I was sitting in a bus. There was this really fat dude sitting next to me. He smelled like he lived in a trash can. I was squeezed against the bus' window. Outside, the weather was rainy, and there was kinda a small thunderstorm. I don't know why, but I liked thunderstorms. They gave me a...refreshening feeling. I brushed a tress of blond hair away from my face and sighed.

My name is Jayda Sparks. I´m fifteen years old. I have blond hair and green eyes. I play football, and I love singing. And yeah, I´m a demigod. More precisely, a daughter of Nike. You know, the victory goddess... And if you ask - yeah, I like winning.

Right then, I was on the way to my football practises. I raised the volume of my mp-3 player. I was listening to Titanium, which for some reason, was one of my favourites. The fat dude made a sudden move, probably annoyed. Maybe he didn't share the same taste in music . However, he tilted me straight to the window, so there I was closely squeezed against it. I gave him an icy look. Really, what was wrong with this dude?

Well, I think that was enough of complaining. "Excuse me?" I said loudly enough, and gestured towards the busses passageway. "This is my stop."

The dude sighed, annoyed, and then, slowly removed his ass from the seat. My existence was probably a huge headache for him. Well, that wasn't really my problem. I hopped to the aisle and soon stepped to the rain. I didn't have an umbrella. And it kinda wouldn't make any difference if I had one, since my practise was anyway going to be out in the open.

I breathed in the fresh, humid air and let the water run on my face. My sneakers were soon wet, and so was my hair, my clothes... well, I was pretty soaked when I arrived in the football field. The thunder clouds were whirling in the sky, and the rain was increasing. Yeah... the weather was pretty nice.

"Jayda?" One of my teammates, Chloe, exclaimed. Most of our team members were already there, standing in front of the stand.

"Yeah", I answered her. "Where's A?" Our coach's name was Aida, but we used to call her 'A'.

"Don't know", Chloe admitted, "she should already be here."

I scowled. Our coach wasn't usually late. "So, what shall we do, then?"

"Ann, did you call A?" Chloe shouted to the rain.

Ann, who was a few ten feet away from us with the others, raised her cell phone at us, shaking her head.

I pulled my hoodie's sleaves to cover my hands. It was getting really cold, and the rain and my wet clothes didn't help. I looked around for any monsters to appear trying to kill me. I didn't see any. Thought the place didn't feel safe... like something bad was about to happen - and yes, I know that feeling pretty well. The only question was: what should I do with my team mates? They could be pretty annoying sometimes, but I kind of didn't want them to be eaten by... anything. I took my hand on the zipper of my sports bag. Besides my football, water bottle and other normal stuff, I kept my silver dagger in there. I bit my lip. "Okay", I said in a loud voice and led Chloe towards the rest of our group. "I think we should go to McDonald's." There was a small McDonald's near the football field. We sometimes went there after practises.

"Mm... Okay, fine with me. It's freezing out here!" Lauren said, shivering a bit.
Soon the others agreed with my idea, since A hadn't aswered their phone calls or text messages. I couldn't be sure, but I thought, that even though they were mortals, they could sense the danger. Not wittingly, but uncounsciously. So they followed me to the McDonald's without any protest. I still didn't spot any monsters, but I stayed alart. With the rain and everything, my field of vision was pretty small.

I lived in a small town in Ohio with my dad. We stayed in an old row house in the middle of nowhere. My school was there, too. It was a shabby, small school, and there was only something like a few hundred pupils, if even that. The football field was in the same part of the town, only a few miles from our house. The summers I spent at Camp Half-Blood, and sometimes I visited there also other times. For the rest, I lived here in Ohio. It could be extremely boring. But now it seemed that something un-boring was finally happening. And yes, unlike many other demigods, I actually got bored if monsters didn't attack me often enough. Yeah, that may sound a bit strange.

So, after a few minutes of plodding in the rain, we reached McDonald's. It was a shabby, small house - wasn't everything in this place small and shabby? We were all soaked, and I heard Adyson murmuring something about her hair and make up, which, for surprise, were ruined by the rain. I turned to check my back, then rushed the others to go inside.

Inside the McDonald's, there was just the cash desk and a few tables. There wasn't staff behind the cash. And there were no customers. It was almost abnormaly quiet, the only sound I heard, was the rain outside. My teammates fell silent, too. Yeah, I was pretty sure, they could sense the danger. And then, without any warning, a dozen monsters appeared from nowhere, like the shadows had made them. In short order, I slided my hand into my sports bag and pulled out my dagger. "Get down! Under the tables!" I shouted to my teammates, as I stepped in front of them to face the monsters. From the corner of my eye, I saw the girls plunge on the ground. They looked terrified, as they tried to hide under the tables. The monsters had surrounded me. They were everywhere around me. Fortunately, they didn't seem to find the other girls worth of killing. There were only two kinds of monsters: snake women and laistrygons. The place was a bit small for the latter ones - their heads almost touched the ceiling.

I quickly looked behind, and for my amazement, the access to the door was clear. I quickly stepped back, planning to bait the monsters to come out after me, so that my teammates would be safe. But as I took my firs step backwards, someone grasped my shoulder from behind. I tensed, shocked. For a second ago, there weren't anyone behind me... I striked the grasper in the chest with my elbow. The strike was hard, but as the person reeled back, he still managed to pull me with him out of the door.

I fell on my butt, and my hands met the hard tarmac. I immediately looked behind my shoulder, to see who had yanked me out. For my big surprise, I saw Nico di Angelo behind me. "Nico!" I got on my feet and gestured towards the McDonald's. "How did you know to come here... Whatever. How about my friends?"

"They'll be left alone. The monsters are after us... after me, we should get going."

"How can you be sure?" I hesitated.

"Just trust me!" He caught my wrist. "Come!"

And in a one glimpse, the view around me turned black, and the temperature fell even colder. I knew what was going on: we were shadow traveling. It was something I had never experienced before. I didn't know which was up, and which was down. There was nothing but pure darkness around us, and the speed was... Well, kind of awesome.

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