DISCLAIMER!!! I do not own Percy Jackson, The Lotus Casino, or a box of Greek fire… unfortunately. I do, however, own all the characters in this story, except all of those created by the illustrious Rick Riordan.

YOU MUST READ THIS! Do not read this story unless you have finished Requiem for a Nightmare or don't care if the ending is spoiled. This is the sequel, a little early, but I got the idea and couldn't get rid of it.

Chapter 1

I strung yet another box onto the pile around the support beam. Music and screaming was coming from above. Occasionally the sound of a lottery jackpot pierced through the ambient noise. Down here there was no partying, no celebrations, just a large room made of concrete with no decorations except an array of support columns spaced 10 feet across. The air was musty and smelled like cigarettes. We were in the basement of the Lotus Casino. Tessa was crouching next to me, helping me pile on yet another box labeled "high explosive." If the purpose of our mission hasn't been made clear yet, let me explain;

"That should do it," I said proudly, staring at the lovely Tessa Menzies. I held up a large red button. "One press of this button and this whole building becomes nothing more then a pile of ruble that will someday be a vacated lot." Tessa smiled at me. She walked up next to me and slowly leaned towards me. I closed my eyes and pursed my lips.

Then I heard a loud "bang!" from the other side of the room and was instantly sprayed with a cold familiar smelling liquid. I recoiled back in surprise, landing on my butt. I wiped my face with my hand and examined it. My hand was coated with a deep crimson liquid. Blood! I thought. Bulky men in dark suits poured through each and every entrance into the room. They were yelling and chanting, making the room sound like a battlefield, noisy and unorganized. I looked at Tessa body. It had fallen over too; the only difference was the body was more in a crumpled heap. I got up onto my knees and peered at her face. It was pale with a solitude hole in the center of her forehead. I screamed.

Oh my gods! I screamed in my head, my whole body shacking from shock. A man grabbed me from behind and threw me backwards. I crashed into a concrete wall and fell to the floor. I didn't care though; all I was thinking was, Tessa! My Tessa! She's dead! How can this be! My Tessa! I looked up through tear filled eyes at a three men standing in front of me. One had a gun pointed at my head while the other two roughly searched my body.

We've been caught. I thought. We've been caught and now they've killed Tessa! How could they do this! I could hardly understand my own thoughts they were racing through my head so fast. I was filled with misery, misery and anger. My stomach churned and my sight grew blurry. I stood up and threw the man in front of me back several yards. I turned around and slashed the two men who had been searching me with my newly grown claws. Instantly I was held back by rows of guards, put I overpowered them all with one sweep of my arm. I was nailed in the back by a stray bullet and crumpled to the floor. I landed on a pile of wooden boxes. The boxes broke under my weight and pounds after pound of high explosive liquid poured out of them.

MUST…COMPLETE…THE MISSION! My deranged and shock-obscured mind thought. I gave a scream of rage and threw off every guard on my stinging back. My sweatshirt which had been badly torn by my transformation collapsed into threads and the detonator fell out.

"Don't!" came a scream from behind me. I whipped around and saw Tessa's body lying on the ground; only she was sitting up, her arm out-stretched. "We didn't evacuate the building! Don't kill those innocent people!"

"Tessa, you're alive?" But after a slight mental lapse she was on the floor again, lying in a pool of blood. Even though she was dead, I still her voice pierce over the ambient noise.

"Tarrick, don't! Tarrick! Tarrick! Tarrick!" I ignored her and turned around. I found the detonator and pressed it. I small fire appeared on the box.

HADES! I thought. The explosives drained so now the detonator isn't submerged!

I ran towards the box, hoping to splash a pool of explosives onto the flame, knowing the pilot light only had enough fuel to burn for 20 seconds. I tripped over a guard I had knocked out and fell to the floor. A group of heavy security guards jumped on me and pinned me down. I tried to get up, but the pain of the bullet in my back on top of the fact that I was running low on morph power left me dead tired. After wrestling with them for a couple seconds I gave up and relaxed. 2 seconds later the pilot light fizzled out.

The whole operation was a complete failure. I thought. Tessa and I will die for nothing. It was a depressing, saddening, sobering thought. I could still hear my name being shouted in the background. I was flipped on my back had a gun barrel stuck up my nostril.

"Not so tough are you demigod?" asked the husky guard. I heard a shot fired and I died.

**********

"Tarrick! Tarrick! Tarrick! Come on Tarrick!" I heard a scream in front of me. I opened my eyes and saw Archie starring at me. He looked into my eyes and winced.

"Ooh, some dream eh?" he asked me nervously. He patted my reassuringly on the shoulder. "Come on, get up! No sleeping on the job!" He held out his hand and helped me up. He handed me a wooden box full of Greek fire told me where to put it. He wired the whole thing up and pressed a few buttons on his watch. The events of my dream were flashing through my mind.

Tessa is dead, I have to understand that, I thought sadly. We continued the set up in silence, the only sound coming from a small generator in the south east corner and Archie's occasional grunts of annoyance when I would place a box in the wrong place or when I dropped a box on his foot, again.

