A/N: ToaLapaka: it's here, the thing you've been waiting for since eMMeD posted that it was coming all of twenty minutes ago. The Under Demigods!
eMMeD:Witty, Lapaka. He worked on that for a full twenty minutes, ladies and gentlemen.
ToaLapaka: yes, waiting for FanFiction to work right (it never did).
eMMeD: I hope some of my readers will come and read this. This first chapter is written by ToaLapaka, but the next one will be written by me.
Disclaimer: Neither one of us are Rick Riordan. If we were, this would be in book form (and probably have a better title)
ARTHUR-1
Camp Begins
First, I don't want to be a half-blood. It's really not something you really ask to be. Keep that in mind while you read this. Second, I never led a quest before, so if my decisions seem stupid, it's because of lack of experience.
Winter break started out okay, I guess. I mean when you live year round at Camp Half Blood, the seasons start losing all meaning. The only thing I had going for me was my mom had finally claimed me, but even that wasn't that good of news. I guess I owe Percy something, I mean if it wasn't for him, I'd still be rotting in Hermes cabin. But being in the Athena Cabin wasn't that great either. Sure it was less crowded and I actually got my own bunk, but have you ever been stuck in a cabin all year with a bunch of brainiacs? Apparently when my mom thought me into existents, she wasn't thinking very hard. The only good thing about the seasonal breaks was that my best friend, Rodney Pyre (but everyone calls him Rod), came to camp.
But wait, you still have no idea who I am. My name is Arthur Psyches, I'm fourteen-years-old, and you know my mom is Athena. My dad… well let's not talk about him right now. I first came to camp during the winter of Titan's Curse, as the other campers called it, but I didn't get claimed until Percy set the age limit. One of the old past times at the Hermes cabin was guessing who the undetermined kids belonged to, but that's changed since the age limit. I was guessed to be almost every minor gods' kid, Hermes, even Hades once (because of my sunny outlook on life). See I never told anyone about my dad, and I never knew the woman I called mom was actually my step mom, but I knew she hated me for some reason. I never showed any Athena level excellence in any of the activities. I was sort of good at art and crafts, pretty good at strategy games, when I got a chance to play them. Of course my dyed black hair also detracted from any suspicions that I was an Athena kid. I have multiple reasons for keeping my hair dyed black, but I won't go into those right now.
Now onto Rod. Rod is rather tall and lanky, the exact opposite of all the rest of his half-blood siblings. He had buffed up a bit from when he first joined, but he's still pretty skinny. He has brown hair and green eyes. He joined camp at the same time I did. Apparently, Hephaestus is better about claiming his kids than Athena. Rod was claimed a few weeks after he joined. Most of the campers thought he would be the first brown-headed Athena kid, but most campers guessed correctly that he was a son of Hephaestus, and some thought that Zeus had fallen off the bandwagon again creating Rod. See, Rod is fascinated with electricity. In fact, when he had been confirmed as one of Hephaestus' kids, he made this awesome crossbow that shot electrified arrows. His mom was still alive, and not evil, so he lived with her most of the year. From what I heard, she's pretty awesome. She'd have to be to keep him away from Camp Half Blood. He loves this place; I mean where else could he get access to a fully functional forge.
He and I became friends during the first week we were at camp. And it was definitely not because we have anything in common. He's completely pro-gods, but I'm anti-gods. In fact the only reason I give offerings and toast to the gods is because Rod reminded me that they would probably blast me out of existence if I didn't.
Anyways, I waited at the edge of the camp's barrier for Ms. Pyres blue Saturn to drive up. Rod had tried to convince her to switch to another car considering that we had been in a giant war with the Greek version of Saturn, the Titan Kronos. It just didn't seem right that she was driving around with his Roman name on her car.
Finally, I saw Rod's car drive up at the base of the hill. He gave his mom one last goodbye hug as I ran down to meet him. He was wearing a Camp Half Blood T-shirt and his favorite Pittsburg Steelers hat.
"Rod!" I yelled down at him.
"Arthur!" he gave me a wide smile and ran up to meet me. "So, how many people have you annoyed since I've been gone?" he asked jokingly.
