Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I only own the plot and my own characters, the rest of the characters are owned by their respective owners and everything else belongs to Rick Riordan.

Samantha

Samantha was not amused. In hindsight her day had gone terribly but compared to what she would be facing in the future, she would find herself wishing she could go back to these types of days. Her life was just so much simpler on a normal day, or whatever qualifies as a normal for a demigod.

It had started with waking up in the Ares cabin. Yes, she was the daughter of the violent and bloodthirsty god of war, but despite being a child of Ares she looked nothing like her siblings and held different values. Her slim build and graceful movements were nothing like her bulky, heavy siblings and this was usually the source of an argument. Which is exactly what happened a few minutes after she pulled on an orange Camp Half-blood tank top, ripped shorts and combat boots. She rolled her eyes as he approached. Brendan was one of the more aggressive and largest of her siblings, which frustrated her because she could never power her way past them. "Hey skinny ass," he sneered. "Ever thought about building up so it doesn't look like our father made a mistake claiming you as one of us?"

Samantha just rolled her eyes and stood to face him. Brendan made daily attacks about her differences since he got here just over a week ago and it was beginning to wear on her patience. Her cabin mates never got involved either; in Ares you fought your own battles. The only time the entire cabin got involved is if the insults affected something everyone was involved with, but in this cabin you had to earn your way to the top the hard way by showing you could beat everyone in a fight.

Brendan kept coming at her. Built like a football offensive linesman and taller than her by about a foot, he was rather intimidating. But his attitude was several feet taller than he was, something Samantha had been shaving down since he had been claimed. Several scars along his body paid tribute to her efforts but they didn't seem to get through his thick skull. She idly wondered if bringing her blade down on top of his head more often would get the message through but instead she folded her arms and raised her eyebrows. "Are you sure it was me who was the mistake? How about you, with your pathetic sword fighting? An Aphrodite kid could take you on and win while barely breaking into sweat Brendan."

Brendan turned an impressive shade of red and closed the distance quicker to get in her face. "Why you little b-"

He was cut off by the point of Samantha's blade, Nous (mind) being pressed against his throat and her glare stabbing daggers into his face. "Just shove off, I don't have the patience or time to deal with your pathetic ass right now, so get out of my face before I give you some more scars, and maybe I'll put them in some more painful areas this time because the ones before didn't seem to send a message."

Brendan gulped, staring down the length of her sword and backed away. Rolling her eyes, Samantha rolled the hilt of her sword around her wrist and it transformed back into a ring on her middle finger before turning towards the door. Her cabinmates parted, allowing her to have a clear path to the common area outside before she headed for the dining pavilion for breakfast.

Then her day had progressed into dealing with a number of pranks from the Hermes cabin in the training arena, leaving her drenched in cold water and in a very sour mood. Now as she crouched on her perch in a tree beside the creek boundary of the capture the flag game, she watched as several holes opened up in her team's defense as they were drawn away by a superb bait and attack plan from the Athena cabin. She reluctantly gave them credit for the plan, as a strategist herself she admitted it was a spectacular plan but now was when much of her team's attack fell on her shoulders. She heard a rustle below her and knew the small flank squad from the blue team was moving across the boundary. She quickly signalled Elizabeth from the Apollo cabin before clambering down the tree and dropping softly to the ground behind the group of five opponents.

Her signal instructed sElizabeth to lead a group of fours of the defenders from the flag area up to confront the flanking group. They would support the attack group soon but that group was made of the Ares cabin and would fight back hard, which bought her some time. She fingered her two rings, which were her swords Mind and Noumenon (Intuition), and slowly followed the group, only to be brought up short by a hand pulling back on her ponytail and a celestial bronze blade being placed against her throat from behind. "Going somewhere Sam?" A very familiar voice whispered in her ear.

Samantha groaned. Of course he would know what she would be doing, he was smart enough to predict her and saying he knew her tendencies was an understatement. She didn't need to turn to see the smirk on Marcus Brooke's face behind her; instead she quickly began analyzing where she was and what she could do to get out of this situation. "Brooke, what did I say about pulling on my hair?" She asked as she turned her head to face him and fingering his sword.

The grin on his face did not waver. "Not to?"

Samantha silently fumed, freeing her hair from his grip and fully turned her body, aware of the sword still held against her throat. She fingered the blade again, "and what did you just do?" She asked, hoping to delay a few more seconds before he decided to move her as a prisoner.

