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halothenthehorns · 1 month

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Chapter 1: THE STOLEN CHARIOT

Percy felt the slight shake to his arm, the swirling heavy warmth of sleep leaving him with a sense of happiness. He didn't dream here, which he suspected was the only reason he hadn't been driven nuts yet by getting full rest, but he missed it a lot too. Even if they were horrible visions, just to see where everybody he yearned to be with so much was.

His heavy eyes fluttered, he saw the blonde hair and smiled, thinking it was Annabeth there to call him a drool swamp and they had activities to get to as he tried to slur something together.

"Don't worry Magnus, he'll learn his genders eventually," a surprising female voice instead said close by, and he blinked the last of the fog away to see it was Magnus's exasperated face leaning back. Percy wiped at his sticky chin and muttered an apology to Annabeth's cousin to hide his longing and confusion and mild anger at her hadn't vanished with a nice nap.

"Want some soup?" Magnus offered in a clear offer to change the subject, a steaming mug of something very good smelling in his other hand.

"Yeah," Percy croaked, taking it and sipping the warmth at once to keep that feeling in place all the same.

Time had passed, though he couldn't guess how much as always as he fumbled for the spoons handle and really dug in. He looked around to see Thalia and Jason by the door, laughing and teasing each other about something he was sure, though he couldn't tell from this far away. They were mirroring each other in an odd way, the more energized they got into their topic the more they both kept snapping their fingers before they spoke in an almost eureka moment. It was odd, Thalia's close proximity must be affecting Jason when he did it too.

Will and Nico were right where they'd been, still whispering and sitting very close together like Paul and his Mom on the couch while Percy's eyes were glued to the TV ignoring them.

Magnus and Alex were still hovering in front of him, like they weren't sure if it was safe to leave and he was eating in his sleep or something, but they were signing to each other. It was pretty entertaining to watch, they made large exaggerated faces and were using the gestures slow enough Percy amused himself for quite a few minutes trying to guess what a few could mean before Thalia finally smacked Jason and announced they needed to move on before she started burying bodies with only affection for it in her tone.

As Jason made to pick up the dark red book with an orange five on the spine, it looked a little misshapen, which explained why another book fell out of its pages like someone had tried to cram them together.

It was the brightest book of the bunch being daisy yellow, as well as the smallest. The thin amount of pages was almost as disconcerting as the whole set. What happened in this one that was so important it was included but not attached to any of the others? On the spine was just three symbols instead of any numbers. A chariot, a dragon, and a sword, none of which needed much translation for how this was going to go.

"Err," Jason said loudly, holding it up for the others inspection.

"I say we go for it?" Thalia offered when Nico swallowed but didn't duck his head or start screaming. It felt odd to get a say in if they wanted what they were sure this was about to be revealed, for once. It wasn't even vital to Percy's last adventure that they knew of. It was just the fact that, this wasn't horrible. She liked sharing her life with her brother, even if Jason didn't know that's what was happening. It was far easier to have this explained for her than trying to put all this together herself.

Nico felt the exact same way. He shrugged and gestured for them all to get comfortable with no feeling of fear for once. He found himself looking forward to what Will and Alex were going to say about the Underworld more and more, and what had been going through Percy's mind with a clear head instead of his old fantasies which were fading from his mind more every day.

"Okay," Jason grinned, clearly just happy to be involved at all as he flopped back into his beanbag and read, "The Stolen Chariot."

"Uh," Thalia and Nico said together, exchanging startled looks. There had been no chariot when they were kidnapped by Persephone.

"Who is Percy stealing a chariot from?" Magnus asked in instant concern who he pissed off this time.

"What kind of chariot?" Alex asked with devilish delight, instantly hoping it was Apollo's.

"Why is Percy stealing a chariot?" Will sighed.

"All questions and more that shall be answered in the following order," Percy said while raising two fingers. "Shut, up." Percy said as casually as ever, sitting comfortably in his seat and knocking back the last of his soup, as unbothered as ever at his life on full display. Whether it was a side adventure with his friends or an odd, out of context day shopping with his mom, it was another day of his life he was getting back. If he didn't show an ounce of unease for this mystery, Jason didn't bother to hesitate a second more.

"Pfft," Thalia scoffed, "none of us could go a sentence living like that."

I was in fifth-period science class when-

"Hey, wait a second," Jason spluttered, unable to even get through a whole sentence before he looked around at Percy and Nico. "Does this take place before or after your birthday?"

Percy could feel his mind scrambling for the answer like a pop quiz at his intensity, he panicked and blurted the first thing that came to mind, "Tuesday!"

Thalia sighed and rubbed her temple while Will gave Percy an understanding smile and Jason looked mollified.

"Sorry," Percy shook himself as he vaguely realized that wasn't the right answer, "um, what was that?"

Jason started to repeat himself before Percy nodded and said, "yeah, after." Then he shivered at the suggestion of what Nico thought was the way to win...then he tapped his mind in frustration at feeling like he was missing something. He'd spent some good times at camp, but there was like a glitch in his mind. Ants? Bronze? Odd smell? Was he having a seizure?

"Are you going to share with the class?" Alex tried her hardest not to demand, but it was a struggle.

Percy and Nico exchanged looks, then Percy felt a sharp stabbing pain in his temple anew, making him hiss and causing the room to tremble as his mind tried to race around every avenue of that connected memory without assistance.

"Percy said he'd think about it," Nico offered. "Nothing was decided that night. Ms. Jackson was delightful and Mr. Blowfis shoved all of the left overs into my hands without taking no for an answer when I tried to leave, while Tyson spent the evening asking what every appliance in the kitchen did. A typical night there I'm sure."

Percy was smiling and relaxed again by the end, very unlike that evening, but a soothing balm on his conscience to have the rest of the night restored in such detail that it didn't take any part of him to offer. He was suddenly very grateful for whatever these other days were going to be, all the better to not think about that for a few moments more.

He also failed to mention as well as Nico had how resistant he'd initially been to the idea. He'd eaten that cake in three bites on Percy's windowsill and tried to just dish out the information and depart like some demon carrier pigeon, but Percy had insisted he wanted more explanation and there was more cake.

Nico's resistance had crumbled, but it was a reluctant kid who shuffled in the doorway and stayed in the shadows. Percy remembered wondering when was the last time he'd been around other people, if it was because they were mortals or so much older or just had flesh.

His mom had of course brought him right into the light and fawned over him so much Nico had been smiling like Percy hadn't seen in a long time.

Percy really hoped to push past all that...unless they were going to be focused on that topic before he had to start the war in this mini book? And this was him and Nico doing research into-

"They told you to call them Sally and Paul at least five times Nico," Percy instead went back to teasing and talking to him like normal. Far more normal even than ever before, just a casual friend.

"And it sounds rude and I can't make myself do it when she hugs me like that," Nico shrugged with his arms crossed. He wasn't sure he'd ever want to go back there, it was the warmest place he'd ever been to. It had given him whiplash that night from so long without anything like that and he was sure if he ever went there again he'd burrow into the hall closet and refuse to ever leave.

Nico noticed the hints of jealousy on all of their faces except Thalia, who was nodding in understanding, which was also very strange. Of the myriad of emotions he kept expecting to be on the receiving end of, that was never one of them, but he got it simply for meeting the famous Sally Jackson.

Jason sighed and muttered about getting through this as he went back to the tiny book, visions of blue cake he could have easily pulled from the fridge just not enough.

I heard these noises... SCREECH! "HIYA!"

"A ninja is fighting a bird?" Magnus tried to say with confidence, but it still sounded like a question.

"Heeya is almost yeehaw backwards, maybe it's a cowboy trapped in a mirror verse," Alex said with her usual full confidence of putting the strangest words of man into the world.

Like somebody was getting attacked by possessed poultry, and, believe me, that's a situation I've been in before.

Will sighed and rubbed at his ear again. He really hated those stupid stymphalian birds.

Nobody else seemed to notice the commotion. We were in the lab, so everybody was talking, and it wasn't hard for me to go look out the window while I pretended to wash out my beaker.

Sure enough, there was a girl in the alley with her sword drawn. She was tall and muscular like a basketball player, with stringy brown hair and jeans, combat boots and a denim jacket.

"Clarisse?" Percy demanded along with everybody else around him.

"I did not make up a description of a random person," Jason promised as he composed himself past his shock quick enough. Just because the last time he'd heard of Clarisse leaving camp she'd blown a cannon at a hydra and then had her own ship blown up and was then almost eaten by a cyclops over a firey pit didn't mean explosions followed her everywhere...it was just a really bad combination with Percy's also steller ability to cause explosions and fires wherever he went!

She was hacking at a flock of black birds the size of ravens.

Alex smiled with interest if any Norse myths were going to crossover like last time when a Roman god had been in that Labyrinth. Surely their excursion in this place at the bottom of the ocean couldn't be the first instance of their worlds overlapping.

Feathers stuck out of her clothes in several places. A cut was bleeding over her left eye. As I watched, one of the birds shot a feather like an arrow, and it lodged in her shoulder. She cursed and sliced at the bird, but it flew away.

"Should I feel bad that's kind of cool," Nico grinned.

"Clarisse would either body slam you to the floor or nod her approval depending on where her pride sat," Thalia shrugged in agreement; so the answer was he didn't really feel that bad at all anyways.

Unfortunately, I recognized the girl. It was Clarisse, my old enemy from demigod camp.

Causing the others to laugh in surprise and Jason to even lean behind Thalia to pat him on the shoulder as he said, "look at you finally learning to use that phrase right! She actually is your very first enemy, and you are old enough to have an old enemy now!"

"It really does just take a few years for any lesson to sink into his brain," Thalia rolled her eyes in agreement.

"I will throw feathers at all of you if you don't stop mocking my poor, innocent younger self," Percy sighed, causing even more laughter at the poor, innocent, pathetic threat instead while Percy joined in.

Clarisse usually lived at Camp Half-Blood year-round. I had no idea what she was doing on the Upper East Side in the middle of a school day, but she was obviously in trouble. She wouldn't last much longer.

I did the only the thing I could.

"Mrs. White," I said, "can I go to the restroom? I feel like I'm going to puke."

You know how teachers tell you the magic word is please? That's not true. The magic word is puke. It will get you out of class faster than anything else.

"Write that down, write that down!" Alex mock hissed at Jason like she was getting the secret to life.

"Don't have to tell me twice," Jason laughed in agreement.

"I bet she's worse than others too," Will grinned. "Mrs. White, let me guess, she's a huge germaphobe too."

"Yep," Percy agreed, which was kind of strange for a science teacher to freak out any time a kid so much as sneezed.

"I want to know if that's universal," Will said saintly. "I haven't tried that on Chiron."

"You slacker, I had more faith in you," Percy told him in mild disappointment.

"Go!" Mrs. White said.

I ran out the door, stripping off my safety goggles, gloves and lab apron. I got out my weapon – a ballpoint pen called Riptide.

"And here I was just thinking you should probably live in that getup," Thalia snorted. "You cause enough messes you might as well run around in safety gear!"

"I looked like a discount mad scientist," Percy sighed. "And all we were doing was learning how to burn water, I wasn't exactly at risk of my life."

There was an odd moment of concerned silence before Thalia said, "um, Percy, only you could burn water, the rest of us boil it."

"Yeah, I thought so to," he grinned. He couldn't remember every detail of the lecture they'd gotten before hand, something about hydrogen and energy and junk, but it was cool to see and he was glad he had before Clairsse showed up.

Nobody stopped me in the halls. I exited by the gym. I got to the alley just in time to see Clarisse smack a devil bird with the flat of her sword like she was hitting a home run. The bird squawked and spiralled away, slamming against the brick wall and sliding into a trashcan. That still left a dozen more swarming around her.

"Clarisse!" I yelled.

"Didn't you learn your lesson about that," Will sighed, looking as close to strangling Percy as he ever did. "Last time she got bowled over by Bad Cow Number One crashing into her and you broke your ankle, nearly setting our camp on fire!"

"You need to pay more attention Will," Percy said with a smirk. "We've just established I've only now started using the word old right, you think I'm going to remember something that happened years ago? About Clarisse!"

"He's got you there Will," Nico chuckled while Will sighed in defeat.

She glared at me in disbelief. "Percy? What are you doing –"

She was cut short by a volley of feather arrows that zipped over her head and impaled themselves in the wall.

"This is my school," I told her.

"Just my luck," Clarisse grumbled, but she was too busy fighting to complain much.

"To much," Alex noted with interest. "So she did complain a little and you just blocked it out."

"Something I've always been very good at no matter my age," Percy assured.

I uncapped my pen, which grew into a metre-long bronze sword, and joined the battle, slashing at the birds and deflecting their feathers off my blade. Together, Clarisse and I sliced and hacked until all the birds were reduced to piles of feathers on the ground.

"Teamwork!" Jason cried cheerfully. He was all about that any time it came up, and he always seemed weirdly fond of Clarisse to the others confusion.

"Yeah, yeah, we didn't all die again," Percy patiently agreed.

We were both breathing hard. I had a few scratches, but nothing major. I pulled a feather arrow out of my arm. It hadn't gone in very deep. As long as it wasn't tipped with poison, I'd be okay. I took a bag of ambrosia out of my jacket, where I always kept it for emergencies, broke a piece in half and offered some to Clarisse.

"If it isn't that bad then why are you risking that?" Magnus asked, vividly remembering he'd burst into flames or something as bad if he ate to much.

"Wouldn't you indulge every chance you got?" Percy asked with a grin, just to get a hint of that taste.