"Oh, only a few dozen," I responded, still laughing.
"You're going light this year." We walked up the hill to the cabins. Instead of just having the regular U-shaped Olympian cabins, it was now a triangle, with new cabins for Hades and all the minor gods, or at least all that we could remember. I looked over the minor god cabins; there were Hecate, Iris, Hypnos, Hebe, and Nemesis. I look over at Rod; he was still staring at Hecate cabin.
"What are you looking at?" I asked.
"What?" he looked at me like he had just come out of a daze. The only people I've ever seen staring at buildings are my siblings and Rod. He would stop a giant machinery stare like it was Aphrodite cabin after the Stoll brother's mango prank. Trust me, if you saw shoes, purses, locks of hair, and the occasional young camper flying out of a cabin, you would stare. "Oh, nothing, let me drop my stuff off, and then let's go to the forge, I've been dying to get back to my work." I wanted to keep pushing, but he started running to Hephaestus cabin.
After Rod dropped off his bags, we headed to the forge. The heat of the forge was welcomed after the cold winter weather outside. We worked our way through the heat and oppressive smoke to Rod's work bench. It was littered with half-finished project, a small remote control chariot, a Greek battle helmet with two small radars sticking out from the top with a red tinted visor over the eyeholes, and… well you get the picture. Rod picked up the beginnings of a sword, grabbed a hammer, and started pounding the metal. "What happened to Beckendorf's dragon?" he asked, never looking up from his project.
"What?" I asked, somewhat surprised that he had noticed it was missing.
"The bronze dragon that guards the camp, where is it?"
"Oh, well you see…" I really didn't want to tell him about the Hephaestus cabin curse.
"Rod, Is that you," called Carl Fouler, another Hephaestus kid. He was a short guy with red hair, which was singed at the edges and looked like he had been on the wrong end of an explosion (which he probably had been). He was covered in soot, and he smelled of burnt metal.
"Carl, what happened to you?" Rod asked.
"Hephaestus cabin curse strikes again, bro."
"Hephaestus cabin curse?"
"You didn't hear bro? Our cabin's cursed. Everything we make just blows up or falls apart."
"Oh come on, you're not telling me you actually believe our cabin's cursed."
"It's true," I said, "It all started when Beckendorf's dragon went rogue and ran out into the woods."
"Wait, there's a huge, thousand-pound dragon roaming around in the woods, and we can't find it?" Rod asked, I could tell he wasn't taking this seriously.
"Dude, every time we send someone out to get it, it roasts them like marshmallows. It's like Beckendorf is haunting us, man," Carl answered.
"Oh come on," Rod laughed.
"Laugh all you want, but when your inventions blow up in your face, don't say I didn't tell you so." With that Carl walked back to his own work bench. Rod went back to pounding his sword.
"He's telling the truth," I said.
"You believe Carl?" He laughed, "He's not the most trust worthy person when it comes to the supernatural."
"That true," I thought back to the time when Carl had sworn his work bench was haunted because all his projects kept moving over night. It turned out it was a mouse that had been going for the grilled cheese sandwiches he left there daily. "But it's not just him. Nobody in Hephaestus cabin has been able to build anything for months. And you saw what happened to Jake."
He kept silently pounding at his sword. "I got to meet up with the rest of my cabin. Archery is starting soon, and Malcolm will be mad if I'm late."
"Malcolm? Where's Annabeth?" He asked, still not looking up from his project.
"Long story," I said, trying to get out of the forge, "Percy's missing, everyone's looking for him, and Hera sent Annebeth a dream telling her to go to the Grand Canyon, got to go, bye." That apparently got his attention; because he finally looked up from his sword and said, "What?"
"See you later," I called back as I left the forge.
I started running to my archery class, when I saw her, Kayla Austin, daughter of Apollo. She was beautiful; she had a perfect tan, stunning blond hair with brown streaks which was pulled back into a ponytail, and her eyes were light brown. She was wearing a Camp Half Blood T-shirt and skinny jeans, and stood in front of the lake so the light caught in her are beautiful golden hair. I stopped and stared for a while, until I heard another girl's voice.
