#and i know the revolutionaries are right but i also know they'll kill me and im trying to make peace with my death | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

pjo-rewrite · 10 months

Text

The Lightning Thief

Chapter One

I ACCIDENTALLY VAPORIZE MY PRE-ALGEBRA TEACHER

If you're reading this because you think you might be one, my advice is: close this book right now. Believe whatever lie your mom or dad told you about your birth, and try to lead a normal life.

Being a half-blood is dangerous. It's scary. Most of the time, it gets you killed in painful, nasty ways.

If you're a normal kid, reading this because you think it's fiction, great. Read on. I envy you for being able to believe that none of this ever happened.

But if you recognize yourself in these pages-if you feel something stirring inside-stop reading immediately. You might be one of us. And once you know that, it's only a matter of time before they sense it too, and they'll come for you.

Don't say I didn't warn you. My name is Percy Jackson.

I'm twelve years old. Until a few months ago, I was a boarding student at Yancy Academy with my sister, a private school for troubled kids in upstate New York.

Are we a troubled kids? Yeah. You could say that.

I could start at any point in our short miserable lifes to prove it, but things really started going bad last May, when our sixth-grade class took a field trip to Manhattan- twenty-nine mental-case kids and two teachers on a yellow school bus, heading to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to look at ancient Greek and Roman stuff.

I know it sounds like torture. Most Yancy field trips were.

But Mr. Brunner, our Latin teacher, was leading this trip, so I had hopes.

Mr. Brunner was this middle-aged guy in a motorized wheelchair. He had thinning hair and a scruffy beard and a frayed tweed jacket, which always smelled like coffee. You wouldn't think he'd be cool, but he told stories and jokes and let us play games in class. He also had this awesome collection of Roman armor and weapons, so he was the only teacher whose class didn't put me to sleep.

I hoped the trip would be okay. At least, I hoped that for once Atalanta or I wouldn't get in trouble. Boy, was I wrong.

See, bad things happen to me on field trips. Like at my fifth-grade school, when we went to the Saratoga battlefield, I had this accident with a Revolutionary War cannon. I wasn't aiming for the school bus, but of course I got expelled anyway. And before that, at my fourth-grade school, when we took a behind- the-scenes tour of the Marine World shark pool, I sort of hit the wrong lever on the catwalk and our class took an unplanned swim. And the time before that... Well, you get the idea.

This trip, I was determined to be good and keep Atalanta under check.

Atalanta Jackson, my younger sister, has horrible anger issues. Just look at her wrong, and she’ll punch you; straight up. She’s technically supposed to be in fifth grade but Yancy Academy had realised that she actually listens to me; Sometimes. Which was better than none I guess, so they put her in most of the same classes as me. She has dark brown hair that she normally had in two nicely plaited braids, murky green eyes— maybe teal-ish if you looked close enough. Anyways, I didn’t really want to be put in charge of her, which didn't help my mood.

All the way into the city, I put up with Nancy Bobofit, the freckly, redheaded kleptomaniac girl, hitting my best friend Grover in the back of the head with chunks of peanut butter-and-ketchup sandwich.

Grover was an easy target. He was scrawny. He cried when he got frustrated. He must've been held back several grades, because he was the only sixth grader with acne and the start of a wispy beard on his chin. On top of all that, he was crippled. He had a note excusing him from PE for the rest of his life because he had some kind of muscular disease in his legs. He walked funny, like every step hurt him, but don't let that fool you. You should've seen him run when it was enchilada day in the cafeteria.

Anyway, Nancy Bobofit was throwing wads of sandwich that stuck in his curly brown hair, and she knew I couldn't do anything back to her because I was already on probation. The headmaster had threatened me with death by in-school suspension if anything bad, embarrassing, or even mildly entertaining happened on this trip.

"I'm going to kill her," I mumbled.

Grover tried to calm me down. "It's okay. I like peanut butter."

He dodged another piece of Nancy's lunch. But it fell on my sister.

"That's it." Atalanta started to get up, but Grover pulled her back to her seat.

"You're both already on probation," he reminded us. "You know who'll get blamed if anything happens."

Looking back on it, I wish Atalanta had decked Nancy Bobofit right then and there. In-school suspension would've been nothing compared to the mess we were about to get ourselves into.

***

Mr. Brunner led the museum tour.

He rode up front in his wheelchair, guiding us through the big echoey galleries, past marble statues and glass cases full of really old black-and-orange pottery.

It blew my mind that this stuff had survived for two thousand, three thousand years.

He gathered us around a thirteen-foot-tall stone col-umn with a big sphinx on the top, and started telling us how it was a grave marker, a stele, for a girl about our age. He told us about the carvings on the sides. I was trying to listen to what he had to say, because it was kind of interesting, but everybody around me was talking, and every time I told them to shut up, the other teacher chaperone, Mrs. Dodds, would give me the evil eye.

Mrs. Dodds was this little math teacher from Georgia who always wore a black leather jacket, even though she was fifty years old. She looked mean enough to ride a Harley right into your locker. She had come to Yancy halfway through the year, when our last math teacher had a nervous breakdown.

From her first day, Mrs. Dodds loved Nancy Bobofit and figured I was devil spawn. She would point her crooked finger at me and say, "Now, honey," real sweet, and I knew I was going to get after-school detention for a month. It was a good thing Atalanta couldn't take that class.

One time, after she'd made me erase answers out of old math workbooks until midnight, I told Grover I didn't think Mrs. Dodds was human. He looked at me, real serious, and said, "You're absolutely right."

Mr. Brunner kept talking about Greek funeral art.

Finally, Nancy Bobofit snickered something about the naked guy on the stele, and I turned around and said, "Will you shut up?"

Atalanta nuged me. It had came out louder than I meant it to.

The whole group laughed. Mr. Brunner stopped his story.

"Mr. Jackson," he said, "did you have a comment?"

My face was totally red. I said, "No, sir."

Mr. Brunner pointed to one of the pictures on the stele. "Perhaps you'll tell us what this picture represents?"

I looked at the carving, and felt a flush of relief, because I actually recognized it. "That's Kronos eating his kids, right?"

"Yes," Mr. Brunner said, obviously not satisfied. "And he did this because ..." "Well..." I racked my brain to remember. "Kronos was the king god, and-" "God?" Mr. Brunner asked.

"Titan," Atalanta called out. "He didn't trust his kids, who were the gods. So Kronos ate them. But his wife hid baby Zeus, and gave Kronos a rock to eat instead. And later, when Zeus grew up, he tricked his dad, Kronos, into barfing up his brothers and sisters-"

"Eeew!" said one of the girls behind us.

"-and so there was this big fight between the gods and the Titans," Atalanta continued, "and the gods won."

Some snickers from the group. It would probably help you to know by now that Atalanta has a slight accent. French/New York combo accent to be more specific. So, I had to admit, she sounded funny when she talked.

Behind me, Nancy Bobofit mumbled to a friend, "Like we're going to use this in real life. Like it's going to say on our job applications, 'Please explain why Kronos ate his kids.'"

"And why, Mr. Jackson," Brunner said, "to paraphrase Miss Bobofit's excellent question, does this matter in real life?"

"Busted," Grover muttered.

"Shut up," Nancy hissed, her face even brighter red than her hair.

At least Nancy got packed, too. Mr. Brunner was the only one who ever caught her saying anything wrong. He had radar ears.

I thought about his question, looked to Atalanta for help but she was just looking at Mr. Brunner with a glare. I gave up and shrugged. "I don't know, sir."

"I see." Mr. Brunner looked disappointed. "Well, half credit, Jacksons. Zeus did indeed feed Kronos a mixture of mustard and wine, which made him disgorge his other five children, who, of course, being immortal gods, had been living and growing up completely undigested in the Titan's stomach. The gods defeated their father, sliced him to pieces with his own scythe, and scattered his remains in Tartarus, the darkest part of the Underworld. On that happy note, it's time for lunch. Mrs. Dodds, would you lead us back outside?"

The class drifted off, the girls holding their stomachs, the guys pushing each other around and acting like doo-fuses.

Grover and I were about to follow when Mr. Brunner said, "Mr. Jackson."

I knew that was coming.

I told Grover and Atalanta to keep going. Then I turned toward Mr. Brunner. "Sir?"

Mr. Brunner had this look that wouldn't let you go- intense brown eyes that could've been a thousand years old and had seen everything.

"You must learn the answer to my question," Mr. Brunner told me. "About the Titans?"

"About real life. And how your studies apply to it."

"Oh."

"What you learn from me," he said, "is vitally important. I expect you to treat it as such. I will accept only the best from you, Percy Jackson."

I wanted to get angry, this guy pushed me so hard.

I mean, sure, it was kind of cool on tournament days, when he dressed up in a suit of Roman armor and shouted: "What ho!'" and challenged us, sword-point against chalk, to run to the board and name every Greek and Roman person who had ever lived, and their mother, and what god they worshipped. But Mr. Brunner expected me to be as good as everybody else, despite the fact that I have dyslexia and attention deficit disorder and I had never made above a C- in my life. No-he didn't expect me to be as good; he expected me to be better. And I just couldn't learn all those names and facts, much less spell them correctly.

This was probably why Atalanta didn't like him, it was bad enough that she only started to understand how to speak English, fully, three years ago, but reading it was a whole different thing.