"Fair," Magnus muttered, even if it did sound weirdly risky, and they were only on the first page of Percy's latest stunts. It could only go downhill from here.

"I don't need your help," she muttered, but she took the ambrosia.

We swallowed a few bites – not too much, since the food of the gods can burn you to ashes if you overindulge. I guess that's why you don't see many fat gods.

"Or it's because they can change their shape at will," Thalia rolled her eyes at him.

"Why would they only change their shape at me?" Will asked innocently.

Nico snickered and Thalia looked more likely to chuck part of her seaweed beanbag at him than keep mocking Percy for a moment before Jason moved on.

Anyway, in a few seconds our cuts and bruises had disappeared.

Clarisse sheathed her sword and brushed off her denim jacket. "Well... see you."

"Hold up!" I said. "You can't just run off."

"Sure she can," Nico said blankly. "We all have lives that don't involve you Percy. You were her side quest for once."

Percy very much exaggerated his hurt expression, pressing his hand to his heart and everything, but Jason was to busy snickering at the next line of the book to let him play it up to much.

"Sure I can."

Causing the others to laugh in surprise and Nico sigh and decide there were worse people he could have mimicked.

"What's going on? What are you doing away from camp? Why were those birds after you?"

Clarisse pushed me, or tried to. I was too accustomed to her tricks. I just sidestepped and let her stumble past me.

"Clarisse and I perfect bullfighting, if anybody's trying to come up with alternate chapter titles," Alex offered.

"We were not," Percy sighed.

"Come on," I said. "You just about got killed at my school. That makes it my business."

"You got here there Perce," Thalia chuckled. "I always blame anything on you if it happens in your radius, and sometimes when it isn't."

"Yes! Minor victory," Percy cheered all the same.

"It does not!"

"Let me help."

She took a shaky breath. I got the feeling she really wanted to punch me out, but at the same time there was a desperate look in her eyes, like she was in serious trouble.

Their mild humor at this situation suddenly went sharp with concern. Clarisse was nobody's favorite person, but she wasn't the mindless bully anymore who just dumped people's heads into toilets. Was Chris okay? Was her dad doing worse than just verbally castrating her? Not even Will, Thalia, and Nico knew what was going on because this had never been on their radar.

"It's my brothers," she said. "They're playing a prank on me."

"Oh," I said, not really surprised. Clarisse had lots of siblings at Camp Half-Blood. All of them picked on each other. I guess that was to be expected since they were sons and daughters of the war god, Ares. "Which brothers? Sherman? Mark?"

Percy's assumption didn't feel unreasonable, some of the tension eased back out, but this answer didn't track with Clarisse doing anything other than walking away from Percy's help.

"No," she said, sounding more afraid than I'd ever heard her. "My immortal brothers. Phobos and Deimos."

Magnus looked traumatized anew. He even clapped a hand to his mouth, as if fearing anything else he ever asked about next was going to make an appearance at Percy's life.

"Chill Magnus," Percy sighed, "I can't say I'm surprised more children of Ares are making my life miserable."

He didn't move, and Alex reached over to begin trying to pry his fingers away.

"I can't say I'm pleased," Will sighed. "The major gods messing with your life causes me enough heart failure, now the minor gods are joining in."

"They weren't messing with Percy's life," Alex corrected, foot now firmly planted on the ground and actually tugging while Magnus kept his hand locked in place and glared at her. "They were messing, with, Clarisse!" They were kind of concerned what she was fixing to do if he didn't comply and a little more scared to get between them.

"That's, not better Alex," Will sighed just as much at her comment as he did in relief when she sat back anyways and signed something to him.

He stared at her a moment longer before lowering his hand and saying, "no," with a weary groan. He signed it as he said it, putting his pointer and middle finger together to tap against his thumb with his other fingers curled up.

"Thank you," she signed back with a smirk.

They were fascinated what she'd said, and Percy was blunt and curious enough to hope he'd get an answer. "What'd you say to him?"

"I asked if he wanted to be the next Oracle," she said proudly. "I just made that sign up too and he still knew what I meant."

"She mixed the signs for magic and mummy, it was very effective," Magnus admitted with a reluctant smile.

"He can't be a magic mummy prophecy thing if he keeps talking without guessing right," she concluded proudly.

We sat on a bench at the park while Clarisse told me the story. I wasn't too worried about getting back to school. Mrs. White would just assume the nurse had sent me home, and sixth period was woodwork class. Mr. Bell never took attendance.

Percy was smiling at the fact that he'd just been at school long enough to know that kind of teacher observation. He so rarely was anywhere that long.

"So let me get this straight," I said. "You took your dad's car for a joyride and now it's missing."

Magnus made a spluttering of laughter and Alex nodded in agreement. "The book needs to skip over what was actually said more and straight to your understanding of the situation."

"It would be bike jacking too, so I don't know what Percy heard," Jason offered with a bit less laughter, though not to much.

"Ares has a war chariot," Nico reminded with a grin of excitement if they were fixing to get a description of that sometime soon. "Apollo isn't the only one with a fancy ride, all of them have one. It might be what's going on, if Ares sent her to get that back when it was stolen."

"Mmm, I hope that's what's going on, karma," Thalia cackled at his comeuppance finally for his part in Zues's bolt being stolen.

"It's never occurred to me that's what his bike was," Will admitted looking back, "I just thought he created a bike made of human skin and darkness for funsies that one time."

"Why would gods even have chariots if they can just materialize wherever they want?" Magnus asked, his humor subsiding at yet another strange Greek thing.

"It would take twenty years to list all their insane things they do and have and said and did with no rhyme or reason," Thalia sighed.

"It's not a car," Clarisse growled. "It's a war chariot! And he told me to take it out. It's like... a test.

"Oh," Will blinked finally in understanding. He'd heard in passing of this cabin's right of passage, though Ares did it sparingly only to his children he thought were worthy. It was a great honor from what he understood, and yet he couldn't remember her bragging about this coming up one bit.

I'm supposed to bring it back at sunset. But –"

"Your brothers carjacked you."

"Chariot-jacked me," she corrected.

"Percy, you've won chariot races," Jason rolled his eyes at him. "Why are you acting like this is a new concept."

"Keeping Clarisse angry at me is my default," Percy said with an odd twist to his mouth. If he didn't keep her agitation on display, her voice started cracking, and that scared him more.

"They're his regular charioteers, see. And they don't like anybody else getting to drive. So they stole the chariot from me and chased me off with those stupid arrow-throwing birds."

"Your dad's pets?"

She nodded miserably. "They guard his temple. Anyway, if I don't find the chariot..."

She looked like she was about to lose it. I didn't blame her. I'd seen her dad, Ares, get mad before, and it was not a pretty sight. If Clarisse failed him, he would come down hard on her. Real hard.

And Percy would never let that happen to anyone, they all collectively understood without further explanation where this was headed. They still weren't sure why this memory of all things was being shown when the Titan's army was still amassing and Percy might be about to die any page now with his sixteenth birthday on the horizon, but it didn't seem to matter to him.

He was sitting up straight in his seat, a look of concentration on his face only there when he was settling in to help on the next deadly quest. Percy was going to take this seriously and help Clairesse, that's all they needed to know.

"I'll help you," I said.

Jason read past that as casually as if Percy were blushing around Annabeth again. It was just par for the course.

She scowled. "Why would you? I'm not your friend."

I couldn't argue with that. Clarisse had been mean to me a million times, but still, I didn't like the idea of her or anybody else getting beaten up by Ares. I was trying to figure out how to explain that to her when a guy's voice said, "Aw, look. I think she's been crying!"

"Bite him," Alex said at once in such a robust tone they thought she'd said fight for a hot second, but she was scowling so much it was kind of a coin toss.

Magnus couldn't shake the idea out of his head for a moment of Alex going around biting random people on the street if they laughed at people crying, and it did not disturb him as much as it probably should have.

A teenage dude was leaning against a telephone pole. He was dressed in ratty jeans, a black T-shirt and a leather jacket, with a bandanna over his hair. A knife was stuck in his belt. He had eyes the colour of flames.

In another life, that could have been Nico, Percy thought with distaste. This guy had a much stronger aura that instantly put Percy off though, the kind that made his fist ball up to try and hide the shaking like he'd just thrown Nancy Bobofit into that fountain all over again and Mrs. Dodds locked eyes with him. It was anger and fear all bundled up into one tight emotion he would happily lash out with as readily as Clarisse would on any person.

"Phobos." Clarisse balled her fists. "Where's the chariot, you jerk?"

"Whatever happened to corpse breath and Prissy?" Alex sighed. "She hasn't thrown out a good insult in ages."

"The angrier she gets the less imaginative," Percy shrugged. "If she ever calls you one syllable, run for your life."

"You lost it," he teased. "Don't ask me."

"You little –"

Clarisse drew her sword and charged, but Phobos disappeared as she swung, and her blade bit into the telephone pole.

Phobos appeared on the bench next to me. He was laughing, but he stopped when I stuck Riptide's point against his throat.

"Ha!" Will cried in triumph, before he blushed and looked around like he'd done something embarrassing cheering for Percy threatening to stab another god.

"That does tend to silence most people," Thalia said in agreement.

"You guys are lucky I've never tried it on any of you blabber mouths," Percy chuckled.

"You'd better return that chariot," I told him, "before I get mad."

He sneered and tried to look tough, or as tough as you can with a sword under your chin.

An expression Nico had once imagined on Percy's face, clawing his way towards a swimming pool as Luke followed him with his bloody sword point on that deck. Percy had still looked plenty intimidating in his mind, a deep angry scowl on his face ready to taunt to his last breath Luke would never win.

This guy had nothing on Percy even if he had managed it.

"Who's your little boyfriend, Clarisse? You have to get help fighting your battles now?"

"Chris isn't a violent guy is he?" Thalia chuckled. "I hope he doesn't challenge Percy to a duel to the death for this rumor getting a start."

"I will concede that fight, I don't take up every challenge I'm given," Percy promised with an amused dismissal.

"He's not my boyfriend!" Clarisse tugged her sword, pulling it out of the telephone pole. "He's not even my friend. That's Percy Jackson."

Something changed in Phobos's expression. He looked surprised, maybe even nervous. "The son of Poseidon? The one who made Dad angry? Oh, this is too good, Clarisse. You're hanging out with a sworn enemy?"

"The whole cabin kind of lives with him," Magnus rubbed at the back of his neck. "Is it really such high treason?" He wasn't naive enough to think Ares and his kin had forgiven him exactly, but Ares's curse had come and gone in Zoe's death, it hadn't been mentioned in a while, so he'd sort of hoped at least his kids weren't crouched in the shadows anticipating revenge.

"It's certainly not encouraged," Percy said from personal experience of none of his favorite people ever coming from there.

"I'm not hanging out with him!"

"True too," Jason chuckled, "Percy invited himself along, again. She could get a restraining order against you."

"I bet her criminal record is longer than mine," Percy scoffed.

Phobos's eyes glowed bright red.

Clarisse screamed. She swatted the air as if she were being attacked by invisible bugs. "Please, no!"

"Are all of Ares kids just, like this?" Alex asked in disgust. He was worse than Clarisse, a high feat considering she'd started out pretty bad but only gotten better. She had a feeling this guy wasn't going to get the same humanizing treatment his half-blood children did.

"I guess it's one of those things they can't help but inherit, like Zues's kids being all spark and no bite," Percy smirked, not even flinching as Thalia smacked him.

"What are you doing to her?" I demanded.

Clarisse backed up into the street, swinging her sword wildly.

"Stop it!" I told Phobos. I dug my sword a little deeper against his throat, but he simply vanished, reappearing back at the telephone pole.

"Don't get so excited, Jackson," Phobos said. "I'm just showing her what she fears."

The glow faded from his eyes.

Clarisse collapsed, breathing hard. "You creep," she gasped. "I'll... I'll get you."

Jason squirmed in his seat as he realized just how bad he felt for her. This minor god was everything wrong with Clarisse when she'd met Percy, and he wished Percy had lopped off his neck just so they could laugh as he grew it back. The idea felt like an invasion of his mind, something he'd never have dared to think before this he was positive, but he felt it to be true all the same.

Phobos turned towards me. "How about you, Percy Jackson? What do you fear? I'll find out, you know. I always do."

"Give the chariot back." I tried to keep my voice even.

"How strange for you to be scared of such a weirdly specific thing," Thalia smirked, laughing as Percy rolled his eyes at her.

"I took on your dad once. You don't scare me."

Phobos laughed. "Nothing to fear but fear itself. Isn't that what they say? Well, let me tell you a little secret, half-blood. I am fear. If you want to find the chariot, come and get it. It's across the water. You'll find it where the little wild animals live – just the sort of place you belong."

Magnus tried very hard not to cringe at the idea of Percy facing off against wild animals. He might be fond of the idea of Mrs. O'Leary now, but that didn't mean he wouldn't piss his pants and run for his life from her in person, and who knew what other monstrous wolf like creatures this guy had guarding the place.

"Are you going to the zoo!" Alex gasped with such child like delight it made it hard for Magnus to focus on anything else all of a sudden.

"I hope he puts it in the meerkat home if so," Percy chuckled along.

He snapped his fingers and disappeared in a cloud of yellow vapour.

"I always knew yellow could be an evil color if it just tried hard enough," Alex said seriously.

"Well that is certainly a topic for another day," Thalia said with interest.

Now, I've got to tell you, I've met a lot of godlings and monsters I didn't like, but Phobos took the prize.

"Is the prize being personally thrown into that pit?" Magnus asked with only mild sarcasm.