Marcus grin was still on his face until shouts and the sound of metal clashing rang through the trees to their left. One glance was all it took for him to move his unwavering attention and Samantha took full advantage of it, shoving the blade away from her throat and angling her body to deliver a side kick into his bronze breastplate.

To his credit, Marcus took the kick quite well, only stumbling back a few feet but it was still enough time for Samantha to squeeze her rings and transform them into her pair of swords before he recovered and faced her, the sword now held in front of him against her two.

The pair circled each other warily in the small clearing, each taking in the surroundings and each other. Marcus was dressed in a full set of armour over a camp t-shirt and shorts with sneakers. Samantha could see his eyes were narrowed in concentration through the face guard of his helmet and noticed his sword drifting to the side, opening an angle for an attack when she hesitated. Something was different when she looked at Marcus and one eyebrow moved up, asking a silent question. Marcus's smile widened and he called out, "I told you she would notice, and it worked just as planned."

Samantha hesitated, not willing to glance around to look for who he was calling out to. Her battle senses would tell her if someone appeared nearby. "You're not using your dagger. Why the sword this round?"

The situation confused her immensely. Marcus always carried a knife that had been given to him years ago. Actually it had been her who had gifted it to him, but she shook her head before the memories could take over her mind and distract her. But this time he stood in front of her with a sword that did look familiar to her. Marcus's smile got wider if it was possible, "One, to distract you which was successful, and two, to trap you which was also successful."

Samantha glanced around. "Trap? Brooke you're supposed to be a smart guy. Alone against me in a small clearing with a sword isn't much of a trap. And since when did you get a sword anyway?"

Unfortunately, she failed to look down and did not see the glint of Celestial Bronze down by her feet. Just as she finished her sentence the long metal cable tightened from where it was hidden in the leaves and branches, immediately pulling her legs together and wrapping around her ankles. Samantha bit back a curse as she tumbled towards the ground and rolled as she landed on her shoulder, stopping in a sitting position and looked at her ankles.

Binding them together seemed to be a cable of celestial bronze, binding her ankles together. What surprised her was the seemingly lack of an end to the cable because it seemed to be one solid piece wrapped around her ankles. Glancing up at Marcus, she took in his now very wide smile, which she hadn't seen in a long time. "So this was all part of some brilliant plan to remove me from the game?"

Marcus simply shrugged. "It worked, so I can't complain. The hard part was getting you to not notice the new invention of the Hephaestus cabin, which I'm sure you've determined by now is a self-attaching cable that merges with itself so there's no chance of breaking."

He turned away, pressing something on his sword that caused it to glow briefly before seemingly collapsing in on itself until it became the knife that she had gifted to him. Samantha's eyes widened as Marcus turned his head and smirked again. "I've been a bit friendly with the Hephaestus cabin lately, Michael especially as you can see by the modifications here. The "Innovator" is still as good as ever. I'll have someone from the cabin come along to free you after the game, until then I hope you can hop well Sam."

Marcus turned his back and walked back towards where her team's flag was, Samantha glaring daggers at his back the entire way until he disappeared into the trees and she was alone in the clearing slumped against a tree. The cable around her ankles bit into the leather of her combat boots, making any leg movement painful and she was in the process of determining how far she could get with her legs bound when she heard shouting from a ways down the creek. She sighed, then her head swung around when she realized the shouting was coming from both sides of the creek as demigods converged on the boundary and exploded into cheers, signalling the end of the game.

A/N: And there it is! The first chapter that really didn't contain any of the other characters, but the story has to start somewhere right? This will be replacing the introduction completely so the story begins right on this chapter. Read, review, follow, fav, criticise, do whatever you guys feel like doing, I'll listen to it all. Also let me know if you feel like the story has way too many tangents or plotlines, I tend to lose direction and write my chapters as ideas come to the head. Thanks for reading!

Now for what most of you are waiting for, the five main characters of this story will be:

Samantha Tamaguchi – Daughter of Ares

Marcus Brooke – Son of Hermes

Alejandra Vitale – Daughter of Apollo

Grayson Wilson – Daughter of Athena

Jon Griffin – Son of Apollo

Thanks again to everyone for your character submissions and I hope you all keep reading! - angelfirecho