I mumbled something about trying harder, while Mr. Brunner took one long sad look at the stele, like he'd been at this girl's funeral.

He told me to go outside and eat my lunch.

***

The class gathered on the front steps of the museum, where we could watch the foot traffic along Fifth Avenue.

Overhead, a huge storm was brewing, with clouds blacker than I'd ever seen over the city. I figured maybe it was global warming or something, because the weather all across New York state had been weird since Christmas. We'd had massive snow storms, flooding, wildfires from lightning strikes. I wouldn't have been surprised if this was a hurricane blowing in.

Nobody else seemed to notice. Some of the guys were pelting pigeons with Lunchables crackers. Nancy Bobofit was trying to pickpocket something from a lady's purse, and, of course, Mrs. Dodds wasn't seeing a thing.

I saw Grover and Atalanta sitting on the edge of the fountain— away from the others. We thought that maybe if we did that, everybody wouldn't know we were from that school-the school for loser freaks who couldn't make it elsewhere— having a heated conversation; they never seemed to get along, well Atalanta that is. Didn't know what her problem was. I went and sat on the edge of the fountain in between them and they stopped their bickering.

"Detention?" Grover asked.

"Nah," I said. "Not from Brunner. I just wish he'd lay off me sometimes. I mean-I'm not a genius."

No one said anything for a while. Then, when I thought that Grover was going to give me some deep philosophical comment to make me feel better, he said, "Can I have your apple?"

I didn't have much of an appetite, so I let him take it.

I watched the stream of cabs going down Fifth Avenue, and thought about my mom's apartment, only a little ways uptown from where we sat. I hadn't seen her since Christmas. I wanted so bad to take Atalanta, jump in a taxi and head home. She'd hug us and be glad to see us, but she'd be disappointed, too. She'd send us right back to Yancy, remind me that we had to try harder, even if this was my sixth school in six years and I was probably going to be kicked out again. I wouldn't be able to stand that sad look she'd give me. I had to be a good example for Atalanta.

Why be a good example for Atalanta? Two reasons:

1) Atalanta had stumbled into my mom's work and brought her home with her that night. Atalanta had been six, knew no English, and dirty. Really dirty. So my mom took her in after translating French to English about how she had ran away form "A bad place." And 2) I’m her older brother.

I was about to unwrap my sandwich when Nancy Bobofit appeared in front of me with her ugly friends-I guess she'd gotten tired of stealing from the tourists-and dumped her half-eaten lunch in Grover's lap.

"Oops." She grinned at me with her crooked teeth. Her freckles were orange, as if somebody had spray- painted her face with liquid Cheetos.

I tried to stay cool. The school counselor had told me a million times, "Count to ten, get control of your temper." But I was so mad my mind went blank. A wave roared in my ears.

I don't remember touching her, but the next thing I knew, Nancy was sitting on her butt in the fountain, screaming, "Percy pushed me!" "Severes you right!" Atalanta yelled back at her.

Mrs. Dodds materialized next to us.

Some of the kids were whispering: "Did you see-" "-the water-" "-like it grabbed her-"

I didn't know what they were talking about. All I knew was that I was in trouble again.

As soon as Mrs. Dodds was sure poor little Nancy was okay, promising to get her a new shirt at the museum gift shop, etc., etc., Mrs. Dodds turned on me. There was a tri-umphant fire in her eyes, as if I'd done something she'd been waiting for all semester. "Now, honey-"

"I know," I grumbled. "A month erasing workbooks." That wasn't the right thing to say.

"Come with me," Mrs. Dodds said.

"Wait!" Atalanta and Grover yelled at the same time. "It was me. I pushed her." Atalanta finished.

I stared at her, stunned. I couldn't believe she was trying to cover for me. She almost never covered for me.

She glared at her so hard she trembled. "Fine, come along Jacksons." Ms. Dodds said.

"Wait-" Grover called out.

"It's okay, man," I told him.

"Honey," Mrs. Dodds barked at us. "Now."

Nancy Bobofit smirked.

Atalanta gave Nancy her deluxe 'I'll-kill-you-later' stare. Then we turned to face Mrs. Dodds, but she wasn't there. She was standing at the museum entrance, way at the top of the steps, gesturing impatiently at me to come on.

How'd she get there so fast?

I have moments like that a lot, when my brain falls asleep or something, and the next thing I know I've missed something, as if a puzzle piece fell out of the universe and left me staring at the blank place behind it. The school counselor told me this was part of the ADHD, my brain misinterpreting things. Atalanta had it too; supposedly.

I wasn't so sure.

We went after Mrs. Dodds.

Halfway up the steps, I glanced back at Grover. He was looking pale, cutting his eyes between us and Mr. Brunner, like he wanted Mr. Brunner to notice what was going on, but Mr. Brunner was absorbed in his novel.

I looked back up. Mrs. Dodds had disappeared again. She was now inside the building, at the end of the entrance hall.

Okay, I thought. She's going to make me buy a new shirt for Nancy at the gift shop. But apparently that wasn't the plan.

We followed her deeper into the museum. When we finally caught up to her, we were back in the Greek and Roman section.

Except for us, the gallery was empty.

Mrs. Dodds stood with her arms crossed in front of a big marble frieze of the Greek gods. She was making this weird noise in her throat, like growling.

Even without the noise, I would've been nervous. It's weird being alone with a teacher, especially Mrs. Dodds, even if Atalanta was right next to me. Something about the way she looked at the frieze, as if she wanted to pulverize it...

"You've been giving us problems, honey," she said.

I did the safe thing. I said, "Yes, ma'am."

She tugged on the cuffs of her leather jacket. "Did you really think you would get away with it?" The look in her eyes was beyond mad. It was evil.

She's a teacher, I thought nervously. It's not like she's going to hurt me.

I said, "I'll-I'll try harder, ma'am." Thunder shook the building.

"We are not fools, Percy and Atalanta, Jackson," Mrs. Dodds said. "It was only a matter of time before we found you out. Confess, and you will suffer less pain."

I didn't know what she was talking about. I looked to Atalanta. Her eyes were blown wide and she looked frozen in fear, her hand over her charm on her necklace. She seemed to be mumbling something that I couldn't understand.

All I could think of was that the teachers must've found the illegal stash of candy I'd been selling out of my dorm room. Or maybe they'd realized I got my essay on Tom Sawyer from the Internet without ever reading the book and now they were going to take away my grade. Or worse, they were going to make me read the book.

"Well?" she demanded. "Ma'am, I don't..."

"Your time is up," she hissed.

Then the weirdest thing happened. Her eyes began to glow like barbecue coals. Her fingers stretched, turning into talons. Her jacket melted into large, leathery wings. She wasn't human. She was a shriveled hag with bat wings and claws and a mouth full of yellow fangs, and she was about to slice me to ribbons.

Atalanta pulled on her necklace and then she had a sword?!

"Come on bird brain! He doesn't know about anything! Come at me!" Atalanta yelled at Ms. Dodds.

Then things got even stranger.

Mr. Brunner, who'd been out in front of the museum a minute before, wheeled his chair into the doorway of the gallery, holding a pen in his hand.

"What ho, Percy!" he shouted, and tossed the pen through the air. Mrs. Dodds lunged at me.

With a yelp, I dodged and felt talons slash the air next to my ear. I snatched the ballpoint pen out of the air, but when it hit my hand, it wasn't a pen anymore. It was a sword-Mr. Brunner's bronze sword, which he always used on tournament day.

Mrs. Dodds spun toward me with a murderous look in her eyes.

My knees were jelly. My hands were shaking so bad I almost dropped the sword.

She snarled, "Die, honey!"

And she flew straight at me.

Absolute terror ran through my body and I heard a cry from where Atalanta was. I did the only thing that came naturally: I swung the sword.

The metal blade hit her shoulder and passed clean through her body as if she were made of water. Hisss!

Mrs. Dodds was a sand castle in a power fan. She exploded into yellow powder, vaporized on the spot, leaving nothing but the smell of sulfur and a dying screech and a chill of evil in the air, as if those two glowing red eyes were still watching me.

I was alone.

Atalanta was no where to be seen. There was a ballpoint pen in my hand.

Mr. Brunner wasn't there. Nobody was there but me.

My hands were still trembling. My lunch must've been contaminated with magic mushrooms or some-thing.

Had I imagined the whole thing? I went back outside.

It had started to rain.

Grover and Atalanta were sitting by the fountain, a museum map tented over their heads. Nancy Bobofit was still standing there, soaked from her swim in the fountain, grumbling to her ugly friends. When she saw me, she said, "I hope Mrs. Kerr whipped your butt."

I said, "Who?"

"Our teacher. Duh!"

I blinked. We had no teacher named Mrs. Kerr. I asked Nancy what she was talking about. She just rolled her eyes and turned away.

I asked Atalanta why she’d left, and when she’d said “What are you talking about?” I instead turned to asking them where Mrs. Dodds was.

They said, "Who?"

But they paused first, and neither of them would look at me, so I thought they were messing with me.

"Not funny, guys," I told them. "This is serious."

Thunder boomed overhead.

I saw Mr. Brunner sitting under his red umbrella, reading his book, as if he'd never moved.

I went over to him.

He looked up, a little distracted. "Ah, that would be my pen. Please bring your own writing utensil in the future, Mr. Jackson."