"If I could tie some flying shoes to his feet I would," Percy agreed.

I don't like bullies. I'd never been in the "A" crowd at school, so I'd spent most of my life standing up to punks who tried to frighten me and my friends. The way Phobos laughed at me and made Clarisse collapse just by looking at her... I wanted to teach this guy a lesson.

I helped Clarisse up. Her face was still beaded with sweat.

"Now are you ready for help?" I asked.

We took the subway, keeping a lookout for more attacks, but no one bothered us. As we rode, Clarisse told me about Phobos and Deimos.

"They're minor gods," she said. "Phobos is fear. Deimos is terror."

"What's the difference?" Magnus asked.

Jason chuckled without surprise as he read how Magnus had mimicked the book. Magnus just sighed while Percy gave him a nod. At least he wasn't the only one in the room.

"What's the difference?"

She frowned. "Deimos is bigger and uglier, I guess. He's good at freaking out entire crowds. Phobos is more, like, personal. He can get inside your head."

"That's where they get the word phobia?"

Percy cleared his throat with a significant smirk.

"Do you want a cookie Percy?" Thalia cooed.

"Yes," he sniffed, deciding if nobody else was going to take back their snark he'd indulge himself. Jason waited patiently as he went and came back munching on a handful before continuing.

"Yeah," she grumbled. "He's so proud of that. All those phobias named after him. The jerk."

"You know," Alex sighed, "I bet if he was an actual decent half-sibling, Clairesse would be bragging about this constantly instead. It's kind of almost cool in a way."

"So why don't they want you driving the chariot?"

"It's usually a ritual just for Ares's sons when they turn fifteen. I'm the first daughter to get a shot in a long time."

"That is so cool," Jason grinned with enough delight to make up for her rotten dad and horrible half-siblings, immortal and otherwise who apparently hadn't given her enough credit for this.

"Can't say she didn't earn it," Percy agreed, his voice more reluctant, but no less meaningful.

"Good for you."

"Tell that to Phobos and Deimos. They hate me. I've got to get the chariot back to the temple."

"Where is the temple?"

"Pier 86. The Intrepid."

"Did those words mean something to you?" Magnus asked Percy.

"About as much as clam chowder does to you," Percy shrugged. "I know what it is, but I'm not all up in arms about it."

How was it possible he kept managing to answer questions without actually answering them? Percy seriously needed to stop hanging out with Chiron. Magnus didn't harass him for more though, he was sure they'd find out when Percy and Clairesse got that chariot there.

"Oh." It made sense, now that I thought about it. I'd never actually been on board the old aircraft carrier, but I knew they used it as some kind of military museum. It probably had a bunch of guns and bombs and other dangerous toys. Just the kind of place a war god would want to hang out.

"Huh," Magnus said without a drop of interest. Turns out an answer was just as useless as no answer too.

"We've got maybe four hours before sunset," I guessed. "That should be enough time if we can find the chariot."

"But what did Phobos mean, "over the water"? We're on an island, for Zeus's sake. That could be any direction!"

"Did she not hear the part about the animals?" Alex looked a little pouty cute wild critters that could probably murder them all without the monsterus upgrade weren't everyones top priority.

"She was a little distracted," Will reminded. "Oh," he snapped his fingers in thought. "I bet it's in the boar exhibit!"

"Sweet! Pumba and hula skirts for everyone," Alex cheered. Even when they got the reference, they were all still pretty concerned by her.

"He said something about wild animals," I remembered. "Little wild animals."

"A zoo?"

I nodded. A zoo over the water could be the one in Brooklyn, or maybe... someplace harder to get to, with little wild animals. Someplace nobody would ever think to look for a war chariot.

"Staten Island," I said. "They've got a small zoo."

"Maybe," Clarisse said. "That sounds like the kind of out-of-the-way place Phobos and Deimos would stash something. But if we're wrong –"

"We don't have time to be wrong."

"Couldn't you two split up?" Nico frowned. "Whistle for Blackjack and a buddy, they fly faster and you could check both."

"I don't think Clairesse could handle these guys on her own, best to stick together," Percy shook his head, wishing instead he had time to get in contact with Grover or Annabeth for support.

He didn't say it with any kind of cockiness in his voice, he didn't think she'd make or break this all on her own without his help. It was more of a statement that he wanted to help her through this in whatever way he could.

We hopped off the train at Times Square and caught the Number 1 line downtown, towards the ferry terminal.

We boarded the Staten Island Ferry at three thirty,

It was getting on in the afternoon, school would be letting out soon, time was not on their side. What time did the zoo close? "I wish the zoo was open at night," Percy said sporadically.

"It is if you're not a coward," Alex sniffed.

along with a bunch of tourists, who crowded the railings of the top deck, snapping pictures as we passed the Statue of Liberty.

"He modeled that on his mom," I said, looking up at the statue.

"One of the many things I like about you Perce," Magnus chuckled in surprise. "Don't ever let someone tell you you don't listen."

"Huh?" Percy said distractedly, his mind to busy smiling back at when she'd told him this over fixing his straps before their last capture the flag game that summer. Spouting random architecture facts always helped her relax and he'd asked her about something to do with the Eiffel Tower and she'd gone off. They'd won the game.

Clarisse frowned at me. "Who?"

"Bartholdi," I said. "The dude who made the Statue of Liberty. He was a son of Athena, and he designed it to look like his mom. That's what Annabeth told me, anyway."

Clarisse rolled her eyes. Annabeth was my best friend and a huge nut when it came to architecture and monuments. I guess her egghead facts rubbed off on me sometimes.

Percy chuckled along with the others at that rather undersold summary of her. Annabeth was all that and so much more to him and he rarely if ever knew how to say any of it any better.

"Useless," Clarisse said. "If it doesn't help you fight, it's useless information."

"You're friends names aren't useless," Jason said back in a very weary kind of voice. He sounded almost scared. "Getting to laugh isn't useless. I doubt she thinks Chris is useless if he can't hold his own."

It was clearly a touchy subject to him, and with good reason, as Percy rubbed his own temple. Nobody who had their every thought and emotion stripped away would ever think of something they learned again as useless.

It was a harsh view, and one none of them bought Clairesse herself believed. Not after everything she'd been through to help Chris last summer, not after everything she'd done in the battle that followed to help tend the wounded.

I could've argued with her, but just then the ferry lurched like it had hit a rock. Tourists spilled forward, tumbling into each other. Clarisse and I ran to the front of the boat. The water below us started to boil. Then the head of a sea serpent erupted from the bay.

"We've been surprisingly lacking on sea monsters in your life," Magnus sighed as if this had been inevitable.

"A fact I didn't know to savor until it was gone," Percy nodded.

The monster was at least as big as the boat. It was grey and green with a head like a crocodile and razor-sharp teeth. It smelled... well, like something that had just come up from the bottom of New York Harbor. Riding on its neck was a bulky guy in black Greek armour. His face was covered with ugly scars, and he held a javelin in his hand.

"Deimos!" Clarisse yelled.

"At least it's him instead of some other minor Greek god deciding to have a day with you," Jason tried to offer something nice.

"I think I'd rather just have one worse day of my life where they all get it out of the way at once," Percy shook his head. "I'll find a way to have them all fight each other to the death while I eat my snacks and watch and then have to fight the winner."

"I think that would be Zues," Will said with only a slight whimper to his voice.

Percy shrugged and looked more interested in going back to the fridge.

"Hello, sister!" His smile was almost as horrible as the serpent's. "Care to play?"

"Do we get to pick the game?" Percy sighed.

"No," Nico frowned at the idea of this guy warping a thumb war into a deadly tournament anyways.

The monster roared. Tourists screamed and scattered. I don't know exactly what they saw. The Mist usually prevents mortals from seeing monsters in their true form, but whatever they saw, they were terrified.

"Loch ness monster," Alex grinned.

"Mega shark," Magnus sighed.

"Garbage barge getting to close," Thalia wrinkled her nose in disgust.

Percy dreaded the day any of them started manipulating the Mist, he had a feeling all of those options were still more terrifying than anything the god of terror could manage.

"Leave them alone!" I yelled.

"Or what, son of the sea god?" Deimos sneered. "My brother tells me you're a wimp!

"He shouldn't believe everything he hears," Jason rolled his eyes, "it leads to stupid rumors. Would he also believe Phobos if he said he saw Percy hooking up with Clarisse?"

Percy looked traumatized enough at the continued joke like all of them were actively trying to summon the brothers in here now to laugh along.

Besides, I love terror. I live on terror!"

He spurred the sea serpent into head-butting the ferry, which sloshed backwards. Alarms blared. Passengers fell over each other trying to get away. Deimos laughed with delight.

"That's it," I grumbled. "Clarisse, grab on."

"What?"

"Grab onto my neck. We're going for a ride."

She didn't protest.

Will smiled in surprise at the amount of trust Clairsse was showing in that moment. He knew the bully of a girl who had once made Magnolia Cresnt cry by ripping up her flowers would never have done such a thing.

She grabbed onto me, and I said, "One, two, three – JUMP!"

We leaped off the top deck and straight into the bay, but we were only underwater for a moment. I felt the power of the ocean surging through me. I willed the water to swirl around me, building force until we burst out of the bay on top of a ten-metre-high waterspout.*30 feet I steered us straight towards the monster.

Alex grinned with jealousy at Clarisse getting to experience that. She just knew the child of a war god was having an adrenaline rush right then and probably liked Percy plenty now for this awesome tactic. Clarisse might even stop threatening to kill him or something crazy.

"You think you can tackle Deimos?" I yelled to Clarisse.

"I'm on it!" she said. "Just get me within three metres."*ten feet

We barrelled towards the serpent. Just as it bared its fangs, I swerved the waterspout to one side, and Clarisse jumped. She crashed into Deimos, and both of them toppled into the sea.

The sea serpent came after me. I quickly turned the waterspout to face him, then summoned all my power and willed the water to even greater heights.

WHOOOOM!

Fifty thousand litres of salt water crashed into the monster. I leaped over its head, uncapped Riptide, and slashed with all my might at the creature's neck. The monster roared. Green blood spouted from the wound, and the serpent sank beneath the waves.

The forced environmentalist in Percy from all his time around Grover actually felt kind of bad for the animal...and also wondered how safe that blood was for the already deplorable water.

I dived underwater and watched as it retreated to the open sea. That's one good thing about sea serpents: they're big babies when it comes to getting hurt.

That got a good laugh from everyone in here, though the confused question from Nico, "when did you fight any of them to know this?"

"The fish talk," Percy chuckled. "Whenever I pop into the ocean, some of them even like to brag about witnessing fearsome fights that shook the ocean, and the retreating monster always has like, five missing scales."

Clarisse surfaced near me, spluttering and coughing. I swam over and grabbed her.

"Did you get Deimos?" I asked.

Clarisse shook her head. "The coward disappeared as we were wrestling. But I'm sure we'll see him again. Phobos, too."

Tourists were still running around the ferry in a panic, but it didn't look like anybody was hurt. The boat didn"t seem damaged. I decided we shouldn't stick around. I held onto Clarisse's arm and willed the waves to carry us towards Staten Island.

"Or next thing you know, the local paper's going to be calling you a boat terrorist," Thalia agreed.

"I'd get Tyson to try and clear my name," Percy tried to disagree, but knew she was more than likely right.

In the west, the sun was going down over the Jersey shore. We were running out of time.

I'd never spent much time on Staten Island, and I found it was a lot bigger than I thought and not much fun to walk. The streets curved around confusingly, and everything seemed to be uphill. I was dry (I never got wet in the ocean unless I wanted to) but Clarisse's clothes were still sopping wet, so she left mucky footprints all over the sidewalk,

"You can't dry other people's clothes?" Magnus asked in surprise.

"Apparently not through thought, though I was afraid Clairsse would break my fingers if I tried to pat her shoulder and find out," Percy admitted.

and the bus driver wouldn't let us on the bus.

"Did the guy come away from that with all of his face still attached?" Jason asked in mild concern.

"Yeah," Percy whispered, his heart sinking faster than the sun. Rather than getting angry, she'd watched it drive off with a concerningly red face and gasping breath that seemed closer to tears than Percy had ever wanted anyone to be, let alone her.

"We'll never make it in time," she sighed.

"Stop thinking that way." I tried to sound upbeat, but I was starting to have doubts too. I wished we had reinforcements. Two demigods against two minor gods was not an even match, and when we met Phobos and Deimos together, I wasn't sure what we were going to do. I kept remembering what Phobos had said: How about you, Percy Jackson? What do you fear? I'll find out, you know.

After dragging ourselves halfway down the island, past a lot of suburban houses, a couple of churches and a McDonald's,

Causing a smattering of giggles and some side eyed looks at Nico, who held his head with dignity and retorted before anyone could ask, "no, I was not hiding in the playpen keeping an eye on them."

"I just hope you try other fast food chains and some home cooked styles," Will didn't sound the least bit sarcastic at least. "Maybe the dead like tofu burgers too, you don't have to be brand loyal," he didn't manage to finish in the same way and fell off snickering too while Nico sighed but grinned at what they were mocking. Not his creepy death summons, just the food he'd used.

we finally saw a sign that said ZOO.

"Real subtle with that imagery," Percy chuckled.

"A blink and you'll miss it sign," Thalia agreed in confusion. The giant honking statue was the obvious tourist attraction, but surely this was on somebody's list to go to instead.

"I hope they label everything like that in there, keep it a theme," Jason grinned. "I don't want fancy plaques under each animal with their Latin name and their biome details, I just want it to say eagle. That's it, that's all you get..." He trailed off laughing as hard as everyone else.

