Disclaimer: I don't own Percy Jackson or the main story line of this FANfiction.

Thank you, TibbiToo for Beta-ing! :)

One

All right, first things first: whatever Percy told you, drop it. This is my side of the story and he can go pout in a corner about it for all I care. I don't want to hear 'Well, Percy said this' and 'Percy said that' through my entire story. If you are going to be one of those people, close the book now.

Good. Now that that's all sorted, we can move on. I'm going to go ahead and correctly assume Percy-the-Pessimist already gave you the 'being-a-Half-blood-is-scary-and-ignore-it-until-you-can't' speech?

Yeah, I thought so.

Honestly, I really don't mind being a half-blood. Well, other than the fact you almost never go to the same school twice, never have that many normal friends, and you're countlessly being attacked by terrifying, blood-thirsty monsters that will stop at nothing to kill you… Yeah, except that—it's awesome.

It can be scary at times for sure, but I still don't think I would trade it away for a normal life… even if I had the chance.

My name is Leila Jackson and I am rare and dangerous half-blood. Although, probably not in the way you're thinking.

This story could began with any weird experience in my small depressing life, but things went down right strange last May right before my brother and I got expelled from Yancy Academy.

Yancy Academy was by far not a fun school to attend, but it did have some perks. Like all the field trips. None of them were extremely entertaining, but it gave us a chance to see the outside world once in a while.

Nothing terribly bad had happened this year on any of our field trips. Yet. Not that I was expecting anything, but stuff usually goes crazy by now.

See, field trips were all together a horrible experience. Not that they weren't interesting… we just usually get expelled early or something.

Exhibit A: In the fourth grade our class went on a behind-the-scenes tour of Marine World. Everything was going fine until we got to the shark pool and Percy just so happened to lean against the lever that made us have a surprise swim-with-the-sharks tour. Exhibit B: Fifth grade we were at the Saratoga battlefield. Since we were extremely bored, Percy and I might have sneaked to the very back of the tour group and accidently set off a Revolutionary War cannon. Of course, it missed our completely evil History teacher by a few feet and hit the school bus instead.

You get the picture.

Percy was totally determined to be 'good' this trip but really, what happened didn't surprise me in the least.

Before that day, I didn't question my reality at all. Everything was pretty normal. I was just one of twenty-eight 'special' kids that had been thrown onto a bus for the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.

The field trips we took this year already had been pretty boring so far but this time it wasn't our horrid Science or History teacher's leading the tour, it was Mr. Brunner. Mr. Brunner was pretty cool. Or as cool as you can get being a teacher. He taught Latin and he usually found a way to make it as interesting as possible. Least I didn't have to worry about making sure Percy stayed awake in his classes. I had hoped since Mr. Brunner would be leading the tour, it would be an all right trip.

Then I learned who the other teacher chaperone was.

Mrs. Dodds.

Okay, after our last teacher had some emotional breakdown, the school board must have sat down and decided we needed a harsher, stricter, math teacher because we got landed with Mrs. A. Dodds. (Don't ask me what the 'A' stands for. I have no clue.)

I swear from the first day, she just decided to hate me. In about the first four seconds of class, she had managed to give both me and Percy double detention. That was a new personal best for me.

But of course, if she chooses to hate someone, she's got to choose to love someone too, right? Right.

And the person she chose was Nancy Bobofit; possibly the most annoying, stuck-up, disgusting twelve year old on the planet. No lie. I have proof.

The whole way to the museum all she did was chuck pieces of her gross, ketchup and peanut butter sandwich at Percy and Grover. Lucky enough, I was in the seat behind them, and out of range.

Percy's roommate, Grover, was a red-headed crippled boy who tried to get along with just about everyone in the world; even Nancy. I didn't share or understand the appeal. I couldn't care less if Nancy liked it when I punched her, as long as I got to punch her at all.

"I'm going to kill her," Percy mumbled.

One word that describes my brother more than any other… hmm, it'd got to be either 'oblivious' or 'loyal'. That boy hates it when someone he cares about is hurting and will do anything to make it stop, but he also has a lot of trouble seeing something that's straight up glaring at him in the face.