I handed Mr. Brunner his pen. I hadn't even realized I was still holding it. "Sir," I said, "where's Mrs. Dodds?"

He stared at me blankly. "Who?"

"The other chaperone. Mrs. Dodds. The pre-algebra teacher."

He frowned and sat forward, looking mildly concerned. "Percy, there is no Mrs. Dodds on this trip. As far as I know, there has never been a Mrs. Dodds at Yancy Academy. Are you feeling all right?"

#percy jackson #percy jackon and the olympians #annabeth chase #grover underwood #Atalanta Jackson #pjo oc #pjo rewrite #sally jackson #Mr. D #chiron #chiron pjo #camp half blood

6 notes · View notes

jazzy---j · 1 year

Text

Daughter of Poseidon: The Lightning Thief

“even the gods have to bow to fate”

Chapter Summary: A field trip suddenly becomes dangerous and traumatic, unveiling an unsettling reality for Cassie Jackson. Leaving her and her brother scrabbling for answers.

Masterlist >>> Read on ao3 (1/23)

We Accidentally Vaporize Our Pre-Algebra Teacher

This is not really how I pictured my life going. I don't know what exactly I pictured but the life of a half-blood was not it. But I am who I am for a reason.

However despite how amazing my demigod, hero life sounds, if YOU are reading this because you think you might be one of us, my advice is: close this book right now. Believe whatever lie your mom or dad told you about your birth, and try to lead a normal life. It almost is not worth it.

Being a half-blood is dangerous. It's scary. Most of the time, it gets you killed in painful, nasty ways. Which can honestly be such a drag.

If you're a normal kid, reading this because you think this is fiction, great. Congratulations. Read on. I envy you for being able to believe that this is just a fun little bit of urban fantasy escapism.

But if you recognize yourself in these pages, if you feel something stirring inside-stop reading immediately. You might be one of us. And once you know that, it's only a matter of time before they sense it too, and they'll come for you. Don't ignore it. Try and get in touch with me, with any of us and we will find you. We never leave a demigod behind.

Don't say I didn't warn you.

My name is Cassandra Jackson. But everyone just calls me Cassie. It’s faster, easier and if you call me Cassandra... well you will literally be sleeping with the fishes.

I'm eleven years old. Until a few months ago, I was in the sixth grade with my older brother Percy. We went to Yancy Academy, a private school for troubled kids in upstate New York.

Are we troubled kids? Well duh. Wouldn't be much fun if we weren't.

I could start at any point in my short miserable life to prove it, but things really started going bad last May, when our sixth-grade class took a field trip to Manhattan- twenty-eight mental-case kids and two teachers on a yellow school bus, heading to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to look at ancient Greek and Roman stuff.

I know, it sounds like a chaotic disaster. Most Yancy field trips were.

But Mr. Brunner, our Latin teacher, was leading this trip, so it may not be so bad.

I hoped the trip would be okay for us. At least, I hoped that for once Percy and I wouldn't get in trouble. Boy, was I wrong.

See, bad things happen to us on field trips. Like at our fifth-grade school, when we went to the Saratoga battlefield, Percy had this accident with a Revolutionary War cannon. He wasn't aiming for the school bus on purpose. And I still swear I didn't mean to light the wick. At the time I didn't know the thing still even worked. Percy and I were just immersing ourselves in the history of Saratoga. But of course, we got expelled anyway.

And before that, at our fourth-grade school, when we took a behind-the-scenes tour of the Marine World shark pool, Percy sort of hit the wrong lever on the catwalk, and our class took an unplanned swim.

At our third-grade school, I let out all the animals at the petting zoo. They just looked so sad, and I know this is crazy but I heard the horses just begging me to let them out. So I did, and a teacher may or may not have taken a trip to the ER.

And the time before that... Well, you get the idea.

But this time Percy and I talked it over and we decided that we had to get it together. We were determined to be good. We were gonna keep each other in check, no mess ups, no screw ups.

All the way into the city, we put up with Nancy Bobofit, the freckly, redheaded kleptomaniac girl, (also my roommate, lucky me) hitting Percy's best friend Grover in the back of the head with chunks of peanut butter-and-ketchup sandwich.

Grover was an easy target. He was scrawny. He cried when he got frustrated. He must've been held back several grades because he was the only sixth grader with acne and the start of a wispy beard on his chin. On top of all that, he was crippled. He had a note excusing him from PE for the rest of his life because he had some kind of muscular disease in his legs. He walked funny, like every step hurt him, but don't let that fool you. You should've seen him run when it was enchilada day in the cafeteria. He also had the weirdest fashion sense with a rasta cap and baggy jeans. But he was one of the greatest friends Percy has ever had, besides me of course, and I was thankful for that.

Anyway, Nancy Bobofit was throwing wads of sandwich that stuck in his curly brown hair, and she knew we couldn't do anything back to her because Percy and I were already on probation. The headmaster had threatened us with death by in-school suspension if anything bad, embarrassing, or even mildly entertaining happened on this trip.

Which is such a shame because I had so many plans.

"I'm going to kill her," Percy mumbled.

I scoffed, picking the foam out of the hole of my seat, "Get in line bro."

Grover tried to calm him down. "It's okay. I like peanut butter."

He dodged another piece of Nancy's lunch.

"That's it." Percy started to get up, but Grover and I pulled him back into the seat.

"You're already on probation," Grover reminded him.

"And you know who'll get blamed if anything happens," I added.

I grabbed his hand, "Come on Percy we talked about this."

We locked eyes, and I took a second to analyze my brother's face. Even though we weren't actually twins we still looked really similar. Both of us had wild windswept jet black hair and vibrant sea-green eyes.

“Remember what mom said, ‘“Hold fast, Perseus.””

He sighed and closed his eyes, nodding in agreement.

Looking back on it, I wish I'd let Percy deck Nancy Bobofit right then and there. Heck, I wished I'd done it. An in-school suspension would've been nothing compared to the mess I was about to get myself into.

Mr. Brunner led the museum tour.

He rode up front in his wheelchair, guiding us through the big echoey galleries, past marble statues and glass cases full of really old black-and-orange pottery.

It blew my mind that this stuff had survived for two thousand, three thousand years. Probably even longer.

He gathered us around a thirteen-foot-tall stone column with a big sphinx on the top and started telling us how it was a grave marker, a stele, for a girl about our age. He told us about the carvings on the sides. I was trying to listen to what he had to say because it was kind of interesting, but everybody around me was talking, and every time Percy or I told them to shut up, the other teacher chaperone, Mrs. Dodds, would give us the evil eye.

Mrs. Dodds was this little math teacher from Georgia who always wore a black leather jacket, even though she was fifty years old. She looked mean enough to ride a Harley right into your locker. She had come to Yancy halfway through the year when our last math teacher had a nervous breakdown.

Which I, of course, had nothing to do with.

From her first day, Mrs. Dodds loved Nancy Bobofit and figured Percy and I were devil spawns. She's not entirely wrong but, that wasn't the point.

She would point her crooked finger at us and say, "Now, honey," real sweet, and I knew we were going to get after-school detention for a month.

One time, she'd made Percy erase answers out of old math workbooks and I had to scrap gum off the bottom of all the desks in her classroom. We were both up until pass midnight. One day Percy angrily told Grover he didn't think Mrs. Dodds was human. He looked at us, real serious, and said, "You're absolutely right."

So not ominous at all. Everything's all fine and dandy.

Mr. Brunner kept talking about Greek funeral art.

Finally, Nancy Bobofit snickered something about the naked guy on the stele. I turned around to say something but Percy beat me to it exclaiming, "Will you shut up?"

It totally came out louder than he meant it to.

My big brother ladies and gentlemen.

The whole group laughed. I turned and gave them a death stare and they quickly shut up. That's right no one was gonna make fun of my brother except me. Mr. Brunner stopped his story.

"Mr. Jackson," he said, "did you have a comment?"

I dared a glance at Percy and his face was totally red. He said, "No, sir."

Mr. Brunner pointed to one of the pictures on the stele. "Perhaps you'll tell us what this picture represents?"

I looked at the carving and felt a flush of relief because we just studied this in class. Percy should remember this. "That's Kronos eating his kids, right?" Percy exclaimed.

"Yes," Mr. Brunner said, obviously not satisfied. "And he did this because..."

"Well..." Percy started trying to remember. "Kronos was the king god, and-"

"God?" Mr. Brunner asked.

"Titan," I coughed into my hand.

"Titan," he corrected himself as grabbed my hand to give a gentle squeeze in thanks.

"And... he didn't trust his kids, who were the gods. So, um, Kronos ate them, right? But his wife hid baby Zeus, and gave Kronos a rock to eat instead. And later, when Zeus grew up, he tricked his dad, Kronos, into barfing up his brothers and sisters-"

"Eeew!" said one of the girls behind me, I turned and made a face at her. Percy gripped my hand tighter in warning. I turned back around and made a face at him too. He ignored me.

"-and so there was this big fight between the gods and the Titans," He continued, "and the gods won."

Some snickers from the group.

Behind me, Nancy Bobofit mumbled to a friend, "Like we're going to use this in real life. Like it's going to say on our job applications, 'Please explain why Kronos ate his kids.'"

"And why, Miss Jackson," Brunner said, "to paraphrase Miss Bobofit's excellent question, does this matter in real life?"