We turned a corner and followed this curvy street with some woods on one side until we came to the entrance.

The lady at the ticket booth looked at us suspiciously, but thank the gods I had enough cash to get us inside.

We walked around the reptile house,

Magnus and Alex burst out laughing hard, quickly exchanging smiles and trying to stutter something about Percy releasing a boa, but it made no sense to anybody else and Percy thought them nuts anyways.

and Clarisse stopped in her tracks.

"There it is."

It was sitting at a crossroads between the petting zoo and the sea otter pond: a large golden and red chariot tethered to four black horses. The chariot was decorated with amazing detail. It would've been beautiful if all the pictures hadn't shown people dying painful deaths.

"Really is a mystery how she doesn't get along with you better Nico," Percy sighed. He'd only seen details like that on Hades's palace.

"We spend to much time arguing which is better," Nico said deadpan. "Causing death or being death."

The horses were breathing fire out of their nostrils.

Families with buggies walked right past the chariot like it didn't exist. I guess the Mist must've been really strong around it, because the chariot's only camouflage was a handwritten note taped to one of the horses' chests that said OFFICIAL ZOO VEHICLE.

"I bet Ares is really kicking himself right now he never thought to turn his ride into that," Jason said with full exaggeration.

"Must wear khakis to ride," Alex nodded seriously.

"Yes, I'll drive!" Will cheered.

"None of us have a license, I wouldn't get in a vehicle with any of you whackjobs," Nico lied through his teeth as he smiled along.

"Where are Phobos and Deimos?" Clarisse muttered, drawing her sword.

I couldn't see them anywhere, but this had to be a trap.

I concentrated on the horses. Usually I could talk to horses, since my dad had created them. I said, Hey. Nice fire-breathing horses. Come here!

One of horses whinnied disdainfully. I could understand his thoughts, all right. He called me some names I can't repeat.

"I bet Will could repeat them," Alex smirked.

Will sighed, mildly embarrassed for what he'd called Hera.

Percy couldn't even look that offended as he tried to say, "hey, I could say them! It's just, my moms got a thing against strong language too-"

Alex winced and nodded quickly in understanding that didn't need further elaboration.

"I'll try to get the reins," Clarisse said. "The horses know me. Cover me."

"Right." I wasn't sure how I was supposed to cover her with a sword, but I kept my eyes peeled as Clarisse approached the chariot. She walked around the horses, almost tiptoeing.

She froze as a lady with a three-year-old girl passed by. The girl said, "Pony on fire!"

It was a cute moment for five seconds, before they all sighed and remembered how Rachel had described how horrifying the world could be and nobody believed her. There went another child inbound for the same fate, unless she herself just happened to be a half-blood and was likely to deal with even worse. Percy might have just witnessed the first of many memories where she would try to believe the lies her mom told her.

"Don't be silly, Jessie," the mother said in a dazed voice. "That's an official zoo vehicle."

The little girl tried to protest, but the mother grabbed her hand and they kept walking. Clarisse got closer to the chariot. Her hand had almost reached the rail when the horses reared up, whinnying and breathing flames. Phobos and Deimos appeared in the chariot, both of them now dressed in pitch-black battle armour. Phobos grinned, his red eyes glowing. Deimos's scarred face looked even more horrible up close.

"The hunt is on!" Phobos yelled. Clarisse stumbled back as he lashed the horses and charged the chariot straight towards me.

Now, I'd like to tell you that I did something heroic, like stand up against a raging team of fire-breathing horses with only my sword.

"Uhhu, and that Chimera was really a chihuahua all along," Jason shook his head at Percy's internal thought still thinking them fools...which was a weird sentence the longer he thought about it.

The truth is, I ran. I jumped over a trashcan and an exhibit fence, but there was no way I could outrun the chariot. It crashed through the fence right behind me, ploughing down everything in its path.

"Percy, look out!" Clarisse yelled, like I needed somebody to tell me that.

"At least she's doing her due diligence and not, not helping," Nico snickered.

"Can't say she doesn't give clear and precise orders," Will agreed a tad more honestly.

"Revenge," Alex told a lot more seriously for all the times Percy did that to her.

I jumped and landed on a rock island in the middle of the otter exhibit. I willed a column of water out of the pond and doused the horses, temporarily extinguishing their flames and sending them into confusion. The otters weren't happy with me. They chattered and barked, and I figured I'd better get off their island quick, before I had crazed sea mammals after me too.

"I bet they swear more than the horses," Thalia chuckled.

"You're lucky they didn't start throwing their pups at you, trashing their home," Jason snorted.

I ran as Phobos cursed and tried to get his horses under control. Clarisse took the opportunity to jump on Deimos's back just as he was lifting his javelin. Both of them went tumbling out of the chariot as it lurched forward.

I could hear Deimos and Clarisse starting to fight, sword on sword, but I didn't have time to worry about it because Phobos was riding after me again. I sprinted towards the aquarium with the chariot right behind me.

"Hey, Percy!" Phobos taunted. "I've got something for you!"

"A white flag?" Magnus said without a hint of hope.

"Magnus, if you don't want to play anymore, just say so," Alex rolled her eyes. "He throws one of those otters at you in revenge!"

"I like Magnus's better," Percy sighed.

I glanced back and saw the chariot melting, the horses turning to steel and folding into each other like clay figures being crumpled. The chariot refashioned itself into a black metal box with caterpillar tracks, a turret and a long gun barrel. A tank. I recognized it from this research report I'd had to do for history class. Phobos was grinning at me from the top of a World War II panzer.

"Say cheese!" he said.

"Whatever happened to the easy monsters, like the math teacher just slicing me to ribbons?" Percy sighed.

"You need constant experience and new environments to learn to grow Percy," Thalia said in a pretty good imitation of Chiron's voice.

"You need a swift kick to the head and your turn at this," Percy scoffed. The annoying part was Thalia probably could take down a tank with just her bow without even pulling out her shield.

I rolled to one side as the gun fired.

KA-BOOOOM! A souvenir kiosk exploded, sending fuzzy animals and plastic cups and disposable cameras in every direction.

"I bet somewhere in those rocks Kampe' is cheering for him," Alex snorted.

"How do you keep managing to make this universe crazier Alex?" Percy groaned, now the vivid idea in his head of Phobos riding on her in mind.

"I'm just special that way," she grinned.

As Phobos re-aimed his gun, I got to my feet and dived into the aquarium.

I wanted to surround myself with water. That always increased my power. Besides, it was possible Phobos couldn't fit the chariot through the doorway. Of course, if he blasted through it, that wouldn't help...

"What do you need us for anyways Percy," Jason chuckled in surprise he'd been about to say the same thing. "You think all the good comments for yourself."

"Can I get that in writing Jason?" Percy smirked.

"Get what in writing?" He asked swiftly, turning back to the book like the smart kid he was.

I ran through the rooms washed in weird blue light from the fish tank exhibits. Cuttlefish, clown fish and eels all stared at me as I raced past. I could hear their little minds whispering, Son of the sea god! Son of the sea god! It's great when you're a celebrity to squids.

"I bet it is," Will snorted. "I can't imagine much impresses them!"

He spoke in that unique way where Percy wasn't sure if he was being sarcastic or not, so he just let that one slide.

I stopped at the back of the aquarium and listened. I heard nothing. And then... Vroom, Vroom. A different kind of engine.

I watched in disbelief as Phobos came riding through the aquarium on a Harley-Davidson. I'd seen this motorcycle before: its black flame-decorated engine, its shotgun holsters, its leather seat that looked like human skin. This was the same motorcycle Ares had ridden when I'd first met him, but it had never occurred to me that it was just another form of his war chariot.

"It really wouldn't have made any less sense for him to have just created that out of thin air or this," Magnus sighed.

"I'm surprised he didn't use the tank!" Alex yelped.

"Hello, loser," Phobos said, pulling a huge sword out of its sheath. "Time to be scared."

"I did not set my alarm for this!" Percy groaned.

"You don't set your alarm for anything," Thalia rolled her eyes.

I raised my own sword, determined to face him, but then Phobos's eyes glowed brighter, and I made the mistake of looking into them.

Jason hesitated at once, watching Percy intently.

It took him a moment to realize he was silently asking permission. Like this would finally be the thing so embarrassing and so private he'd yank the baby yellow book away and declare them all off limit to his thoughts. These guys had read every dumb, stupid, Annabeth related, illegal, and illogical thing he'd ever done, and they still checked in with him to make sure they weren't crossing a line as nobody tried to rush Jason.

Percy just shrugged and waved him on.

Suddenly I was in a different place. I was at Camp Half-Blood, my favourite place in the world, and it was in flames. The woods were on fire. The cabins were smoking. The dining pavilion's Greek columns had crumbled and the Big House was a smouldering ruin. My friends were on their knees pleading with me. Annabeth, Grover, all the other campers.

Save us, Percy! they wailed. Make the choice!

Percy shivered, his stomach a painful twisted fire all its own he wished he could wrap in a nonflammable lab coat and goggles.

The interesting thing was though, as he wrapped his arm around himself and curled in tight for the vivid memory of that paralyzing, painful idea, was where it was hurting. Not his head, not tormenting his memory. Just the idea of this still sickened him, and that was its own host of problems he didn't know how to dissect.

I stood paralysed. This was the moment I had always dreaded: the prophecy that was supposed to come about when I was sixteen. I would make a choice that would save or destroy Mount Olympus.

Now the moment was here, and I had no idea what to do. The camp was burning. My friends looked at me, begging for help. My heart pounded. I couldn't move. What if I did the wrong thing?

Thalia's heart truly went out for him. She wasn't surprised in the slightest to hear all that, it had once been her greatest fear too. She'd passed this on to him, and he'd stepped up and accepted it so Nico wouldn't know this burden.

She could have never stepped out of this fear like she already knew he would.

Then I heard the voices of the aquarium fish: Son of the sea god! Wake!

Suddenly I felt the power of the ocean all around me again, hundreds of litres of salt water, thousands of fish trying to get my attention. I wasn't at camp. This was an illusion. Phobos was showing me my deepest fear.

I blinked and saw Phobos's blade coming down towards my head. I raised Riptide and blocked the blow just before it cut me in two.

"Saved by the fish," Thalia snorted in surprise. "Oh, I hope you liberate them all by dumping that place into the ocean so they don't turn into fish sticks!"

"This probably is the greatest thing to ever happen in their little lives, we have cuddle fish to thank for your existence," Will agreed way to excitedly, like he was fixing to demand a cuddle and it kind of scared Percy.

"One of these days, I'm going to do something so awesome and epic, none of you chuckleheads will come up with some smart-ass response," Percy said with no amount of confidence.

"Please," Alex smirked in a way as if taking on a bet, and Percy swallowed in horror, immediately scolding himself of five seconds ago and whatever other memory he'd just provoked into Alex's line of sight.

I counterattacked and stabbed Phobos in the arm. Golden ichor, the blood of the gods, soaked through his shirt.

"Does that do anything?" Magnus couldn't help but ask with disgust in his tone, Thalia had just mentioned eating fish sticks. "In Christian myth they like, symbolically eat their god through bread and wine. Does that stuff help make your ambrosia?"

Percy felt a sudden need to vomit violently at the suggestion. He really felt the need to get Magnus tested for ADHD or a psycho-analysis, definitely one of those.

"Certainly in some myths their blood is referenced," Will said without even batting an eye. "A few monsters were said to be powered by it," he didn't say which out loud, as one theory was Talos. "It's not actually as common as Percy makes it seem for the gods to bleed though, so nothing that specific, I think."

"Only Will's allowed to answer my questions now," Magnus decided, since that answer hadn't scared the piss out of him.

Will pursed his lips and felt instantly bad he'd kind of been lying. Magnus's question was in fact one interpretation of their godly food, none of the kids at camp just liked to acknowledge it...so it was more a lie of omission.

Phobos growled and slashed at me. I parried easily. Without his power of fear, Phobos was nothing. He wasn't even a decent fighter. I pressed him back, swiped at his face, and gave him a cut across the cheek. The angrier he was, the clumsier he got.

"He didn't just flee?" Alex quirked a brow in surprise. "Ares did when you finally got a stab in, so this guy's just a smidge better than his dad."

"I will not be dishing out compliments to any of them," Percy scoffed.

I couldn't kill him. He was immortal. But you wouldn't have known that from his expression. The fear god looked afraid.

Thalia threw her head back laughing in delight. It was quite an evil laugh and there really should have been lightning crackling behind her, but Percy merely gave her a high five of delight as he smirked along.

Finally I kicked him backwards against the water fountain. His sword skittered into the ladies room.

"Using your own curse against him, you are something to strive for Perce," Jason snickered along.

"Enough, with the bathroom guys!" Percy groaned.

"Not a chance," Alex scoffed.

I grabbed the straps of his armour and pulled him up to face me.

"You're going to disappear now," I told him. "You're going to stay out of Clarisse's way. And if I see you again, I'm going to give you a bigger scar in a much more painful place!"

Nico couldn't help the breath that escaped him, the stab of heat that washed through him. Yeah, that was hot.

He ducked his head and ran a very embarrassed hand through his hair to hide such a thing in hopes Will wouldn't notice. That was still okay to think with Will's arm around him...right?

He gulped. "There will be a next time, Jackson!"

And he dissolved into yellow vapour.

I turned towards the fish exhibits. "Thanks, guys."

Then Nico felt all the more embarrassed at how kind he found that act. Percy thanking the fish felt very much in the same way he thanked his skeletons. Apparently that crush was still in there, or at least parts of Percy he still greatly admired.

