The Poetry Princess

The first memory Rapunzel would have of her new life would be running. Running away from the woman she had called mother for eighteen years. As it had turned out "Mother" Gothel wasn't her mother at all. Who or rather what she was, was a Harpy in disguise. This information had been overwhelming and difficult to understand. What Rapunzel had been able to piece together was that the gods and Goddesses from Ancient Greek myths and legends were actually real. Which seemed...impossible if she was being honest, but something in her heart told her that it was the truth. This came as sort of a relief since Gothel hadn't been the most affectionate or caring "mother". Heck she didn't even let Rapunzel out of her sight, let alone their towering apartment building. So while it seemed ridiculous, finding out Gothel wasn't really her mother had been strangely comforting. That's how Rapunzel came to packing her most treasured things and sneaking out of the apartment building she'd spent her entire life inside of.

Fifteen year old Eugene Fitzherbert and his Satyr friend Maximus were keeping a watchful eye on the citizens of Manhattan. You could never really tell if someone was a monster just by looking at them. At least that's what Eugene had learned from his short time with Max. The pair had been traveling together since the Satyr had caught the teen committing petty theft in a small mid-western town. Max had told Eugene that he didn't need to steal to take care of himself. That there was a place for kids like him. Being an orphan, Eugene tried to cut the guy loose. The last thing he wanted was to get sent to another orphanage. But being a Satyr, Maximus wasn't so easily shaken. He eventually caught up with the boy and told him all about Camp Half-Blood and the kinds of kids that lived there. It hadn't taken much to sell the young boy. A safe place he could call home, full of other kids with...unique abilities? He was so there! And that's how Eugene Fitzherbert had found himself in New York City with an anxious Satyr.

Maximus sniffed the air tentatively. Something was definitely about to go wrong, he could feel it in his hooves. Of course protector's trips to Camp Half-Blood very seldom went off without a hitch. So really it wasn't a matter of if something would go wrong but merely when. Then again he and his new pal Eugene hadn't exactly had an easy trip. There had been a few minor monsters on the road to camp, but still nothing majorly threatening had crossed their path. This was enough to cause a seasoned Satyr like Max to worry. Then he smelled her. A warm summery scent with a hint of something else...acrylic paint maybe?

"Max, did you see that?" Eugene exclaimed, breaking his friend's concentration. Maximus mumbled a couple of ancient Greek curses before turning his head to see what Eugene was gawking at. A small girl in a purple sundress had just come running out of a towering building. Max noticed several things at once. The girl's hair was long and blonde. And not just long like down to her waist. No it trailed well past her knees, past her feet, and trailed several inches behind her. Why would someone grow their hair that long? And what was that she was wielding? It looked like a frying pan. Yup, that was defiantly a frying pan. And holy Zeus, the girl wasn't even wearing shoes!

"Do girls normally storm around New York carrying frying pans?" Eugene asked, rubbing the back of his neck with one of his hands. Max couldn't tell if his travel companion was joking or not. Of course girls didn't walk around with frying pans normally!

"Not usually." Maximus grumbled. "And as a general rule people don't carry around a backpack and a weapon unless they're running away from something."

"Let's talk to her!" Eugene suggested excitedly. "She could be like us! Well not so much like you, she isn't a goat. But like me! She could be like me! Hey Blondie!" He shouted across the street to the girl who couldn't have been much older than himself.

"Who goes there?"Rapunzel shouted at a nearby pigeon. It flew away, unimpressed by her wild pan waving. "I warn you, I-I'm dangerous!" Of course this wasn't at all true. It was the first time Rapunzel had even been outside in her whole life. But the thugs and ruffians on the streets didn't know that.

"What's the matter with you?" Max growled. He smacked his friend in the back of the head, which was quite a feat since the Satyr was a good foot or two shorter than the teen. "A, never shout at a woman armed with cooking utensils. B, Don't shout at anyone in New York City. And C, Never draw attention to yourself when you are trying to avoid monsters."

"Monsters." Eugene shuttered at the memory of their last monster encounter. "Right sorry, I forgot."