"Busted," Grover muttered.

"Shut up," Nancy hissed, her face even brighter red than her hair.

At least Nancy got packed, too. Mr. Brunner was the only one who ever caught her saying anything wrong. He had horse ears.

I thought about his question, shrugged, and gave the safe non-committal answer, "I don't know, sir."

"I see." Mr. Brunner looked disappointed. "Well, half credit, Mr. and Miss. Jackson. Zeus did indeed feed Kronos a mixture of mustard and wine, which made him disgorge his other five children, who, of course, being immortal gods, had been living and growing up completely undigested in the Titan's stomach. The gods defeated their father, sliced him to pieces with his own scythe, and scattered his remains in Tartarus, the darkest part of the Underworld. On that happy note, it's time for lunch. Mrs. Dodds, would you lead us back outside?"

The class drifted off, the girls holding their stomachs, the guys pushing each other around and acting like complete morons.

Grover, Percy, and I were about to follow when Mr. Brunner said, "Mr. and Miss. Jackson."

Damn... almost made it.

Percy told Grover to keep going. Then I turned toward Mr. Brunner. "Sir?"

Mr. Brunner had this look that wouldn't let you go, intense brown eyes that could've been a thousand years old and had seen everything.

"You must learn the answer to my question," Mr. Brunner told us. "About the Titans?" Percy asked.

"About real life. And how your studies apply to it."

"Oh."

"What you learn from me," he said, "is vitally important. I expect you to treat it as such. I will accept only the best from you, Percy and Cassie Jackson."

I was kinda annoyed with that statement. He pushed us so hard.

I mean, sure, it was kind of cool on tournament days, when he dressed up in a suit of Roman armor and shouted: "What ho!'" and challenged us, sword-point against chalk, to run to the board and name every Greek and Roman person who had ever lived, and their mother, and what god they worshipped. But Mr. Brunner expected Percy and I to be as good as everybody else, despite the fact that we both have dyslexia and attention deficit disorder, and Percy and I had never made above a C- in our lives. And no he didn't expect us to be as good; he expected us to be better.

No pressure.

Percy mumbled something about trying harder, while Mr. Brunner took one long sad look at the stele like he'd been at this girl's funeral.

He told us to go outside and eat lunch.

The class gathered on the front steps of the museum, where we could watch the foot traffic along Fifth Avenue.

Overhead, a huge storm was brewing, with clouds blacker than I'd ever seen over the city. I figured maybe it was global warming or something because the weather all across New York state had been weird since Christmas. We'd had massive snowstorms, flooding, and wildfires from lightning strikes. I wouldn't have been surprised if this was a hurricane blowing in. That would actually be the least of my concerns.

Grover, Percy, and I sat on the edge of the fountain, away from the others. We thought that maybe if we did that, everybody wouldn't know we were from that school-the school for loser freaks who couldn't make it elsewhere.

"Detention?" Grover asked.

"Nah," Percy said. "Not from Brunner. I just wish he'd lay off me sometimes. I mean- I'm not a genius."

"You most certainly are not," I said smirking as I unwrapped my sandwich.

“Shut up, Cassie,” Percy said jokingly as he flicked my shoulder.

I stuck my tongue out at him.

Grover didn't say anything for a while. Then, when I thought he was going to give us some deep philosophical crap like they say in the movies, he said, "Can I have your apple?"

Percy shrugged and handed it to him. I offered him my granola, but he declined, and I began to feed it to the pigeons.

I watched the stream of cabs going down Fifth Avenue and thought about my mom's apartment, only a little ways uptown from where we sat. I hadn't seen her since Christmas. I wanted so badly to jump in a taxi and head home with Percy. She'd hug us and be glad to see us, but she'd be disappointed, too. She'd send us right back to Yancy, remind me that I had to try harder, even if this was our sixth school in six years and we were probably going to be kicked out again. I wouldn't be able to stand that sad look she'd give me.

I also wished that I could go visit the dance studio around the corner. I had been dancing since I was 6, my mom enrolled me to try and run off all my nervous energy and help me focus. I fell in love and have been dancing ever since. Unfortunately, I haven't been in a year because of school. I was extremely out of practice and just itching to start again.

Mr. Brunner parked his wheelchair at the base of the handicapped ramp. He ate celery while he read a paperback novel. A red umbrella stuck up from the back of his chair, making it look like a motorized cafe table. Like in those Italian romance movies that I watched from the window of Ms. Noris's fourth-story apartment across the street.

I was about to drink my juice box (yeah a juice box, sue me) when Nancy Bobofit appeared in front of us with her ugly friends-I guess she'd gotten tired of stealing from the tourists-and dumped her half-eaten lunch in Grover's lap.

"Oops." She grinned at me with her crooked teeth. Her freckles were orange as if somebody had spray-painted her face with liquid Cheetos.

I tried to stay cool. The school counselor had told me a million times, "Count to ten, get control of your temper." Sometimes, it actually worked for me. Percy on the other hand... not so much.

The next thing I knew, Nancy was sitting on her butt in the fountain, screaming, "Percy pushed me!"

Mrs. Dodds materialized next to us.

Some of the kids were whispering: "Did you see-" "-the water-"

"-like it grabbed her-"

There was no way what I just saw was real. No way. All I knew for sure was that my big brother was in trouble again.

I looked over at Percy like, "Dude, what did you do?"

As soon as Mrs. Dodds was sure poor little Nancy was okay, promising to get her a new shirt at the museum gift shop, etc., etc., Mrs. Dodds turned on us. There was a triumphant fire in her eyes as if she just proved an argument. "Now, honey-"

"I know," Percy grumbled. "A month erasing workbooks."

That wasn't the right thing to say.

"Come with me," Mrs. Dodds said, "Cassandra too!" she said almost triumphantly.

Oh great! I'm in trouble by association.

Percy froze and stared at her in disbelief, "She didn't even do anything!" he yelled.

"I'll be the judge of that Mr. Jackson!" she sneered.

"Wait!" Grover yelped. "It was me. I pushed her."

I stared at him, stunned. I couldn't believe he was trying to cover for us. Besides the fact that it was totally a bad idea, Mrs. Dodds scared Grover to death.

She glared at him so hard his whiskery chin trembled. "I don't think so, Mr. Underwood," she said.

"But-"

"You-will-stay-here."

Grover looked at me desperately.

"It's okay, man," Percy told him.

"Thanks for trying," I added.

"Honeys," Mrs. Dodds barked at us. "Now." Nancy Bobofit smirked.

Percy gave her his deluxe I'll-kill-you-later stare as he grabbed my hand.

Damn, I did not want to be on the other end of that.

Then I turned to face Mrs. Dodds, but she wasn't there. She was standing at the museum entrance, way at the top of the steps, gesturing impatiently at me to come on.

I glanced at Percy and he looked just as puzzled as I felt.

How... how did she get there so fast?

We have moments like that a lot when our brain falls asleep or something, and the next thing I know I've missed something as if a puzzle piece fell out of the universe and left me staring at the blank place behind it. The school counselor told us this was part of the ADHD, my brain misinterpreting things.

I wasn't so sure, this time. My grip on Percy's hand only tightened.

We continued after Mrs. Dodds.

Halfway up the steps, Percy turned and glanced back at Grover. He was looking pale, cutting his eyes between us and Mr. Brunner, like he wanted Mr. Brunner to notice what was going on, but Mr. Brunner was absorbed in his novel.

I looked back up. Mrs. Dodds had disappeared again. She was now inside the building, at the end of the entrance hall.

Okay, something clearly isn't right.

In any normal situation, she would make us buy a new shirt for Nancy at the gift shop. But that clearly wasn’t the plan.

We followed her deeper into the museum. When we finally caught up to her, we were back in the Greek and Roman section.

Except for us, the gallery was empty.

Mrs. Dodds stood with her arms crossed in front of a big marble frieze of the Greek gods. She was making this weird noise in her throat, like growling.

Even without the noise, I would've been nervous. It's weird being alone with a teacher, especially Mrs. Dodds. Something about the way she looked at the frieze as if she wanted to pulverize it...

"You've been giving us problems, honey," she said.

Percy said, "Yes, ma'am."

I decided to stay quiet, with my mouth we'd end up in even more trouble than we already were.

She tugged on the cuffs of her leather jacket. "Did you really think you would get away with it?" The look in her eyes was beyond mad. It was evil.

She's a teacher, I thought nervously. It's not like she's going to hurt us. I'm pretty sure that is highly illegal.

Percy said, "We-we'll try harder, ma'am." Thunder shook the building. If we were in a movie that probably means something very bad is about to happen.

"We are not fools, Percy and Cassie Jackson," Mrs. Dodds said. "It was only a matter of time before we found you out. Confess, and you will suffer less pain."

"Percy-, " I said nervously as I gripped him.

Ok, now I'm really confused.

I didn't know what she was talking about.

All I could think of was that the teachers must've found the illegal stash of candy Percy had been selling out of my dorm room. Or maybe they'd realized I'm the one who super glued the science teacher to his desk chair and let loose all the frogs in the classroom.

What can I say I enjoy chaos.

"Well?" she demanded.

"Ma'am, I don't..." I trailed off.

"Your time is up," she hissed.

Then things got even weirder.

Mr. Brunner, who'd been out in front of the museum a minute before, wheeled his chair into the doorway of the gallery, holding a pen in his hand.

