A/N Io non aquisto.
Book of the Update: The Irish Dream by Nora Roberts
Majority of this is Rick's!
Chapter 2
"Whew!" Leo cried as we dumped the sheet of bronze onto the deck of the ship. Gods, that thing was heavier than you would think.
"What happened to you?" Piper asked, making me look at Leo. His hair was greased back. He had welding goggles on his forehead, a lipstick mark on his cheek, tattoos all over his arms, and a T-shirt that read HOT STUFF, BAD BOY, and TEAM LEO. I held my hand up to my mouth to hold back a snort at the thought of explaining this to the others.
"Long story," he said. "Others back?"
"Not yet," Piper said. Leo cursed.
Just then, Jason sat up, rubbing his head and blinking slowly.
"Hey, man! Glad you're better. I'll be in the engine room." He looked at me, silently asking if I was coming. I shook my head no and he ran off with the sheet of bronze, leaving Hazel and me in the doorway.
Piper raised an eyebrow at her. "Team Leo?"
"We met Narcissus," Hazel said, which didn't really explain much. "Also Nemesis, the revenge goddess."
Jason sighed. "I miss all the fun."
On the deck above, something went THUMP, as if a heavy creature had landed. Annabeth and Percy came running down the hall. Percy was toting a steaming five-gallon plastic bucket that smelled horrible. Annabeth had a patch of black sticky stuff in her hair. Percy's shirt was covered in it.
"Roofing tar?" Piper guessed.
Frank stumbled up behind them, which made the hallway pretty jam-packed with demigods. Frank had a big smear of the black sludge down his face. "Ran into some tar monster things," he said after regaining his balance in the tight space.
"Hey Jason, glad you're awake," Annabeth called out to him and he nodded and gave her a weak smile. "Where's Leo?"
"Engine room," Hazel and I said at the same time. We looked at each other, and there was something in her eyes – was that jealousy? But then it was gone and I shook my head, focusing on more important matters. The entire ship suddenly jolted to the side and shook a bit, as if someone was pounding on the hull.
Percy almost spilled his bucket of tar. "Uh, what was that?" he demanded.
"Oh…" Hazel looked at me, giving an embarrassed little laugh.
"We made contact with the nymphs residing in this lake. We were uh…not received well," I took over when she didn't finish.
"Great." Percy handed the bucket of tar to Frank and Annabeth. "You guys help Leo. I'll hold off the water spirits as long as I can."
"On it!" Frank promised.
The three of them ran off, leaving us at the cabin door. The ship listed again, and Hazel hugged her stomach like she was going to be sick. "I'll just…" She swallowed, pointed weakly down the passageway, and ran off.
Water splashed up the sides so high that I could see it over the windows. "I'm going to see if Valdez needs any help," I shouted over the noise of the waves before running down the corridor and making a sharp turn into the engine room.
Even before I got there, I could tell that it wasn't good, just by the noise. I cautiously stepped into the engine room, which was covering in smoke and had little sparks coming off of metal….um…engine stuff.
"Leo?" I called, but I could barely even hear my voice over the noise, so I yelled again, "LEO?"
"REY!" His voice came from just behind me and I turned to see him kneeling by some contraption thing with a wrench in one hand and a….Xbox controller (…?) in the other.
"YOU NEED ANY HELP?"
He nodded gratefully and handed me some screws and the wrench and Xbox controller. "CAN YOU JUST HOLD ONTO THOSE FOR A MINUTE?" I nodded and he jumped up and ran around to the other side of what I assumed was the engine.
It was huge, but I suppose that made sense, seeing as it powered a giant magical flying warship about to battle giants and mother earth.
Leo came back around and took the stuff out of my hands, grinning like a madman. "THERE'S A BIG YELLOW BUTTON OVER THERE; I NEED YOU TO HOLD IT DOWN WITH ONE HAND AND PULL OUT THE RED BOLT NEXT TO IT WHEN I SAY. OKAY? DON'T LET GO OF THE BUTTON!"
"OKAY," I shouted, running over to the other side and quickly found the button.
"RED BOLT NOW!" He hollered after a minute and I reached over and yanked out the already loose red bolt a few feet to the left of the button. There was a flash of light and I squeezed my eyes shut and heard a BOOM and almost got knocked over by the impact of whatever had happened.
Then it was gone and Leo was behind me. I could feel his chest pressed against my back and he leaned down to put his face near mine, wrapping his arms around me. "You can open your eyes now, Your Majesty," he murmured right next to my ear.
I did. "Can I release this button?"
"Yup."
I did.
"Where do you want the bolt?"
"Just drop it; I'll find it later."
I did.
"You okay?"
"You can turn around now, you know."
I did.
"Hello," I said, a bit flustered at being this close to him.
"Hello," he said back, grinning again.
"Hello," I said again before mentally slapping myself. Here I was, praetor of Rome, getting tongue-tied by some boy. But Leo Valdez wasn't just "some boy", now was he? He was Leo Valdez, and he was most certainly allowed to make me tongue-tied and flustered.
He leaned his head forward, a bit uncertainly, and I realized that he was probably just as….unsure where we were as I was. There seemed to be a mental battle going on in that head of his, but whichever side won, it was apparently the side that wanted to press his lips to mine and wrap his arms a bit tighter around my back.
My hands went up to his hair, which, surprisingly, didn't feel as filthy with engine grease and sweat as it was.
