Chapter 1: A Fireman and a Pretty Lady

Leo P.O.V

Leo sat in the mess hall along with his siblings, happily munching on his third taco. The Argo II was halfway done. They only needed to add on food, weapons, other lethal details, pack the ship and then fly off into the sunset.

Except for one thing…

The Prophecy of Eight. With that thought, the taco happiness had completely dissolved, the exhaustion settling back on his shoulders.

Together, with Rachel's creepy prophecy possessions and simple math, everyone had determined that there were three demigods at the Roman Camp and four at the Greek Camp.

So the big question on everyone's mind was:

Where was the Eighth demigod?

The prophecy read:

Eight half-bloods shall answer the call,

To hurricane or fire, the world must fall,

A pledge of love with a final breath,

And foes bear arms to the Doors of Death

Leo tried to brush it off, not worrying about it, but Annabeth was frantic. On top of her still M.I.A. boyfriend, she was now having searchers look for special smelling demigods on the run. Leo had laughed at the 'smelling' part, and then she had practically punched him. Thankfully, Piper had convinced everyone with her charmspeak to calm down before his gorgeous face was smashed in.

But Annabeth had dragged Jason into her stress, who dragged Piper into it, and then left Leo alone to his own devices. But, surprisingly, he had been able to fight off the loneliness by distracting himself with building the Argo. The best part was when he had installed Festus's head onto the ship. His drilling teeth and fiery roars had kept him company.

But now, the isolation and tiredness began to eat at him again. He sighed, and opened his mouth to take another delicious bite, when yells began resonating from near Thalia's Pine. The mess hall became silent for a moment, everyone exchanging looks before the Ares table yelled: "Charge!" And everyone dashed after them across the camp towards the yells.

Leo stuffed the rest of the taco into his mouth, swallowing the crunchy goodness, before pulling a large hammer out of his tool belt and igniting it on fire.

But suddenly the screaming crowd stopped suddenly. Leo slammed into a large kid smelling of salty sweat. He turned around glaring down at him. Leo smiled weakly and waved. "Hey…"

The kid lunged at him, and Leo yelped and dashed through the crowd, possibly catching a few kids on fire, but that wasn't important.

He burst through the front of the crowd and spilled onto the wet grass that extinguished the flame on his hammer. He cringed in anticipation. But when he peered up, he sighed in relief to see the baby cyclops, Tyson, who was apparently Annabeth's boyfriend, Percy Jackson's half-brother. (Leo had stopped trying to figure out godly genetics a long time ago.)

But what really grabbed his attention was the squirming burlap bag, which was making muffled shouts and other angry noises. Tyson didn't really seem fazed. He carefully set down the bag and pulled up Leo in a suffocating hug, yelling happily: "Fireman!"

Leo laughed weakly as he tried to put air back into his lungs. "Tyson...please...put me...down!" He squeaked out.

"Oh, sorry, fireman!" He apologized, his large brown eye watering.

Leo waved him off. "It's fine Ty', just…" he trailed off nervously and pointed to the bag. "Uh, what's that?"

"New demigod! She wasn't happy so I put her in a bag. Don't worry, I was very careful." Tyson responded proudly.

Leo's eyes widened, but before he could reply, Annabeth's voice sounded from behind him.

"There's a what in there?" Annabeth shouted worriedly.

"Demigod!" Tyson said happily, still oblivious to the problem the situation held.

"Uh, yeah, no." She said and grabbed her dagger. She carefully sliced through the fabric. She whispered some unintelligible words to the person, before extending her hand.

Slowly, Annabeth pulled out a girl about his age that made everyone gasp. Annabeth stumbled back and paled. One of her siblings rushed forward and supported her.

As Leo studied the girl, he realized why everyone was so shocked. In the Big House, he had seen a collage of pictures, one of which pictured Annabeth and her boyfriend and this girl was almost identical to him.