"What ho, Percy, Cassie!" he shouted, tossing a pen and small glinting object in the air. It flew so fast I could barely make it out. Mrs. Dodds lunged at us.

With a yelp, Percy and I dodged in opposite directions. I felt talons slash the air next to my ear. I snatched what I could now see was some sort of metal bracelet cuff out of the air, but when it hit my hand, it wasn't a bracelet anymore. It was a spear!

Ok...that's new. Bracelet turning into medieval murder weapon.

To my right Percy was holding a sword, the same sword Mr. Brunner used on tournament days.

Mrs. Dodds spun toward me with a murderous look in her eyes.

My knees were jelly. My hands were shaking so bad I almost dropped the spear.

She snarled, "Die, honey!"

And she flew straight at me.

Absolute terror ran through my body. I did the only thing I could do: I slashed with the spear.

The metal blade hit her shoulder and passed clean through her body, clashing and clanging with Percy's blade as he swung through with the sword.

Mrs. Dodds was a sandcastle in a power fan. She exploded into yellow powder, vaporized on the spot, leaving nothing but the smell of sulfur and a dying screech and a chill of evil in the air, as if those two glowing red eyes were still watching me.

We were alone.

The spear went limp like a wet noodle in my hands and seemed to shrink. It began to wrap around my arm and once it was done it harden again into a bracelet cuff that looked like a snake coiled around my arm. I tugged on it, trying to get it off but it wouldn't budge. I finally decided to just pull my jacket sleeve over it and deal with it later.

So.... that happened.

Mr. Brunner wasn't there. Nobody was there but us.

I ran to Percy, and he gripped me tightly in a hug. He was shaking just as badly as I was.

"Percy, what was that?" I exclaimed.

"I don't know," he said, eyes still searching the exhibit as if Mrs. Dodd's would show up again.

My hands were still trembling. My lunch must've been contaminated with magic mushrooms or something.

It was much more believable than the fever dream we just witnessed.

"Come on, let's get out of here," Percy said as he grabbed my hand and we went back outside.

It had started to rain.

Grover was sitting by the fountain, a museum map tented over his head. Nancy Bobofit was still standing there, soaked from her swim in the fountain, grumbling to her ugly friends. When she saw me, she said, "I hope Mrs. Kerr whipped your butt."

Percy stopped walking, "Who?"

"Our teacher. Duh!"

I blinked. We had no teacher named Mrs. Kerr. I asked Nancy what she was talking about. She just rolled her eyes and turned away.

Percy asked Grover where Mrs. Dodds was.

He said, "Who?"

But he paused first, and he wouldn't look at us, so I thought he was messing around.

"Not funny, dude," I told him. "This is serious."

Thunder boomed overhead.

I saw Mr. Brunner sitting under his red umbrella, reading his book as if he'd never moved.

"Stay here Cassie, I'm gonna figure out what's going on," Percy said.

He went over to Mr. Brunner.

I moved close enough to hear what they were saying but not too close in case there were any more surprises from Mr. Brunner the only other teacher on the trip. My ears strained to listen.

Mr. Brunner looked up, a little distracted. "Ah, that would be my pen. Please bring your own writing utensil in the future, Mr. Jackson."

Percy handed Mr. Brunner his pen. I hadn't even realized Percy still had that. "Sir," Percy said, "where's Mrs. Dodds?"

He stared at Percy blankly. "Who?"

"The other chaperone. Mrs. Dodds. The pre-algebra teacher."

He frowned and sat forward, looking mildly concerned. "Percy, there is no Mrs. Dodds on this trip. As far as I know, there has never been a Mrs. Dodds at Yancy Academy. Are you feeling all right?"

Yep, something is definitely going on.

chapter 2 >>>

6 notes · View notes

lovetheworld-harrypottergirl · 2 years

Text

Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Theif

Chapter 1 - I ACCIDENTALLY VAPORIZE MY PRE-ALGEBRA TEACHER

Look, I didn't want to be a half-blood.

If you're reading this because you think you might be one, my advice is: close this book right now.

Believe whatever lie your mom or dad told you about your birth, and try to lead a normal life.

Being a half-blood is dangerous. It's scary. Most of the time, it gets you killed in painful, nasty ways.

If you're a normal kid, reading this because you think it's fiction, great. Read on. I envy you for being able to believe that none of this ever happened.

But if you recognize yourself in these pages — if you feel something stirring inside — stop reading immediately. You might be one of us. And once you know that, it's only a matter of time before they sense it too, and they'll come for you.

Don't say I didn't warn you.

My name is Percy Jackson.

I'm twelve years old. Until a few months ago, I was a boarding student at Yancy Academy, a private school for troubled kids in upstate New York.

Am I a troubled kid?

Yeah. You could say that.

I could start at any point in my short miserable life to prove it, but things really started going bad last May, when our sixth-grade class took a field trip to Manhattan — twenty-eight mental-case kids and two teachers on a yellow school bus, heading to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to look at ancient Greek and Roman stuff.

I know — it sounds like torture. Most Yancy field trips were.

But Mr. Brunner, our Latin teacher, was leading this trip, so I had hopes.

I hoped the trip would be okay. At least, I hoped that for once I wouldn't get in trouble.

Boy, was I wrong.

See, bad things happen to me on field trips. Like at my fifth-grade school, when we went to the Saratoga battlefield, I had this accident with a Revolutionary War cannon. I wasn't aiming for the school bus, but of course I got expelled anyway. And before that, at my fourth-grade school, when we took a behind-the-scenes tour of the Marine World shark pool, I sort of hit the wrong lever on the catwalk and our class took an unplanned swim. And the time before that . . . Well, you get the idea.

This trip, I was determined to be good.

"I'm going to kill her," I mumbled.

Grover tried to calm me down. "It's okay. I like peanut butter."

He dodged another piece of Nancy's lunch.

"That's it." I started to get up, but Grover pulled me back to my seat.

"You're already on probation," he reminded me. "You know who'll get blamed if anything happens."

Looking back on it, I wish I'd decked Nancy Bobofit right then and there. In-school suspension would've been nothing compared to the mess I was about to get myself into.

Mr. Brunner led the museum tour.

He rode up front in his wheelchair, guiding us through the big echoey galleries, past marble statues and glass cases full of really old black-and-orange pottery.

It blew my mind that this stuff had survived for two thousand, three thousand years.

He gathered us around a thirteen-foot-tall stone column with a big sphinx on the top, and started telling us how it was a grave marker, a stele, for a girl about our age. He told us about the carvings on the sides. I was trying to listen to what he had to say, because it was kind of interesting, but everybody around me was talking, and every time I told them to shut up, the other teacher chaperone, Mrs. Dodds, would give me the evil eye.

Mrs. Dodds was this little math teacher from Georgia who always wore a black leather jacket, even though she was fifty years old. She looked mean enough to ride a Harley right into your locker. She had ome to Yancy halfway through the year, when our last math teacher had a nervous breakdown.

Mr. Brunner kept talking about Greek funeral art.

Finally, Nancy Bobofit snickered something about the naked guy on the stele, and I turned around and said, "Will you shut up?"

It came out louder than I meant it to.

The whole group laughed. Mr. Brunner stopped his story.

"Mr. Jackson," he said, "did you have a comment?"

My face was totally red. I said, "No, sir."

Mr. Brunner pointed to one of the pictures on the stele. "Perhaps you'll tell us what this picture represents?"

I looked at the carving, and felt a flush of relief, because I actually recognized it. "That's Kronos eating his kids, right?"

"Yes," Mr. Brunner said, obviously not satisfied. "And he did this because..."

"Well..." I racked my brain to remember. "Kronos was the king god, and — "

"God?" Mr. Brunner asked.

"Titan," I corrected myself. "And... he didn't trust his kids, who were the gods. So, um, Kronos ate them, right? But his wife hid baby Zeus, and gave Kronos a rock to eat instead. And later when Zeus grew up, he tricked his dad Kronos into barfing up his brothers and sisters — "

"Eeew!" said one of the girls behind me.

" — and so there was this big fight between the gods and the Titans," I continued, "and the gods won."

Some snickers from the group.

Behind me, Nancy Bobofit mumbled to a friend, "Like we're going to use this in real life. Like it's going to say on our job applications, 'Please explain why Kronos ate his kids.'"

"And why, Mr. Jackson," Brunner said, "to paraphrase Miss Bobofit's excellent question, does this matter in real life?"

"Busted," Grover muttered.

"Shut up," Nancy hissed, her face even brighter red than her hair.

At least Nancy got packed, too. Mr. Brunner was the only one who ever caught her saying anything wrong. He had radar ears.

I thought about his question, and shrugged. "I don't know, sir."

"I see." Mr. Brunner looked disappointed. "Well, half credit, Mr. Jackson. Zeus did indeed feed Kronos a mixture of mustard and wine, which made him disgorge his other five children, who, of course, being immortal gods, had been living and growing up completely undigested in the Titan's stomach. The gods defeated their father, sliced him to pieces with his own scythe, and scattered his remains in Tartarus, the darkest part of the Underworld. On that happy note, it's time for lunch. Mrs. Dodds, would you lead us back outside?"

The class drifted off, the girls holding their stomachs, the guys pushing each other around and acting like doofuses.

