A big reminder that I don't own anything related to the universe of Percy Jackson. All the rights reserved to dear King Rick Riordan. This is just for fun. No harm intended.

On a happier note, I wanted to say that this was only made possible because you guys were so damn kind to me about Child of Land and Sea. So thank you. From the heart.

Act I - To The World Of Skies

Part I - Let this be a sign, let this road be mine, let it lead me to my past.

It was like her life had started in the National Museum.

She wasn't sure where she was; hell, she wasn't sure who she was. There were other teenagers sprawled in the seats in front of her, but wherever she looked she couldn't find a single face she recognized.

"Lena, are you okay?" the girl beside her asked. She wore no makeup and her chocolate brown hair was cut choppy and uneven, like she was trying not to look good, but it definitely didn't work. She was seriously pretty.

"Um, I don't..." Lena didn't know what to say. Was that her name? Lena? It didn't sound familiar to her ears.

A teacher shouted, "All right, cupcakes, listen up!" He scanned the bus and his eyes fixed on Lena, and his scowl deepened. The man knew she wasn't supposed to be there, that she didn't belong there, but he looked away and cleared his throat. "Stay with your partner. Don't lose your worksheet. And don't touch anything." He picked up a baseball bat and threatened them with it.

Lena's heart was beating in her throat. "I shouldn't be here," she said.

The boy on her other side scoffed. "Me either," he said. "I'm telling you, I'm innocent. Piper was the one who stole that BMW."

The girl blushed. "I didn't steal that car, Leo!"

"Oh, yeah, I forgot. You 'talked' the dealer into lending it to you," he said sarcastically. He was a lanky sort of boy. His skin was tanned, he had curly brownish hair, and a mischievous smile that told you right away this guy should not be trusted around matches or sharp objects. His long, nimble fingers wouldn't stop moving, touching everything he could reach. "I hope you've got your worksheet, 'cause I used mine for spit wads days ago. Why are you looking at me like that? Somebody draw on my face again?"

Lena was starting to panic. "I don't know you."

Leo gave her a crocodile grin, but before he could make a retort the teacher yelled from the front. "Problem back there?"

"Sorry, Coach!" Leo shouted back. "I'm having trouble hearing you. Could you use your megaphone, please?"

The Coach grunted like he was pleased to have an excuse to do that. But when he spoke with the megaphone, his voice came out like Darth Vader's. The kids cracked up. The Coach slammed down the megaphone. "Valdez!"

Piper stifled a laugh. "How did you do that, Leo?"

As they headed inside the museum, Leo slipped a tiny Phillips head screwdriver from his sleeve. "I'm a special boy."

Lena tried to steady her breathing. "What am I doing here? What is going on?"

Piper knit her eyebrows. "Lena, are you okay?"

"I don't... I can't..." Lena stepped away from the both of them, which seemed to hurt the girl's feelings. "I don't know who I am." The revelation made her eyes water up. Her head started to spin. It was like the memories were trying to come, but something was blocking them; something that made her head ache.

Leo and Piper exchanged a concerned look. "Alright, be chilled," Leo said. "I'll fill you in, yeah? We go to the Wilderness School, which means we're bad kids. Your family, or the court, or whoever, decided you were too much trouble, so they shipped you off to this lovely prison, eh, sorry, boarding school, where you learn valuable nature skills like running ten miles a day through the cacti and weaving daisies into hats! And for a special treat we go on educational field trips with Coach Hedge, who keeps order with a baseball bat. Is it all coming back to you now?"

Lena glanced apprehensively at him. "No."

"Right," Leo nodded. "Then some more. So the three of us started here together this semester. We're totally tight. You do everything I say and give me your dessert and do my chores—"

"Leo!" Piper snapped.

"What?" he shrugged. "I'm helping our poor friend, Piper. Which is more than you're doing standing there."

"She's got amnesia or something," Piper said. "We've got to tell somebody-" before she could finish, a bulky guy said she had to go with them because they were partners and had to stay together. Apprehensively, she let herself to be led away.

"Poor fool. He still thinks he got a shot with her. He thinks gay means happy," Leo laughed at his own joke. "See? If you don't remember me, that means I can reuse all my old jokes!"

"All right, cupcakes," Coach Hedge announced. "You are about to see the Grand Canyon. Try not to break it. The skywalk can hold the weight of seventy jumbo jets, so you featherweights should be safe out there. If possible, try to avoid pushing each other over the edge, as that would cause me extra paperwork."

They had reached the far end of the exhibit hall, where some big glass doors led out to a terrace. The coach opened the doors, and they all stepped outside. The Grand Canyon spread before them.

