Chapter 1

We Accidentally Vapourize Our Pre-Algebra Teacher

Aaron:

look, we didn't want to be half-bloods. If you are reading this because you think you might be one, our advice is: close this book immediately.

Believe whatever your parents told you about your birth and lead a normal life. Aaron?

Aaron:

Oh, right, being a half blood is dangerous. it's scary, sometimes even of the times it gets you killed in painful and nasty ways

Percy:

If you're a normal kid, reading this book because you think its fiction, great. Read on. We envy you for being able to believe that none of

this ever happened

Aaron:

But if you recognise yourself in these pages... if you feel anything stirring inside... stop reading this book, it could save your life, you could be one

of us. And its only a matter of time before they sense it too, and they will come for you.

Don't say we didn't warn you.

Aaron, you want to start?

Okay, my name is Aaron Jackson, and my twin brother here is Percy Jackson.

We are twelve years old. Until a few months ago, we were boarding students at Yancy Academy, a private school for troubled kids in upstate New York.

Are we troubled kids?

Yeah, you could say that

We could start at anytime in our short miserable lives to prove it, but things really started going downhill last May, when our class went on a field trip to Manhattan. Twenty-Nine mental-case students and two teachers on a yellow school bus, going to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to look at dusty Ancient Greek and Roman stuff.

I know, it sounds boring. Most of the field trips at Yancy were.

But Mr. Brunner, our Latin teacher, was leading this trip, so we had high hopes.

Mr. Brunner was this middle-aged guy in a motorized wheelchair. He had thinning hair and a scruffy beard and a slightly frayed tweed jacket, which for some reason always smelled like coffee. You wouldn't think he'd be anywhere near cool, but he always told stories and jokes and let us play games in class, which was fine by me. He also had this cool collection of Roman armour and weapons, so he was the only teacher ever whose classes didn't put me to sleep.

My brother and I both hoped we wouldn't get into trouble.

Boy were we wrong...

See, bad things happen to us when we go on field trips. like our fifth grade trip to the Saratoga battlefield, Percy had this accident with a Revolutionary War cannon. He wasn't aiming at the school bus...

Percy:

Hey! In all fairness, Aaron aimed it...

Aaron:

...but we still got expelled anyways. And before that, our fourth grade school took a behind-the-scenes tour of the Marine World shark pool. I sort of leaned against the wrong lever, and our class took an unexpected dive in the shark pool. and the time before that... well, I think I've nailed the idea in your head.

This trip we were both determined to be good.

All the way into the city, we had to put up with Nancy Bobofit, a freckly, red-headed kleptomaniac girl, trying to hit our friend Grover on the head with pieces of peanut-butter and ketchup sandwich.

Like I said, Tried.

I kept blocking the pieces of sandwich with my wings...

Oh yeah, guess I should explain that.

You see, i am... different. Well, more different, than the other kids, and my brother. For my entire life, up until my life changed, I... We, had no idea why, since we were identical twins, up until our eyes, which were slightly different. My wings were midnight black and had a span of 7 1/2 feet on each side, which I usually don't have them extended, most of the time i had them resting against my back. You will see later in the story why I have them.

Anyways, back to the story.

Grover was an easy target. He was scrawny. He cried when he got frustrated. He must have been held back a couple of grades, because he was the only sixth grader with the start of a wispy beard on his chin and a case of acne. On top of all that, he was crippled. He had a note excusing him from P.E class for the rest of his life because he had some type of muscular disease in his legs, but don't let that fool you. You should see him on enchilada day in the cafeteria, boy can he run when he wanted to...

Anyway, Nancy Bobofit was still trying to throw wads of sandwich in his hair which i still blocked with my wings, which i wish she wouldn't, that sandwich will take a while to clean out. She knew we couldn't do anything other than that about it, because the school had threatened my brother and I to in-school suspension, which might ruin us for a while, if anything bad, disastrous, embarrassing, or even mildly entertaining happened on this trip.

"I'm going to kill her," my brother growled

I tried to calm him down and remind him to what might happen if he follows through with his plan. "It's fine, I can wash it out later Perce. Remember what would happen if we tried that out now?"

I blocked another piece of Nancy's lunch.

"That's it." He started to get up, but Grover pulled him back down.

"Aaron's right, Percy. You two are already on probation," he said to my brother "You know who'll get blamed if anything happens." he said pointing at me and Percy.

