This story is currently under revisions (terrifying, I know!) and therefore the writing will be, well, a little,um, inconsistent. So this is the FIRST revised chapter of, well, sixteen (oh wow there goes my bag of chip-flavored air) and I hope you'll forgive the haggard appearance of my story here.

I OWN NOTHING. I LOSE. GOOD DAY SIR.

MAX

This is a recap. A recap of the last few years of my life, as told by myself and a few not-so-crazy people I met along the way. This all starts with Dylan, my most recent boyfriend, and when I found out the jerk was cheating on me. It was Maya, by the way. My wonderfully semi-evil clone. Maya's pretty cool. Dylan is sum of the earth.

After the whole Dylan thing, I left town with the flock. You know them. I mean, if you don't, that's on you. Totally your fault. Not my problem.

But there are bigger fish you need to know about. Like the fact those stupid white coats gave me cancer the last time I was, well, abducted. There is a giant tumor pressing against the inside of my skull. Oh and you can't forget the blood stuff. I have tons of white blood cells on steroids trying to kill me. (It's leukemia if you didn't figure it out.)

That's not the least of my worries at the beginning of our journey, though.

The biggest of the fish are these crazy kids we saw in an alley while we were flying over San Francisco.

PERCY

This day couldn't possibly get worse. Annabeth and I had been out and about in San Fran, since she was visiting her dad and I just needed a break from the craziness of the city. So I rode the train out with Annabeth before classes started for our senior year. It's been nice to get up without nightmares from the war with Gaea and go for a run by the beach, polluted as it might be. The naiads complain about it a lot.

It was on one of our last days out here that we just so happened to run into a pair of empousai. They were snarky, trying to get two innocent kids to come with them, probably to kill them for Hecate or something. I mean, who was I to leave these kids at the mercy of evil, metal-legged, magical vampires?

"Hey!" I uncapped Riptide and bolted after them into the alley. Annabeth followed behind me, holding her dagger out menacingly. "Leave them alone."

One of them hissed, walking towards us one uneven step at a time. "These will be much better, sister."

"Don't be tempted, Agalia," the other called after her. "Demigods only kill. We must take these offerings to our mistress."

"I don't think Hecate will appreciate you killing two mortal boys for fun," Annabeth said.

"I'm done waiting," I said and lunged for the closest metal vampire.

She smirked when I slammed Riptide into her metal leg and bared her fangs, reaching for my neck with razor sharp nails. Annabeth went after the other empousai, but before she could get one hit on her, six feathery things fell from the sky, landed between Annabeth and I and the empousai.