A/N: So… hey people, I actually wrote something and posted it. Wow. GO ME! But anyway, this is like a total AU from book four on. So forget everything that happened in TLO, and just… go with it. This is the prologue, and it may be confusing. Ah screw it, it probably will make like no sense whatsoever. Just read it.

Disclaimer: I own nothing, no money is being made, blah blah blah. Although actually, I do own Keara and a few other characters whom you will eventually meet.

It was all crashing down, and I knew it.

Fires burned all around us as campers and renegades prepared for the battle. The sun had just set, and the sky was a blood red color. I'm not superstitious or anything, but that didn't strike me as a good omen. But hey, we already knew we were screwed.

Oh, I didn't mean that like we as an army were going to lose. In fact, we'd probably win the battle and the war with all the help we'd been getting. But victory and the rewards in brought was only guaranteed to the half-bloods that had never gone against the gods. And, technically, me, Keara, Nico, Annabeth, and all the other renegades had gone against them by saying we wouldn't fight unless necessary. And the little part where we didn't just stand by and let them kill us. But other than that we'd done nothing.

Zeus didn't see it that way though. He had branded us as outlaws and renegades, and had tried to kill us with all the help he had available. Which, in case you don't know, is a lot. And in his mind, our helping the campers in this war didn't change the fact that we didn't always obey the gods, and so he wanted us killed. All of us. Including the half bloods that had done nothing but decide they didn't want to go to Camp Half Blood.

Now the people in our group that had pissed off some god or another, that I could kind of understand. Kind of. James had fought with pretty much all the gods at one point or another, Keara had insulted every god she'd ever met and disobeyed quite a few, and I… well, I hadn't been liked for being Poseidon's son in the first place and when I decided to fight with my sister, I think I drove off what few allies I had. So if nothing else, at least the gods had some sort of reason to dislike us. But Nico had done nothing but be born to Hades. Fi had done nothing besides being born to Hecate. It wasn't fair that they might have to die simply because they'd been part of our group.

But we had a chance to stop the gods from killing the younger kids, if not the older kids who were considered the leaders. If we could make a deal with them, they might spare our friends in return for something. And we had something that they needed very badly to win this war. Even though that might not be enough to get them to spare our friends, we had nothing else to offer. It would have to be enough.

Across from us in the clearing stood four gods, waiting to hear our deal. I swallowed nervously and looked down, feeling as if I was already doomed. Although they weren't gods that hated us to the point of killing us on sight, none of them looked very happy to be there. In fact, all of them looked pretty irritated, and I was beginning to think this was a lost cause.

Keara elbowed me and jerked her head in the direction of the gods. "If they're going to listen to us, we need to say it now," Keara muttered. "They're gods; they're not used to waiting for anything, the spoiled bastards."

I tried to speak but couldn't get it out, so I nodded instead.

"You gonna be able to say it?" Keara asked warily.

I cleared my throat and nodded. "I- yeah. I, uh, can say it. Yeah."

She glanced at me again, started to say something but changed her mind, and just nodded, jerking her head in the direction of the gods.

I swallowed hard and stepped forward, praying it wasn't too obvious that I was utterly terrified. "We called you here to make a deal with you," I said, my voice echoing in the nearly silent clearing. "One that could help you end the war faster." I paused and looked at each of the gods there, making sure that none of them were pissed off to the point of trying to kill us. Dionysus looked bored, Hermes looked irritated, and Artemis and Poseidon's faces were unreadable.

I swallowed again and continued. "Kronos keeps getting stronger every day. If you wait too much longer, he'll be unbeatable, and he's already going to be really hard to fight. All of you gods are going to be fighting other monsters or defending other places in this battle, so you probably won't be able to fight him. Me and Keara, though- we aren't assigned to a certain place or monster right now. All we're supposed to do is keep our rebels under control." I tried not to let my bitterness over that show, but I probably failed miserably. "Whether you like it or not, we're strong enough to at least injure him badly, and maybe even kill him. We'll fight him so you don't have to in return for something."

"Of course," Dionysus muttered, idly picking at his fingernails. "You brats can never do anything for free. What exactly do you want? Gold for you to spend on your little toys? Power to pretend that you aren't just a pair of bastards who were never supposed to be born? Oh, I know," he said, smirking nastily, "Something from Aphrodite to aid in your romances. No doubt you need help there."

Was it absolutely necessary for him to be a jerk? I started to respond, but Keara beat me to it. "Holy crap," she said, snorting, "How the hell did you survive in that camp of yours? I'd have killed you in the first week." She shook her head and continued, "And you're the one that needs help with your romances. How many times have you cheated on Ariadne? You gods have no room to speak."

Dionysus' eyes flashed. "That is none of your business," he snarled.

"Just saying," Keara muttered, smirking.

I sighed and rolled my eyes. "Anyway," I said, cutting them off before Keara could piss him off too badly. "What I was going to say was that we'll fight Kronos in return for you sparing our friends. Meaning that you don't touch them just because they sided with us."

Hermes shook his head. "We can't agree to that," he said. "The other gods- Hera and Zeus especially- won't like that we went behind their backs for a deal like this in the first place. They really won't like it if we gain almost nothing in return, and so they will claim that because they did not agree to this deal, they do not have to uphold it, and your friends' lives will be in danger anyway."

I frowned, starting to feel more nervous than I had at the beginning. "But you are gaining something," I said cautiously. "If we fight Kronos, there's no danger to you. And if we win, the war's over. If we lose, well, you got rid of us at least. There's nothing that says me and Keara are going to fight Kronos no matter what, and so we don't have to fight him."

"But you probably will fight him, regardless of rather we agree to this or not," Artemis said, speaking up for the first time. "You caught his attention with that raid on the Princess Andromeda. He sees you as a threat now more than he did, and so he will want to get you out of the way. Zeus is well aware of that, and so he thinks that you are giving up only what we already had. He will only agree to spare your friends if you sacrifice something else as well."

"We don't have anything else to give," Keara said, frowning.

What are they getting at? She asked me mentally.

I don't know, I answered, But I don't like it. I get the feeling that whatever they're saying, it was planned.

No shit, Percy, she replied. I hate dealing with gods.

Poseidon sighed and looked right at us. "Unfortunately, you do," he said grimly.

"No, we don't," Keara said, suspicion evident in her voice. "We don't have anything you'd… Oh gods," she breathed, turning and looking at me as it hit her.

I suddenly felt very old and very tired. "We do, don't we?" I said, feeling resigned and thinking that I should have realized it would be the only way they would agree to this. "We've got our lives. The other gods won't touch our friends so long as they can kill us." I groaned, and shook my head. "That's what the deal is, isn't it? Our lives for our friends."

"You don't have to agree to it," Poseidon said. "You can walk away now and take your chances after the war."

Keara swore colorfully. Should we agree to it?

I don't know, I said gloomily. It's probably the only way they won't hurt our friends, but…

Keara sighed. We're the leaders, though. They aren't going to like us taking this deal.

I laughed miserably. Are you kidding me? If we take the deal, we can't tell them. They'd knock us out and run back to the mountains. There's no way we can tell them.

So we just leave them in the dark? She demanded. What about James and Nico? What about Annabeth? You don't want to tell them?

I don't know, I said, feeling horrible. If we took the deal, our friends would be safe, but we would be dead. If we didn't take the deal, we could take our chances hiding from the gods, but we would always be running. We'd never be safe.

Should we take it or not?