"Wicked," Leo said but Lena's attention was somewhere else. Banks of storm clouds had moved overhead casting shadows like angry faces across the cliffs. Lena got a piercing pain behind her eyes and fear flooded her stomach. "You all right? Don't you dare throw up, Lena, 'cause I haven't brought my camera."

Lena grabbed the railing. She was shivering and sweaty, but it had nothing to do with heights. She blinked, and the pain behind her eyes subsided. "Just a headache," she managed. Thunder rumbled overhead. A cold wind almost knocked her sideways.

"This can't be safe." Leo squinted at the clouds. "Storm's right over us, but it's clear all the way around. Like the Addams family."

Coach Hedge frowned at the storm like it bothered him too. "We may have to cut this short, so get to work!"

The storm rumbled, and Lena's head began to hurt again. She reached into her jeans pocket and brought out a coin: a circle of gold the size of a half-dollar, but thicker and more uneven.

"Dang, is that gold?" Leo asked. "You been holding out on me!"

"Leo," she called urgently, "are you sure we're friends? What was the first day we met? What did we talk about?"

"It was…" he frowned. "I don't recall exactly. I mean, I'm all wrong in the head. I'm ADHD."

"But I don't remember you at all! I don't remember anyone here. What if—"

"You're right and everyone else is wrong?" Leo asked. "You think you just appeared here this morning, and we've all got fake memories of you?"

Lena blinked. "That's exactly what I think. And I'm going to prove it. Stay here."

Before he could protest, she headed across the skywalk toward Coach Hedge, who was leaning on his baseball bat, studying the storm clouds. "You did this?" he asked.

"What?"

Coach Hedge glared at her. "Don't play games with me, blondie. What are you doing here, and why are you messing up my job?"

"You mean...you don't know me?" Lena said. "I'm not one of your students?"

"Never seen you before today."

Lena was so relieved she wanted to cry. "Uh... I don't know how I got here. I just woke up. I'm not supposed to be here, am I?"

Hedge's gruff voice dropped to a murmur. "You got a powerful way with the Mist, blondie, if you can make all these people think they know you; but you can't fool me. I've been smelling monster for days now. I knew we had an infiltrator, but you don't smell like a monster. You smell like a half-blood. So... who are you, and where'd you come from?"

"I have no idea what you just said. I don't know who I am. I don't have any memories. You've got to help me."

The Coach studied her face. "I believe you. But what you are... it means trouble. Now I got to protect three of you rather than two. Are you the special package? Is that it?"

"What are you talking about?"

Hedge shook his head. "I got a message from camp. They said an extraction team is on the way. They're coming to pick up a special package, but they wouldn't give me details. I thought to myself, fine, you know? The two I'm watching are pretty powerful, older than most. I know they're being stalked. I can smell a monster in the group. I figure that's why the camp is suddenly frantic to pick them up. But then you pop up out of nowhere. So, are you the special package?"

"I didn't get half of what you just said," Lena confessed.

"Forget it. I'll just have to watch you, too, until the team gets here."

Lightning crackled overhead. The wind picked up with a vengeance. Kids screamed. "Everyone inside!" Coach shouted. "Off the skywalk!" The storm churned into a miniature hurricane. Kids screamed and ran for the building. Leo lost his balance and almost toppled over the railing, but Lena grabbed his jacket and pulled him back.

Piper and her partner were holding the doors open. Lena, Leo, and Coach Hedge ran toward them, but the wind was pushing them back. The doors slammed shut. Piper tugged at the handles. "Dylan, help!" she shouted, but the guy just stood there with an idiotic grin.

"I'm done helping," he said. He flicked his wrist, and Piper flew backward, slamming into the doors and sliding to the skywalk deck.

"I should've known that was our monster," Coach said. "The way that boy eats..."

"What monster?" Leo shouted.

The Coach lifted his baseball bat which changed into a crudely shaped tree-branch club, with twigs and leaves still attached. Dylan gave him that psycho happy smile. "Oh, come on, satyr. Let the girl attack me! You're getting too old for this. Didn't even notice me."

Hedge growled. "You're going down, cupcake."

"You can't protect three half-bloods at once," Dylan told him. He pointed at Leo, and sent him flying off the skywalk. Somehow, Leo managed to grab a thin ledge about fifty feet below the skywalk and hung there by his fingertips.

"SOS!" he yelled up at them.

Coach Hedge cursed and tossed Lena his club. "I don't know who you are, blondie, but I hope you're good. Keep that thing busy while I get Leo." He kicked off his shoes revealing a pair of hooves.

"You're a faun!" Lena said.

"Satyr!" he snapped. "Fauns are Roman," and he leaped over the railing.