Then Will called in delight, "aw, Percy! Your mom would be so proud! You didn't even need a Nereid to remind you that time!"

He sounded so sincere, he really wasn't mocking Percy but just happy he was over there showing gratitude. Maybe it was all the mystery surrounding a Big Three Kid Nico would never get, maybe it was just Will, but Nico still found it plenty charming too...and leaving him just as confused.

Then I looked at Ares's motorcycle. I'd never ridden an all-powerful Harley-Davidson war chariot before, but how hard could it be? I hopped on, started the ignition, and rode out of the aquarium to help Clarisse.

"That gave me seven more kinds of terror than that God ever could," Jason shivered at the idea of Percy with that kind of power.

"Annabeth would be drooling right now if she heard that," Thalia rolled her eyes, causing Percy to turn a whole new color of red as he blushed and stammered at her like his tongue had been decompressed.

I had no trouble finding her. I just followed the path of destruction.

"How we always find Clarisse at camp too when we need to go looking for her," Will chuckled.

"You do it the hard way," Thalia scoffed, "I just shout as loud as I can about how Ares's sacred animal should have been a chicken and she comes running."

"Yeah, but Thalia, I don't wish to die," Will groaned.

"Your loss," she shrugged, "she's great practice, better than half the monsters you'll find in that forest."

Fences were knocked down. Animals were running free. Badgers and lemurs were checking out the popcorn machine. A fat-looking leopard was lounging on a park bench with a bunch of pigeon feathers around him.

Alex hummed with pleasure at the mention of some of her favorite animals. She loved sneaking into zoo's to get more ideas of what to turn into. The mayhem at every corner and Percy once again putting gods in their place somehow just made this trip sound even better.

I parked the motorcycle next to the petting zoo, and there were Deimos and Clarisse in the goat area. Clarisse was on her knees. I ran forward but stopped suddenly when I saw how Deimos had changed form. He was Ares now – the tall god of war, dressed in black leather and sunglasses, his whole body smoking with anger as he raised his fist over Clarisse.

"You failed me again!" the war god bellowed. "I told you what would happen!"

He tried to strike her, but Clarisse scrambled away, shrieking, "No! Please!"

There was no room for shock or denial in them, it's not as if this had been subtle at any point in time. Just more than enough anger that Ares should come sniffing around hoping for a fight so Percy could stab him somewhere even better this time. Will would have even been happy to cuss up a storm if that would have attracted him faster.

If this were a true memory or just a nightmare becoming reality, the fact was, Percy wasn't going to let it go any farther.

"Foolish girl!"

"Clarisse!" I yelled. "It's an illusion. Stand up to him!"

Deimos's form flickered. "I am Ares!" he insisted. "And you are a worthless girl! I knew you would fail me. Now you will suffer my wrath."

I wanted to charge in and fight Deimos, but somehow I knew it wouldn't help. Clarisse had to do it. This was her worst fear. She had to overcome it for herself.

You could only help someone so much, Magnus well knew from seeing it time and again. If someone didn't want to be helped, they never would change. Clarisse was strong, he wanted her to fight back, but even if she didn't have it in her, Percy would never just stand there and let the worst happen if she couldn't and lived with this forever.

"Clarisse!" I said. She glanced over, and I tried to hold her eyes. "Stand up to him!" I said. "He's all talk. Get up!"

"Unlike his daughter," Thalia agreed savagely. Clarisse was her word. That girl did not postulate and pretend to be the toughest girl at came. She strived for it. A worthy huntress if she'd ever consider it.

"I... I can't."

"Yes, you can. You're a warrior. Get up!"

She hesitated. Then she began to stand.

An old chant came to Nico's mind, one he found himself uttering now. Not quite a summons, more like an empowerment to help the spirits stay longer if you had a need for them or had to wrestle for control. The shadows on the wall danced. They seemed angry, and vengeful, but it didn't scare anyone this time as they swirled about. They wanted to be free of here, not come closer.

"What are you doing?" Ares bellowed. "Grovel for mercy, girl!"

Clarisse took a shaky breath. Very quietly, she said, "No."

"WHAT?"

She raised her sword. "I'm tired of being scared of you."

Deimos struck, but Clarisse deflected the blow. She staggered but didn't fall.

Will felt a burn pass through him, the kind that made the world turn red. Clarisse had earned her father's respect and gotten his blessing, but she should have been granted it here too. How Ares had restrained himself he didn't know, she should have been burning as bright for this as he felt.

"You're not Ares," Clarisse said. "You're not even a good fighter."

"Can Clarisse get disowned for that?" Jason asked with a bit of worry amongst his pride though. He didn't want her to get in even more trouble for making Ares's immortal kids look bad. Percy was one thing, Clairsse could receive his actual wrath.

"I don't care," Percy's grin was too infectious, the kind of bright eyed energy that could take on every Olympian without batting an eye. He'd get his dad to adopt her or something.

Deimos growled in frustration. When he struck again, Clarisse was ready. She disarmed him and stabbed him in the shoulder – not deep, but enough to hurt even a godling.

He yowled in pain and began to glow.

"Look away!" I told Clarisse.

We averted our eyes as Deimos exploded into golden light – his true godly form – and disappeared.

We were alone except for the petting zoo goats, which were tugging at our clothes, looking for snacks.

"Dang it, nobody told me Grover was there in spirit too!" Alex snickered.

"I'm going to throw pellets at you," Jason sighed at her.

"Clarisse would be thanking me for taking those sappy looks off your faces," Alex sniffed with confidence.

The motorcycle had turned back into a horse-drawn chariot.

Clarisse looked at me cautiously. She wiped the straw and sweat off her face. "You didn't see that. You didn't see any of that."

I grinned. "You were great."

"The correct answer, Percy, was 'see what? I didn't see anything!'" Thalia told him in exasperation.

"Didn't get that memo," Percy shrugged. They hadn't seen the surprised smile on her face, and he was used to ignoring what Clarisse said anyways.

She glanced at the sky, which was turning red behind the trees.

"Get in the chariot," Clarisse said. "We've still got a long ride to make."

A few minutes later we reached the Staten Island Ferry and remembered something obvious: we were on an island. The ferry didn't take cars. Or chariots. Or motorcycles.

"Um, it's a godly vehicle," Magnus said blankly. "Are you telling me it obeys the laws of physics and needs a road?"

"I, didn't think to test that theory," Percy admitted. He and Clriasse had definitely been in panic mode by the color of the sky.

...and boy was that new for Magnus pointing this out for once! Alex found herself beaming. Their little boy was growing up!

"Great," Clarisse mumbled. "What do we do now? Ride this thing across the Verrazano Bridge?"

We both knew there wasn't time. There were bridges to Brooklyn and New Jersey, but either way it would take hours to drive the chariot back to Manhattan, even if we could fool people into thinking it was a regular car.

Then I got an idea. "We'll take the direct route."

Clarisse frowned. "What do you mean?"

I closed my eyes and began to concentrate. "Drive straight ahead. Go!"

Clarisse was so desperate she didn't hesitate.

Jason looked so jazzed in his seat, laughing up a storm he tried to read through. "I always knew she'd do great on your quests! She's actually trusted you all day and this is going to be so cool in your next fight when you two team up with Annabeth and the monsters won't know what hit them!"

"Yeah Jace, really looking forward to that," Percy said in exasperation, mostly for his entirely correct and yet way to much enthusiasm for their next deadly adventure on the horizon.

She yelled, "Hiya!" and lashed the horses. They charged straight towards the water. I imagined the sea turning solid, the waves becoming a firm surface all the way to Manhattan. The war chariot hit the surf, the horses' fiery breath smoking all around us, and we rode the tops of the waves straight across New York Harbor.

Magnus missed the days when that would have been the weirdest thing he'd hear in his life. After a moment of consideration though, he found himself instead realizing what he really still missed was Hearth and Blitz. This, this was just something he was indeed used to.

We arrived at Pier 86 just as the sunset was fading to purple. The USS Intrepid, temple of Ares, was a huge wall of grey metal in front of us, the flight deck dotted with fighter aircraft and helicopters. We parked the chariot on the ramp and I jumped out. For once I was glad to be on dry land. Concentrating on keeping the chariot above the waves had been one of the hardest things I'd ever done. I was exhausted.

"I'd better get out of here before Ares arrives," I said.

Clarisse nodded. "He'd probably kill you on sight."

"Pfft, let him try," Alex scoffed with complete confidence.

"Let him not," Percy's tone was a surprise; soft, a tad concerned. The last time he'd pissed that guy off, Zoe had died for it. His sons might not have enacted some curse on his blade before they'd vanished, but for all he knew, Clarisse was going to suffer next for their win this day.

"Congratulations," I said. "I guess you passed your driving test."

"Bet we can't make illegal copies out of that license," Percy sighed in disappointment.

"Bet I know some people who still try," Will groaned, Alex and the Stolls at the top of his list.

She wrapped the reins around her hand. "About what you saw, Percy. What I was afraid of, I mean –"

"I won't tell anybody."

Percy winced, muttering an apology into the universe and still wishing to curse out whatever god had done this to him. Not for his sake, but because Clarisse had no more say in her life being exposed than Annabeth and Grover.

"We promise not to speak of word of this to Clarisse," Thalia offered in return.

"Speak for yourself," Jason still had that crazy smile in place like he was going to demand of her as soon as possible what it had felt like to stab a god and then be in their godly glow. He had Percy's account, but more perspectives could only be better!

Thalia elbowed him, hard, and he yelped in surprise then pouted and muttered a promise along with everyone else they'd take this secret to the grave to stave off embarrassing the poor girl. She'd been through enough.

She looked at me uncomfortably. "Did Phobos scare you?"

"Yeah. I saw the camp in flames. I saw my friends all pleading for my help and I didn't know what to do. For a second, I couldn't move. I was paralyzed. I know how you felt."

Jason looked around at Percy with even higher regards than before in his eyes. Percy could have just said yeah and left it at that making Clriasse feel he was lying considering he'd come to her rescue.

Instead, Percy had somehow given the perfect answer. She could have known he'd needed help to snap out of it too, but Percy had a little to much pride of his own to share that, and if he had Clarisse probably would have thought he was still a liar. He really knew everyone in camp so well, it made him jealous and all the more respectful towards him.

She lowered her eyes. "I, uh... I guess I should say..." The words seemed to stick in her throat. I wasn't sure Clarisse had ever said thank you in her life.

"Don't mention it," I told her.

I started to walk away, but she called out, "Percy?"

"Yeah?"

"When you, uh, had that vision about your friends..."

"You were one of them," I promised. "Just don't tell anybody, okay? Or I'd have to kill you."

A faint smile flickered across her face. "See you later."

"See you."

I headed off towards the subway. It had been a long day, and I was ready to go home.

"All done," Jason said in surprise when he flipped the page and saw a new chapter title.

"Not that this wasn't as thrilling as any other thing we've heard about your life," Magnus said as he got up to get the book, "but why were we shown that again, like this? Aside from getting a day in the life of Clarisse's miserable side of the family, this wasn't anything I'd think we wouldn't have found out about from some passing comment of yours." Then again the books, his memories, whatever, weren't prone to glossing over to much, so perhaps this was just significant for a reason they weren't seeing.

"Don't look at me, I have no idea what order this is going in," Percy shrugged. It would have been nice if that had instead been from Clarisse's perspective to give him a real break. Ah well, he wasn't going to be complaining about one more memory back.

#pjo #Percy Jackson #clarisse la rue #Jason Grace #Thalia Grace #nico di angelo #will solace #alex fierro #Magnus Chase #reading the books #HDYSG

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halothenthehorns · 5 months

Text

Chapter 6: NICO BUYS HAPPY MEALS FOR THE DEAD

Even when Percy looked moments away from torturing Will just to get an answer out of somebody what happened on this quest, Nico licked his lips nervously before he could start anew. Would it be awkward to ask if it was all in his head every time he got this book it seemed like a worse than usual chapter?

Then he read the new title and sunk low in his seat, waiting for the bombardment of freaking out that would ensue about his next death entrapment of them all.

"Well that was very considerate of you, but I have questions," Magnus tried to begin as politely as ever. "Do they prefer chicken nuggets or burgers? What toys were available?"

"When it says buy, like where did you get the money?" Alex asked with diabolical interest. "Did you ask your dad for it? Try to pay them in drachmas? Mythomagic cards?"

"I'm over here hoping he didn't threaten the cashier with that sword," Jason admitted.

Nico was only blushing a tiny bit as he smiled at them. "Um, a bit of all three." He'd tried to ask Hades for money and information, but hadn't even made it past the front gates of his palace before he was bared by the fury's telling him now wasn't a good time.

Minos had helped him with the details among his own research and he'd just stolen the rest.

That unfortunate incident with the chicken nuggets and the dog chasing him out of the car would not be discussed.

At least I got a good night's sleep before the quest, right?

"Do you jinx yourself on purpose?" Thalia asked him in concern. "Like, you do know when you throw questions like that out into the universe, you're just going to get slapped with the opposite answer."

"I'm starting to get that, yeah," Percy mock rubbed his cheek.

"Will it stop him from doing it?" Alex snorted.

"Nope," Magnus sighed.

Wrong.

"So, should I just start wishing for a horrible night's sleep?" Percy groaned.

"Percy, I don't think anything can fix, whatever this mess of your life is," Jason told him with nothing but sympathy.

"I've already tried shock therapy, so I'm out of ideas," Thalia agreed cheerfully.

