The Jar
Hi! I know I should be updating my other story, but this one has been sitting on my mind for a while now. This will be a series of one-shots happening on the Argo II or on the quest in general following the short adventures of our favorite heroes that totally should have appeared in the book.
This chapter takes place just after the crew of the Argo II find Leo at that one café in that once city in the book the House of Hades. Enjoy!
Leo had been working on the engine for the last hour, and, thanks to the Argo's crew running to a Home Depot and Lowe's several times, he was nearly finished.
That was until he noticed a jar sitting in the corner.
It was a good size, and it had a faded label on the outside that appeared to be for jam. It looked as if the inside had been spray-painted black because he couldn't see into it, and the lid was a bright, shiny gold color.
Wiping of his hands on his jeans, Leo scooted over to the jar and carefully took it, lest it be secretly hiding Greek Fire or some other explosive substance. He peered carefully at the sides, hoping for a break in the black glass to see inside, but there was no such luck.
His curiosity immediately took over, and he tried to open it. When it didn't budge, he wiped more oil off his hands and tried again. And again. And again.
The only thing that stopped him from snapping his wrist in the attempt was Hazel, who had successfully retrieved more celestial bronze from a cache of old Greek weapons hidden deep in a hill just outside the city.
"What are you doing!?" she asked when she saw Leo's red face, contorted with the effort of trying to open it.
"I found this jar sitting in the corner and I was trying to open it!"
"Do you know what's inside?" Hazel asked.
"That would be a negative," he responded, but when he saw Hazel's scolding look on her face, he attempted to support his position. "I've got, like, serious ADHD, girl. You can't expect me to just work with a mysterious jar sitting in front of me- it's unnatural!"
"Let me see it," she said, holding out her right hand while the other rested on her hip, still looking like she was prepared to put him in a time-out if she felt like it.
Leo handed it over, and Hazel examined it as if she had x-ray vision.
"There aren't any precious metals in it, and I can sense maybe a pinch of some sort of rock inside, which could easily be dust. Here; let me try to open it." She laid her hand on top and gently tried to turn it.
If she opens it when I couldn't, this will be so embarrassing, Leo thought, groaning on the inside.
Hazel's face started turning red with the effort, and soon her hand left the lid, panting with the effort. "It's really stuck on there," she pointed out.
"I noticed."
"And now, thanks to you, I'm curious too!"
As much as Leo hated to admit it, they needed help with this problem. And two faces popped up in his head when he thought of strength.
He sighed, acknowledging his defeat. "Let's go ask Frank."
Frank was very frustrated with the jar. He'd been running errands with the flying Jason while Piper had gone with Hazel to get the now-forgotten celestial bronze, and now both he and Jason had tried and failed to open the mysterious black jar.
"Can't you like Mist it open?" Piper asked Hazel.
"Can't you Charmspeak it open?" the thirteen-year-old countered, just as frustrated with the situation as everyone else.
"Maybe I can…" Piper took the Jar from Frank. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath all dramatic-like before saying, "open!"
The jar just sat there.
"I said open you stupid little thing!"
Again, the jar did nothing.
Piper just about threw the thing into the harbor before Hedge came up from his room.
"Whoa! What's all this about yelling and throwing? And why didn't you invite me?"
"We've been trying to open this jar for the last half-hour!" Jason said, glaring at the thing.
"Well, how about you all step back and let me try?"
The jar was passed to the satyr. He examined it for a moment before pulling out his bat and whacking it before anyone could blink.
Instead of shattering, the jar was flung across the deck. It smashed into Festus's head and started rolling back to them. The mechanical dragon groaned in annoyance.
"That's all I've got. Di Angelo! Do you have any idea how to open it!?"
Nico head of black hair popped out from behind the ballistae, an I'm-going-to-kill-you look on his face. Apparently, they'd woken him from a nap.
"Try slicing the dang thing," he growled, getting comfortable behind the ballistae again. "You're all demigods, aren't you?"
Those two sentences opened up a brand new world of possibilities.
Everyone agreed they needed to get the ship moving, so the put the black jar in its place of honor as the centerpiece on the dining table, sitting there so that everyone could look at it and try a new idea whenever they thought of one.
Surprisingly, the jar still wasn't open by the time they'd ventured through the House of Hades and retrieved Percy and Annabeth.
The crew of the Argo II had literally tried everything- Leo had heated the jar up so much that he could have fully-cooked a cow at close range in about two seconds, Hazel had tried crushing it between two diamonds she "found lying around," Frank had attempted to turn into an octopus and swim it down to the lowest depth possible in the Mediterranean, hoping the air pressure might crack it, Piper had used every known language to try and coax the jar lid to open, and Jason had dropped it several times from the highest point he could go without suffocating into forests and mountains. They'd each tried to use their weapons to slice the jar or pry it open. None of them had had any luck.
They presented the problem to Percy and Annabeth after Reyna, Nico, and Coach Hedge had left with the Athena Parthenos. Annabeth laughed and rolled her eyes.
"Have any of you tried a jar opener?"
The teenage demigods stared at her blankly.
This only caused the blonde to sigh, take the jar, and march them all below deck to the mess hall.
She opened a cabinet filled with cooking utensils nobody really used (they did have magic plates, after all) and shuffled through them, pulling out an unfamiliar device with jagged sides and a black plastic handle. It fit perfectly around the jar, and, moving slowly for dramatic effect, Annabeth easily pried the lid off.
"See? The answer was easy enough all a-"
She screamed, dropping the jar (which still didn't break) and running. They all heard her door slam shut, the screaming continuing in her room.
Percy crouched down and laughed, letting a large, hairy tarantula climb onto his hand.
"Hey little buddy," he said to the creature as it moved from hand to hand. "Sorry to do this, but-"
In one swift motion, he uncapped his sword and sliced the arachnid in half.
Annabeth came out of her room when Percy told her it was dead, though she did freak out when one of its legs twitched a final goodbye.
She refused to enter the mess hall until the creatures had been thrown overboard and the entire room was disinfected twice with a variety of different cleaning sprays.
After the whole mess was over, Leo took the jar, thinking of throwing it overboard for all the trouble it had caused, but he was surprised to see a small white envelope sitting at the very bottom.
With a small amount of trouble, he extracted the envelope and opened it, revealing a note that had two words on it:
Cheers!
-Hera
I thought it'd be funny for Hera to pull a little prank on Annabeth, even though the goddess knows how important she is to the quest. This came fully together within a 45-minutes time period so please forgive any mistakes. Feel free to leave ideas for other one-shots you'd like to see and I'll give credit where credit is due. Don't forget to leave a favorite, follow, and a review if you like the story!