Lena threw the club and smacked Dylan on the head so hard he fell to his knees. Piper's fingers closed around the club when it rolled next to her, but before she could use it, Dylan rose. Golden blood trickled from his forehead. "Nice try, goldilocks," he said. "But you'll have to do better."

The skywalk shuddered. Dylan's body dissolved into smoke until his whole form was suddenly composed of swirling black vapor, his eyes like electrical sparks in a living storm cloud. He sprouted black smoky wings and rose above the skywalk.

"You're a ventus," Lena said automatically. "A storm spirit."

"My mistress told me to way," Dylan said. "She said a third was coming, someone special. She'll reward me greatly for your death!" He raised his hand and blasted Lena in the chest.

Lena found herself flat on her back, her clothes smoking. The lightning bolt had gone straight through her body and blasted off her left shoe. She rose unsteadily to her feet.

"How are you alive?" Dylan's form flickered. "That was enough lightning to kill twenty men!"

"I'm not a man," Lena said. She flipped her coin in the air like she'd done it a thousand times in what felt like other lives. She caught it in her palm, and suddenly she was holding a golden sword.

"Who are you, half-blood?" Dylan backed up and Lena could see fear in his eyes. "My mistress will destroy all demigods," he threatened. "This war you cannot win." And to prove his point he threw Piper over the railing, screaming as she fell.

Lena saw Coach Hedge climbing the cliff with Leo on his back. Time seemed to slow down. Then Leo was on the floor and Coach launched himself at the spirit and they both rose into the air, gaining speed. The satyr and the storm spirit spiraled into the clouds and disappeared. Then Lena made up her mind. She ran to the railing and jumped over the side.

In a heartbeat, she caught up with Piper. Lena tackled her waist and closed her eyes. Suddenly the wind died. Piper's scream turned into a strangled gasp. Lena opened her eyes and saw they were floating in midair. She hugged Piper tight, and Piper hugged her back. They were nose to nose.

"How did you—"

"I don't know," she said. Lena could feel pressure under her feet giving them support. She imagined that lifting them up and instantly they shot skyward. As soon as they landed on the skywalk, they saw Leo moving his arms frenetically.

"Stupid … ugly … goat," he was saying.

"Where did he go?" Piper asked.

Leo pointed straight up. "Never came down. What happened? The tornado guy, the gold sword, you flying? What is this? I'm hallucinating? Because I didn't take my pills today and-"

"You acted like... like you'd seen this before," Piper told Lena. "Who are you?"

Lena shook her head. "That's what I've been trying to tell you. I don't know."

"And that... Dylan..." Piper shuddered. "He called us... what, demigods?"

Leo lay on his back, staring at the sky. "Don't know about you guys, but I'm not feeling too godly. You guys feeling godly?" Then he gasped. "Tell me if those are flying horses. Because I really thought I could live without those pills, but now I'm starting to regret this decision..."

Lena looked up and saw a flying chariot coming their way. "Reinforcements," she guessed.

The chariot landed on the far end of the skywalk. Two guys came off of it, one with sand colored hair and a bald one. They both wore jeans and orange T-shirts. The first one pulled a knife and placed it at Lena's neck.

"Where is she?" he demanded. His gray eyes were more violent than the storm above.

"Where's who?" Lena stuttered.

The boy frowned. "What about Gleeson? Your protector? Where is he?"

"The Coach's first name was Gleeson?" Leo asked interested. "Now I get it. All that anger... Well, he got taken by some… tornado things."

"Storm spirits," Lena corrected.

The boy arched an eyebrow. "You mean anemoi thuellai? That's the Greek term. Who are you, and what happened?" He put away his knife as Lena tried her best to explain. "That doesn't make any sense. They told me she'd be here! Hera said if I came here, I'd find the answer."

"Yo, Anthony," the bald guy approached. "Check it out." He pointed at Lena's feet. "Cinderella. The blonde girl with one shoe. She's the answer."

"No, Butch," the other one, Anthony, insisted. "She can't be. I was tricked." He glared at the sky. "What do you want from me?" he shouted. "What have you done with her?"

The skywalk shuddered.

"What's his problem?" Lena asked. "He looks like he wants to kill me."

"Seriously," Leo agreed.

Butch hesitated. "Cut him some slack. He had a vision telling him to come here, to find the Cinderella with one shoe. That was supposed to be the answer to his problem."

"What problem?" Piper asked.

"He's been looking for one of our campers, who's been missing a few days," Butch said. "He's going out of his mind with worry. He hoped she'd be here."

"Who?" Piper insisted.

"His girlfriend," Butch grinned. "Andy Jackson."