Of course you've heard of brave Percy Jackson, the son of the all-powerful Poseidon, god of the seas. You've heard of wise Annabeth Chase, the daughter of Athena. You know about witty Leo Valdez, the fire using son of Hephaestus. You know about beautiful Piper McLean, daughter of Aphrodite and the movie star Tristan McLean. And, of course, you know of Jason Grace, the son of Zeus, the King of the Gods.
But no one knows about me.
My name is Patrick Terranos. I had to introduce myself because no one knows who I am. This is the story about a lost demigod. I was brought to Camp Half-Blood when I was seven years old, the same time Percy Jackson came to camp. My father was dead, killed by the Hydra. I alone had escaped. A satyr had found me, perhaps by luck, and brought me to Camp Half-Blood.
I was put in the Hermes cabin. For years, I waited for my mother to claim me, but she never did.
I trained at camp, but I was never spectacular. Sure, I was a pretty good fighter, but Percy overshadowed me. He got all the glory. Never was I mentioned among the senior campers. And Percy was cool and all, but it would've been nice to win just once.
I was there when Percy brought the lightning bolt back to Zeus. I was there when he sent the Golden Fleece to camp and brought Thalia back to life. I was there when he came back to camp, praised because he had saved Artemis. I was there when he escaped from the Labyrinth alive. I was there when he saved Olympus and made the gods swear never to ignore their children. And I was there when he disappeared.
I felt mad at the Olympians. Even though they swore on the River Styx to claim their kids, they never did claim me. I was beginning to think I wasn't a demigod, but I had to be, because when I was injured, I had drunk nectar to heal my wounds.
In short, life sucked for me.
That is, until I discovered who my divine mother was.
It was a bright sunny day in the Arena. I had my celestial bronze sword unsheathed and was fighting the head of the Nemesis cabin, Jake Marvell. He alone saw me as his friend. We were the only ones in the Arena.
We fought for a few minutes, then sat on the benches, drinking nectar and complimenting each other on the awesome moves we had performed.
I asked, "Have they found Percy yet?" I was stuck asking Jake these kinds of questions because only the senior counselors knew.
Jake shook his head. "Nope. Annabeth led yet another search party, but still no luck."
I felt glummer than ever before. "And...and have we heard from Jason's quest yet?" Somehow, I knew what his reply was going to be.
"No," Jake answered. "Not yet. They're bound to contact us soon." But it sounded like he was reassuring himself more than me.
I stood up angrily and kicked a rock. "I hate being a demigod. I don't know who my mom is. I don't know anything! If the gods swore never to ignore their children, then why is my mother ignoring me? It's unfair!"
"I know it is," Jake soothed. "Your mother's probably going to claim you soon."
"No, she's not!" I yelled. "She's never going to claim me because she doesn't care about me! She hates me because I'm nothing special! I hate the gods." I didn't know where these words were coming from. It didn't sound like me. It was like someone was speaking through me, telling me what to say, propelling my rage. "My mother is stupid! All of the gods are evil! IT'S SO UNFAIR! WHY DOESN'T SHE JUST CLAIM ME NOW?" I was at a peak in my anger.
Suddenly, there was a rumbling sound from under the earth. The ground began to shake. Jake even fell over. And I was feeling stronger than ever before.
Cracks appeared in the ground. Pillars of rock surfaced. And there was a magnificent CRACK, and the Arena split in half. Then it began to sink into the ground.
"Run!" gulped Jake. He sped off towards the exit of the sinking Arena. Without hesitation, I followed him.
We ran straight to the Big House, where Chiron the centaur was playing Blackjack with Dionysus, the god of wine. It seems kind of random, but you get used to it once you stay at Camp Half-Blood for a good six years.
"What is it now?" drawled the god. He barely looked up from his cards when I replied.
"The Arena! Cracks appeared in the earth and giant spikes of stone and...and it's sinking!" I shouted.
Chiron threw his cards on the table and galloped to us. I was breathing heavily, grasping a stitch in my chest. Jake was leaning against the railing of the porch, hyperventilating as well. Chiron looked over to where the Arena was. But there was no Arena. Instead, a giant gaping hole had formed where the Arena used to be.
"It's gone," rasped Chiron. Then he turned to me and Jake. "How...which one of you did this?"
"Me," I admitted. "I got all mad about...about my mother not claiming me, and it happened."
Suddenly, a symbol appeared over my head. I had not felt more excited in my life. When I glanced up, I saw a bright green hologram of a majestic oak tree. It rotated twice, slowly, then disappeared. When it left, I felt kind of disappointed. An oak tree was not any symbol I had seen before, and trust me, I had seen tons of symbols over the past six years. But Chiron seemed to know what it was, because his eyes bulged and he nearly fainted. When he was about to collapse, grape vines sprouted from the ground and wrapped themselves around Chiron's waist.
Dionysus was standing right next to me, his eyes fixed on the spot where my symbol had been, but his finger pointed at Chiron. Even the indifferent god of wine seemed interested. This was a first.
Chiron bowed after the grape vines retreated into the earth. Jake copied him, and even Dionysus fell to his knees. Campers gathered around to see who everyone was kneeling to, and when they saw me, they burst into laughter. After all, wouldn't you laugh if you saw the nobody at camp being given the royal treatment (literally)? But when they heard Chiron speak, they hastened to bow.