Her skin was pale, but had Mediterranean undertones. She was fiddling with a silver bracelet that had only a small blue stone in the center. Her grey tank-top wrinkled and her pale green jeans ripped. Her black-blue hair was long and hung to her mid back. But what really caught his attention was her eyes. They were like swirling seas, blue-green waves crashing against her pupils.

Her eyes glanced over the crowd. Then she took a step back with and deadpanned: "Nope." And began back walking towards the barrier.

There was a pause before Annabeth shook herself out of her stupor and chased after her. Leo stood stunned and barely noticed Jason and Piper break through the crowd and stand next to him. They were panting tiredly.

"What in Hades is going on?" Jason asked.

"Uh, well, you see…" Leo stammered in confusion.

"You don't know, do you?" Piper said dryly.

Leo sighed and explained what was going on so far, Tyson's arrival, the girl in the bag, her strangely similar appearance to the missing son of Poseidon, and her just flat out leaving.

By the end of the short explanation, Leo noticed that almost all of the campers had left to go back to their activities, leaving the trio alone to wait.

Suddenly, Annabeth appeared walking back up the hill, chatting nervously with the girl. She was only answering in single syllables, but at least she wasn't running away.

They walked up to the trio and Annabeth awkwardly cleared her throat. "Okay, guys, this is Rhode. She's a new...demigod."

Everyone looked above her head expectantly. Annabeth scowled after a few moments, cursing the gods for slacking off on their claiming duties.

"Uh, why is everyone looking at the empty space above my head?" She asked, cocking an eyebrow and pointing to where they were looking.

"No reason!" They replied simultaneously.

Rhode didn't look convinced, but she stuck her hand out to Piper, who was closest. "So I'm Rhode, Rhode Léon-" But before Piper could respond and shake her hand, Leo pushed her out of the way.

He shook Rhode's hand quickly, a bit of soot rubbing off on it. "I'm Leo Valdez, Bad Boy Supreme, but you, Pretty Lady, can call me whatever you want." He winked and ran his fingers through his hair.

Rhode turned fifty shades of red and nodded quickly. Piper scowled and whacked him upside the head, making him yelp. "Idiot," she muttered, and then turned to Rhode with a genuine smile. "I'm Piper, Piper McLean, and this is my boyfriend, Jason Grace."

"It's very nice to meet you all," Rhode said. Her voice had a odd but subtle accent to it, and her dialect and mannerisms were a bit old-fashioned. Leo grinned softly at the uniqueness.

He hooked his arm with hers. "Come on! I'll show you all around camp, and we can try to figure out your godly parent, and then maybe later,-"

"There will be no later," Annabeth said, rolling her grey eyes with annoyance. "Leo, you have work to do on the Argo. Jason, go help him set up the mast, we need our flyboy for that. And Pipes', please show Rhode around. I need to go think…" she concluded, her eyebrows furrowing.

Jason cupped Piper's face and pecked her on the cheeks. "See you later Pipes'."

Leo stuck his finger in his mouth and bent over, pretending like he was going to puke. Rhode snickered quietly at his expression, and he winked back at her impishly. When Piper turned around, she immediately stopped laughing and stood still as a soldier. Piper gently grabbed Rhodes hand.

"See ya', Superman." Then she turned to Leo and narrowed her eyes with a scowl. "Repairboy, I'm warning you right now, no stalking, no cringey pickup lines, and no winking, got it?"

He stood up straight and mock saluted, but crossed his fingers behind his back. "You got it, Beauty Queen."

"You guys sure have a lot of nicknames," Rhode muttered. Everyone turned to her, and her eyes widened, the blush returning to her cheeks. "Oh gods, did I say that out loud?"

"Sure did, Pretty Lady, and now you've got one too." He smirked.

"Fat chance, Mr. Badboy," she stuck her tongue out at him and she and Piper darted away laughing.

The minute they were out of earshot, Leo sighed happily. Jason just shook his head, "Come on, Mr. Spock, we've got work to do," and started to walk away.

Leo groaned loudly. "I don't even like Star Trek!" He whined and chased after him.