Looking back on it, I wished I helped my brother execute his plan right there and then. In-school suspension would be way better as to what would soon be happening.

Mr. Brunner led the tour through the museum.

He rode up front in his wheelchair, guiding us through the big echoey galleries, past marble statues and glass cases full of really old pottery

It blew our minds that this stuff had survived for two to three thousand years.

He gathered us all around a thirteen-foot-tall stone column with a big sphinx on the top, and started to tell us about how it was a stele, for a girl about our age. He told us about the carvings on the sides. I was trying to listen, but everybody around me was talking, and every time my brother told them to shut up, Mrs. Dodds would give us the evil eye. Mrs. Dodds was this little math teacher from Georgia who always wore a black leather jacket, even though she looked like she was from ancient times, she still looked mean enough to ride a motorcycle into your locker (which I hope she doesn't). She had come to Yancy half-way through the year when our previous math teacher had a nervous breakdown.

From her first day, Mrs. Dodds loved Nancy Bobofit and figured me and my brother were the spawn of the devil. She would point her crooked finger at us and say, "Now, honey," real sweet, and we both knew right away that we would be staying back to erase math textbooks until midnight. One time, when we got back from erasing math textbooks, Percy told Grover that he didn't think Mrs. Dodds was human. He just turned around and looked at him seriously and said, "you're absolutely right."

Mr. Brunner kept talking about Greek funeral art.

Finally, Nancy Bobofit snickered something about the naked guy on the stele, and my brother turned around, and before i could do anything, he said, "Will you shut up?"

it sounded like it came out louder than he meant to.

The entire group started laughing. Mr. Brunner stopped his story.

"Mr. Jackson," he said, "did you have a comment?"

his face looked beet red. he replied, "No, sir."

Mr. Brunner pointed to one of the carvings on the stele. "Perhaps you'll tell us what this picture represents?"

He looked at the picture and a look of relief played across his face as he recognised it. "That's Kronos eating his kids, right?"

I was surprised he even knew what that was because he never remembered what was taught in class, even if he tried his best. must be the ADHD and Dyslexia that we had.

"Yes," Mr. Brunner said, obviously not satisfied. "And can you tell us why he did this?"

I was worried he would get it wrong, but to my surprise...

"Well..." he thought. "Kronos was the king god, and..."

"God?" Mr brunner asked, quizzicly.

"Titan." I whispered to him.

"Mr. Jackson, I do believe Percy will get this right on his own."

"Sorry, sir." I apologised.

"continue, Percy." Mr. Brunner told my brother.

"Anyway... Kronos was the king Titan and... he didnt trust his kids, who were the gods. So, um, Kronos ate them, right? But his wife hid baby Zeus, and gave Kronos a rock to eat, instead of Zeus. Later, when Zeus grew up, he tricked his dad into barfing up his brothers and sisters..."

"Eeew!" said some of the girls behind him. I turned around and gave them my infamous death stare, and they shut up pretty quickly.

"...and so there was this big fight between the Titans and the Gods," he continued, "and the Gods won."

Some people in the group were snickering, and before I could glare at them, Nancy Bobofit said, "Like we're going to use this in real life. Like its going to say on our job applications, 'Please explain why Kronos ate his kids.'"

"and why, Mr Jackson," Mr. Brunner said, "to paraphrase Miss Bobofit's excellent question, does this matter in real life?"

"Busted," me and Grover both said in sync

"Shut up," she hissed, her face brighter than her hair.

At least she got packed, too. Mr. Brunner was the only teacher ever hearing her say anything bad. Gotta love those radar ears of his.

Percy thought about the question, until he gave up and shrugged. Well, I couldn't have expected him to know that, because I didn't know it either.

"I see," Mr. Brunner said, clearly disappointed. "Well, Half credit to Mr. Jackson. Zeus did in fact feed Kronos a mixture of mustard and wine, which made him disgorge his other five children, who, of course, being immortal gods, had survived and had been living inside the Titans stomach, completely undigested. The gods then defeated their father and cut him into a thousand pieces with his own scythe, and tossed his remains into the darkest part of the Underworld, Tartarus.

As he said that last word, the air turned a bit cold, and if anyone else noticed, they didn't give in.

"And on that happy note, it's time for lunch. Mrs. Dodds, would you lead the class back outside?"

The class then drifted back outside, the girls holding their stomachs, like they were about to puke, and the guys pushing each other around and acting like doofuses.

Grover, my brother and I were about to follow when Mr. Brunner said "Jacksons."

