I grabbed the hostage, hosted the maiden over my solider and ran. The ground shook as the giant hell hound chased me with grim determination. I saw my allies Bruce and Cassie at the exit of the area pleading at me to hurry. I was within feet of the exit when I heard a booming bark from behind.
The world rushed up to meet me and the maiden flew up into the air. I fell in the cold icy mud. My crowbar skidded across the frost and out of reach. I tried to get up, but a hairy paw held me down. I heard the beast tear into the maiden and her insides rained over my flattened frame.
"Mrs. O'Leary! You know not to ruined the hostage, we need them to last all day!" scolded Percy. The hell hound put down her tattered target dummy and looked embarrassed as she mournfully chewed on the dress it was wearing.
I got up and brushed the straw off my bomber jacket (present from my horse-dad).Percy was struggling to pull a wig out of Mrs. O'Leary's maw as some younger girl stared at him dreamily. Then Annabeth walked over to her and shooed her off. I walked over to my friends. "Time?" I asked.
"Nine seconds" said Cassie. She was wearing pink hoodie and her hair waved slightly in the breeze. Her blue eye sparkled slight with a soft warmth like… um, you didn't need to hear that. Sorry, I try not to get weird like that anymore. Suddenly she pushed her dark brown behind her ear and looked away. Man, she was acting weird lately.
"Let's go show the Ares cabin's snow fort what Cassie learned last week." said Bruce, sensing the awkwardness. The rest of the day was fun, despite Cassie acting weird. She used Orpheus' lyre (which was now a baby blue electric guitar) to play "We didn't start the fire" to melt Ares' cabin's snow fort, but then ignored me when I asked her if she wanted any cocoa. Around five she went off to ice skate with some other muses' kids and I got to talk to Bruce.
"so, what's up with Cassie? I mean she's… I dunno." I asked him in my awkward way. He exhaled slowly.
"well… she said she found something out about… your mom." He said painfully. He winched a little too.
"what?" I asked trying to contain my shock. I mean, I hadn't seen her since I was a baby and she just tossed me out like trash, but I wanted to know her anyway.
"She didn't say what she knew, but I didn't want to ask her. She seemed… almost scared." He said. I got up and walked over to iris's cabin.
When I got there I Iris messaged my "parents" and was hit with a wave of centaur Christmas carols and my "dad's" voice. "Yo, little man! Happy Decimero! That's Spanish! Guess what? Your gett'n a little bro! Horse mom's preggers! bet ya can't wait till Christmas cuz it's your birthday! I think. See ya, gotta get some crunk nog!" then he left. So yeah, I guess I'm almost two.
That night we played man hunt and I was the hunted. I managed to get up on Zeus' fist and watch the campers scurry by. Finally Cassie and Bruce walked into the clearing.
"so, you want to tell me who john's mom is?" said Bruce leaning causally on his spear. Cassie froze then slowly turned around.
"look, I've told you before, I don't know for sure. Plus I doesn't matter because she abandoned him." She said. Then she looked at the ground and said "I don't what to do."
"shhhhhh" he said walking up close to her, "we'll think of something." Then he pulled her in for a hug. At this point I was really hoping it was just a friend hug, but then they kissed. Crap. I froze time and hoped off the boulder. I just needed time to think. Then I saw movement in the bushes. Someone had seen me, someone knew who I was.
