Disclaimer: As awesome as I am, I decided to give Rick Riordin a chance, and he owns PJATO.

"WELCOME TO GOODE HIGH SCHOOL". I sighed. After our vacation in Montauk, it was finally time for me to go back to school. A new school. Mom was making go here because my new step-step-dad teaches English here.

Now, I know what your thinking. "Step-step-dad?" No, my mom is not a slut. She fell in love with a dude and had me, then he had to go to this big important job somewhere overseas. My mom then married Smelly Gabe because she needed someone to support the family and protect me. But, after a while it became clear that he wasn't really interested in supporting the family or protecting anyone, and then began hitting my mom. So she ditched him. Then she met Paul Blofis, a nice guy that she actually fell in love with. They got hitched, he got a teaching job, and here I am, standing in front of another school, with no friends, ADHD, dyslexia, and an English teacher for a step-step-dad, and vise-versa.

I started up the steps to the building, and went straight to the principal's office to get my class schedule. I knocked on the door, and could here an audible sigh of annoyance. "Come in, if you must." I halfheartedly pushed the door open. A desk covered in all kinds of useless junk sat up against one wall. A trash can in one corner was overflowing with empty beer cans. I wondered if that kind of thing was even allowed at a high school. Behind the desk, sitting in a swivel chair, with a horrible look of boredom and annoyance on his face, sat a pudgy short man, with bloodshot eyes and a quadruple chin.

"Well? Do please hurry up about it and sit down, brat." I sat down before I could think about it. "I suppose I must welcome you to the school. Well, welcome. We hope you enjoy your stay and all that. Here is your schedule." He handed me a pamphlet with all of my classes. He leaned over and said into the microphone on his desk, "Mr. Brunner? Could you send Mr. Underwood up here? And do be quick about it would you?"

"Yes, Mr. D. I will send him up right away," a voice answered. From the tone, I could tell that this Mr. Brunner probably loved our principal as much as I did.

"Are you allowed to drink alcoholic beverages here?" I asked him. He rolled his eyes and shook his head no. "Then how come you do?" I asked, pointing to the trash can. I knew I was pushing it, but this guy was really making me mad.

Before he could answer, a short boy with curly brown hair, and a very nervous expression opened the door slowly and came in. "Yes, Mr. D?" he asked while fidgeting his fingers.

"Would you be so kind as to show Mr. Pedro Jordan here around our lovely school? Thank you so much." His voice was dripping with so much sarcasm; it was almost painful to listen to.

"Actually, kind sir, my name is Percy Jackson. Per-cy Jack-son. I know it can be hard at first, but I'm sure that if you keep practicing, you'll get it eventually," I told him with a sweet and innocent smile as I left with Mr. Underwood. Wow. Really, I'm usually not so mean. Oh well.

"You know he's gonna be really mad at you," he said. He kept glancing over his shoulder, like he was afraid the bogeyman would be looking for him.

"I know. Percy Jackson," I said holding my hand out to him and smiling. I doubted this guy had very many friends with his nervous personality.

"G-Grover Underwood. I'm supposed to show you around." He showed me the major areas of the school, my locker, and where my first class was, which he shared with me.

Now I got a better look at him. His brown curly hair was about two inches long everywhere, and desperately needed to be combed. His eyes were a light color blue, and were frantically looking in all different directions like he was terrified of everything. His eyebrows were sort of scrunched up in a way that made him look sort of confused. They looked like they were stuck that way, though, so he generally always looked nervous or scared. He had a pretty serious acne problem. His nose and ears were kind of pointy. He almost looked like a goat.

Grover visibly relaxed as we entered our first class: Latin. That made me feel a lot better about things, since he had been tense and nervous for the rest of the time since we met. This teacher must be pretty friendly for Grover to feel relaxed around them.

"...which angered Athena, so she cursed Medusa by turning her into a horrible - Ahh! Mr. Underwood. How nice of you to join us. And you must be Perseus Jackson." He turned toward me. I cringed as he said my real name. I mean, seriously...your firstborn son, the one to carry on the family name, somebody you created with someone you loved, the one that will take care of you when you get old and get Alzheimer disease, and all those baby names to choose from...would you really choose a name like Perseus?

"Just Percy, sir."

He nodded. "Very well, Mr. Jackson. I am Mr. Brunner." The inside of me delighted and said "Tee-hee!" This was the guy that didn't like the principal. That somehow made me feel happy. "You may take a seat." I did. I was surprised at how interesting it was. Now, I'll have you know that am not exactly a star student. I have never received above a B- on a report card. School just isn't my thing. I usually can't sit still, cause of my ADHD, and don't expect me to get farther than one page at a time while I'm reading a book, because of my dyslexia.

And so, my day continued just like any other day. Until fourth period. I was on my way (or I thought I was on my way. Not sure if I was actually headed in the right direction.) to biology, and I heard a rather terrifying voice taunting somebody.