"Well don't forget ever again or it may be the last time you do!" Max scolded. Eugene was about to apologize, but the Blonde girl was heading their way.

"Ok, Rapunzel you're acting crazy. You just attacked a pigeon. What have the pigeons ever done to you?" She mumbled to herself as the bird flew away. "Gothel can't get to you now." She tried to assure herself. "You're safe." She insisted, taking slow measured breaths. But Rapunzel could have sworn someone had called out to her. Of course it was New York City, there had to be plenty of other blondes in the city, hadn't there? Then again how many of those people have roughly 70 feet of hair wrapped around their arm? She was certain the call had been to her. But who had it come from? And were they a friend or a foe? Rapunzel nervously searched the New York streets.

Her eyes settled on two males who were bickering at the park across the street. One of them was a boy. He couldn't have been very young since he was sporting a stylish goatee. He kind of reminded Rapunzel of a modern day pirate. His tan pants were tucked into a pair of brown combat boots. He wore a tight fitting white dress shirt, which look a size or two too small for him. Over the dress shirt he wore a blueish gray vest. He polished off his pirate look with a brown satchel slung across his chest. The second man looked at least ten years older than Rapunzel. He wore loose fitting dress pants, a button up shirt and a bow tie. It was a strange combination that, to Rapunzel at least, only made the man look shorter than he probably was. Of course standing next to the handsome teen boy probably didn't make him look any taller. Something told her it would be safe to approach these two men. Looking back on this later she realized it was her probably the fates giving her a little nudge in the right direction.

"Well don't forget about it!" The shorter man barked at the younger. "Or it may be the last time you do!"

"Um...excuse me gentlemen." Rapunzel tried to sound confident as she addressed them. She tried to pretend that she talked to other people all the time. Eugene and Max weren't convinced. The young girl came off as shy and awkward, which was fine with them. At least it meant she wasn't dangerous.

"How can we help you?" Maximus offered, he tried his best not to scare her.

"I-I..." Rapunzel had to be careful. These men may look friendly but they could just as easily be thugs or ruffians. "I am trying to get to Lawng eye-land." She explained.

"Long Island?" Eugene beamed. He tried hard not to laugh at her mispronunciation. "What a coincidence! Max and I are heading there ourselves!" He slapped his pal on the back.

"Eugene!" Max scolded his friend again. He would have kicked the kid if he wasn't afraid it would expose his hooves from the shoes they were hidden in.

"Oh come on, Max!" Eugene put on one of his patented puppy-dog like faces trying to win Maximus over to his side. "Do your Satyr thing and see if she's one of us!"

"Wait Satyr?" Rapunzel repeated excitedly. "Like in mythology? Greek Mythology?" Rapunzel started to bounce excitedly on the balls of her feet. If she could convince this Satyr to guide her to Long Island and Camp Half-Blood she wouldn't have to worry about Gothel the Harpy getting to her. A satyr would keep her safe. His handsome friend might also be a worthy warrior.

"That depends." Maximus answered her calculatingly. "What do you know about Greek Mythology?"

"Oh I know lots of things!" Rapunzel assured him. "See I've been.." She faltered. What if Max wasn't a nice Satyr? What if he'd been hired by Gothel to make sure she never escaped their apartment? Suddenly the handsome boy seemed imposing rather than welcoming.

While Rapunzel stood there trying to decide what to do, a fourth person joined their party. If Rapunzel had to guess his age she would have said he was probably somewhere between seventeen and nineteen. He had perfect bronze skin and sunshine blonde hair just like Rapunzel. She couldn't see his eyes because they were hidden behind a dark black pair of sunglasses, but he seemed friendly enough, dressed in surfer style clothes. He emitted a very care-free vibe.

"I'm sorry, do we know you?" Eugene growled, clearly not impressed with the newcomer.

"Eugene you idiot, that's Apollo, you know the god!" Maximus chided. "You'll have to excuse my friend Lord Apollo, he's an idiot."

"No worries, dudes." Apollo nodded in the Eugene's direction. "Listen, I've gotta got do this thing up at the mountain." The god pointed a finger in the direction of the Empire State Building. "But Max if you could do me a solid and take my daughter to Camp Half-Blood..."

