The New Girl Runs Into A Tree

You know, you'd have thought that I'd be getting good at dealing with stroppy girls. Rachel, Annabeth, Thalia, Clarisse, not to mention the Goddesses of Olympus. That was before I met Jeanie Helsing.

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Me, Tyson, and Nico were having some 'Guy Time', playing basketball. Turns out Tyson is really good. Well, he should be, considering he is as big as the net. He scored eight hoops in the first three minutes! So we quit the basketball, and pulled out our swords. After the whole business with the Titans last year, dueling a demi-god and a seven foot Cyclops (yeah, he grew another foot) was easy.

I had managed to get Tyson out of breath, and had just turned to Nico, when out of the blue, we heard a loud scream. We looked at each other. And Cyclops and demi-gods agreed: "Hell."

I ran up to Half-Blood Hill as fast as I could, uncapping Riptide with Nico and Tyson following me. I suddenly saw where the screaming was coming from. There was girl legging it towards camp. It was weird enough that she was here anyway, but this one was running towards Thalia's tree. And fast.

Without warning, there was a THUMP from the tree. I couldn't believe it. The girl had run straight into it, and was lying unconsious beneath it.

"Where is that damn dragon?" Nico yelled, pulling out his Styrgian Iron Sword.

"Um... He's on his lunch break." I pointed out. The son of the Lord of the Dead looked at me. If looks could kill - well they can with him, but anyway - I'd be taking a bath in the Styx.

"So, you're telling me that the ONE hour, of the ONE day in the ONE week that a girl runs into the tree, Peleus is OFF?" he screamed.

"Donkey leg!" exclaimed my brother, brightly. Nico glared at him too.

"Fine, so the ONE hour, of the ONE day in the ONE week that a girl runs into a tree, being chased by a donkey le-what?" he stopped abruptly. I didn't wait to hear the rest. That empousai was dead meat.

"Hey! Get away from her!" I yelled. She took a step back and looked at me. I was staring at the face of Kelli, the demonic (in every sense of the word) cheerleader I had met before. Albeit, we met in several, very odd, circumstances.

"Ah, Percy! What a surprise! Decided to take that offer of a kiss?" she asked.

"You kiss anyone and I'll slice your lips off! What happened to your sisters?" I jeered, "Oh, I forgot, I killed them, right?"

Kelli hissed and lunged towards me, but Tyson was too quick. He ran towards her with his club and took her by suprise, bonking her on the head so hard she crumpled to the floor before exploding into dust.

"WOO! I killed a MONSTER!!" my little brother cheered. I was about to see if the girl was alright, but Nico beat me to it, kneeling beside her and propping her up on his knee.

I finally got a good look at her. She had very long, jet black hair, and very pale skin. She could've been a child of Hades, too. She was skinny, I noticed, and I had to admit, she was wearing some pretty cool stuff. Her long white t-shirt had CHOOSE LIFE written across it, and she wore a black waistcoat over it. She had seriously ripped black jeans and on her feet were a pair of very cool goth boots. Y'know, the leather ones with steel inlays and stuff. Weirdly, she had a single leather glove on. Just one, with no fingers. Ah well.

"Hello? Can you hear me?" Nico gently shook her. No response. "You okay?"

"Nico? Maybe we were to late." I said sadly. "Come on, lets go get Chir-"

The girl suddenly opened her eyes and looked at Nico. She then sat up abruptly and punched him in the face. He flew backwards and hit the tree. I only noticed later that she was an extremely powerful hitter afterwards.

"STAY AWAY FROM ME!!!" she shouted as she stood up. "I'm armed, I - wait, why are you laughing?"

I was creasing up. The whole waking up and finding yourself in the arms of a stranger had been a lot like mine and Thalia's first meeting, but Thalia hadn't rabbit punched me in the face when she woke up!

"I..... I..... ha ha ha.." I choked out. She promptly slapped me round the face and told me to get a hold of it in a rather, um, inappropriate way.

"Sorry, sorry! It's just, you, I mean, you PUNCHED him!" I was gasping for breath, and my cheek was on fire. Her eyes were so dark they looked black, and at the moment, they were pretty freaking scary.

"WHAT IS GOING ON?" she roared. Just before I had to answer (not like I had one anyway), I head the familiar clip-clop of Chiron's hooves approaching.

"That is exactly my question too, dear. What IS going on Percy?" Chiron asked. "And why is Nico unconcious?"

I managed to tell him what had happened through my bursts of laughter, Chiron then took the girl down to the Big House.

"Come on Percy! Tyson, help bring Nico too, we'll need to get some nectar and ambrosia for him!" he called back. Me and Tyson looked at each other, shrugged, and started lugging our friend after them. Ah, just an average day in Camp Half Blood.

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After Nico had recovered and the girl had calmed down, we sat down with Chiron and Mr D for some answers. Tyson went off to see the hippocampai.

"Before we start, can I just say, uh.... thanks and sorry to you two. I guess I shouldn't have hit you or, um.... knocked you out," muttered the girl, blushing. I grinned.

"No problem, just tell us why you're here!" I said. She grinned cheekily at me. At last, something I could relate to.

"My name's Jeanie. Jeanie Helsing." She shot Nico a dirty look when he sniggered. "Yeah, like the vampire hunter. This guy in my school told me to come here. Don't ask me why."

"A satyr, I suppose. Anyway, so you followed his advice, and that empousai caught up with you," said Chiron.

"That's right. And, um.... Is this a fair or something? 'Cos I'm pretty sure I've just been chased by a demon with a dodgy leg and I'm currently staring at a cen... cent..."

"Centaur?" I offered helpfully.

Jeanie gulped. "Yep."

"You are."

Jeanie stared at me, her eyes wide, and blinked. Then her face lit up and she grinned. "WOAH! A REAL LIVE CENTAUR!!!!!!!!"

After Jeanie had got used to the idea that the Greek gods were alive and kicking, and pretty much everything from mythology was true, we were OK.

Turns out she had taken the train from California to get here, where she'd been ambushed by Kelli. She'd fought her off about six times before arriving and running into the tree.

She was thirteen. It didn't occur to me to ask who her parent was.

Hi!! This is IBreakForWerewolves and LapdogDaVinci!! Yeah. I would like to say that this is NOT just written by IBFW. It is co-written with LapdogDaVinci. Thank you very much my luvver.

Anyhoo, this is Chapter 1 of PJ & TLG. Reviews would be VERY much appreciated!!

PS - I would like to establish the fact that my co-writer and I are not very sane people. So, at the end of every chapter, there will be a 'blooper' - in other words, the random weird stuff that could have happened in the chapter, but didn't!!

BLOOPER -

"Where is that damn dragon?" Nico yelled, pulling out his Styrgian Iron Sword.

"Um... He's on his lunch break." I pointed out. The son of the Lord of the Dead looked at me. If looks could kill - well they can with him, but anyway - I'd be taking a bath in the Styx.

"So, you're telling me that the ONE hour, of the ONE day in the ONE week that a girl runs into the tree, Peleus is OFF?" he screamed.

"Donkey leg!" exclaimed my brother, brightly. Nico glared at him too.

"Fine, so the ONE hour, of the ONE day in the ONE week that a girl runs into a tree, being chased by a donkey leg, he's off!"

"Tree!"

"Fine, how about; the ONE hour, of the ONE day in the ONE week that a girl runs into a tree, being chased by a donkey leg and a tree!"

Tyson and Nico looked pleased with themselves, and high-fived. I shrugged.

Isn't it weird that when we actually got there, the empousai and the girl had gone...