"What's wrong, Scaredy Goat? Did somebody take your book, baby?" Uh-oh. I didn't think it was even possible for there to be a more perfect person to fit the description of "Scaredy Goat" than Grover.

"N-no. I'm p-p-perfectly fine wi-without that b-book. Y-you can k-keep it." I rushed onto the scene. Of course, there was Grover, being held by his shirt collar against the wall by a big, gruff looking girl. Not like, "fat" big, more like, "lots-of-muscle-I-could-kick-Percy's-butt-with" big. I knew I definitely did not want to be on this person's bad side. Still, I had to help Grover.

"Stop."

Hmm. Nothing happened. That's weird. I'll have to try harder.

"Hey! Leave him alone!" I shouted. She looked at me like I had just eaten a garbage can. "Yeah, you. Put him down!" Grover looked even more terrified than usual. He looked at me in a way that clearly said, "Run for your life while you still have a chance!" But by the time I was done reading that look, it was too late. The girl now had both of us pinned against the wall with our feet dangling. Man, she was stronger than she looked.

"You say something, punk?" I was about to say yes, but apparently she didn't really want an answer. "Here, you can follow your goat friend down the toilet," she said smirking, while I heard some people snickering. I hadn't noticed, but we had attracted quite a crowd at this point.

"I'd rather not, thank you," I replied. Then I realized that that was probably not going to help me much, and I kneed her in the stomach, which wasn't hard at all since she was holding me at just the right hight.

After that, it was like it was all a joke. For a second she seemed utterly confused, and then her face showed denial, followed by a look of shock, like she just couldn't believe I had actually done that. It was quite comic to watch, actually. The move on my part hadn't really hurt her; in fact, I doubt she even felt it. But she obviously wasn't used to being stood up to.

In the end, Grover and I were simply covered in pencil shavings, homework scraps, and a couple of bruises instead of toilet water. But we were late for class, which earned us detention.

"You are amazing." That kind of caught me off guard. I didn't feel very amazing at that particular moment in my life, walking down the hall towards detention on the first day of school, after getting beat up and having a trash can dumped over my head. I turned towards Grover with my eyebrows raised.

"Nobody has ever stood up to Clarisse before." He turned his gaze towards the floor and added in a much smaller voice, "Especially for me." Wow.

"I'm not that great. I mean, I didn't beat her, and now we both have detention. I don't really feel like I helped that much." It was true. If I hadn't done anything, Clarisse most likely wouldn't have given Grover anything worse than a scratched book or two. Because of me, her confidence had been lowered, her ego shaken, and her self-esteem jarred, and now she didn't like me very much. Just because I didn't want Grover to get hurt. I have always had a problem with loyalty. Here I was, coming to Grover's rescue, even though I had only known him for a couple of hours. I felt like I was his protector.

"Are you kidding me? The whole school knows about you! You were already good-looking. But now that you've stood up to Clarisse, you're a hero." Hmm. Hero. Good-looking. I like you, Grover.

"I really don't see why you are making such a big deal. I didn't do anything even you yourself couldn't have done, Grover." Okay, that's not quite how I meant it. He looked a little hurt.

He groaned. "Look around you. The whole school is talking about how brave you are." I didn't have to look very far. A group of boys a little off to our left were talking in hushed tones and glancing sideways at us. Two scrawny-looking boys were looking at me in awe, not even trying to hide the fact that they were talking about me. Practically all the girls in the hallway were either giggling or sighing or pointing at me.

I puffed my chest out a little farther. What?

As I pulled open the door to detention I could hear the entire room draw in one, long breath. Just for fun, I pulled it open as slowly as I could, and when it was all the way open, I held it there. Sure enough, all the voices, whispers, giggles, and even footsteps stopped. Silence. Then I let the door shut completely. As the door closed, the room seemed to let out the breath it had been holding. I laughed silently. Grover looked at me like I had truly lost my mind. Maybe I had. This time when I opened the door, I actually went through it. Right before it closed all the way, I could hear voices and chattering start up louder than they had been before. I had controlled the whole school's breathing.

I was popular. Wow. I'm impressed.

I was the proudest thing ever walking into detention that day.

I sat down in a seat next to Grover. I kept checking the clock, and every time I looked, less time had passed. After a while, I began to wonder if it would start going backwards if I looked too often. Then I fell asleep.

Who knows how long later, someone was shaking me. I blinked myself awake. "The zombie lives." A girl a little shorter than myself sat back in her seat. She had beautiful curly blond hair, but it was pulled back into a ponytail. Her eyes were stormy gray, and amazing. They had a sort of glaze that made you feel like she was studying you, memorizing every single molecular feature on your soul. They were confident. She seemed ready for anything. They were also intimidating. They seemed to be able to see into your very being, everything wrong about you.

They were gorgeous.

I expected her to say something about me standing up to Clarisse, helping Grover when he was helpless. Saving the day for an innocent citizen. But no. My ego had apparently had enough boosting today. Instead, she gave an annoyed look and stood up and said, "You know, you drool in your sleep."