We both saw that coming

We told Grover to go on. Then we turned to Mr. Brunner. "Sir?" we both asked.

Mr. Brunner had this look that wouldn't let go of you, unlike my 'death stare', he had intense brown eyes that looked like they've seen everything

"I need you to find the answer to my question," Mr brunner told us.

"About the Titans?"

"About real life. And how both of your studies apply to it."

"oh." was the only thing that came out of my mouth.

"What you learn from me, is vitally important. I expect you two to treat it as such. I will accept only the best from you two, Jacksons."

I flexed my wings nervously

I wanted to get angry, this guy pushed me and my brother so hard.

I mean , sure, it was cool when he would dress up in Roman armour, and would shout, "What, ho!" and challenge you sword point to chalk to name every Greek and Roman person who ever lived, and who their parents were, and what God they worshipped. But Mr. Brunner expected us to be as good... no... he expected us to be better, than the other kids, despite our ADHD and dyslexia, and we both never made above a C- in our lives.

I mumbled something about 'trying harder' and Percy said something like 'sorry, sir', while Mr. Brunner told us to go outside and eat.

We both nodded and left him stare at the stele with those thousand year old eyes.

The class gathered on the front steps of the museum, where we could watch the traffic go by.

Overhead, a huge storm was brewing, and everyone was looking at it nervously. the clouds covering New York were blacker and bigger than any other storm I had seen. The weather in New York has been weird since Christmas. We'd had massive blizzards, floods, and wildfires from lightning strikes. I wouldn't be surprised, nor do I think anybody else would be, if this was a hurricane blowing in.

most of the kids from our school hadn't noticed the storm, but as I looked around, a lot of the adults were. Some of the guys were pelting pigeons with lunchables crackers, Nancy Bobofit was trying to pick-pocket something from a lady's purse. Naturally, Mrs. Dodds wasn't seeing a thing.

Grover, Percy, and I were sitting by a fountain away from the museum, thinking that if we didn't stay around the group of kids, nobody would think we were from That school... the school for loser freaks that couldn't make it anywhere else.

The three of us sat on the edge of the fountain facing away from the group.

"Detention?" Grover asked us.

"Naw." Percy said.

"Not from Brunner. I just wish he would lay off us sometimes, I mean, we aren't geniuses." I said.

Grover didn't reply for a while, until he said, "Can I have your apple?" he asked my brother. Percy shrugged, and said, "Sure." and tossed him the apple.

"Hey," I said. They both looked at me. "How about we use my apple as a hacky sack?" I asked.

"Sure." they both replied.

Soon, we were bouncing the apple around the three of us. I wasn't too bad, I'll have to admit, neither were Percy and Grover.

We played for a bit longer, bouncing the apple off of anything we could. Arms, legs, head, feet. I was rolling it off my wings as well.

The game ended when Grover backhanded the apple, by accident, and it went flying, until we couldn't see it.

I sighed, for we had nothing to pass the time now. Percy and Grover were talking about something, but I wasn't focusing.

I watched the stream of cabs go down Fifth Avenue, and thought about our mothers apartment, only a little ways away from here. My brother and I hadnt seen our mother since Christmas break, and I wanted, soo badly, to just hop in a cab and head to her apartment. she'd hug me and be glad to see me again, but she would also be disappointed, and tell me to try harder and send me right back to Yancy.

Mr. Brunner had parked his wheelchair at the base of the handicapped ramp. He ate celery while he read a paperback novel. A white and red umbrella stuck up from the back of his wheelchair, so he looked like a mini motorized table.

I sighed at all the deep thinking I was doing and went to unwrap my sandwich when Nancy and her ugly friends showed up in front of the three fo us... I guess she'd gotten tire of trying to pickpocket tourists. and dumped her half eaten lunch on Grovers lap.

"Oops." She grinned at me with here crooked teeth, that looked like a dump truck took care of them. Her freckles were orange, as if someone melted a bunch of cheetos and put them in a spray bottle and sprayed them all over her face.

I tried to stay cool, especially when my brother usually lost it, but this time seemed to affect me as much as him. 'Count to ten, get control of your anger.'

I was so angry that my mind went blank. A wave roared in my ears.

I don't remember touching her but the next thing I knew, Nancy was sitting in the fountain, soaking wet.

"You freak!" She screamed at me then repeatedly screamed that me and my brother pushed her into the fountain, which was getting annoying.