Grover and I were about to follow when Mr. Brunner said, "Mr. Jackson."

I knew that was coming.

I told Grover to keep going. Then I turned toward Mr. Brunner. "Sir?"

Mr. Brunner had this look that wouldn't let you go — intense brown eyes that could 've been a thousand years old and had seen everything.

"You must learn the answer to my question," Mr. Brunner told me.

"About the Titans?"

"About real life. And how your studies apply to it."

"Oh."

"What you learn from me," he said, "is vitally important. I expect you to treat it as such. I will accept only the best from you, Percy Jackson."

I wanted to get angry, this guy pushed me so hard.

I mean, sure, it was kind of cool on tournament days, when he dressed up in a suit of Roman armor and shouted: "What ho!" and challenged us, sword-point against chalk, to run to the board and name every Greek and Roman person who had ever lived, and their mother, and what god they worshipped.

But Mr. Brunner expected me to be as good as everybody else, despite the fact that I have dyslexia and attention deficit disorder and I had never made above a C- in my life. No — he didn't expect me to be as good; he expected me to be better. And I just couldn't learn all those names and facts, much less spell them correctly.

I mumbled something about trying harder, while Mr. Brunner took one long sad look at the stele, like he'd been at this girl's funeral.

He told me to go outside and eat my lunch.

The class gathered on the front steps of the museum, where we could watch the foot traffic along Fifth Avenue.

Nancy Bobofit was trying to pickpocket something from a lady's purse, and, of course, Mrs. Dodds wasn't seeing a thing.

Grover and I sat on the edge of the fountain, away from the others. We thought that maybe if we did that, everybody wouldn't know we were from that school — the school for loser freaks who couldn't make it elsewhere.

"Detention?" Grover asked.

"Nah," I said. "Not from Brunner. I just wish he'd lay off me sometimes. I mean — I'm not a genius."

Grover didn't say anything for a while. Then, when I thought he was going to give me some deep philosophical comment to make me feel better, he said, "Can I have your apple?"

I didn't have much of an appetite, so I let him take it.

I watched the stream of cabs going down Fifth Avenue, and thought about my mom's apartment, only a little ways uptown from where we sat. I hadn't seen her since Christmas. I wanted so bad to jump in a taxi and head home. She'd hug me and be glad to see me, but she'd be disappointed, too. She'd send me right back to Yancy, remind me that I had to try harder, even if this was my sixth school in six years and I was probably going to be kicked out again. I wouldn't be able to stand that sad look she'd give me.

I was about to unwrap my sandwich when Nancy Bobofit appeared in front of me with her ugly friends — I guess she'd gotten tired of stealing from the tourists — and dumped her half-eaten lunch in Grover's lap.

"Oops." She grinned at me with her crooked teeth. Her freckles were orange, as if somebody had spray-painted her face with liquid Cheetos.

I tried to stay cool. The school counselor had told me a million times, "Count to ten, get control of your temper." But I was so mad my mind went blank. A wave roared in my ears.

I don't remember touching her, but the next thing I knew, Nancy was sitting on her butt in the fountain, screaming, "Percy pushed me!"

Mrs. Dodds materialized next to us.

Some of the kids were whispering: "Did you see — "

"—the water—"

" — like it grabbed her — "

I didn't know what they were talking about. All I knew was that I was in trouble again.

As soon as Mrs. Dodds was sure poor little Nancy was okay, promising to get her a new shirt at the museum gift shop, etc., etc., Mrs. Dodds turned on me. There was a triumphant fire in her eyes, as if I'd done something she'd been waiting for all semester. "Now, honey — "

"I know," I grumbled. "A month erasing workbooks."

That wasn't the right thing to say.

"Come with me," Mrs. Dodds said.

"Wait!" Grover yelped. "It was me. I pushed her."

I stared at him, stunned. I couldn't believe he was trying to cover for me. Mrs. Dodds scared Grover to death.

She glared at him so hard his whiskery chin trembled.

"I don't think so, Mr. Underwood," she said.

"But—"

"You— will— stay— here."

Grover looked at me desperately.

"It's okay, man," I told him. "Thanks for trying."

"Honey," Mrs. Dodds barked at me. "Now. "

Nancy Bobofit smirked. I gave her my deluxe I'll-kill-you-later stare. Then I turned to face Mrs. Dodds, but she wasn't there. She was standing at the museum entrance, way at the top of the steps, gesturing impatiently at me to come on.

How'd she get there so fast?

I wasn't so sure.

I went after Mrs. Dodds.

Halfway up the steps, I glanced back at Grover. He was looking pale, cutting his eyes between me and Mr. Brunner, like he wanted Mr. Brunner to notice what was going on, but Mr. Brunner was absorbed in his novel.

I looked back up. Mrs. Dodds had disappeared again. She was now inside the building, at the end of the entrance hall.

Okay, I thought. She's going to make me buy a new shirt for Nancy at the gift shop.

But apparently that wasn't the plan.

I followed her deeper into the museum. When I finally caught up to her, we were back in the Greek and Roman section.

Except for us, the gallery was empty.

Mrs. Dodds stood with her arms crossed in front of a big marble frieze of the Greek gods. She was making this weird noise in her throat, like growling.

Even without the noise, I would've been nervous. It's weird being alone with a teacher, especially Mrs. Dodds. Something about the way she looked at the frieze, as if she wanted to pulverize it...

"You've been giving us problems, honey," she said.

I did the safe thing. I said, "Yes, ma'am."

She tugged on the cuffs of her leather jacket. "Did you really think you would get away with it?"

The look in her eyes was beyond mad. It was evil.

She's a teacher, I thought nervously. It's not like she's going to hurt me.

I said, "I'll— I'll try harder, ma'am."

Thunder shook the building.

"We are not fools, Percy Jackson," Mrs. Dodds said. "It was only a matter of time before we found you out. Confess, and you will suffer less pain."

I didn't know what she was talking about.

"Well?" she demanded.

"Ma'am, I don't..."

"Your time is up," she hissed.

Then things got even stranger.

Mr. Brunner, who'd been out in front of the museum a minute before, wheeled his chair into the doorway of the gallery, holding a pen in his hand.

"What ho, Percy!" he shouted, and tossed the pen through the air.

Mrs. Dodds lunged at me.

With a yelp, I dodged and felt talons slash the air next to my ear. I snatched the ballpoint pen out of the air, but when it hit my hand, it wasn't a pen anymore. It was a sword— Mr. Brunner's bronze sword, which he always used on tournament day.

Mrs. Dodds spun toward me with a murderous look in her eyes.

My knees were jelly. My hands were shaking so bad I almost dropped the sword.

She snarled, "Die, honey!"

And she flew straight at me.

Absolute terror ran through my body. I did the only thing that came naturally: I swung the sword.

The metal blade hit her shoulder and passed clean through her body as if she were made of water.

Hisss!

I was alone.

There was a ballpoint pen in my hand.

Mr. Brunner wasn't there. Nobody was there but me.

My hands were still trembling. My lunch must've been contaminated with magic mushrooms or something.

Had I imagined the whole thing?

I went back outside.

It had started to rain.

I said, "Who?"

"Our teacher. Duh!"

I blinked. We had no teacher named Mrs. Kerr. I asked Nancy what she was talking about.

She just rolled her eyes and turned away.

I asked Grover where Mrs. Dodds was.

He said, "Who?"

But he paused first, and he wouldn't look at me, so I thought he was messing with me.

"Not funny, man," I told him. "This is serious."

Thunder boomed overhead.

I saw Mr. Brunner sitting under his red umbrella, reading his book, as if he'd never moved.

I went over to him.

He looked up, a little distracted. "Ah, that would be my pen. Please bring your own writing utensil in the future, Mr. Jackson."

I handed Mr. Brunner his pen. I hadn't even realized I was still holding it.

"Sir," I said, "where's Mrs. Dodds?"

He stared at me blankly. "Who?"

"The other chaperone. Mrs. Dodds. The pre-algebra teacher."

He frowned and sat forward, looking mildly concerned. "Percy, there is no Mrs. Dodds on this trip.

As far as I know, there has never been a Mrs. Dodds at Yancy Academy. Are you feeling all right?"

#percy jacksonxreader #percy jackson #grover underwood #mr. brunner #percyjacksonandtheolympians #chapter 1

1 note · View note

proteuus · 4 years

Text

I want to cut up pages from a bible to bind into a journal but I wonder if my parents would be mad at me lmao

#tmrw i think i'll start this new journal #the cover will be this really nice pink paper with a rose pattern on it from my vintage set #and the tracing paper i like to bind into all my journals will look absolutely peak in there #and the lace doyleys (apparently thats how its spelled? idk thats what it says on the package) will be v good #im trying to think of what else i want to bind into there #if i thought ahead i would've bound hamlet pages into the sailor journal and r&j into this one #but thats ok #those pages are too small anyway i had to stick em together #this new journal would look really good as a collage style one but its too girly i know i wont use it #so i dont want to put all that Effort into it #it's way easier to make the clean cut ones #yeah idk what else to bind in there tho. i think bible pages would be solid #im going for vibes like i work for marie Antoinette and its the french revolution #and i know the revolutionaries are right but i also know they'll kill me and im trying to make peace with my death #so. Yeah lmao

6 notes · View notes

leportraitducadavre · 2 years

Note

I'm from middle east and my country is shit, but you don't see me going around trying to kill people. I hate the government but I love my country... Most of Sasuke stans are living a comfortable life in European countries and America, they better stfu about suffering, cause they know how their GOVERNMENTS are fucking with our lives. YOU NEVER EXPERIENCED WAR.