"You're my...Dad?" Rapunzel gasped.

"The one and only!" Apollo grinned. His skin seemed to glow, which was entirely possible, him being the sun god and all. "Hold that thought." Out of nowhere Apollo summoned a scrap of paper and a pen. He began jotting something down. The others could only gaped at him, not sure what exactly was happening. When the sun god had finished writing he handed the paper over to Maximus. "Here you go Max, give that to Dionysus when you get to camp. It should clear things up. 'Punzel," He said looking at his daughter for the first time. "We'll take more laters I promise, but for now I've gotta run. Take care of that hair of yours kiddo." And before anyone could really respond Apollo vanished.

"What's it say?" Rapunzel asked Maximus impatiently. She stood on her toes trying to read the note over the Satyr's shoulders.

"Hold on there, Goldilocks!" Max tugged the paper from her view. "This might not be suitable for Demigod eyes! Apollo wrote this letter for Dionysus. From one god to another. You could go blind from reading it or something!"

"It's just a crappy poem!" Eugene observed. Unlike tiny Rapunzel, he could easily read over the goat-man's shoulders. "Here is my formal claim/Rapunzel is my daughter/Let her into camp."

"He wrote a Haiku for me!" Rapunzel gushed. "Can I read it please?"

"If you want to risk going blind." Max warned half-heartedly before handing the paper off to her. Rapunzel must have been one special kid for Apollo to show up and claim her personally. And he'd mentioned her hair...What was with that hair?

"That's not a Haiku." Eugene observed.

"What are you talking about?" Rapunzel scowled up at him. He thought it was the cutest scowl he'd ever seen.

"The first line. In a real Haiku the lines follow a pattern of syllables. five syllables, seven syllables and them five again. The first line in that poem has six syllables." Eugene pointed out. Furious, Rapunzel began to count the syllables in the first line of the poem. He was right, there were six not five.

"Oh yeah?" The tiny girl continued to scowl up at him. She handed the poem back to Max the satyr and crossed her arms over her chest. "And just who are you to question a god anyway?"

"Flynn. My name is Flynn Rider." He answered automatically. It wasn't his really name of course. No, his mother had blessed him with 'Eugene.' What kind of name was that anyway? Greek, evidentially, but that was besides the point. Throughout all of the Orphanages and Foster Homes that Eugene had been shuffled through, he had always had one companion; a storybook. He didn't really remember how he'd acquired The Tales of Flynnigan Rider, but lets' be honest it was probably stolen from somewhere. Regardless Eugene had grown to idolize the fictional Flynn Rider and began to use the name as an alias whenever he wished to impress someone.

"Well Flynn Rider," He had to admit, the name didn't sound so impressive when Rapunzel hissed it out in such a disapproving tone. "When your godly parent writes you a poem, then you have a right to pick on mine." Her arms where still crossed, but there was a hint of a smile in the corners.

"I'm just saying, for the god of poetry..." Flynn shrugged.

"Careful what you say about the gods!" Max warned. He looked around cautiously as if waiting for Apollo to reappear.

"Who is your godly parent anyway?" Rapunzel demanded. There was a hint of playfulness in her voice now.

"I-I don't know." Eugene admitted quietly.

"Oh..." Rapunzel uncrossed her arms. She felt bad for picking on him now. Sure her Dad had written a crappy poem, but at least he'd shown up. He'd claimed her as his daughter. Poor Flynn didn't know who either of his parents were.

"Hey no worries." Flynn shrugged it off when he realized he'd made Rapunzel uncomfortable. He hated that. People always got all awkward once they found out he was an orphan. "Max says lots of kids don't even get claimed till they show up at camp. So maybe we'll find out then." He suggested with a smirk.

"Well then," Rapunzel sighed cheerily. "We'd better get going. We want to get you to camp as fast as possible!" She grabbed Flynn's hand and started pulling him out of the park.

"Hang on, hang on!" Max called after her. "Hey, Poetry Princess, you're going the wrong way!" He chased after the two Demi-gods as fast as his goat legs would carry him.