That night in my dreams, I was in the stateroom of the Princess Andromeda. The windows were open on a moonlit sea. Cold wind rustled the velvet drapes.

"There is either a really inappropriate dream about to take place, or a nightmare with monsters and dead people," Magnus shivered at that setup.

"My money's on both, Luke's nighttime routine with one of those bear twins," Alex rubbed his hands together. Magnus mock vomited over the side of the couch, though for a moment they weren't sure if he was faking it.

Luke knelt on a Persian rug in front of the golden sarcophagus of Kronos.

In the moonlight, Luke's blond hair looked pure white. He wore an ancient Greek chiton and a white himation, a kind of cape that flowed down his shoulders. The white clothes made him look timeless and a little surreal, like one of the minor gods on Mount Olympus. The last time I'd seen him, he'd been broken and unconscious after a nasty fall from Mount Tam. Now he looked perfectly fine. Almost too healthy.

Percy shivered with the kind of forbidden knowledge nobody could joke away. Somewhere inside his head was the answer to that mystery, and as his stomach churned while he looked down at his own shaking hands, he didn't think he was going to like the answer he'd inevitably get.

"Our spies report success, my lord," he said. "Camp Half-Blood is sending a quest, as you predicted.

Nico really hated that word, traitor. He knew everybody at camp thought he was one bad day away from being one himself. He'd really never gotten to know Silena that well to be calling her anything.

Our side of the bargain is almost complete."

They were already to late, Jason frowned in concern. Their quest hadn't even started and Krono's forces were almost guaranteed through the maze at their convenience. His heart thudded painfully in his chest as he imagined the camp in ashes- No, surely Thalia and Will weren't that good of actors. They'd be more than mildly distressed at this if that were the case. Annabeth's quest had come through, somehow.

Excellent. The voice of Kronos didn't so much speak as pierce my mind like a dagger. It was freezing with cruelty. Once we have the means to navigate, I will lead the vanguard through myself.

"The sarcophagus doesn't grow legs, does it?" Magnus asked in concern.

"Let's be more concerned if he's almost about to leave the coffin," Alex shook his head sharply. "What the heck kind of deal was struck to cause that?"

There was no answer except Thalia playing with her bracelet. She was grateful they didn't seem to connect Luke's life force with Krono's, it was such a twisted bit of magic she couldn't stand to link the two herself.

Luke closed his eyes as if collecting his thoughts. "My lord, perhaps it is too soon. Perhaps Krios or Hyperion should lead—"

No. the voice was quiet but absolutely firm. I will lead. One more heart shall join our cause, and that will be sufficient. At last I shall rise fully from Tartarus.

"Who the heck is that special last someone going to be?" Alex wasn't really joking even as he laced his voice with sarcasm. "Is it going to be some sweet underdog story about an invisible person finally feeling seen by Luke? Is it going to be some mad powerhouse?"

"We really need to take away whatever the heck is feeding his imagination," Percy told Thalia as he watched Alex.

"Or bottle it and use it as a weapon," Thalia agreed.

"But the form, my lord..." Luke's voice started shaking.

Jason shivered right along with him. Was it terror? Excitement? He didn't know which was worse, but any answer wasn't going to be great for Percy.

Show me your sword, Luke Castellan.

"I didn't even think this guy had a last name," Percy jolted in surprise. "I thought he was just born Luke Evil, or Luke Son of Hermes, and just dropped it to Luke."

Thalia didn't even have the heart to smack him for being an idiot. Sooner than she'd like, Percy would know all to well what came attached with the last name of Castellan.

A jolt went through me. I realized I'd never heard Luke's last name before.

"Annabeth never cursed it in front of you," Alex agreed, "we didn't get to hear Chiron chasing him around and yelling it."

"Now we just need to know his middle name, surely then somebody can do an evil spell to curse him or something," Magnus agreed.*

"We're not the fae folk Magnus, that's not how that works," Thalia couldn't help but snicker at him, keeping to herself Luke's middle name was Oro in case anybody wanted to try.

It had never even occurred to me.

Luke drew his sword. Backbiter's double edge glowed wickedly—half steel, half celestial bronze. I'd almost been killed several times by that sword.

"You've almost been killed several times by being in school too and we don't go around reminding you of that," Will said.

"Yes you do, frequently!" Percy yelped.

"It was a silly detail Percy, we assume everything's tried to kill you at this point, including the kitchen sink with lava in it," Magnus rolled his eyes.

It was an evil weapon, able to kill both mortals and monsters. It was the only blade I really feared.

Nico's hand twitched uncomfortably to his own sword that could do the same. That was branded the same. The only difference was his blade had never tried to kill Percy. He hoped that distinction would be enough nobody would try to disarm him if the truth of what he carried came out.

You pledged yourself to me, Kronos reminded him. You took this sword as proof of your oath.

"Yes, my lord. It's just—"

You wanted power. I gave you that. You are now beyond harm. Soon you will rule the world of gods and mortals. Do you not wish to avenge yourself? To see Olympus destroyed?

A shiver ran through Luke's body. "Yes."

Thalia knew in that moment she could hear that a thousand more times and it would still hit her fresh and raw every time. It just wasn't the same person to her. Luke might as well have died instead of her and come back as someone else.

The coffin glowed, golden light filling the room. Then make ready the strike force. As soon as the bargain is done, we shall move forward. First, Camp Half-Blood will be reduced to ashes. Once those bothersome heroes are eliminated, we will march on Olympus.

"It's an honor to be so bothersome we have to be eliminated before the gods," Percy said with all the snap of a dragon.

"C-compliments?" Will agreed hesitantly.

There was a knock on the stateroom doors. The light of the coffin faded.

"Does Kronos only talk to him?" Alex asked with his head tipped to the side. "Like, imaginary friend style?"

"I can't imagine why, I'm surprised there isn't a speaker attached to his lid so the whole ship can hear him monologuing," Jason rolled his eyes.

Luke rose. He sheathed his sword, adjusted his white clothes, and took a deep breath.

"Come in."

The doors opened. Two dracaenae slithered in—snake women with double serpent trunks instead of legs. Between them walked Kelli, the empousa cheerleader from my freshman orientation.

"This book stays rated K right?" Magnus asked with mild concern for their joke from the beginning of the chapter getting another uncomfortable piece set in.

"How should I know? How do you rate monsters turning to dust, because it's pretty traumatic to any age from where I'm sitting," but Percy looked just as queasy why she'd walked in like this was a red carpet ceremony.

"Hello, Luke," Kelli smiled. She was wearing a red dress and she looked awesome,

"The highest amount of praise a teenage boy can give," Thalia snorted.

"Oh gods, please nobody ever tell Annabeth I called an empousa awesome before her," Percy groaned, causing a round of snickering he really didn't approve of.

"You told her she was going to do awesome on this quest," Will reminded fairly without dropping his smile. "I think she'd give you a pass on the demon that's supposed to be hot."

but I'd seen her real form. I knew what she was hiding: mismatched legs, red eyes, fangs, and flaming hair.

"What is it, demon?" Luke's voice was cold. "I told you not to disturb me."

Magnus mock wiped sweat from his brow Luke was disgusted with her. Now they'd just get death threats and insults...though it did make him wonder why Luke apparently didn't have an attraction to her like Percy had.

Kelli pouted. "That's not very nice. You look tense. How about a nice shoulder massage?"

"I wouldn't let that thing near any part of my body," Jason shivered. "I'm not banking on the fact she'd just drink from my neck."

"Good instincts," Alex approved.

Luke stepped back. "If you have something to report, say it. Otherwise leave!"

"I don't know why you're so huffy these days. You used to be fun to hang around."

Thalia would have rather been slapped than realize she'd ever think the same thing as Kellie, and yet the sick feeling in her gut only seemed to settle in at home. How long exactly had these two been hanging out for her to claim this?!

"That was before I saw what you did to that boy in Seattle."

"Oh, he meant nothing to me," Kelli said. "Just a snack, really. You know my heart belongs to you, Luke."

"My heart belongs to my snacks too," Alex frowned. "Whatever she did to that boy in Seattle has to be something alright."

Magnus had a very concerning look on his face as he struggled with the idea of whether he wanted to know details of that or not. What could she have done that was so awful even this guy deemed it too horrible?

"Thanks, but no thanks. Now report or get out."

Kelli shrugged. "Fine. The advanced team is ready, as you requested. We can leave—" She frowned.

"What is it?" Luke asked.

"A presence," Kelli said. "Your senses are getting dull, Luke. We're being watched."

She scanned the stateroom. Her eyes focused right on me. Her face withered into a hag's. She bared her fangs and lunged.

"Eep!" Magnus jumped in his seat no matter the lack of harm that was coming to him. "Can you die in your dreams!"

"Gods I hope not, I've had enough close calls," Percy was rubbing his chest in here plenty to prove it had been real enough to him too.

I woke with a start, my heart pounding. I could've sworn the empousa's fangs were an inch from my throat.

Percy's trembling fingers brushed over his thumping pulse one last time too. Not a reminder he needed, but when did he ever get a say in those?

Tyson was snoring in the next bunk. The sound calmed me down a little.

"I would have thought it was the ocean," Thalia snorted.

"To each their own, hopefully Annabeth snores," Jason snickered.

I didn't know how Kelli could sense me in a dream,

"I really didn't question that to much," Magnus admitted, "or I'd just fall back down the rabbit hole of wondering how she even existed."

but I'd heard more than I wanted to know. An army was ready. Kronos would lead it personally.

"So what specifically in that would you like to know less about?" Alex frowned. "Because I'm personally interested in any details I can get how to stop that!"

"The part about what they'd be wearing while doing it," Percy rolled his eyes.

"But the details make it!" Alex looked personally wounded.

All they needed was a way to navigate the Labyrinth so they could invade and destroy Camp Half-Blood, and Luke apparently thought that was going to happen very soon.

I was tempted to go wake up Annabeth and tell her, middle of the night or not.

"Regardless of those pesky, man-eating harpies inflicting curfew huh?" Will chuckled.

"Percy is the reason the curfew exists," Jason said in exasperation.

"Nuhu!" Percy yelped. "The Aphrodite kids, or heck the Hermes kids are far worse about that!"

"You're the only person in your cabin, so you get all the blame," Thalia reminded with a smirk.

"So are you," Percy shot back. He felt instantly bad for it though, as Thalia winced and looked away. Clearly that was a bit of a sore subject to her, she probably would have preferred if he'd reminded she was responsible for all of the trouble Artemis's Huntresses got up to when there.

Then I realized the room was lighter than it should have been. A blue and green glow was coming from the saltwater fountain, brighter and more urgent than the night before. It was almost like the water was humming.

I got out of bed and approached.

No voice spoke out of the water this time, asking for a deposit. I got the feeling the fountain was waiting for me to make the first move.

"You're grasping a fountains nonverbal cues better than anything Annabeth has ever actually said to you," Magnus snorted.

"Note to self, teach your cousin sign language too," Alex chuckled.

I probably should've gone back to bed. Instead I thought about what I'd seen last night—the weird image of Nico at the banks of the River Styx.

"You're trying to tell me something," I said.

No response from the fountain.

"It's perfectly normal to talk to inanimate objects," Will said innocently. "It's when they start talking back you should be worried."

"How many cups of coffee has that taken?" Nico asked slyly.

Will blushed and decided against answering.

"All right," I said. "Show me Nico di Angelo."

I didn't even throw a coin in, but this time it didn't matter. It was like some other force had control of the water besides Iris the messenger goddess.

Nico still disliked this coming up as much as ever, because he could never ask what the heck was going on. Would his sister have had different abilities than him, was this a manifestation of using the Mist like Thalia could? If she could send messages to Percy, why couldn't she do the same for him?!

He knew the answer though, no matter how many warnings she would have sent about not trusting Minos and to stop what he was doing, he most likely wouldn't have listened until something else had happened, like Percy saving his stupid life. Again.

The water shimmered. Nico appeared, but he was no longer in the Underworld. He was standing in a graveyard under a starry sky.

"It's good to get out and check the scenery every now and then," Alex nodded as if this had been a serious concern of his.

Thalia twirled her bracelet around and decided Nico might not want to know the Huntress's own ideas of his sister looking down on him from those stars. They might not all get a constellation, but they were a part of Artemis up there.

Giant willow trees loomed all around him.

He was watching some gravediggers at work. I heard shovels and saw dirt flying out of a hole. Nico was dressed in a black cloak. The night was foggy.

"Really setting the mood I hear, all you're missing is the ominous fire," Alex chuckled.

"I avoid human sacrifices if it's not convenient," the morbid joke slipped out only after a moment of hesitation. He finally got the reaction he was expecting too, Alex laughed.

It was warm and humid, and frogs were croaking. A large Wal-Mart bag sat next to Nico's feet.

"Which I really hope isn't left there when you're done, or somebody's going to end up on Grover's shit list," Jason grinned.

"One of the very few lists I strive to stay off of," Nico promised.

"Is it deep enough yet?" Nico asked. He sounded irritated.

"Nearly, my lord." It was the same ghost I'd seen Nico with before, the faint shimmering image of a man. "But, my lord, I tell you, this is unnecessary. You already have me for advice."

"I want a second opinion!" Nico snapped his fingers,

Will hummed with appreciation on that. "You should have like, three at minimum before making whatever life-altering decisions go into digging up holes."

"Next time you'll be the third," Nico promised, not bothering to hide his amusement.

and the digging stopped. Two figures climbed out of the hole. They weren't people. They were skeletons in ragged clothes.

"Cooool," Alex grinned. "How long have you been at this? And you've already got minions at the tip of your fingers!"