Mrs. Dodds materialized next to us.

Some of the kids were looking at Nancy and us and were whispering: "Did you see . . ."

". . . the water . . ."

". . . like, it grabbed her . . ."

One of them said with an amazed and shocked face, "They didn't even touch her"

As soon as Mrs. Dodds was finished making sure Nancy was okay, promising that she would get her a new shirt from the gift shop, etc . . .

Mrs. Dodds turned to me and my brother with a triumphant look on here face, as if we just did something she had been waiting for all semester. "Now, honey . . ."

"I know," Percy grumbled. "A month erasing workbooks"

I physically face-palmed at what he said, which definitely got us into more trouble.

"Come with me," Mrs. Dodds said

"Wait!" Grover almost screamed "It was me! I pushed her into the fountain."

My brother and I looked at him a bit shocked at what he said. Mrs. Dodds scared Grover to death, and here he was taking the blame, sacrificing his free time for hell with Mrs. Dodds.

"I don't think so, Mr. Underwood," She said.

"But . . ."

"You. Will. Stay. Here." she said demandingly

Grover looked between us desperately

"It's okay man," I told him, "You tried," Percy finished

"Honey," Mrs. Dodds practically barked. "Now"

Nancy Bobofit smirked

I gave her my infamous death stare, and she went pale and shrank back into the towel currently wrapped around her.

I looked back to Mrs. Dodds, only to find she was at the museum entrance already.

I tapped my brother in the shoulder, and he turned around to look at me. He raised an eyebrow, and I pointed to Mrs. Dodds, which he looked surprised at.

"How did she get up there so fast?" he asked me.

"I don't think we will ever know."

We walked up the stairs to the museum, leaving me thinking if this was my ADHD acting up, because I have had moments like that where my brain falls asleep, or something, and the next thing you know, I missed something important. Though I know for a fact, that Percy has them way more than I do.

Though I wasn't too sure this time . . .

We both looked at each other, and shrugged. Then we went to follow Mrs. Dodds up the steps.

Halfway up, Percy glanced back, so I did the same to see what he was looking at, and I saw Grover nervously switching his eyes between Mr. Brunner and us, like he wanted Mr. Brunner to notice what was happening, but Mr. Brunner was to engrossed into his book that he didn't even look up when Nancy hit the fountain.

We looked back up to find Mrs. Dodds already at the end of the main hall to the museum.

Okay, I thought, She's going to make us buy Nancy a new shirt at the gift shop. But apparently that wasn't the idea she had in mind.

We followed here deeper into the museum.

"Where is she taking us?" Percy asked me.

"I have no idea, but I wish I wouldn't have to find out." I replied.

When we finally caught up to her, we were back in the Greek and Roman section.

Except for us, the gallery looked empty.

Mrs. Dodds stood with her arms crossed in front of a big marble frieze of the gods. She was making this weird noise in her throat, almost like .. growling.

Even without the noise, I would've been nervous. It's weird being almost completely alone with a teacher, especially Mrs. Dodds. Something about the way she looked at the frieze that de-pictured the gods overthrowing their father, almost like she wanted to pulverize it . . .

"You two have been giving us problems, honey," she said

We did the safe thing and said, "Yes Ma'am."

She started to tug on the cuffs of her leather jacket, which made me nervous, as I started to move my wings restlessly. "Did you really think you were going to get away with it?"

The look in her eyes were beyond mad, they were downright evil.

Percy was nervously picking at his shirt

She's a teacher, she's not actually going to hurt us . . . is she? I thought

We still went down the safe path as Percy said, "We . . . we'll try harder, Ma'am."

Thunder shook the building.

"We are not fools Jackson twins," Mrs. Dodds snarled. "It was only a matter of time before we found you out. Confess and you will suffer less pain."

I had no idea what she was saying, for fear of her harming me or my brother.

All I could think about was that the teachers must have found out the illegal stash of candy that me and my brother have been selling out of our dorm room for months. Or maybe they found out that my brothers' essay on Tom Sawyer was from the internet without him ever reading the book, and now they suspect that I did the same since they all think we work together as a team, which was true, but never cheating or anything like that, and now they were going to take our grades away, or worse for Percy, they were actually going to make him read the book!

"Well?" she demanded

"Ma'am, I . . . we don't . . ."

"Time's up!" She hissed.

Then, the weirdest thing happened. Her eyes began to glow bright like barbecue coals. Her fingers stretched and turned into long talons. Her jacket melted into her back and turned into big leathery bat wings. She was a shrivelled hag with wings.

