Chapter 2
Back and Not So Ready
With a loud sigh Ronnie plopped onto her bunk. The Apollo cabin was completely empty except for the small blonde. She was glad, she didn't need to be crowded as she tried to unpack.
The cabin seemed eerie without its usual hustle and bustle. The silver daggers hanging from the light blue walls suddenly seemed dangerous instead of giving Ronnie a safe feeling that she usually got. Everything was exactly the same, but different. She had been gone for a while which was probably why she felt uneasy. The only thing that she felt comfortable around was the familiar wooden desk that had been claimed by her since she had arrived seven years ago. Ronnie had been ten then.
The desk was cluttered with random pieces of paper which where covered in scribbles. Ronnie could barely read her own messy handwriting. The words on the page were gibberish to her. Maybe because of her dyslexia or maybe just because her handwriting wasn't legible.
Ronnie stood up and inched towards the desk thinking if she was closer she could the read scribbles better. That wasn't the case. The small letters jumbled together almost like they were taunting her. That was what Ronnie hated about being a demi-god. She couldn't pick up a novel (that wasn't written in Greek) and just read it. No, she had to stare at the mess of the words trying to get a least a word or two out of it.
There was a soft knock on the half open door. Ronnie turned her head at the sound.
"Come in!" She shouted at the person standing behind the door.
A girl poked her head into the room. A huge grin was plastered onto her face as she took Ronnie's whole image in. Ronnie felt a similar grin spread across her own face.
"Ronnie!" The girl squealed.
"Bridget!" Ronnie squealed back.
"I just CANNOT believe you're back! This is amazing!" Bridget's loose red curls bounced up and down as she raced towards Ronnie.
Ronnie's mind wandered back to the quest that she had declared, "most stupidest mistake ever." The sad thing was she remembered everything clearly. Each swift movement of Chase and Brooke, the doubting gazes of Amy, and of course the planning of the capture of the Pelican Spear played in her head like it was a movie. The spear had been in her reach, she could remember the spear placed on the pedestal. It had been right there, but of course it was a trap. There would be no way that the emposua's would just leave it there. Ronnie scoffed, forgetting about Bridget all together and just letting her thoughts suck her into them. Damn emposua had distracted Chase and her being all little miss hero had to go help him. Brooke told her to go on with the plan, she could've handled it. But Ronnie disagreed, she slayed the emposua, but lost the spear.
"Uh, hello? Ronnie?" Bridget waved a hand in front of Ronnie's dazed expression.
Bridget had watched Ronnie silently fight wither herself. As the minutes passed she grew more and more worried. Ronnie was totally out of it. Even with Bridget waving
her hand in her face Ronnie had stayed lost in her thoughts.
"Ronnie!" Bridget yelled concern dancing in her pale green eyes.
"Huh? What?" Ronnie answered eyeing Bridget curiously like Bridget had been the one arguing with herself for the last five minutes.
"You totally blanked out." Bridget replied.
Ronnie ran a hand through her hair, not quite believing it. But she had, she knew. She merely shook her head and denied it, there was no need to worry the daughter of Aphrodite. She would blow it out of proportions and soon everyone would know, that is if the others didn't tell them first. If that was true it would take a serious scandal for everyone to forget about it, not everyone was as nice as Chiron.
In the distance the conch horn blared telling the campers it was dinner time.
Bridget looked at the door then back at Ronnie, "This conversation is NOT over. You are going to tell me what's going on!"
With that said she slipped out of the cabin and ran off to the pavilion.
Ronnie laughed. Bridget wasn't going to find out from her. No, she was going to hear it from her gossiping siblings that were the eyes and ears of Camp Half Blood. But Bridget would confront her, guess it was time for Ronnie to activate mission avoid Bridget.
The pavilion was crowded like usual, but soon the crowd would be gone and only the year rounders like Ronnie would be left. Ronnie would be sad to see them go yet she was happy to know they would be with their families.
She took a seat with her half-brothers and sisters. They gave her a wary look, debating whether or not to talk to her. Ronnie knew then that the story had to have circulated around already. The jokes and taunts were about to start. At least they wouldn't last long, Percy and Annabeth ,the directors of camp, were about to arrive. They knew what it felt like to fail a quest, they wouldn't allow the put-downs. Ronnie sighed, she sounded weak.
"Hey, Ronnie." Her half-sister snickered before talking again, "How was the quest?"
Ronnie shot a deadly glare at the Dionysus table where Kellan and Amy sat. They both shook their heads, but Ronnie still doubted they were telling the truth. She then turned her glare to Brooke, who was sitting at the Boreas table with wide brown eyes. Brooke would never do that, she was too sweet despite her father's bipolar personality. Now Chase... he could've said something. She pondered on that thought, it didn't make sense she did save his life...
Must've been Kellan and Amy, she finally decided.
Ronnie, back to reality, locked her gaze on Gigi, the half sister. "I think you already know that answer Gigi."
A small smirk spread on her face as if she was triumphant, but Ronnie didn't care, "As a matter of fact I do know. Quite a thrilling tale, am I right? At least you didn't fail the quest because of some stupid reason or something. Oh maybe because you fought someone else's battle instead of sticking to the plan? that would be a HUGE, stupid mistake."
Fury bubbled up inside of Ronnie, "So you're saying if someone's life was at danger you wouldn't help? That's low... even for you."
It was Gigi's turn to grow furious, "Oh please, let's face it, hun, Brooke was handling it, you only wanted to hog the spotlight and play the hero. You wanted to be your brother," Another smirk danced across her face as she added, "Conrad."
Something inside Ronnie snapped. No one had spoken his name since the accident. The name was like a fragile vase, if you dropped it (as in said it), it would fall to the ground and break into a million pieces. And if the owner was attached to it, she too would be broken like Ronnie had been at that moment.
"Enough, Gigi." boomed a voice.
Annabeth and Percy Jackson had entered the scene. They seemed to still be processing what had happened. Usually the campers were laid back not causing drama.
Gigi flipped her chocolate brown hair over her shoulder and muttered, "Fine."
The pavilion was silent as Annabeth's gray eyes looked over every one of them. She was addressing the problem carefully. Percy, on the other hand, was about to just dive into confronting them. he thought that would be the best way to handle the problems at Camp, taking risks.
But before Percy could talk Annabeth asked, 'What happened?"
Gigi twirled her hair around her finger the dumb act coming into play while Ronnie looked down nervously twiddling her thumbs. No one was going to come forward and that is how both of them ended up in the directors' office after dinner.