"Wow, Perce," I told him. "We're not even halfway there, and you're already ready to murder someone."

"Shut up," he snapped.

"It's okay," Grover tried to assure him. "I like peanut butter." Like that was going to stop Percy. Yeah, good try, Grover.

I had a different plan on how to try and stop my brother from getting us both in trouble. I sighed and stretched my leg out into the aisle a little.

Percy got up. "That's it." He moved a little but promptly tripped over my leg and fell into the empty seat beside me.

"What was that—," he started.

"We're already on probation, Percy," I reminded him. "I don't want in school suspension too."

"No one said you had to do anything," he replied irritably.

"Yes," I nodded, "but do you really think I'm going to sit around while you beat up Nancy? No way would I pass up that chance." He sighed.

"Mr. Jackson," Mrs. Dodds snapped, "go back to your assigned seat." I smiled as he rolled his eyes and reclaimed his seat next to Grover.

Mr. Brunner led the tour through the museum from his motorized wheelchair, just riding along giving us one explanation after another description.

All the Greek and Roman war stuff was kind of cool, but it seemed a whole lot older than five thousand years. I mean, sure, five thousand years was great; it was lucky to survive that long, but it still seemed older somehow.

Eventually, my mind started to wander. According to the school's counselor, I'm supposed to stop, collect my thoughts, and rejoin reality when this begins to happen. Apparently, my ADHD messes with my head too much when I let my thoughts drift. When I was younger, I used to have hallucinations, but I haven't had those in a long time.

Besides, I'm old enough to know just to keep my mouth shut about it if I ever do.

I snapped back to the present when I heard Percy say: "Will you shut up?" For one wild second, I was afraid I had started talking out loud while I was zoned out, but when I saw him glaring at Nancy, I relaxed.

Then I realized that the comment must have come out louder than Percy meant it to, because Mr. Brunner had stopped talking about the Greek funeral art.

Mr. Brunner raised an eyebrow at Percy. "Mr. Jackson, did you have a comment?"

Percy glanced down. "No, sir."

"Perhaps you'll tell us what this picture represents?" Mr. Brunner asked, pointing to a craving on a stele. I gazed at it and smiled. Percy knew this one, I was sure of it.

"That's Kronos eating his kids, right?" Percy recognized.

Mr. Brunner nodded. "Yes, and he did this because…?"

"Well…" Percy paused for second before continuing. "Kronos was the king god, and—"

"Titian," I muttered to him from under my breath.

"Titian," Percy corrected then went on. "And… he didn't 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. And later, when Zeus grew up, he tricked his dad, Kronos, into barfing up his brothers and sisters—"

"Eeew!" exclaimed some girl next to me.

I decided to mess with her a bit, so I leaned over to her and gave her a very serious glare. "At least you weren't there."

She threw me a wild look. "Freak!"

I snickered at her panicked look and leaned away again.

"—and the gods won," Percy finished, summing up about ten thousand years of History in less then five minutes.

"Like we're going to use this in real life," Nancy Bobofit scoffed. "Like it's going to say on our job applications, 'Please explain why Kronos ate his kids.'"

I crossed my arms in frustration and shifted my weight. Every second Nancy got more annoying—in school suspension looked better.

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

I smirked as Grover muttered, "Busted."

"Shut up," Nancy mumbled in embarrassment.

"I don't know, sir," Percy answered, some of the snickering had been silenced.

Mr. Brunner sighed as if he expected better. "Well, half-credit, Mr. Jackson. Zeus did indeed feed Kronos a mixture of mustard and wine, which made him disgorge his other five children, who, of course, being immortal gods, had been living and growing up completely undigested in the Titan's stomach." I couldn't help but grimace at that piece of information—growing up in someone's stomach did not rank high on my list of Top 10 Best Childhoods in History.

"The gods defeated their father, sliced him to pieces with his own scythe, and scattered his remains in Tartarus, the darkest part of the Underworld," Mr. Brunner concluded. "On that happy note, it's time for lunch. Mrs. Dodds, would you lead us back outside?"

"Ready?" I asked Percy and Grover, as the rest of the class started outside.

"Sure," Percy agreed. "Let's-"

"Mr. Jackson," Mr. Brunner interrupted.