"Um," Nico kept finding himself grinning in surprise somebody said cool in regards to him. "Just that past month. It used to take a lot of effort to concentrate and resurrect them without passing out."

Will couldn't help a frown at the end, watching Nico with concern how somebody could say that casually. Who had been there for Nico when he woke up? Just some old ghost?

Nico just saw the frown, and the concern, and swallowed anxiously if he'd finally freaked Will out. Alex interrupted with, "Sweet, and you could do it down here?" Alex was starting to eye the walls in a bit of a concerning way.

"Probably," Nico shrugged nonchalantly. "There's plenty of skeletons in the ocean to pull from if I wanted to try, though it's easier pulling them from the soil for some reason."

"Please do not," Magnus did not care his voice cracked, it seemed to encourage Nico to move on just that touch faster.

"You are dismissed," Nico said. "Thank you."

"Politeness!" Will chuckled. Nico felt a tiny breath of relief come loose he'd rather not dwell on. He didn't need anybody's opinion.

The skeletons collapsed into piles of bones.

Percy still looked mildly disturbed, but it was definitely at the bottom of strange things he'd seen.

"You might as well thank the shovels," the ghost complained. "They have as much sense."

"Maybe we should thank the shovels too," Thalia sniffed. "I actually do owe my shield a thanks or too for saving my hide."

"I knew a guy who named his vacuum," Percy shrugged.

"That ghost sounds like he's being disrespectful on purpose," Jason frowned. "He's no different than them, just floating there. Is he saying he shouldn't be thanked for all his advice?" His creepy, murdery advice Nico shouldn't be around.

"It wasn't part of the ceremony, just something, I wanted to do," Nico said with a sad smile. He didn't have any specific memories of his mother encouraging manners or anything, but he liked to think that would have made her smile. It had just felt like the natural thing to do.

Nico ignored him. He reached into his Wal-Mart bag and pulled out a twelve-pack of Coke. He popped open a can. Instead of drinking it, he poured it into the grave.

"There had better be some serious reason you're wasting perfectly good Coke," Percy told him tragically.

Nico gave him an awkward smile he couldn't say yes. It hadn't gone remotely as planned. Did Percy consider everything he did a waste?

"Let the dead taste again," he murmured. "Let them rise and take this offering. Let them remember."

He dropped the rest of the Cokes into the grave and pulled out a white paper bag decorated with cartoons. I hadn't seen one in years, but I recognized it—a McDonald's Happy Meal.

He turned it upside down and shook the fries and hamburger into the grave.

"In my day, we used animal blood," the ghost mumbled. "It's perfectly good enough. They can't taste the difference."

"I will treat them with respect," Nico said.

"What's the difference? The grease, I mean, Greek of it all?" Alex snickered at his almost pun.

"The principal," Nico grinned. "It adds that little bit of extra mph," he even sprinkled his fingers like his sister was adding a last dash of cinnamon.

"Mmm, the perfect ingredient then," Alex laughed as he even smacked his lips.

"At least let me keep the toy," the ghost said.

"Be quiet!" Nico ordered.

"Well now you're just not being nice Nico," Percy grinned. "You should always bring enough of those for everybody."

"You can be quiet too," but there was nothing but an exasperated sigh in Nico's voice for knowing he could never make Percy Jackson do that.

He emptied another twelve-pack of soda and three more Happy Meals into the grave, then began chanting in Ancient Greek. I caught only some of the words—a lot about the dead and memories and returning from the grave. Real happy stuff.

"All we're missing is the ball pit," Percy tried to say without sounding too queasy.

The grave started to bubble. Frothy brown liquid rose to the top like the whole thing was filling with soda. The fog thickened. The frogs stopped croaking. Dozens of figures began to appear among the gravestones: bluish, vaguely human shapes. Nico had summoned the dead with Coke and cheeseburgers.

"That is some serious mojo my dude," Magnus told him. He didn't think he sounded that terrified that somebody he now knew, like actually in person, treated this as their casual Saturday night. It was more strange to him than the idea of having a roof over his head again.

"There are too many," the ghost said nervously. "You don't know your own powers."

"As much as I don't trust this ghost, I don't think it's great he's the one cautioning you over that when he's just begging you to do some wild stuff," Jason frowned.

"Yeah, yeah," Nico muttered inaudibly. Like he needed another person to tell him what an idiot he'd been for having Minos around.

Jason heard the reluctance in his voice, he realized he'd said something wrong, but he wasn't sure what. He glanced awkwardly between Percy and Nico, who had been more awkwardly still trying at stilted conversation and avoiding each other all morning, and then Will who looked as confused and concerned as he felt. He felt a flash of sadness for Nico, it didn't seem like he'd made many great friends since his sister's death, he certainly never went around mentioning someone he'd rather have down here who would know what had upset him.

"I've got it under control," Nico said, though his voice sounded fragile.

He drew his sword—a short blade made of solid black metal. I'd never seen anything like it. It wasn't celestial bronze or steel. Iron, maybe? The crowd of shades retreated at the sight of it.

"I've been meaning to ask about that," Alex looked so eager, they could literally not predict what was about to come out of his mouth. "Where'd you get the sword? Does they have a name?"

"Um," Nico looked more baffled at his sword being called a they. Was Riptide a they? "It doesn't have a name, and it's a long story," he sighed. "It involves a clown, a fish, and I'm pretty sure Phil hasn't forgiven me for wrecking that statue, so, later."

"You mean, a clown-fish?" Percy tried to correct.

"No, no, fish, clown, two separate dudes," Nico shrugged.

It wasn't even the top twenty weirdest things any of them had tried to wrap their heads around. Alex still looked very much like he was going to protest until he got this story in detail, but Nico was trying to keep reading and had once again masterfully maneuvered out of sharing his own autobiography Alex was clearly after from all of them.

"One at a time," Nico commanded.

A single figure floated forward and knelt at the pool. It made slurping sounds as it drank. Its ghostly hands scooped French fries out of the pool.

"I really want to say eww here," Thalia looked far to intrigued to sound right anyways, "but I'm more curious what would happen if anybody other than a ghost drank that."

"To clarify, it takes you chanting, right?" Magnus asked with a heavy frown. "Because if I start shoveling fries, a burger, and a coke all at once and swallow, I will blame the consequences on you."

"I promise not to chant over your food while you're eating," Nico said with a little to much of a wicked smile to encompass that promise he'd never chant around him. "Seriously though Thalia, it wouldn't have an effect on anything but a ghost, the ritual just gives them back their human form. So, unless you lost it, it would just taste normal."

"Huh," she grinned, very curious if Artemis knew about this ritual and used it to commune, or if the gods even needed such a thing and could freely interact with any ghosts from their past that lingered.

When it stood again, I could see it much more clearly—a teenage guy in Greek armor. He had curly hair and green eyes, a clasp shaped like a seashell on his cloak.

Percy wondered how self-centered it was of him to feel very awkward that an obvious ancestor of his had been the one to get to drink.

Then Alex laughed enthusiastically and ruined the idea it was just his idea. "I'm really getting the impression why Percy thought you wanted his soul though just from this moment. What are the odds of that one Nico?"

Nico looked like he was going to keel over from stress rather than answer.

Percy swooped in anyways, pigheaded or not, "a child of Poseidon got to the water fountain first, it's a matter of pride!"

Alex just gave one last chuckle and was clearly going to let it go, while Nico took deep breaths and fought back tears of shame how stupid obvious his obsession had been. How Percy wasn't cringing in disgust away from him as far as he could he didn't know.

"Who are you?" Nico said. "Speak."

The young man frowned as if trying to remember. Then he spoke in a voice like dry, crumpling paper: "I am Theseus."

"Cool!" Jason yelped like he'd just gotten the best birthday present and the rest could all stay in their wrappings. "Can you summon back any hero of old?!" The idea of being able to converse with The Caligula for any length of time and ask him about all his rulings and advice sounded like a dream!

"Not exactly," Nico said sullenly. If he could just call his sister up like this whenever he pleased, he liked to think he wouldn't always feel so alone.

Jason didn't ask any further questions, though it was obvious he really wanted to.

No way, I thought. This couldn't be the Theseus. He was just a kid. I'd grown up hearing stories about him fighting the Minotaur and stuff, but I'd always pictured him as this huge, buff guy. The ghost I was looking at wasn't strong or tall. And he wasn't any older than I was.

"That was just depressing," Will frowned. The age of manhood back then had been like fifteen or something. In theory, they all knew the heroes of old had been about the age they were now.

To hear it described so vividly though only emphasized the idea no demigod in history had really gotten an easy life.

"How can I retrieve my sister?" Nico asked.

Theseus's eyes were lifeless as glass. "Do not try. It is madness."

"Does a ghost telling you something's mad make that better or worse?" Magnus asked.

"I'm going to leave that up to the ghost your questioning," Alex shrugged as if this were an every day occurrence for him.

"Just tell me!"

"My stepfather died," Theseus remembered. "He threw himself into the sea because he thought I was dead in the Labyrinth.

"Tragic," Jason said with sympathy.

"Now see, why couldn't my life parallel that story," Percy huffed.

"Because if Sally pushed Gabe off the roof she never would have discovered her passion for the arts," Thalia tragically reminded.

I wanted to bring him back, but I could not."

Nico's ghost hissed. "My lord, the soul exchange! Ask him about that!"

Theseus scowled. "That voice. I know that voice."

Percy felt like there was a mosquito bite on his brain. Something he longed to scratch at but knew he shouldn't or it would just get worse.

"No you don't, fool!" the ghost said. "Answer the lord's questions and nothing more!"

"I know you," Theseus insisted, as if struggling to recall.

"How did Theseus die again?" Magnus asked wearily. "Does dying affect your memory?"

"Very much so," Nico sighed. "They're specters who forgot themselves without the ritual, and even then, it won't all come back."

"And, um, let's just say it wasn't a happy ending I'd want to end up with," Percy said with a wince. He remembered stories about sons of Poseidon mildly better than others and hoped his powers never failed him when he was thrown into the ocean.

"Right," Magnus agreed reluctantly, realizing he probably shouldn't ask again unless it was about the original Perseus.

"I want to hear about my sister," Nico said. "Will this quest into the Labyrinth help me win her back?"

Will's laugh was nothing but sympathetic. "I'd help you out no problem Nico, with anything other than this."

Nico smiled. Will had already said as much, but it was still nice to hear.

"Win her back?" Jason couldn't help but fret over that word. "Is the labyrinth a game and you win a prize?" The dread in his voice made it sound like one he didn't think he'd participate in if given the chance.

"There are many things to discover down there," Nico answered as cryptically as possible.

Theseus was looking for the ghost, but apparently couldn't see him. Slowly he turned his eyes back on Nico. "The Labyrinth is treacherous. There is only one thing that saw me through: the love of a mortal girl. The string was only part of the answer. It was the princess who guided me."

"We don't need any of that," the ghost said. "I will guide you, my lord. Ask him if it is true about an exchange of souls. He will tell you."

"A soul for a soul," Nico asked. "Is it true?"

"A part from the absolute ick factor of that being discussed," Alex said cheerfully, "are we going to get details on how that would work?"

"No," Nico said flatly. The little he'd gleaned from Minos had put him off this idea until his last desperate attempt with nothing left to lose. He would not be sharing what he'd considered doing to Daedalus' soul to retrieve Bianca's with it.

"I—I must say yes. But the specter—"

"Just answer the questions, knave!" the ghost said.

Suddenly, around the edges of the pool, the other ghosts became restless. They stirred, whispering in nervous tones.

"Anything that makes a ghost nervous and I am out," Magnus muttered.

Then again, Nico obviously made them nervous, so maybe that was a little to broad. He still wasn't happy about whatever was coming next, he knew that much.

"I want to see my sister!" Nico demanded. "Where is she?"

"He is coming," Theseus said fearfully. "He has sensed your summons. He comes."

"It's not Hades is it?" Alex asked, sounding far to much like that's something he wanted to happen. "I am honestly expecting him to show up any time now to scold you for messing with this stuff, all the underground talk, the ghosts, it fits perfectly!"

"It was not Hades," but Nico wasn't going to elaborate any more than that. He was not looking forward to that stupid ranch anymore than he was that stupid cavern with Pan.

"Who?" Nico demanded.

"He comes to find the source of this power," Theseus said. "You must release us."

"The one occasion I will always agree the pronoun game is the worst," Alex shook his head with disgust. "Just say his bloody name!"

"He forgot the name of the ghost following Nico around he obviously knows, he might not know whoever it is that's about to show up, just that he doesn't want to be around him," Jason offered halfheartedly.

The water in my fountain began to tremble, humming with power. I realized the whole cabin was shaking. The noise grew louder. The image of Nico in the graveyard started to glow until it was painful to watch.

"Stop," I said out loud. "Stop it!"

The fountain began to crack. Tyson muttered in his sleep and turned over. Purple light threw horrible, ghostly shadows on the cabin walls, as if the specters were escaping right out of the fountain.

In desperation I uncapped riptide and slashed at the fountain, cleaving it in two. Salt water spilled everywhere, and the great stone font crashed to the floor in pieces. Tyson snorted and muttered, but he kept sleeping.

"Man, that was like, the coolest thing too," Alex pouted.

"Hopefully Tyson can fix it," Magnus offered.

I sank to the ground, shivering from what I'd seen. Tyson found me there in the morning, still staring at the shattered remains of the saltwater fountain.

"Nico," Will managed through numb lips. "What happened?"

"I got caught," he shrugged with the kind of nonchalance of this being an everyday occurrence.

