Hey, guys! So this is the rewrite of my story Not Again!. I just felt the story wasn't focused enough on Percy anymore. I actually have the next few chapters written up too (I just might not be able to update again until Monday). Anyway, I hope y'all enjoy this version!
Happy Fourth!
Disclaimer- If I were Rick, I would be putting all of my energy into the Mark of Athena, not fanfiction.
I stood facing a low brick apartment building gathering my courage. The five story building overlooked the edge of a college campus. The hallways and staircases were exposed to the weather, making the place seem more like a motel than an apartment building. According to the plaque on the wall in front of me, this dingy college dorm was once a vibrant, busy part of Philadelphia culture.
Slowly, I made my way up the concrete steps to the top floor. I was about to do something I hadn't done since the Labyrinth: ask someone I didn't really know for help.
There were two apartments on this floor and I didn't have any clue which one I needed to go to. Thinking it was less likely to have monsters that would kill me, I moved to knock on the door with potted plants and viney flowers growing happily around it.
Laughter and the sound of a debate emanated from the open window. When I knocked, no one seemed to notice for the longest time.
By the third knock, all the noises stopped, only to be replaced by one girl's lecturing voice.
"Seriously? Among the five of you no one could answer the door? It has to be the person who's actually doing something in the kitchen?"
The door opened and revealed the owner of the voice.
"Yes?" She asked, leaning against the door frame.
I recognized her from the sports stations on TV. She had the same long, brown hair pulled back into a ponytail, the mixed posture somewhere between a girl's and a guy's, and stood at about 5'8". She even had the little jagged scar at the base of her neck. The only difference was the slight bulge of her abdomen. If that bulge meant what I thought it did, we had a problem.
"Can I help you?" She asked, pulling me from my thoughts.
"Uh, can I talk to you out here, alone?" I asked, my eyes flicked to the tall guy who'd come to stand behind her in the doorway.
Her eyes searched my face and I felt almost as though she were tugging at my conscience as she scanned my eyes. Finally, she spoke.
"Athan, back off."
The guy took a step back as she walked out and closed the door behind her. She motioned down the 'hall' a little ways with a spoon she had in her hand. My mind wandered to what kind of damage she might be able to do with that spoon.
She leaned against a vertical metal post that ran from the floor through the roof and helped to support the railing around the entire upper floor.
"Speak." She said simply as she twirled the spoon in her fingers.
"I need your help with something." I started.
She held up the spoon in a 'hold on a second' gesture. "I don't know you." She paused. "Do you even know who I am?"
"Of course I know you. A person can't watch a college basketball game without hearing about the injury you sustained last fall." I made a mental note to see if she had a limp. "'Kezi Blake blew out her knee in a preseason game. This guy sprained his ankle and needs to be carried out on a stretcher. She limped off with help from only one medic.'"
Kezi sighed. "That's certainly me. But I still don't know who you are."
"I'm Percy Jackson." I said, pushing down the hood of my hoodie.
"Really?" Kezi asked. I nodded. "Huh." She shrugged.
"Like the guy from the completely-non-fiction-fiction books." I prompted, having not expected the reaction I'd received.
"No kidding." Kezi said sarcastically. "I totally figured that out by myself."
"What? How?"
"Black hair and green eyes. Aura of power and the way you keep looking around like you've been in more than a few near-death fights. You're either you or Harry Potter." I scowled at her and she laughed. "But seriously, I read those books religiously in junior high and high school. Your leather necklace is sticking out from the collar of your shirt and your hoodie sleeve is pushed up enough to reveal your tattoo."
I looked down at my wrist and cursed in ancient Greek. My sleeve had pushed halfway up my forearm.
I shook it off. "So, I need help with a quest." I shifted nervously on my feet.
"A quest-" Kezi prompted, running her spoon along the railing.
"To find Annabeth. She's lost." I stopped when Kezi suddenly dropped her spoon over the railing. She winced and leaned over to see if it'd hit anyone.
She looked back to me. "Annabeth is lost." Kezi let out a long breath and her eyes got the same faraway look as Annabeth's did when she was thinking. "Why do you need my help?" Her eyes stayed fixed on some faraway point.
"We don't have a real prophecy, but Rachel said the oracle wanted us to go to Pittsburgh and look for her." I studied Kezi's face as I spoke, she blinked and a small smile pulled at her lips.
"And?" She asked, looking at me again.
"Chiron thought it'd be a good idea to talk to you about going along. You know, someone who actually knew something about the city."
"I'm sorry, how does Chiron know me enough to recommend me?" Kezi narrowed her eyes and studied my face again.
"Camp has been keeping an eye on you." I started but was interrupted by loud footsteps coming from the direction of the apartment Kezi hadn't come out of. A blond guy my height (5'11) ran around the corner and took hold of my shirt.
"What the hell do you think you're doing, Jackson?" He growled and did his best to slam me against the wall. I opened my mouth to respond, but was cut off. "Chiron said they'd never have to get involved. They've been through enough."