This is why the anti-Sasuke fandom, and by extension, pro-Tobirama fans piss me off. It's not even about preferences for hating a particular character simply because they don't match their aesthetic. NO! They just have to pull out half-assed "facts" that are in no way related to canon and dump onto the social media sites without any backup evidence to prove their rhetoric claims. And oh, don't even try to kindly point them in the right direction by providing proofs from the manga panels because they'll drag out their real life sob stories to play the victim and send an angry mob to harass you until you have admitted defeat. UGH.

... what? Alright, first of all, hello Anon, thank you for reaching out. Let me reply to this as thoroughly as I can, hopefully, the fact that I'm not from a first-world country makes my point more valuable (in that person’s mind).

1) Even from the Middle East and experiencing war, that's not to say their experience is universal. Their claim of "I hate my government but I love my country" is... sort of weird. First of all, there's no problem with loving your country, many revolutionaries loved their nation and decided to stand against the system for that same reason -they refused to be oppressed inside their own home, are they claiming that going against the government is going against one's country? Makes absolutely no sense.

Maybe is my own cultural experiences (here, during the seventies and eighties, many people disappeared because they stood up against the government, hell, teenagers who asked for a free bus ticket to go to school were abducted because they were seen as "revolutionaries", and we are not supposed to do something because then "we don't love our country"?), but how is wanting equal treatment disputes the idea of loving your country? And even if Sasuke does hate his village, what’s exactly the issue? Why does he have to love the place where his family was murdered just to reflect this person’s own feelings of patriotism for a place that apparently does nothing but make them suffer? How does that make him a bad person? Why the love for a symbolic place has to be stronger than his love for his family or a group of people? Why are they asking blind loyalty and patriotism to a person belonging to a discriminated, minoritarian group that was killed in the name of peace?

Hiruzen, who unlike Danzo was more inclined about exploiting people’s bonds and emotions in order to tie them to Konoha rather than a person/clan; basically constructing Konoha as a symbol that encompasses those who are dear to the shinobi, creating a nationalistic mindset where family=village. Therefore, if Konoha (symbol) isn’t as important as a specific group/person, then you’re against the village as a whole. It’s a Them vs. Us clash that ultimately benefits the system as it currently is since any criticism can be taken as subversion. And again, it also contradicts the theory as it’s rawly presented since Hiruzen isn’t against those emotions existing, but to whom or what they are subjected to: The individual or the village. (x)

2) Staying with the phrase "I'm from middle east and my country is shit, but you don't see me going around trying to kill people. I hate the government but I love my country" plus the "you never experienced war", what does that mean? Why are they stating Sasuke goes around killing people? He killed Danzo, Itachi, and some samurais, and all of them are with the system that oppresses many people on daily basis, no innocent was murdered, why are they comparing having a shitty life and then deciding to kill innocents with Sasuke? Shouldn’t be Gaara the one put in that statement, then? Or he gets a free pass because he was manipulated by Shikaku even tho Sasuke was also manipulated by Itachi? How come we blame the reaction of the kids instead of the system that created them in the first place?

3) “Most of Sasuke stans are living a comfortable life in European countries and America, they better stfu about suffering, cause they know how their GOVERNMENTS are fucking with our lives.” I agree that first-world countries take advantage of third-world countries and exploit their citizens and natural resources to maintain their economy afloat, then why don’t they see that Konoha, and every big Village in Naruto, is a metaphor of just that? They promote and provoke wars which battles are carried out in smaller countries (so the structural damage doesn’t happen in their own space) in order to produce economic and political gain -it’s explicitly stated, so why wouldn’t characters that want a revolution raise against it and everyone that supports it? Every single person living inside the villages has a military rank, meaning, they’re soldiers (this is also stated and repeated non-stop). It’s their young age something that makes them uncomfortable? Then why is it okay for the government (Kages) to send kids to fight their wars and not bat an eyelash to it but it’s wrong to stand up against it? Name one kid (shinobi) that Sasuke has killed, I’ll wait.

4) "you NEVER EXPERIENCED WAR" There’s no possible change without a revolution, and as a third-world country citizen (I guess, they said they were from the Middle East, they never stated they were from a poor nation) they should know better than anyone this giving how colonialism, imperialism, and capitalism-colonization is also affecting us, I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again:

Change from within is a gradual process that ultimately guarantees future generations to still suffer the same or similar problems that the previous ones did, it shields itself with the idea that it warrants fewer casualties than a head-on confrontation, but it ultimately ends up provoking the same amount of corpses in the long run. (x)

So, to them, Sasuke going against the oppressive government of Konoha is equal to going against the country, and questioning the basis of the foundation of the village is bad. Why, exactly? Because it means people will die? Aren’t people dying right now? Isn’t one of the consequences of wars or genocides (UCM) the death of innocents? (Israel government -to name a Middle East country currently at war, decimating Palestinian people because they want that specific territory isn’t bad? Don’t you think it’ll provoke people’s desire to fight back? Why wouldn’t an Israeli citizen see the problem with it and want to bring the government down? Would that mean the Israeli person is bad because they’re going against his country in order to protect innocents?).

#anti naruto #anti naruto fandom #pro sasuke #pro sasuke uchiha #pro uchiha clan #anti tobirama fandom #anti konoha #anti shinobi system

96 notes · View notes

rpmemesbyarat · 3 years

Conversation

RP meme from Scream Queens Ep 5 "Pumpkin Patch" (Note: Offensive content, use at own discretion)

The theme was "Let Them Eat Cake," so my dad bought me this foreclosed McMansion down the street, and, like, 500 of my closest friends came dressed in 18th century attire, and, oh, the pool was filled with this, like, caviar slurry. And then at midnight, we just burnt the house down. When the firefighters came, they were actually strippers, and they put out the fire with champagne.

So walk me through this, honey.

Well, as you can see, every pumpkin in the patch is artisanal.

Then we move past the ice sculptures of demonic peeing cherubs, and yes, they will all be peeing vodka and Red Bull.

I'm sorry. Corn maze?

It's just that doing an exact replica maze from The Shining would have taken us way over budget on man power alone.

I told you money was no object.

Well, apparently, one of them died or something.

Do you have any idea what's at stake here?

Okay, well, it's not my fault that some guy died in the '70s.

I am tired of your sad-sack, I'm-a-total-downer-all-the-time schtick.

I'm over it!

Oh, my God, why are you so depressed?

Why do I have to be the homely one?

Just a second, nutbag.

God, do I have to spell it out for you?

You're a weird, psycho lunatic who's gonna end up in an asylum somewhere, staring at a wall, trying to nurse a watering can.

That's it! I can't take this anymore!

That is such a Mary Todd Lincoln thing to say.

You scream "I'm done with you" kind of a lot, and yet you're still standing here.

I think you know you have a good thing going.

You get to bask in my starlight as I do all the work and you get to grumble behind my back about how disrespected you are.

There's the door.

There's the door, bitch!

You did not deserve to be spoken to like that. Ever.

That is bollocks!

Clearly this fake kidnapping is a play to get the sympathy vote. So Gone Girl.

This is the biggest candle night of the year!

I hate you right now!

Halloween is the greatest night of the year. Greatest night. Because on this night, even kind of shy, kind of homely girls dress up like total sluts. I mean, every costume is just a slutty version of something. Slutty teacher, slutty nurse, slutty nun. I saw a girl last year dressed as slutty al-Qaeda!

See, Halloween it's a night for dudes with killer bods to walk around with our shirts off. And it's totally appropriate, as long as we call ourselves gladiators, Chippendales.

I have no idea how you got into this college.

Look, we'll just hang out and play charades!

This cannot be happening!

Hey, what about Black Hairy Tongue Disease? I mean, does nobody here care about Black Hairy Tongue?

What about my pumpkin patch?

I blame you for this.

[NAME], nice boobs.

Join me in saying you are not afraid!

Just baking some cookies for the neighborhood trick-or-treaters.

Uh, they're toenail cookies.

Pink fur coats worn in all weather, my idea. Flapper dresses made out of feathers, also my idea. Oversized sunglasses worn everywhere, my idea, my idea, my idea!

So why are you baking toenail cookies and giving them to children?

Okay, whose side are you on?

I'm gonna let you in on a little secret. I'm what you call

a "switch-hitter."

Wait, are you bisexual? Because that's what "switch-hitter" means.

Do you mean "double agent"?

What are you writing?

Do you know how big Halloween is in the candle community?

Is this an ant farm?

There's a mom ant, Deborah, who mostly just lies around and she has about 100 husband ants, who come around and give it to her good, which she really enjoys. And then there's about a million sterile daughter ants who feed her and are her slaves. So, an ideal family.

She'd win. And then I'd beg to be her second-in-command, while quietly pull the strings behind the scenes like Dick Cheney.

This plan involves a lot of circuitous logic.

Oh, my God! Those are, like, $100 each!

They're the highest quality candles that can be purchased retail.

What a brilliant and revolutionary idea.

Are you cheating?

This is a clear violation of the honor code.

You must be new here.