Then, if you can believe it, things got even stranger.

Mr. Brunner, who'd been outside a few minutes ago, wheeled his way into the gallery, holding a pen in his hand.

"What ho, Percy!" he shouted and tossed my brother the pen.

Mrs. Dodds lunged at us.

With a yelp, I lunged at my brother, using my wings to propel myself and him away from Mrs. Dodds. Percy grabbed the pen in mid air, but when he grabbed it, it wasn't a pen any more. It was a 3 ft. bronze sword . . . Mr. Brunner's bronze sword, the one that he always used on tournament day.

Mrs. Dodds slashed at us again, and we both leapt out of the way.

I landed a little ways away from Mrs. Dodds, and I almost impaled my back on something. It was a black sword hilt protruding from the museum floor. When I say black, I mean like, a chaotic black.

I grabbed the hilt and pulled. It came out a lot easier than I thought, because I went flying back next to my brother, who was desperately trying to get away from Mrs. Dodds.

He noticed me, and gestured for me to get up quickly.

"We need to get rid of her." I said to my brother

He nodded. "But, how are we going to do it?" He asked me

"Well . . ." I said, "We have swords, might as well use them."

He finally seemed to remember the bronze sword in his hands. He then noticed the black one in my hands.

"Where'd you get that?" He asked me.

"Lets just focus on not dying."

"Okay, yea."

Mrs. Dodds lunged at us again with murderous look in her eyes.

And we did the only thing that came naturally to us. We swung the swords.

They passed clean through her body, as if it was a heated knife going through butter. Hisss.

Mrs. Dodds was like a sand castle next to a power fan. She turned into dust and evaporated on the spot, leaving the smell of sulfur and that evil feeling as if she was still watching us.

We were alone.

Nothing was in my hands any more, and Percy only had a ball-point pen in his hand.

Mr. Brunner wasn't there. In fact, nobody was there except for me and Percy.

My hands were shaking really bad, Percy wasn't doing any better. His face was white with fear as all the blood drained out of it.

My lunch must have had something spoiled in it, or something.

Had we imagined it all? Percy was there with me, and his face was still white with fear.

It started to rain.

Grover was sitting by the fountain, a museum map was over his head. Nancy Bobofit, still standing there, soaked from her swim in the fountain, the rain not helping at all, grumbling to her ugly friends. When she saw us, she said, "I hope Mrs. Kerr whipped your butts."

My brother, still slightly colourless in the face, looked at her confused, "Who?" he asked

"Our teacher. Duh!"

"We . . . never had a teacher named Mrs. Kerr, and if we did, I don't think she came on this trip with us." I said.

"On that same note," Percy said. "Where is Mrs. Dodds?" He asked.

"Who's Mrs. Dodds?" She asked/spat.

We decided to leave that alone.

Nancy rolled her eyes, so we left to go see Grover.

We asked Grover where Mrs. Dodds was.

He said, "Who?"

But he paused and wouldn't meet our eyes for a bit, so we thought he was messing with us.

"Not funny, man." I said, "Not funny at all."

"This is serious man." Percy said

Thunder boomed, which shocked us.

So we went to go see Mr. Brunner, who had his red and white umbrella propped over his wheelchair still, as if he never moved.

He looked up distracted. "Ah, that would be my pen, Percy. Please bring your own writing utensil in the future."

Percy handed him the pen, not even realizing he still had it.

"Sir," I said, "Where is Mrs. Dodds?" I asked.

He stared at me blankly. "Who?"

"The other chaperone. Mrs. Dodds. The pre-algebra teacher." my brother said for me.

He frowned, looking mildly concerned.

"There is no Mrs. Dodds on this trip. As far as I'm concerned, there has never been a Mrs. Dodds at Yancy Academy. Are you two feeling all right?

Alright, this is going to be the first chapter for my first book. Feel free to leave positive feedback if you like. I already have this entire story laid out in my head, same thing is said with the rest of the 4 books. Though, some suggestions would be nice, but I will only pick one that fits best (or have a bunch of them together) with the idea I have in-mind.

Anyways, feel free to share this with your friends

I will update as soon as I can, so be alert to when it happens. next chapter will be Percy's POV, and I will continue to alternate, Odd numbered chapters for Aaron, Even for Percy.

I hope you like this chapter, and the ones from here on out :)

Peace out...