"Hail, Patrick Terranos, son of Gaea, the Being of Earth," Chiron announced, his voice tinged with shock.
So, for the next few days, the campers finally paid attention to me. At first, it was nice. People I'd seen before but never spoken to came up to me and said things like, "So, you're ol' Earth Lady's kid." I'd feel all happy inside, then they'd add, "What are you going to do, blow up Camp Half-Blood?" Then they'd walk away, laughing.
The only people that stood by me were Jake and Chiron. They were good at keeping my spirits up when I was down. Chiron would support me, and Jake would hang out with me. Life got even worse, if it was possible.
The only good news was that my earth powers scared other people. Whenever the ground began to shake, the people tormenting me would run away, crying. I didn't want to manipulate people, but the ground-shaking just came naturally. I couldn't control it at first, but soon, I began to really master it. I could summon avalanches or gaping holes in the ground or pillars of sharp rock that I could pick up with my geokinesis and throw at targets. I also had chlorokinesis. I could summon vines to strangle people, or roots to trip people.
Then Jason, Piper, and Leo returned. They'd brought news with them that Gaea was rebelling against the gods, and people got even meaner. Kids I had known, like Hermes' kids, would tease me and poke me and call me names. I could have just squashed all of them flat with an avalanche, but I was a good person. I wouldn't do something like that.
Chiron ordered a new cabin to be built. Since Hephaestus' Cabin was already working on a ship they were going to sail to Greece, the Argo II, Nico, a son of Hades, had summoned up some undead builders to work on a cabin.
The cabins were shaped like an omega, an circle opened at the bottom with two horizontal lines leading outwards from the bottom. The Gaea Cabin, or Cabin 21, was built in the center of the two horizontally-lined cabins. I got to decorate it however I wanted. Soon, the Gaea Cabin was finished: a humble dusty-brown house with green ivy-like plants zigzagging all over the walls. It even had a nice porch installed. I was the senior counselor.
And I was the only one in it.
Although things took a turn for the better, little did I know how bad things were going to get.
A few days later, a new kid arrived at camp. He was a small, thin, and scared-looking boy. He looked about my age at the time-thirteen. When I looked inside his eyes, I saw a glimmer of fear there, but also a hint of anger. That surprised me. Time passed. He was put in the Hermes Cabin, but he never was claimed. I felt that he was just like me, so I befriended him.
His name was Kyle. Kyle Houtpole. He told me all about his life; that his parents both had died and left him on the streets; how he was left to fend for himself in the streets of Manhattan. It was sad to hear him recall the tale, but I wanted to know his background.
We were in the strawberry field when he was claimed, a few days after he first came to Camp Half-Blood. Dionysus was there, too, and if it was possible, he seemed even more shocked than when I had been claimed.
I was picking strawberries with Kyle while Kyle rattled on and on about how he hated the gods for not claiming him. It sounded too much like what I had said to Jake, that day in the Arena, so I couldn't bring myself to say anything.
Suddenly we were bathed in an eerie dark purple light. Above Kyle's head was a tombstone with torches guarding it. Kyle seemed utterly bamboozled by this sign, but I bowed, yet I didn't know which god had just claimed him.
But the god of wine knew. Dionysus froze and slowly turned around to stare at Kyle. He bowed down quickly, not saying a word.
"Who's his parent?" I demanded, standing up after the sign disappeared.
"It's..." Dionysus moistened his lips. "Its...er..."
"Tell me." There was a hungry light in Kyle's eyes. "Tell me who my parent is."
"It's Tartarus," Dionysus replied, his face a mask of intense fright. "The spirit of the deepest, darkest pit in the Underworld, the god of nothingness."
Okay, so maybe I had a cabin now. Chiron was reluctant to even let me have a Gaea cabin. But he absolutely refused to order a Tartarus cabin to be built. He said it would tear apart the very foundation of Camp Half-Blood and stain all purpose for the cabin of the gods, or something like that. Chiron told me to tell Kyle that he could stay in the Hades Cabin if he wished.
Kyle was furious. He yelled his head off when I told him the bad news.
"That's the last straw," he fumed. "Maybe I could take being hated at Camp Half-Blood, at least for a little bit. Maybe I could take being the son of an evil spirit. But what I can't take is being unrecognized!" He looked at me with rage shining in his eyes, and for the first time, I was afraid of him. "We should run away."
"But...why?" I sputtered. "Camp Half-Blood is my home! It's the only real place I've ever known!"
"But we need answers!" Kyle insisted. "Like, how were we born if our parents are personifications of the earth and the Underworld? Why were we born if they knew we would be outcasts? Do they even care for us?"
I thought about it for a few minutes. Finally, I said, "Okay. Let's go. We'll meet your father first, the spirit of Tartarus. There's no need to bring anything. We'll only be gone for a bit."
Kyle was about to argue, but I raised a hand, motioning for silence. I closed my eyes and raised my fist slowly in the air. I could feel the earth bending to my will. Then, I opened my hand lightning-quick, and a tunnel opened up in the ground, like a giant invisible fist had just pounded the ground.
"Let's go," I said quietly. "This tunnel will take us straight to the Underworld."
TO BE CONTINUED...