Hey all! This is my first Percy Jackson story. It will probably only be updated every once in a while. Anyways, please read and review! I want to know if it is worth continuing! Thanks
-Cover image from nohongo on DeviantArt
All rights go to Rick Riordan because he is our god XD
-Fixed some consistency issues 3/30/14
CHAPTER 1
Percy
The first day of my second year of high school- I walked into Goode High School feeling good. It was the first time I had ever stayed at a school two consecutive years. Maybe it wasn't my biggest accomplishment, but I guess you could say I was proud. I greeted Chris, Sean, Gavin, Logan, Amber, Lauren, and Olivia at the front door of Goode High School for our Sophomore Year. For a while, I listened to everyone talk about summer vacations. I joked, "I saved the world." They laughed, but had no idea how true it was.
We talked for a while, but I just zoned out and thought about the extremely awkward Iris Message I had with Annabeth last night. I called her while she was having dinner with her stepmom and brothers. It was my first glimpse of her in months, but I only saw about one second of her very shocked face before she proceeded to frantically swing her arm through my face, thus ending our extremely long conversation. I hadn't talked to her in what seemed like forever, because we were out in the real world now and couldn't use cell phones. And I hadn't Iris Messenged her since, afraid that I might IM her while she was in the shower (I wouldn't mind that, but she would probably find someway to kill me from across the country, which would be a very bad thing). I kept forgetting about our four hour time difference so situations like those were very likely to happen.
A voice saying "Percy... Percy... PERCY!" snapped me out of it. It was Amber, "We're going inside now," she stated.
I replied, "Oh...yeah, sorry."
Gavin seemed amused by my apparent stupidity. I just smiled sheepishly and began to walk towards the rest of my friends.
I went to my locker, 482, which was fairly close to my friends'. I felt around my backpack for the picture of Annabeth and me on the beach at Camp Half-Blood. I found it and looked at it longingly for a moment. Annabeth was on my back kissing my cheek and I was smiling at the camera. Rachel had taken it for us. I heard someone walking towards me and I fumbled with the picture, frantically trying to flip it over.
A beautiful, long-limbed, raven-haired girl with freckles snatched it out of my hands. It was Olivia Reese. She was my first friend here other than Rachel Dare who transferred to a girls finishing school, because of a promise she had made to her dad. She looked at it curiously and said,
"Is that your girlfriend?" with a curious face.
I smiled a little and nodded as I thought about her for the millionth time today.
"Bet it's photoshopped." She winked at me and I couldn't tell if she was kidding or not.
Last year I tried to convince Olivia and all of my friends that I didn't want to date anyone because I had a girlfriend, but they all assumed I was lying and was just too afraid to date. I guessed you could say I was well liked at this school. I'm not one of the stereotypical 'jock types' (at least I hope not). That was Marcus and his little group of football players. They're nice to you- when they want something out of you. I didn't even notice all the girls staring at me until my friends had pointed it out to me last year. In fact, I usually don't even realize they like me until the seconds before they ask me out and I turn them down. Even now, I just pretended to not see them. My heart ached for Annabeth. I just hoped, all the way across the country, she was feeling the same way.
"Lemme see your schedule," I said to Olivia. She gave hers to me and I stared at the jumble of words my dyslexic brain couldn't possibly make sense of. Then I decided that trying to make sense of them was a horrible idea and handed both mine and her schedules back. "Uhhh... maybe you better read them."
She handed the schedule back to me, along with the picture, looking unsatisfied. We didn't have any classes together, except for lunch. I looked at her disappointedly. She took her schedule back and went back to her locker. I turned the picture around for the real reason I needed it; I had written my locker combination on the back of it. I looked at it, untidily scrawled 14-22-05 and opened my locker. I threw my books in and smiled as I thought I don't have to worry about Annabeth yelling at me to clean my locker, at least.
When I slammed my locker shut, the football team walked by in their little pack and Marcus, the quarterback, slammed me into the lockers with his shoulder. I glared at him and couldn't resist the urge to punch him. I was inches from his nose when a Korean guy with glasses grabbed my wrist and held me back. Chris, I thought as his face registered in my ADHD brain.
"Calm down, man," Chris commanded.
I glared at him. I gained my composure only slightly after he said, "It's not worth it." I grabbed my stuff and stormed away, fuming. I had had enough with jerks after the Titan War. Last year, Marcus, his trusty sidekick (this kid whose name started with A), and their goons seemed to live for making my life difficult. They hated me for taking the spotlight away from them. I had won the Goode High School Swim team first place, the first time Goode had won first in any athletics event (other than girls volleyball) in 8 years. The football team had lost in the playoffs game and they were all taking it out on me, with the leadership of Marcus.