Then again, they were all presently kidnapped, so maybe it wasn't such a traumatizing thing the second go around. Better company here anyways.

Just after dawn, the quest group met at Zeus's Fist.

"Where Luke was tied up and this problem was resolved in a timely manner for once?" Magnus sighed.

"I'm starting to get worried about your active delusions man, what are you eating over there," Percy shook his head. "If ever something went that easy, I'd be convinced I was being had."

I'd packed my knapsack—thermos with nectar, baggie of ambrosia, bedroll, rope, clothes, flashlights, and lots of extra batteries. I had Riptide in my pocket. The magic shield/wristwatch Tyson had made for me was on my wrist.

"At least they packed the essentials," Will said in relief, but then continued in a rather concerned tone, "but what about the snacks?"

Nico fought hard to smother a snort of mirth as he looked at this blonde guy in shorts and flip-flops. This was probably his first time ever leaving camp down here. It was all so innocent it almost hurt him.

It was a clear morning. The fog had burned off and the sky was blue.

Campers would be having their lessons today, flying pegasi and practicing archery and scaling the lava wall. Meanwhile, we could be heading underground.

"And they're all jealous of each other," Alex chuckled.

"Are you nuts?" Will looked at him scandalized. "We were all thanking our lucky stars we weren't heading to the place that didn't have grass! We all pitched in and held a thank you seminar Percy and Annabeth were at camp to do this quest!"

"Thanks man," Percy sighed. At least he knew Will was joking that time...or he'd somehow hadn't been invited to a seminar about him and he really wasn't upset about it.

Juniper and Grover stood apart from the group. Juniper had been crying again, but she was trying to keep it together for Grover's sake. She kept fussing with his clothes, straightening his rasta cap and brushing goat fur off his shirt.

Percy recalled watching that with a dull sense of confusion. Like that was something his mom would have been doing, not a girlfriend. His eyes had flickered to Annabeth at the time, who had been staring at the rock as if it were going to move and crush her any moment. He'd reached over and zipped a pouch on her backpack left half open without her noticing like that would be of any help.

It had felt silly and stupid at the time, he was really grateful she hadn't noticed then, and the book not mentioning it now.

Since we had no idea what we would encounter, he was dressed as a human, with the cap to hide his horns, and jeans, fake feet, and sneakers to hide his goat legs.

"One of these days I just want you to not though," Thalia grinned. "The amount of people who will just think he's walking around in the weirdest outfit ever would be so much fun."

"We'll get him a cane so everybody will be to awkward to look long too," Percy agreed indulgently.

Chiron, Quintus, and Mrs. O'Leary stood with the other campers who'd come to wish us well, but there was too much activity for it to feel like a happy send-off. A couple of tents had been set up by the rocks for guard duty. Beckendorf and his siblings were working on a line of defensive spikes and trenches. Chiron had decided we needed to guard the Labyrinth exit at all times, just in case.

"What do you mean? That sounds like the best sendoff ever," Jason smiled. "You get to come back and see all the improvements they made, like a then and now skeleton in the works!"

He seemed to be missing the detail they were doing all that in case they didn't come back, and nobody had the heart to correct him.

Annabeth was doing one last check on her supply pack. When Tyson and I came over, she frowned. "Percy, you look terrible."

"The standard morning greeting," Percy sighed.

"He killed the water fountain last night," Tyson confided.

Alex clasped his hands as if blessing the book for that particularly strange sentence.

"What?" she asked.

Before I could explain, Chiron trotted over. "Well, it appears you are ready!"

"It is criminal he is that excited first thing in the morning, let alone about this," Will sighed.

"He's probably lacing his morning hay with coffee beans," Nico agreed.

He tried to sound upbeat, but I could tell he was anxious. I didn't want to freak him out any more, but I thought about last night's dream, and before I could change my mind, I said, "Hey, uh, Chiron, can I ask you a favor while I'm gone?"

"Of course, my boy."

"Be right back, guys." I nodded toward the woods. Chiron asked an eyebrow, but he followed me out of earshot.

"Last night," I said, "I dreamed about Luke and Kronos." I told him the details. The news seemed to weigh on his shoulders.

"I feared this," Chiron said. "Against my father, Kronos, we would stand no chance in a fight."

Chiron rarely called Kronos his father. I mean, we all knew it was true.

"You didn't until he told you," Thalia snorted.

"I assume other kids around camp actually look up the myths. I just wait to live it all out in person," Percy shrugged.

Everybody in the Greek world—god, monster, or Titan—was related to one another somehow. But it wasn't exactly something Chiron liked to brag about. Oh, my dad is the all-powerful evil Titan lord who wants to destroy Western Civilization. I want to be just like him when I grow up!

"How I imagine every rich brat talks to be honest," Magnus scoffed.

"It's a good thing Chiron lives off the saddlebags on his back then and is nothing like them," Jason chuckled.

Thalia smiled to herself they had no idea they'd met a rich brat, and Rachel would have been laughing right along with them.

"Do you know what he meant about a bargain?" I asked.

"A bargain is offering one exchange for another, usually with one person getting a much better deal," Magnus smirked.

"Now if only you knew the definition of shutting up, then we'd have it made," Percy chuckled.

"I am not sure, but I fear they seek to make a deal with Daedalus. If the old inventor is truly alive, if he has not been driven insane by millennia in the Labyrinth...well, Kronos can find ways to twist anyone to his will."

"Maybe Daedalus is insane, and Kronos will twist him all the way back into being sane, and then you swoop in and rescue him," Alex offered.

"That sounds like a lot of twists and turns," Percy sighed. "Any chance we can just skip to the part where he's on our side?" Then Percy winced for reasons beyond him.

"Then we'd lose out on all your brilliant commentary," Will mock pouted.

"I could live without some of it," Percy huffed. He most certainly wouldn't have advertised his every embarrassing mistake for starters.

"Not anyone," I promised.

Percy smiled with pride for that, until he noticed Thalia's uneasy little wince. He settled quietly into his seat beside her and didn't draw attention to that which Nico had read over without a single bit of surprise.

Chiron managed a smile. "No. Perhaps not anyone. But, Percy, you must beware. I have worried for some time that Kronos may be looking for Daedalus for a different reason, not just passage through the maze."

"What else could he want?" Magnus frowned. "How many things can he get from one dude."

"Hercules has defeated everything in the past," Percy reminded in exhaustion just thinking about him. "It's more than possible Daedalus had more than one thing going on."

"What else would he want?"

"Something Annabeth and I were discussing. Do you remember what you told me about your first trip to the Princess Andromeda, the first time you saw the golden coffin?"

I nodded. "Luke was taking about raising Kronos, little pieces of him appearing in the coffin every time someone new joined his cause."

"Still disgusting and terrifying by the way," Will promised as if anyone had forgotten that.

"And what did Luke say they would do when Kronos had risen completely?"

A chill went down my spine. "He said they would make Kronos a new body, worthy of the forges of Hephaestus."

"Kronos clearly needs to get caught up on all the AI movies proving why that won't turn out like he wants," Jason snorted.

"Indeed," Chiron said. "Daedalus was the world's greatest inventor. He created the Labyrinth, but much more. Automatons, thinking machines...What if Kronos wishes Daedalus to make him a new form?"

"He could tell him no," Alex said stoutly. "That powers within anybody's control!"

"I don't think it worked out so well with that evil king," Magnus reminded uneasily. They didn't yet know what had happened to him and his son from that, but going by the history of all these Greek stories, he was guessing, not well.

That was a real pleasant thought.

"If pleasant means bone chilling," Thalia muttered, getting her own flashes of that all over at just the thought of that reveal.

"We've got to get to Daedalus first," I said, "and convince him not to."

Jason frowned as he wondered how far Percy would be willing to go to convince him though. What level of favor would Percy consider to get Daedalus on his side? Would he kidnap the inventor and drag him back to camp just to keep him away from Kronos against his will?

Chiron stared off into the trees. "One other thing I do not understand...this talk of a last soul joining their cause. That does not bode well."

"Must be a pretty special soul to complete such a ritual," Alex said with an almost serious face for a moment before following it up with, "so I guess that leaves Percy out."

"He's got you there," Magnus snorted, "New Yorker's are one in a million."

Percy laughed along at them downplaying this, as well as trying to take some comfort perhaps if his was the soul needed at least that meant this would never happen.

I kept my mouth shut, but I felt guilty. I'd made the decision not to tell Chiron about Nico being a son of Hades. The mention of souls, though—

Magnus and Alex exchanged surprised, uneasy looks for that. They already knew Kronos would be begging to get Nico on their side by any means necessary, but if Percy's guess was right and he was somehow the child of the prophy meant to help drag Kronos's soul the rest of the way out...well they already knew Minos was evil and could be up to something far worse. What if all this talk of helping bring Bianca back was just practice to get Nico ready for something far worse?

What if Kronos knew about Nico?

"We still haven't gotten clarification how anybody knows anything around here," Will shook his head as if this were a mild concern, "no sense in useless worries until then." He bit back the exclamation Nico would have been safer at Camp in the meantime whether anybody knew his parentage or not only because Kronos was no longer a threat. He'd just have to come up with other arguments.

What if he managed to turn him evil?

"He's literally hanging around with an evil ghost and still making morally ambiguous almost good decisions about not wanting to murder people," Jason reminded with a casual shrug. "I like his chances."

"Thanks," Nico muttered in surprise.

It was almost enough to make me want to tell Chiron, but I didn't. For one thing, I wasn't sure Chiron could do anything about it.

"I'll give you that one," Will agreed briskly. He didn't exactly do a stellar job of the campers already under his care.

"Even the best marksman has a limited range," Thalia said with a bit more sorrow. Even if Chiron couldn't have done anything, he surely would have appreciated a heads-up just in case he could later.

I had to find Nico myself. I had to explain things to him, make him listen.

"Strapping someone in a chair for a lecture is worse than anything Kronos would do to him," Magnus reminded.

"I'd offer snacks?" Percy said.

"Nico?" Magnus let him pass judgment.

He considered for a moment, his stomach in knots over the last time he'd let Percy make him listen. It had only opened a whole other can of worms he was still processing.

So for now, he waved his hand and said, "I'll consider it."

"I don't know," I said at last. "But, uh, something Juniper said, maybe you should hear." I told him how the tree nymph had seen Quintus poking around the rocks.

"Which I'm still mildly offended you didn't do yesterday," Jason scowled, "or her, when this happened!" The safety of their home was not something that should be trifled with!

"Juniper's not great with people," Percy reminded, "and I've had, like, a million other things on my mind!"

"Which is 999,999 more than he usually does," Thalia smirked.

Chiron's jaw tightened. "That does not surprise me."

"What does surprise him is when we spend Father's Day hiding his arrows from him and call it advance practice," Will chuckled. He realized after the fact he was probably being a little to nonchalant about this when he got some strange looks for that, or they just didn't think it was funny. Probably the first though.

"It doesn't sur—you mean you know?"

"Percy, when Quintus showed up at camp offering his services...well, I would have to be a fool not to be suspicious."

"Fair enough," Percy huffed, he still thought somebody could have at least gasped.

"Then why did you let him in?"

"Because sometimes it is better to have someone you mistrust close to you, so that you can keep an eye on him.

"I always hated that saying," Alex scowled, "the adage only works in enclosed spaces to know what your enemy is doing intimately, and even then if they're clever enough they'll pull a wool over your eyes. Otherwise, it's safe to be as far away as possible. Or just kill them."

It wasn't much of a guess which Alex leaned towards.

"There's a certain strategy in both," Jason passively said.

He may be just what he says: a halfblood in search of a home. Certainly he has done nothing openly that would make me question his loyalty. But believe me. I will keep an eye—"

Annabeth trudged over, probably curious why we were taking so long.

"What, is she jealous Percy's having a conversation without her in it for a change?" Alex chuckled.

"She's probably convinced Percy will monopolize himself into being Chiron's new favorite," Magnus mock agreed.

"Percy, you ready?"

I nodded. My hand slipped into my pocket, where I kept the ice whistle Quintus had given me. I looked over and saw Quintus watching me carefully.

He raised his hand in farewell.

Our spies report success, Luke had said. The same day we decided to send a quest, Luke had known about it.

"That's happened the last few quests though where he's up to date," Magnus shook his head. "Can't explicitly blame that on him."

"Take care," Chiron told us. "And good hunting."

"If he asks you to bring him back a skin, tell him to get in line," Alex mock waved.

"You too," I said.

We walked over to the rocks, where Tyson and Grover were waiting. I stared at the crack between the boulders—the entrance that was about to swallow us.

"Well," Grover said nervously, "good-bye sunshine."

"Hello rocks," Tyson agreed.

"Hopefully not the last thing they agree on," Jason said with a wayward smile.

And together, the four of us descended into darkness.

"Real happy, go-getter of a last sentence there," Nico shook his head as he passed the book along to Will.

"At least you never leave camp angry at anybody," Alex offered. "By the rules of writing, that would spell trouble with a capital death."

"My life is not an actual book," Percy told him blankly.

"Well the narrator sure isn't reliable enough for this to be a biography," Magnus smirked. "How many times did you say you're voice has cracked from puberty break?"

"And we're moving on!" Percy yelped.

PJOPJO

*There are no canon middle names for any characters in the series except Will, and it kind of drives me nuts.

#pjo #Percy Jackson #Jason Grace #Thalia Grace #alex fierro #Magnus Chase #nico di angelo #will solace #percabeth #solangelo #fierrochase #percy jackon and the olympians #battle of the labyrinth #mcdonalds #reading the books #big three kids

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