Welcome to the new and improved Descendant of Hercules! I'm really sorry I made you all wait so long. Thanks to everyone who read it before and gave their input! Everything belongs to troll king Rick Riordan.
I was having a great day until I blew up a tennis court.
You could say it would be impossible for an eleven year old girl to do that much damage, but, in my defense, it wasn't entirely my fault. No one believed me when I said two eight foot tall giants started throwing flaming tennis balls at me. The only person who thought I wasn't entirely crazy was my best friend Glenn. He was a funny looking kid. He had crutches because of some disease that made him shorter than everyone and a chubby face that you couldn't help but pinch. Glenn and I had become inseparable since third grade when we were both caught by the principal trying to escape and exploded science room (courtesy of yours truly). He's always in trouble with me, which is fine by him. For whatever reason, I've never received more than a detention as punishment. The teachers or officials eyes glazed over and would reduce my sentence. Some of the students would look at me weird whenever that happened. They're probably like "She should be put in jail for a gazillion years". That's why I don't have many friends. Apart from being ADHD, which means I'm impulsive and don't cooperate well with others, and dyslexic, I've been branded a trouble maker by half of the PTA and is on many parents' "don't let my child hang out with her" list. I've grown to accept it, but I'd like company though. I only have Glenn and my mom, but she isn't around much.
Oops, forgot to introduce myself. My name is Aria Piers. It's short for Artemisia (don't ask). I'm eleven (almost twelve) years old and I live on the Upper East Side in Manhattan. My mom is a famous lawyer, so I don't really see her that much. I'm an average student at school. I love to read, which is surprising for someone with dyslexia. I'm severely traumatized of swimming in the ocean (I'll explain later) and I aspire to become a professional tennis player.
Back to blowing up concrete. Everything was going the way it should. I would kick butt on the courts and keep up my reputation of "The best 11 year old tennis player in the state of New York". Most kids were scared of me when I came on the courts. They didn't say anything, but they knew. You don't mess with me when it came to tennis. Today I had doubles practice. I got paired up with some girl named Alyssa. My opponents were two boys I had never seen before. They were new, according to my coach and were here to learn the ropes. They weren't your typical tennis players; with bulky muscles and short arms and legs. Their skills were honestly laughable but when they actually hit a ball, they hit it at such an incredible force they created dents in the floor. Unfortunately, instead of trying to win, they were purposely aiming at me.
"If you shoot me one more time, I'm going to smack both of you so hard you won't feel your faces!" I yelled to the boys after they had hit me again. They looked at each other and smiled.
"Never" they said simultaneously. One of the boys served and the ball created a crater in the wall behind me. Then the weirdest thing happened; they started to grow. They grew until they were eight feet tall and pure muscle. I looked to my left and saw that Alyssa had bolted, leaving me alone to fend for myself. The giants laughed at my being defenceless, and pulled out a ball from their pockets. Not a normal, yellow tennis ball, no, but bronze cannon balls which would surely make me an Aria pancake. They threw one and I panicked. Concrete hit my back as I dived for the floor.
"Puny daughter of the Sky Lord." One said as he threw another ball, this one complete with fire. He missed, but it still managed to singe the hem of my skirt. I hid behind one of the bleacher's walls. Think Aria, I said to myself. How do I get rid of these things? They looked pretty dumb. Maybe I could fool them?
"Hey ugly!" I shouted. I threw a tennis ball at one of their heads so that they would look at me. "You know for a giant, you're really not that intimidating!"
They looked at each other. "LIES! We are the scariest!"
"Oh no. I've seen much scarier monsters than you!"
"Nothing is scarier than a Laistrygonian Giant!"
Okay? "Have you ever heard of a Mrs. Hiddle? It's the scariest thing since the eighties!" Mrs. Hiddle was an old woman who lived near my apartment. She was wrinkly, sour and had a terrible sense of humor.
They looked at each other, confused, and their murderous expressions softened. "Where can we find a…Mrs. Hiddle?"
"At the Met! Look for the really old people, she'll be among them!" I said. They were buying it.
"Thank you Artemisia, descendant of the Great One!" They stomped off, crushing a fence on their way out.
The second they were out of view, I screamed and jumped around. Victory always tasted so sweet. Before I could enjoy another moment of greatness, a dozen adults came barging in.
"What on earth happened here?" bellowed Mr. Springfield, the owner of the tennis club.
"I can explain!" I begged.
Mr. Springfield looked at me with disgust. "Really? Please explain to me how an eleven year old girl can manage to destroy an entire tennis court?"
I looked around to think of ideas. How was I going to explain this? The court looked like a war zone, with craters the size of people in the floor. I was sure the people of New York were wondering why there was a giant mushroom cloud coming out of Central Park. "Um, you see, there were these two boys. But they weren't boys; they got angry and turned into these giants. They started throwing flaming cannon balls at me and I fooled them and they left." I said, exasperated.
