate this is also the when you died." Apollo explains with a cherry wave of his hands as if to encompass both the junkyard and the day itself.
Bianca places the empty glass down on the sand next to her, and when she opens her mouth to reiterate what she was going to say earlier she feels a million times better, "What?"
"I caught you," Apollo says, "When you jumped through the door and then I brought you where you needed to go. I see all you know."
Bianca remembers the feeling of a hand in hers pulling her through the light and stares at Apollo. "Oh...well thank you, but why exactly did you...?"
"Help you? Well, you're changing things. Changing prophecy and time and such. That is sort of my area."
"So you brought me back to the day I die." Bianca half questions, half states.
"Yes, but as of now you never die here. You just get lost for awhile." Apollo grins even wider.
(Bianca doesn't see what the Hades there is to be so happy about so she ignores it.)
"Lost?"
"Yep. I'm afraid the rest of your little questing party have already looked for you and moved on. You'll have to hurry so you can catch up with them." Bianca felt confused and a little out of it, everything was happening so fast. "And what do I do when I find them?"
"Wellll...that is where things start to get a bit tricky you see." Apollo says, rubbing the back of his neck sheepishly, his blue eyes suddenly serious. "You can't tell anyone the truth. It's forbidden."
"Why?"
"Let's just say it would completely destroy everything and Zeus would kill you for changing the course of time."
"Oh," Bianca replies faintly, "I'll keep quiet then, but how do I explain how I survived?"
"Easy. The power of my sister's blessing saved you but to do that it gave away your immortality." Apollo claps his hands and nods once with a pleased smile.
Bianca raises an unimpressed brow, "That is the stupidest explanation I've ever heard."
Apollo deflates with a pout, "Well, it's all I've got so that's what you're going to say unless you can think of something better."
Truthfully, Bianca couldn't but she wasn't going to admit that. Instead she changed the subject, "Thank you, Lord Apollo for everything-" She was cut off by his frantic shushing gestures and nervous glances at the sky, "I'm in disguise, call me Fred." Bianca stares at him before saying in a disbelieving deadpan, "Alright then, Fred. Thank you."
"No problem, sweetcheecks." He says with wink as he stands. "You ever get into any big trouble or need explanations that sound good just shoot a prayer my way." Bianca closes her eyes as Apollo begins to shine brightly and she opened them as it disappeared to find the god gone. In his place was a sturdy looking plain black backpack and she was alone.
With a sigh of determination Bianca hauls herself to her feet, slips the bag over her shoulders and started out of the junkyard. She had friends to find and a quest to finish. She'll worry about everything else later.