"Knew that was coming," Percy muttered. "You guys go ahead. I'll catch up soon." I shrugged and started to the door with Grover.

Our class was directed to sit on the first steps of the museum for lunch, where we could receive the lovely view of noonday rush hour traffic on Fifth Avenue.

"You know what," I started, as Grover and I sat down on the edge of the fountain, "I've lived in this city all my life and there is one thing I never understood."

"What's that?" Grover asked, chewing on a piece of his sandwich.

"Why we call the time of day when traffic is the slowest, 'rush hour'." I shrugged and opened my lunch. "It just doesn't make sense."

He laughed a little. "You're a funny girl, Leila."

"I know," I stated, leaning back to look at the sky. "Think it'll rain?"

Grover eyed the black clouds above us. "No telling."

"The weather's been so weird since Christmas," I commented. "Oh, well. Guess we can blame global warming or something."

Just then, Percy appeared. He huffed down next to me, looking all depressed. I sighed and offered him my sandwich. He smiled as thanks, and took it.

"Detention?" Grover asked.

"Nah," Percy swallowed. "Not from Brunner. I just wish he'd lay off me sometimes. I mean—I'm not a genius."

"You can say that again," I teased. Percy hit me in the arm and tried to glare, but I could see he was fighting a smile, so it was okay.

Percy glanced at Grover.

When Grover finally met our gaze I thought he was going to give us some important speech that would completely change life as we know it… but instead he randomly asked, "Can I have your apple?"

I shook my head and tossed him the apple. "Boys," I scoffed, "they can only keep their minds off food for short periods of time."

Percy nodded wisely and stroked his invisible beard. "No comment," he decided with a final nod.

As Grover ate his apple, I turned around to stare at the fountain. "Think I'd get in trouble if I put my feet in the fountain?" I asked, letting my feet sway a few inches above the water's surface.

Percy shrugged. "Don't know. You probably wouldn't get caught but people would wonder way the ends of your pants were all wet."

"I'll just tell them I fell in the toilet, while I was wrestling a bear," I stated, sticking my feet in the water.

"You're just asking for more of that therapy, aren't you?" Percy said in a mock-serious tone.

I laughed. "Oh, definitely! I just can't get enough of sitting around talking about my feelings for hours at a time."

"Sounds like something normal girls would do at sleepovers," he responded.

"Yes," I agreed, "but I'm not really your cookie-cutter prep school girl, am I?"

"Touché," he mused, still staring at passing traffic.

"What are you thinking?" I asked quietly.

He looked away from Fifth Avenue for a second to look at me. "I'll give you one guess," he told me.

"Forget it," I muttered. But even as I took my feet out of the fountain and started kicking extra water from my feet, I felt my mind starting to wander again. This time was much different than simply spacing out in a classroom.

My curiosity was starting to get the best of me, but I absolutely hated doing this. It was creepy, and it made me feel so much more then the freak I already was.

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. Instantly, thoughts that were not mine filled my mind. I literally knew Percy was thinking of the little upper eastside apartment and the only person that actually made that ratty place home.

"Mom." I didn't have to guess about my answer at all. I knew for a fact Percy was now considering hopping into the closest cab to head home. I shuddered and shook my head, trying to clear my mind of anything other than my own thoughts.

"Don't," I warned him.

"What?" He said. "You don't want see her?"

"Of course I want to see her," I replied. "But what I don't want to see is the look she gives us when she realizes we took off. Again."

"I know," Percy sighed. "She'd send us back saying something really positive about everything—even if this is our sixth school in six years."

"So we have some really bad luck," I remarked. "Is that our fault?"

"I guess not," he reasoned.

"Percy," I sighed, shaking my head. "That was a rhetorical question. You weren't really supposed to answer me."

"Oh," he stated. I laughed a little and rubbed my forehead. "I hate doing that," I complained, trying to push the feel of my brother's thoughts out of my head.

"Not any easier on my end," Percy commented. "It feels like my head is being invaded by aliens or something…"

"Aliens? Really, Percy?"

"Yeah, aren't aliens supposed to like, come to Earth and try to slowly take over human minds…" He trailed off when he saw the blank expression on my face. "Never mind," he huffed.