He pulled back after a moment, but we stayed where we were, just looking at each other, his arms around my waist, my hands twisted in his hair.
There were footsteps down the hall, and he quickly pressed his lips to mine once more before pulling away and running out into the hall.
I stood there, giving myself a second, maybe two, to be a normal teenage girl and freak out a bit, before I composed myself and followed him out into the hall.
Leo was caked in sweat, lime dust, and tar. His T-shirt looked like it had been caught in an escalator and chewed to shreds. The TEAM LEO on his chest now read: AM LEO, and yeah, maybe his hair was a bit more mussed than it was right after the explosion. But he grinned like a madman and announced that they were safely under way. "Meeting in the mess hall, one hour," he said. "Crazy day, huh?"
After everyone had cleaned up, the faun – Coach Hedge, I had to remind myself - took the helm and everyone else gathered below for dinner. It was the first time we'd all sat down together— just the eight of us. I felt like a bit of an intruder, being the only demigod not part of the prophecy, but everyone included me in their conversations and the remaining misgivings I'd had about Percy's Greek friends dissipated.
There was a bit of awkwardness when both Jason and Percy tried to sit in the chair at the head of the table, and sparks literally flew off Jason's hands. There was some tension between them, but they eventually decided to give the chair to Annabeth and sat on the sides themselves.
"So where to now?" Leo asked with a mouthful of pizza. "We did a quick repair job to get us out of the lake, but there's still a lot of damage. We should really put down again and fix things right before we head across the Atlantic."
Percy was eating a piece of pie, which for some reason was completely blue— filling, crust, even the whipped cream. "We need to put some distance between us and Camp Jupiter," he said. "Frank spotted some eagles over Salt Lake City. We figure the Romans aren't far behind us."
That didn't exactly improve the mood around the table.
"I don't suppose we should go back and try to reason with the Romans? Maybe— maybe I didn't try hard enough with the charmspeak."
Jason took her hand. "It wasn't your fault, Pipes. Or Leo's," he added quickly. "Whatever happened, it was Gaea's doing, to drive the two camps apart."
"Maybe if we could explain that, though—"
"With no proof?" I asked. "And no idea what to do about the eidolons and if they're still here? I appreciate what you're saying, Piper. I don't want my people on our bad side, but until we understand what Gaea's up to, going back is suicide. They wouldn't even listen to me if I tried now."
"She's right," Hazel said. She still looked a little queasy from seasickness, but she was trying to eat a few saltine crackers. "We've been raised to distrust Greeks, and Octavian especially will never listen. The Romans have honor to think about. They've been attacked. They'll shoot first and ask questions post hac."
Hazel nodded. "Nemesis said we have only six days until Nico dies and Rome is destroyed."
Jason frowned. "You mean Rome Rome, not New Rome?"
"I think," Hazel said. "But if so, that's not much time." "Why six days?" Percy wondered. "And how are they going to destroy Rome?" No one answered.
There was an awkward silence before Piper began to tell us about the visions she saw in her knife. Then the subject of the Mark of Athena was brought up, though the words themselves were never mentioned. I looked at Annabeth, but she shook her head slightly, like she didn't want it spread around, but that's impossible! The mark of Athena was just some batty old legend passed down from long-dead Lares.
Leo's hand slipped out of mine and brought me out of my thoughts. I looked up at him.
"So…" Leo pushed his chair away from the table. "First things first, I guess. We'll have to put down in the morning to finish repairs."
"Someplace close to a city," Annabeth suggested, "in case we need supplies. But somewhere out of the way, so the Romans will have trouble finding us. Any ideas?"
No one spoke.
"Well," she ventured, "how do you guys feel about Kansas?"
I blinked. Kansas? It was so random, so unexpected. Why Kansas, of all places?
Annabeth seemed to think it was a bit unusual as well, but accepted the suggestion and everyone sort of slipped off to bed, leaving just Leo and me.
"Do you know where my cabin is?" Leo asked, a bit awkwardly and I shook my head.
"Why?"
"Well, you need a place to sleep, obviously," he laughed nervously and scratched the back of his neck. "I mean, I'd sleep on the couch out here, of course…don't sleep all that well anyhow. So uh…I'll just show you the way then?"
He began to walk out the room, but I stopped him. "Leo, I can't just…steal your room! I'll sleep on the couch; you sleep in your room."
He turned back to me, a solemn expression on his face. "If I let a lady sleep on the couch while I had a perfectly good room, my mom would come up out of her grave and smack me."
I let him take the couch after that.
He had told me about his mom once, when we were younger and I said I didn't know where my parents were. I knew he didn't really like to talk about what had happened, so I never pushed him. I just knew that there was a fire, and that she hadn't made it out in time. Now, knowing about the powers he has and that guilty sadness he gets when he talks about it, I started to wonder if it wasn't quite that simple.
Leo pretended to be the happiest guy around, but I knew that deep down, he really wasn't. Not at all. He was sad and regretful, and he didn't like things to be half-finished. That's why, when he came back a while after showing me which room was his, I pretended I was asleep and let him kiss my forehead and murmur something in Spanish and pretended to stay asleep until he shut the door quietly behind his retreating form. He didn't like things to be halfway done because he was never sure if it was the last chance he's had to finish them or not.
A/N is this a boring story? I feel like it's boring. Is it boring?