It took about a second before every single person that was there started laughing.
"It's true!" I pleaded. "They were real!"
Mr. Springfield was the first to calm down. "Of course, you want me to believe your silly story. Now, how did you do it? Molotov cocktail? Dynamite?" At that point, I was panicking. By now, everything would have been cleaned up and the adults wouldn't remember a thing.
Out of nowhere, Glenn came barging in. "Aria, we need to go. NOW!" he grabbed my hand and dragged me away from the battle site. The adults started yelling and we bolted.
"Are you okay?" Glenn asked as we ran through Central Park.
"Yeah, I'm fine. Can you explain to me what is going on?"
"They've found you. It's not good."
"Yeah, but they're gone. I totally fooled them! You should have seen it! " Glenn didn't seem too impressed.
"Aria, you could have died! This is no time to joke around!" He stopped as we waited for the crossing light. "Look. Your mom can probably explain this better than I can."
We turned onto 5th avenue and bolted for my house. I lived in one of those high rise apartments those celebrities owned. It was nice, but I didn't like spending too much time inside. I was always on our balcony or on the roof, doing random things like pretending I was a war general, scouting the area for enemies and whatnot. People thought I was weird.
"I just hope your mom is there" Glenn mused. The elevator dinged and we ran to my door. My apartment wasn't too large or too small. It was all one floor, with floor to ceiling windows and a long terrace in the front. My mom was in the kitchen making supper. She looked like she just came back from another meeting. Everyone would tell me I looked a lot like her. We had the same dark brown hair and tall stature. Except the eyes. I had bright blue eyes instead of her muddy brown. According to her I took after my father. But she would always say his were more electric blue, compared to mine which were the same shade as the sky. It was silly to see her talk about my dad. She got all red and she smiled more.
She was hanging up her cell phone when we came in. She looked pretty startled to see us this early.
"Aria!" She shrieked "What happened to you? Why are you covered in dirt?" Another thing, my mom is seriously OCD. My hyperactivity drives her crazy.
Glenn hushed her. "No time! Aria needs to go right now!" He shouted.
"What do you mean…" she stopped herself. A look of disbelief spread across her face. "No. It can't be. He said she'd be safe for another few years!"
"She won't be if we don't hurry." He said with a little bit of attitude in his voice.
My mother took a deep breath and came up to me. "Listen to me sweetheart. I want you to go to your room and grab your stuff. Clothes for the next couple of weeks, things you'd like to bring with you. And do it fast please." My mother never got scared, but I could see fear in her eyes. She was genuinely worried about me. I nodded and ran to my bedroom. I tore through it, grabbing what my mom had asked me to bring. I emptied half my closet and stuffed the clothes in one of my old, pink tennis bags. I put in some candy from my hidden reserve (like you don't have one) and my teddy bear, Thor. Yes, I named my teddy bear after a mythological Norse God, by according to my mom it was my dad's favorite Avenger, so that's how my bear Thor got his name. I strapped my racket bag to my back (I always have a tennis racket with me) and ran back to the living room where my mom was pacing around.
"I'm ready." I said quietly. Though I had no idea what was going on, the tension in the room was enough to assure me that I was actually in danger. Which wasn't actually a good thing.
"Can I ask you something?"I asked my mom. "What is all this about? I don't understand."
She grabbed my shoulders as she knelt to meet my face. "Look, Aria. Soon enough you're going to find out the truth about certain things; things about you, your dad. Some things won't be pretty, trust me. Many of the things that are planned for you…" she hesitated. I could see in her eyes that it pained her to say this. "Just remember that you are a very special girl. You are so brave sweetheart. Everything will be okay, I promise." My mom actually smiled. I could see she was getting teary-eyed and my throat was getting a little tight as well. I gave her one final hug before Glenn rushed me out the door and into the elevator.
I fidgeted with the straps of my bag throughout the elevator ride. With all this adrenaline running though my body, I haven't been able to think straight. What did my mom mean by things planned for me? She made it sound like it was going to happen in the next couple of days.
I had spent so much time daydreaming, the ride down went by in a flash. As soon as the elevator doors opened, Glenn darted for the exit with me fumbling behind him. We grabbed a cab and my friend asked the driver to take us to Long Island.
"Why there?" I asked. Did Glenn not know how expensive this trip was going to be?
"You'll see." He promised. He took a nervous glance behind us as the cabbie drove us onto the highway to Long Island.
An hour or so later, we had stopped at some deserted road. All there was around us were woods and farmland. Glenn and I left the cab and grabbed my bag from the trunk. My friend paid the cab driver and he sped off. The poor boy looked so nervous, and was always checking behind us as if someone were following. We continued up a decent sized hill, were a giant, Rockefeller Center sized pine tree stood atop it. Glenn made it on top before I did (so not fair) and spread his arms out wide.
"Welcome to Camp Half-Blood!"