"Gaia to Arthur, Gaia to Arthur; come in Arthur." she said.
"What? Oh, it's just you Helen." Helen was a daughter of Hecate. She had short red hair and dark brown eyes. She had been my friend when I first came to camp, but I barely saw her after she was claimed. "And just because we're half-bloods doesn't mean you need to replace every modern saying with something that relates to the Greek mythology".
"But you say what the Hades," she reminded me.
"Yeah but that's different."
"How?" She asked.
"Look, as much as I'd love to stay here in and argue with you, I have got to get to archery before…" just then the late conch shell blew. "Oh great, now Malcolm is going to get on my case. See you, Helen."
I ran to archery and tried to sneak into the line without being noticed, but it didn't work. Malcolm spotted me and called me out to see him. Great, just when my day was going so well. I walked over to Malcolm, muttering Greek curse words under my breath as I went.
"Do you enjoy making us wait?" Malcolm asked as I drew near. I took in a deep breath, trying to keep my temper in check.
"I'm sorry, Malcolm," I said through gritted teeth, better to apologize and get on with it. Malcolm raised an eyebrow. Gods, I hate it when he is in charge.
"And why were you late this time?" Malcolm asked.
"Rod just got here. I had to catch him up on the recent events," I said. I looked over my shoulder to where the other Athena campers were waiting, each with a bow in hand. "Look, you can interrogate me later. Like you said, everyone's waiting." Malcolm looked like he was ready to argue, but I did not see how he could. Athena kids don't usually combat logic. Either way, I didn't give him a chance to respond. Instead, I just walked to the archery area. Malcolm finally seemed to give in and stalked after me. I picked up a bow and took aim. I shot a few arrows, completely missing the target. Little did I know that the next big prophecy was about to begin.
Rod and I were walking to our next activities. Of course, Rod wanted to know what I had been talking about in the forge. I told him about Percy Jackson's disappearance, how in only three days he had everyone looking for him, and threw in a small joke about Calypso's Island, that would've gotten me angry look from almost any other camper. Then I told him about the gods locking themselves away from us for the past few weeks, which was perfectly fine by me. However, Rod got a worried look on his face. "You know this means something big is happening."
"Or maybe Percy just annoyed them one to many times," I suggested.
"The gods wouldn't do something so petty," He insisted.
"Oh they wouldn't? What about the story of Echo? Or Cassandra? Or…"
"Ok I get the picture. But still…" before finish his sentence, a bright light flashed over the lake behind us. Before we knew it a giant chariot came plummeting into the lake. Canoeing campers yelled and tried desperately to row away from the falling mass. We stood in awe of the giant chariot wreck. Five demi-gods, who had been flipped out of the chariot as it fell, came staggering out of the lake. The first kid to come out had a Hispanic tone to his skin; he had curly black hair, with dark brown eyes. The Second kid had blond hair, a small scar over his lip, and blue eyes. The girl of the group was Native American, and had choppy black hair. She had a hard time getting out of the water, so much so the Nyads had to help her out. Don't misconstrue my close observation. I remember every face I see in great detail; it's a son of Athena thing. It's good sometimes, but when I see real ugly face, well, you can see how that would be bad. I recognized the other two instantly, Annabeth, my older 'sister', and Butch, son of Iris, but the other three were complete strangers. Will Solace stomped over yelling at Annabeth about him letting her borrow his chariot, not destroy it. Drew made a comment about being worth the trouble. She seemed rather unimpressed by the new arrivals. Annabeth was organizing guides for them, when above the Hispanic kids head, appeared a flaming hammer.
eMMeD: Okay, so at the end of each chapter Lapaka and I will issue a new challenge to you readers. This week is by whatever means possible, try to figure out what cabin we would be in if we were demigods. You can check out our other stories, profiles, whatever you want to figure out what cabin you would place us in. All people get a shout out in the next chapter.
ToaLapaka: yeah if we were demigods... I-I mean were not actual demigods... uh... um... is it hot in here or just me. Anyways, please Read and Review, not just to give us your answer.
eMMeD: Real discrete there, Lapaka, real discrete.