A/N: Hello! Yes, I know I should be working on It Isn't Over Yet, but this sorta popped in my head and I wanted to do it. Warning: this is gonna be really weird. Honestly, I don't even know what I was thinking.
Disclaimer: I don't own any of the Virals world or Heroes of Olympus. They belong to Kathy Reichs and Rick Riordan. Though I do own Zhipeng and Willow - they're my OCs from the book I'm writing and I had to put them in somewhere. I'll try not to get into their story too much.
Tory POV
"This is so stupid. I can't even put into words how stupid this is."
Thank you for that, Hi.
I was standing in the bunker with my pack: Hi Stolowitski, Shelton Devers, and Ben Blue. My wolfdog, Cooper, was at my side.
I was holding a handwritten letter in my hand. I know. Who goes through all that trouble to actually write a letter these days?
Dear "The Virals",
We ask that you please submit one boy and one girl to our competiton from the following list of names:
Victoria Brennan
Hiram Stolowitski
Shelton Devers
Benjamin Blue
This competition will require intelligence, strength, and athleticism. It will comprise of three teams of two, all working against each other to win the grand prize, which will be revealed later. We ask that you send the competitors to "The Bunker" at nine o'clock tomorrow morning.
Thank you,
Sherman Fox
It was madness. We had found this letter sitting in our bunker when we arrived this morning. It was now three in the afternoon and we still had no idea what we were going to do.
"I hope you keep in mind what happened last time we got a cryptic message like this," put in Shelton.
"And what would that be?"
"Gamemaker. Geochaces. We all almost died."
Shelton took a quick glance at Ben, then looked away just as fast. Ben pretended not to notice. He was leaning against the wall, arms crossed, keeping his distance. It had taken weeks to get him to even talk to us, so competing in some random competition with him would be madness.
"I say we do it." Ben, surprisingly. "Could be fun."
"I agree," I said, making up my mind. "So they want a boy and a girl. Obviously, I'll have to do it."
"Whoa, whoa, whoa," said Hi. "Who said we were participating?"
Shelton nodded in agreement. "There's no way Hiram or I are doing this. So Ben and Tory can go."
That was not what I wanted. I was hoping one of the other boys would volunteer, though the letter called for athleticism. Unfortunately, athleticism was one thing neither Hi or Shelton possessed.
"Maybe we should . . ." My voice trailed off when I saw the look on Ben's face. I gulped nervously and said, "Yeah, sure. Ben and I will do it."
Ben's mouth remained in a scowl, though his eyes lightened up a bit.
This'll be fun.
Hazel POV
"Is this some kind of a sick joke?"
I looked up to my brother, who was holding a piece of paper. He was waving it around in Leo's face, who looked irritated.
"Would you get that thing out of my way? I'm trying to steer a ship here!"
I walked over to the arguing boys. Tensions were running high here on the Argo II now that Percy and Annabeth were in Tartarus. Nobody seemed to get along, and Leo and Nico were no exception.
Their yells got louder and louder and soon enough, the whole crew was on deck. I snatched the piece of paper from Nico's hands and started to read it.
Dear "The Demigods",
We ask that you please submit one boy and one girl to our competiton from the following list of names:
Perseus Jackson
Annabeth Chase
Jason Grace
Piper McLean
Leo Valdez
Frank Zhang
Hazel Levesque
This competition will require intelligence, strength, and athleticism. It will comprise of three teams of two, all working against each other to win the grand prize, which will be revealed later. We ask that you send the competitors to "The Deck of the Argo II" at nine o'clock tomorrow morning.
Thank you,
Sherman Fox
I stared at it in disbelief, then read it out loud to my companions. They all started yelling at once.
"What the Hades?"
"Don't swear on my father!"
"Oh my gods!"
"What are we supposed to do?"
"This is a sick joke."
"Percy and Annabeth aren't even here!"
"Percy's full name is Perseus? Who knew?"
"SHUT UP!" roared Coach Hedge. "Now, who's going?"
"We're actually doing this?" asked Jason in disbelief. The others nodded in agreement.
"Do we have a choice? Now, who has paper and pen?"
Leo pulled the supplies out of his tool belt and handed them over. Hedge scrawled the guys' names on to separate scraps of paper. He then took off his baseball cap and threw the pieces in. Holding it out to Nico, he said, "Would you do the honors, Death Kid?"
Nico scowled, but he grabbed one of the paper scraps and unfolded it. His scowl deepened.
"Leo."
The son of Hephaestus broke into a huge grin. "Yes!" Then he looked at Piper and I. "Which lucky lady will accompany me?"
Oh, gods. That would be a nightmare.
Yet the unthinkable happened.
Before I knew it, Nico was drawing another piece of paper out of the coach's hat and was reading my name off it.
Looks like I was in for an adventure with Repair Boy.
Mystery Person's POV
I checked the time. 8:59 am.
I glanced at my partners. The blond one was too young and the old man was too stubborn, but I enjoyed putting this together with them.
"Is everything ready?" asked the blond one.
The old man nodded. "Everything's good to go."
The minute hand on my watch moved. 9 o'clock sharp.
"Here they come," I told my partners.
The oldest ones arrived first, then the Greeks, and then the wolf kids. They all looked apprehensive. The Greeks were arguing relentlessly, and the wolf kids wouldn't look at each other. The final team was strong and silent.
"Time to start a race."
A/N: I have no idea where this is going. Oh well. Sorry about the randomness of this story, but I've been wanting a PJO/Virals crossover forever.
Did you know that the 4th Virals book, Exposure, comes out on April 15th? Why are authors so cruel? I also finished Shift last night, and I would love Ben's POV more often. Just saying.