I laughed, but unfortunately, that happiness was short lived because at that moment Nancy Bobofit decided it was time to make an appearance.

"Mrs. Dodds wants to see you," she told me with a sneer.

I raised my eyebrow at the ugly red-head. "And why would she need to see me?"

She ignored my question and glanced at my wet sneakers. "Nice shoes," she mocked.

That was all the information I needed. It was now clear Mrs. Dodds had seen me in the fountain and I was going to be punished. Typical.

I exhaled sharply and stood up.

I hopped up the steps toward Mrs. Dodds. She was already waiting there for me. I could tell because her eyes were narrowed as if considering how many different ways of school-induced-torture she could pass me off with this time around. I tried to kick some water out of sneakers to make them look drier then they felt, but it was no use. I figured I'd be in detention for a week anyway. Mrs. Dodds was always sniffing out ways to give me detention.

Halfway up the steps, I heard three words that would change my life forever. "Percy pushed me!" Nancy cried.

I whirled around in utter shock to see Nancy sitting butt-first in the fountain and Percy standing up with his arms thrown out as if he had indeed, just pushed her into the water.

Some of the students had obviously gathered around-sensing the fight- because now they were pointing at Percy, muttering: "Did you see―"

"―the water―"

"―like it grabbed her―"

"What did you do?" I hissed at him since Grover was currently gaping at Percy like a fish, completely in shock.

Percy shook his head. "I don't remember-"

All of sudden, I noticed Mrs. Dodds wasn't at the top of the steps anymore, she was standing behind us glowering down our necks.

I turned and awkwardly crossed my arms under her glare.

"Now, honey―" she started once Nancy had climbed out of the fountain.

"I know. A month erasing workbooks," Percy finished with a scowl.

Somehow, I didn't think he was going to get off so easily.

"Come with me," Mrs. Dodds stated.

"I pushed her," I said before the full reality of the situation had caught up with me.

Mrs. Dodds threw me a sharp look.

It wasn't uncommon for my brother and I to split punishments, but I realized a bit too late that I might have the wet shoes, but I had already been too far away from the fountain to have pushed Nancy.

"We will deal with your lying later," she told me in a hard voice.

I shot Grover a look, and lucky enough—he caught on. "Wait! It was me," he jumped up from his place on the steps. "I pushed her."

Of course, that didn't work either. "I don't think so, Mr. Underwood," Mrs. Dodds stated in a dangerously low voice.

"But―"

"You―will―stay―here," she insisted.

"It's okay," Percy told us. "Thanks for trying."

Something was off. I could feel anticipation rolling off Mrs. Dodds in waves, like she had been waiting for all of this. "Percy—"

"Honey," Mrs. Dodds snarled, cutting me off. "Now."

With one final glare toward the offending redhead, Percy turned and followed Mrs. Dodds back up the steps toward the museum. I was rooted in place, as I watched them disappear from view.

"Something wrong," I stated as soon as the museum door had closed.

"Wha-"

"Grover, something's wrong," I repeated. At this point, I knew I was using a slightly manic tone, but I couldn't help it. All of my muscles were still tensed as if my body had been expecting a fight.

Grover fidgeted, gave me a long worried look than threw a glance toward the museum. "Maybe I should go ask Mr. Brunner—"

I couldn't take it anymore. I bolted up and dashed to the Latin teacher "Sir," I said as soon as I was in front of him, "Mrs. Dodds took Percy into the museum."

He immediately set aside his book and looked at me critically. "What are you talking about?"

I quickly explained the situation to Mr. Brunner as Grover appeared next to me.

"Leila—," he started slowly when I was done.

I knew that tone all too well. That was the tone that the school's counselors use when they're about to insist that everything is all in my head—that this was all just some hallucination brought on by something I saw in the museum. Yet, somehow hearing Mr. Brunner use it on me, made me snap.

"Call it a freaking twin thing," I stated, probably confirming whatever crazy things some of teachers said about me, "but I know Percy is in real trouble."

"I'm sure everything is fine." But as he said this, Mr. Brunner gripped his pen a little tighter into his fist so I could tell he was lying. "You two go sit down, I'll see where Percy's gotten off too."