After a while we were finished and he stood up and smiled. "Now all that's left is to evacuate the building and level this place to the ground." As soon as he finished his sentence I drew my twin swords and ducked behind a pillar.

"Get down!" I hissed at Archie. He looked at me curiously, but ducked behind a pole just to be safe. I didn't know if my dream was going to come true, but I knew one thing for certain; I was not kissing Archie.

"Did you hear anything?" Archie asked.

"No," I responded honestly. "It was more of a hunch." Archie got out from his hiding place and headed back over to the bomb.

"When I get back to camp half-blood, I am telling Chiron to confiscate your action movies."

*******************

Archie and I stood on opposite ends of the vast casino. Archie was holding a bottle of alcohol and I was holding a black ski mask and a very convincing looking cap gun. I nodded to Archie and he started pouring the alcohol on an unused slot machine. I started putting on the ski mask. We had to do these at the exact same time to minimize confusion and maximize panic. Why they only sent two guys to do this? No one will ever know. Archie lit his match and nodded at me. I pulled out my cap gun and nodded back. Archie dropped his match, and the first domino tipped. The slot machine was instantly engulfed in flame. I tipped the pistol into the air and fired three shots.

"Fire! Oh my gods it's a fire!" Archie screamed.

"This is a robbery!" I shouted, firing off another shot. The first couple seconds was confusion. We expected that. Archie threw the rest of the bottle on the fire and a large fire ball erupted, setting fire to the virtual poker stand next to it. I aimed my gun at a bystander and demanded everyone to leave. That got the attention of everyone in the casino.

Instantly the doors were flooded with people trying to leave. Archie and I brought up the rear, ushering people out. I ditched the ski mask behind a roulette table. I picked up the roulette ball and threw it at a nearby window. I shot at it with my cap gun right as the ball shattered the window. People screamed as the glass rained down on them, as if shattered by a bullet. I met up with Archie next to another slot machine. He pulled the lever and ran off.

"Nice effect with the window," Archie commented.

"Nice fire ball," I told him.

We exchanged friendly smiles and broke up; Archie took the west entrance, I took the north entrance. The last thing I saw before I exited the building was the slot machine spinning five "jackpots."

How fitting, I thought. I ran to the third lamppost left parking section A, Archie's and my predetermined meeting point. He was already there, his hand on his watch.

"How ironic," I scoffed. "A free casino evacuated due to a robbery."

Archie chuckled and hit a small button on the underside of his watch. I waited for a couple seconds, but nothing happened.

"Archie-" Archie cut me off with a raise of his pointer finger.

"Wait for it," he coaxed. "Wait for it-" he pointed at the casino right as a sinister rumbled filled the southern tip of Las Vegas. The floor of the building erupted upwards like a volcano. The windows on one of the middle floors shattered, fire pouring out of the holes. The revolving door broke from its hinges and flew at us, hitting a car. A bungee jumping tower tipped over and fell into the chasm the blast had created. The lower floor collapsed, starting a chain reaction until the whole building looked to be descending vertically into the ground. Finally the top floor hit sending out a massive wave of dust. Some loiterers were tipped over, while some were thrown back wards by the massive plume of smoke. When the dust cleared we looked around and saw the former prisoners waltzing around as if nothing had happened. Suddenly I realized there was a nagging in the back of my head.

"Oh my gods," I exclaimed to Archie. "Hades is here!"

"How can you tell?" he asked.

"I can feel his presence. It feels a lot like Nico's presence, only much stronger."

A kid walked by wearing a black leather jacket who also seemed to have the aura of death and sadness. I walked up to him.

"Are you Hades?" I asked him. He was a guy in his late teens with a serious five a clock shadow and messy hair.

"Aw dude no," he replied. "But funny you should ask that, he was my father."

"Oh, really?" I replied interested. "Any body else you know who are demigods?"

"Oh yeah, in fact every one of my friends are sons or daughters of Hades." He went around pointing to countless people naming them all and telling me they were the children of the god of death.

"How many people are there here that are sons of Hades?" Archie asked nervously.

"Aw, pretty much everybody." He motioned to the crowd. "19 out of 20 people in this crowed were probably born to the dude. Later." He saluted us and walked away. I did a quick head count.

"Archie," I addressed him, "there are roughly 10,000 people here."

Archie's eyes grew wide. "So you mean that we just released 9,500 children, all born of one of the most temperamental god into the world, all at the same time?"

I walked over to a small puddle of water that was sitting next to a flaming car. The heat was causing the water to evaporate and a small cloud of mist was rising off of the top of the puddle. I tossed a drachma into the mist.

"Goddess Isis, take my offering; Chiron, camp half-blood." I muttered. The drachma flashed and disappeared. The steam bent and warped until I could see and image of Chiron hovering in the mist.

"Chiron, we may have a problem," Archie told him.

"We know; we just got the prophecy."

What do you think? Is it any good?

Leave me a comment telling me what you think.