Looking at my schedule clearly for the first time, I tried to decipher the words. Olivia had only told me what classes we didn't have together, not my complete schedule. And now, not only was I frustrated from the almost fight with Marcus, but I had to spend time trying to read my schedule because of my stupid dyslexia. I didn't even bother with the intro because the font was like dyslexic kryptonite, although because of some miracle, I managed to decipher the first word during homeroom. I saw it as something like qIziEhn, which I realized after a minute of hard concentration was English, and walked off to Mrs. Jacobsen's class.
I saw Chris, along with Lauren and Gavin in there, who beckoned me over.
"Hey, sorry about that earlier," I said to Chris.
"It's fine. It happens," and it was like nothing ever happened that morning. Chris was easy-going and cool and made friends easily. Everybody liked him because he was hilarious and smart.
I struggled through English and got the usual 'Do you need any extra help?' From the teacher once she saw I had ADHD and Dyslexia.
I figured out science in the middle of English class and breezed through Marine Biology, with Mr. Ganse not hating me. Finally, I figured out my schedule in third period when Gavin explained it to me:
Homeroom
Room C70
Davis, Katherine
7:30
English
Room D25
Jacobsen, Susan
7:45
Science (Marine
Biology)
Room S15
Ganse, Cameron
8:40
Greek
Room C42
Parks, Daniel
9:50
Math
Room D54
Blair, Jennifer
11:15
Lunch
Gym
Room gymnasium
Parson, David
1:00
Elective- None
(Permitted to
use pool during this period)
Room pool
O'Connell, Jonathan
1:55
History
Blofis, Paul
Room C76
2:40
Dismissal
3:30
After Marine Biology, I felt great and made a great impression on my Greek teacher, Mr. Parks. I walk into his classroom and he introduced himself and said "We're going to take a pretest, just to see what you guys know." Everybody groaned, but I smiled silently to myself. This class was going to be a piece of cake...I wanted some cake...preferably blue cake…What are we doing again? I looked down and there was a test in front of me. Guess I better get started. I finished easily and walked up to Mr. Park. He asked, "Do you have a question or something?"
"No, I'm finished,"
He looked at me suprisedly as if he weren't expecting anyone to finish so quickly and glanced over my pretest. "Is Greek your first language Percy?"
"No, I started learning it when I was 12 at summer camp, but it just kind of came easily to me," It was sort of true.
"Wow! It took me seven years to learn Greek fluently. Impressive Percy."
"Thanks Mr. Park," I said awkwardly and went to go sit down. At least he liked me.
Math was so boring I slept through half of it. Ms. Blair was like a robot and talked in the meanest, loudest voice I have ever heard.
After gym, I thought I would die from boredom and bolted straight to the pool. During my elective period, if you did a sport you were allowed to go practice. I changed into my swim trunks and dived to the bottom of the pooI. I sat there for a while before people began swimming laps. The cold, refreshing water invigorated me immediately. I began swimming laps and greeting the new freshman. Tryouts were after school today anyways. The freshman might be some of the best on the team. I also saw Chris, Gavin, and Amber. There were a couple people trying out for captain. Most of them swam pretty well. I was just worried about this guy named Derek, one of Marcus's followers. I was pretty sure he's just here to make sure I have a terrible life.
I was the hero on the swim team last year. Of course, it helped that I had super Poseidon fish-powers, but I had to remember to tone them down a little since I had accidentally swam a third of the world record at practice once.
Paul's class was interesting and fun, considering we were studying mythology. I didn't really focus though, because the books were in English and well, reading and I don't make a great couple.
Finally it was time for swim tryouts. It had seemed like what little that was left of Kronos was slowing down time just to annoy me. I jumped in the pool and said hi to Coach Jon as he walked in with his clipboard. "People who want to try out over here!" He shouted loudly. A fairly large group of 10 or so freshman walked over looking nervous. The top 5 made the team, but I almost immediately knew Christian, a new freshman, would be one to watch out for. The kid had some raw talent, almost 10 seconds ahead of the others, a huge feat considering most races were decided by 2 seconds or less. With his short, wavy, dirty blonde hair, he also wasn't that bad looking either.
Now it was my turn. Captains had to swim a 400IM; butterfly, backstroke, breast stroke, free. I climbed on the starting block and waited for the gun to fire a blank. I let my instincts take over and dived off the block. I felt myself shooting through the water like the bullet that could've been in the gun and was already at the other wall when I reminded myself to slow down. When I looked back, I was a half a lap ahead of everybody else. Crap, I thought. I willed the water not to push me forward and used only my arm strength to swim. I still had a solid lead, but not enough to make anybody scream in shock. I noticed Chris, Gavin, and Amber cheering me on.
I touched the final wall and won slightly and found Derek didn't even make the team. I smiled to myself. Gavin told me he knew I would win all along. I told him thanks and when I went to shake his hand, pulled him into the pool, soaking his shirt and his usually spiked up blond hair was pressed to his head. Everybody laughed. I willed myself to be dripping wet and climbed out of the pool. Now I just wanted to tell Annabeth.