Once Mr. Brunner had also disappeared, I rushed toward the entrance after him.

"Leila—," Grover yelped, taking off after me. "What are you doing?"

"Finding Percy," I said, pulling the building door open.

"Mr. Brunner told us to wait here," he tried.

"Well, there you go," I yanked the door out of his grip. "I never do what I'm told." I darted into the museum before Grover could try and stop me again.

"We don't even know where he is," Grover insisted, following in behind me. "Let's just go back outside and—"

"And what?" I asked. "Wait?" I had never been a patient person, but the thought of actually sitting around waiting for this feeling to leave would literally make me go crazy. I rolled my eyes and continued through the museum.

Grover gulped and trailed next to me quietly. His eyes moved quickly from one place to another, never zooming in on one certain object, like he expected Mrs. Dodds to jump out of the shadows, eyes ablaze at any given moment.

"How—how do you even know we're going the right way?" he stuttered. "We are just going to end up lost in this place!"

A loud BANG echoed through the abandoned hallway. "How about we start there?" I stated.

When I finally rounded the last corner into the empty Greek and Roman galleries, I froze. My brain was just refusing to process what I was seeing.

At the end of the hall, Percy was holding a bronze sword up against possibly the most terrorizing, most confusing thing I had ever seen in my life. The creature had glowing eyes, bat-shaped wings, fangs, talons, and was currently in the middle of attacking Percy.

Okay, I thought. I'm officially nuts.

"How do you run so fast?" Grover asked while gasping in deep breaths of air but froze when he saw the vision in front of us.

"Die, honey!" The creature insisted to Percy as she lunged toward him again. Grover whimpered and grabbed my arm, about to pull me away.

I shrugged off Grover, getting ready to throw the nearest Greek vase when all of a sudden—Percy swung the sword. The blade rushed straight through the creature without resistance, and disappeared.

After a second of hesitation, I stepped away from the corner and ran into the room. "Percy, what on Earth was—"

"Tell me I'm not crazy," he blurted before I could finish.

I gave him a hard look. "We've been over this. You're not the crazy one—I am."

"Not funny," he managed, looking pretty nuts. "You saw that—that thing, right?"

I glanced at his hand and almost had a heart attack. In his hand, there wasn't any sword. Only a normal ball point ball.

"I don't know what I saw," I admitted.

"But it wasn't human?" Percy added with slight glisten of hope.

"It was definitely not human," I confirmed.

"Way to ditch us," I told Grover who was back to sitting outside on the steps as if nothing had happened.

He twitched nervously, and wouldn't meet my eyes. "You and Percy shouldn't wander off," he told me. "You're going to get in trouble with Mrs. Kerr."

"Who?" I asked him.

"Mrs. Kerr," he repeated, motioning towards a blonde woman standing a few feet away.

I gave him a long look as Percy sat down next to us. "Where's Mrs. Dodds?" he asked Grover.

He shifted uncomfortably. "Who?"

"Not funny, man," my brother told him, noticing his lie. "This is serious."

Grover stiffly shrugged and opened a museum map, ignoring us.

Percy and I shared a nervous look, than ever-so-slowly we stood up and backed away.

"Be right back," Percy muttered, walking over towards Mr. Brunner.

I nodded and wiped some rain off my face. I moved under the museum's overhang just now realizing I had been right about the weather—it was raining.

I felt oddly numb, as if my mind was still too busy doing summersaults to process anything else. I had experienced some pretty crazy things in my twelve years, but this ranked top spot.

"That's it," Percy stated in the same monotone I was feeling. "We're crazy."

I took a deep breath, bracing myself for the worst. "What did Mr. Brunner say?"

"He told me—," Percy stopped for a second, then continued. "He told Mrs. Dodds didn't exist."

(A/N: Okay, first chapter down! Woo! Ha-ha, okay so tell me your thoguhts! I know this is way different from my first version, but I love it so much! All right, so I have to say special thanks to Sammi143, Chanaenae11, Paigemeable, Purecaitlyn, and my new Beta TibbiToo!)

Now, I like to ask random questions at the end of each chapter. The rule is if you guys answer, so will I. :) All right, here is the question:
How many museums do you think you've been to?