Who are you calling?

I'm gonna get you fired.

At least you wore something nice today.

Remember to smile for your mug shot.

I'm burping uncontrollably like Robert Durst.

They'll know I'm guilty!

I'm next in line and in charge here.

You can sum up my viewpoint on this with one word; indifference.

We are her only hope.

Sometimes, in order for a person to achieve their full potential, they have to do things on their own.

I am in charge here!

I love that you're a man.

This is the most sensual song ever written.

We need to do this right now!

I just saw her boobs.

Oh, a salad date is, it's like, it's more casual than dinner, but more formal than coffee.

Whose pants are these?

You know, you're a human being with feelings and needs, right?

Enough about me and my confusion and sad dead feeling inside.

It just really hurt my feelings.

Anyway, I'm pretty sure my so-called friends are the ones that turned me in so I'm just feeling, like, super alone right now.

Man, I am your biggest Instagram fan!

I just think you are a style genius.

I will never be able to repay you for the kindness you've shown me in here.

Besties for life, I say.

Your bail's been posted.

I knew you'd bail me out.

Can I just say what a relief it is to be able to share it with somebody and not feel judged?

You know, I mean, all my girlfriends are like, "That's immoral." "You should be ashamed of yourself!"

Ashamed? What the hell you got to be ashamed for?

You should be proud.

I could've lost my job.

I mean, it lasted, like, 45 seconds, and the whole time, it just felt like I was getting stabbed in the abdomen.

I tied him up and I kept my uniform on and proceeded

to read him his rights. My favorite being "You got the right to remain sexy."

Give me some!

You know he's sexy!

That was one of the best nights of my life.

Well, I've already contacted the police department, despite the fact that a person can't be considered "missing" until at least 72 hours has passed.

That's morbid.

I've already hired an investigator.

What, are you two a couple now?

What the hell are you doing?

You sold me down the river, bitch.

Wait, Gary Coleman's parents stole his kidneys?

I would never say that, because I'm pretty sure that never even happened.

Why does ratting me out sound like exactly something you would do?

You know, I've never thought of myself as a killer, but I am seriously considering ramming this pick into the back of your eye socket.

Maybe you'll get your head sawed off.

You have cameras in my room?

I have eyes everywhere, bitch.

The name of my future perfume is Revenge.

How is that something you just happen to know?

That is stupidest thing I've ever heard.

What's the password?

I just can't eat any more of these.

This ain't The Marriage Ref! This ain't Judge Joe Brown! We ain't on the Maury Show! We ain't standin' in line trying to get tickets to Dr. Phil! I am not Steve Harvey, people, and this ain't the Family Feud!

I'm tryin' to catch a killer.

Help me get the spy gear in the car!

How can you promise?

We're in a maze, you don't know where you're going!

I always knew it would come to this.

Why are we doing this right now?

I forgot the flashlights!

What am I supposed to do with this?

This is so creepy.

It smell like booty in here.

I'm getting a nervous feeling in my stomach.

I might start farting. If I cut some, you promise not to tell anyone?

Oh, my boob!

Stay where you are! I'll come and get you!

Ooh, this is nice.

It's really beautiful.

It looks like you just crossed some stuff out and wrote that in in marker.

Okay, can we talk about that for a second? Because it just happened a few hours ago, and I'm still really traumatized.

I need some cheering up right now.

Excuse me, darling, I'm exhausted.

Wait, we need to hear what happened to you.

Just wondering where you find a house with a pit. The market for them would be pretty limited.

Did you escape, or did you kill him?

I've always had a thing for bad boys.

That got way out of hand.

#rp meme #rp memes #rp starters #roleplay memes #roleplay meme #roleplay starters #scream queens

6 notes · View notes

metalgearkong · 3 years

Text

The Falcon & The Winter Soldier - TV Review

5/1/21 ***spoilers***

Created by Malcomb Spellman, directed by Kari Skogland

Out of all the announced Disney+ MCU shows, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier seemed to be the most out of left field. Two sidekicks from the later 2 Captain America movies pair up and get their own show? What made their bormance so special? I mean, I like them well enough, but what is it that warrants a show? With all of it now said and done, this show is not what I expected, in a good way, but I can't say it lived up to its own potential. It brings up a lot of controversial subjects--stuff I really found interesting and progressive, but it doesn't fully commit. That being said, I'm glad it exists, and it takes many steps in the right direction.

6 months after Avengers Endgame, Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie) and Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan) are returning to every day life, and the problems that come along with it. Bucky in particular is attending strict therapy to repair mental damage from decades of being Hydra's Winter Soldier. Sam is working with his sister and her boating shrimp business. As it turns out, the Avengers didn't technically receive a salary. Strange beings who they worked with, and i assumed Tony Stark or government funding supported the Avengers. Who built their base, made their suits, equipment, and how have the Avengers gotten by so far? The idea is brought up, but the show never comes around and fully explores this interesting point.

The Falcon the the Winter Soldier is only 6 episodes long, compared to WandaVision at 8. I feel like this show needed to be as longer for the numerous ideas it brings up and doesn't have time to flesh out. The main conflict of this series is the fight against the Flag Smashers. A revolutionary group, they want to return the world to what it was during the "blip." They want a worldwide policy of nations without borders. This is a really cool concept and something I could get behind, but yet again it's an interesting idea that is never sufficiently fleshed out. What (according to the Flash Smashers) was so great about the state of the world during the blip? What did nations do around the world that makes the Flag Smashers want to return to the way of life? Did people receive more finances and property? Did socialism thrive? None of this is ever expanded upon.

I also didn't care much for Karli Morgenthau, the leader of the Flag Smashers. Apparently their whole side story had to be changed last minute due to the covid-19 pandemic, and their inconsistent dialog and motivation shows this fact. I never bought actress Erin Kellyman as a revolutionary which thousands of people would follow and kill for, nor did I buy her as a juiced-up super soldier. The best character to come out of this show is John Walker as the government approved new Captain America. Wyatt Russell plays the character extremely well, and it's engaging to see a villain which so easily could have been one-dimensional develop into a more rounded person. He did however get a stupid small redemption in the final episode, but this "good guy" moment is wedged between him brutally killing an unarmed person in public, and joining what looks to be a "Dark Avengers" squad. For a show with progressive ideas, John Walker killing a civilian in a fit of rage should have been a point of no return.

My favorite aspect of The Falcon & the Winter Solider are the racial aspects it brings up. Finally we have a big mainstream company and mainstream show directly making light of the unfair bias and poorer treatment of minorities, especially black men. To see it happen even to an Avenger (Sam) was really cool, and fourth-wall breaking. Sam also discovers a man named Izayah who was a test subject, along with other black men, for the original super soldier serum in WWII. Izayah's mistreatment and his disenfranchised view of the United States is some of the best stuff in the entire show. Everything is all about living up to the legacy of Steve Rogers, but Izayah thinks no black man should even want to bear the stars and stripes. I hope this trend continues as it hangs a lampshade on something broad entertainment should address.

The action and cinematography also evoke my favorite corner of the MCU: everything directed by the Russo Brothers. The fight choreography is visceral without having to be flashy or larger than life (until the end). It was also great to see Sam Wilson reject the shield at the beginning of the show, thinking he would never live up to the mantle. His humility and growth throughout the show is also some of the best stuff to see. He truly is a man of the people, and the next best person besides Steve Rogers who truly can be and deserves to be the new Captain America. Zemo (Daniel Bruhl) also reemerges from Captain America: Civil War, but his character is totally retconned into being a Baron (comics accurate) with huge amounts of wealth and resources. I didn't like his character as much as I did in Civil War, as an everyday soldier tearing the Avengers apart is more compelling than a rich and powerful supervillain doing the same thing. He also had a dumb moment where he wore his purple ski mask for literally one action scene (less than a minute or two) and took it off never to be seen again.

Sharon Carter also makes an appearance, but I don't think the character, nor her twist being the Power Broker meant anything to me. It could be this show going a bit too far with its story threads. Carter has never been a charismatic character to me, and I'm wondering how they'll keep her interesting in the MCU going forward. She is the icing on the cake for too numerous and too weak of villains in this series. I also didn't think it was consistent of honorable of her character to go down a bad path especially knowing the lineage of Peggy Carter. I'm curious where this aspect of the story will go, but I'm not holding my breath. I wish this show cut out some of its threads in order to focus on some of its very good core ideas, especially only at 6 episodes.

The Falcon & The Winter Soldier has a lot of interesting ideas and brings up a lot of important ideas. I didn't expect this show to be critical of racial treatment, police brutality, and government overreach. To eventually see Sam evolve into the new Captain America and believing it down to the atom is the best thing to witness about this story. Bucky gets the short end of the stick, and while he does go through healing, I wish he had more great action or dialog scenes. The Falcon & the Winter soldier sets up future stuff, as the MCU does best. Sharon Carter might be some kind of bad guy going forward, the Dark Avengers seem to be forming, and Sam Wilson as Captain America may go on to lead a new generation of Avengers. The show is far from perfect, and sadly doesn't commit to some of its best ideas. I would watch another season, but hope it would have a slightly sharper script.

7/10

#the falcon and the winter soldier #winter soldier #bucky #sam wilson #captain america #MCU #mcu phase 4 #black falcon #anthony mackie #disney #=w=

3 notes · View notes