"Easton!" Kezi snapped as he moved to punch me. The guy Kezi called Athan skidded around the corner and yanked Easton away, effectively slamming him against the wall.
"That's enough, Brady." Easton tried to throw him off, but Athan was a good three inches taller and obviously stronger. Easton gave up.
"What the hell was that about?" Kezi asked, looking between Easton and me as Athan slowly let Easton go.
Easton looked to me and then hung his head. "I know more about your family than you do, Zee." He whispered.
Kezi just looked at him. "What do you mean? Easton, I swear, if you've let me live for seventeen years, thinking my mother was just a selfish bitch who left me with my useless alcoholic of a father, when they were more than that, I will hurt you." Athan moved to wrap his arms around Kezi, pinning her body to his own.
"Nothing that changes anything." Easton defended with his hands raised in surrender. "She's just a daughter of Athena and he's a son of Poseidon."
"What? How do you know?"
Easton rubbed the back of his neck. "I'm a son of Apollo. I made an agreement with Chiron and some of the Olympians that if I watched out for you guys, you wouldn't have to get involved in camp affairs."
"Wait you said 'guys' plural. What does that mean?" Athan asked over Kezi's head.
"It means your mother is a daughter of Zeus and your father is a son of Hades."
Kezi shook her head. "So, what other details have you left out?" She asked, turning her attention back to me.
I shifted on my feet again, nervous as to how they'd react. "Annabeth is- uh," I ran a hand through my hair. "Pregnant."
"Like you." Easton muttered under his breath, still refusing to meet my eye.
"Don't go there." Kezi warned him.
Athan's arms tightened around the person I assumed was at least his girlfriend. "How far?" He asked.
I looked down and rubbed the back of my neck. "Eight months as of last week. She went missing yesterday morning." I checked my watch. It was 3 o'clock, 30 hours after she'd disappeared.
"Who all is going?" Kezi asked gently as she pried Athan's tightly wrapped fingers off her arm.
"Uh, well, Nico," Kezi jumped when he appeared out of the shadows. "And if any of you three are willing to go as well."
"Kezi, no." Athan stated firmly the moment she looked up at him.
"Athan, it's my city. No one knows it like I do." Athan shook his head while she spoke. "What if it was me? I'm only about two months behind her."
Athan froze. "Fine, but I'm not letting you out of my sight." Kezi rolled her eyes and turned to look at Easton.
He finally looked up from a crack in the concrete and locked on her eyes. "I can't very well leave the girl who's practically my sister with only a guy who has never touched a sword in his life for protection from these two." He said, jabbing his thumb at Nico and I.
"Well," Nico said, clapping his hands together. "Let's go catch a football game." Kezi shot him a glare.
"So when do you think we'll get to Pittsburgh?" I asked half an hour later after we piled into Kezi's Chevy.
"Assuming we don't run into any traffic leaving this city," Kezi paused when Athan snorted. "And there is absolutely no traffic on the turnpike, which is actually plausible, and we don't get stuck in the tunnels," Easton snorted this time. "About six hours."
"So according to the GPS, we'll get there at, like, 9:30." Nico summarized.
"If I knew where my GPS was, yes."
"You lost your GPS?" I asked. "Do you even know where you're going?"
"If I don't know this route after four years, I'll never learn it."
Kezi wove around the city avoiding most of the traffic until we merged onto the highway leading out of the city and just sat there for half an hour.
"Sorry, couldn't avoid this part." Kezi said as she swerved out of the way of a tractor trailer.
We passed field after field of corn and other produce, not to mention cows and horses, for what felt like hours with little to no conversation. Eventually, the other guys fell asleep. I decided to start up a conversation with Kezi as we passed a field of wind turbines.
"So, how much longer, do you think?"
"Three hours from the turbines." She said with a glance over her shoulder.
"Three hours exactly?"
"On average, depends on traffic." She laughed when she saw my face in the rearview mirror. "You can't tell me you don't know New York like this."
"The city: absolutely. But the state, not hardly."
"Yeah, well when you take the same route 23 times in 4 years, you can drive it in your sleep."
"Don't do that." I joked.
I watched Kezi in the mirror as a sobered look passed over her face before a hardness settled in her eyes. "I will not die behind the wheel."
"What?" I asked. She shook her head. "I'm sorry; I didn't mean anything by that."
Kezi glanced back at me again. "I know, it's just, I haven't seen two of my siblings since they were in a car accident about seven years ago. Stupid witness protection program."
I looked out the windshield ahead of me, unsure of what to say. "That's rough. Were you close?"
Kezi nodded. "Very. We kind of depended on each other. What with not really having any parents around and everything."
"What do you mean? If you don't mind my asking."
Kezi sighed. "My mother left right around the time my twin brother and I turned two. She left four kids under the age of six with an alcoholic. He tried for a while, but after we were in about second grade, he stopped trying. I honestly haven't seen my father sober in years."
