Disclaimer: I do not own Percy Jackson and the OlympiansChapter 1
"You're on your own soldier..." Percy mimicked bitterly as he heard those last words.
"Calm down Percy!" Annabeth scolded him but was breaking on the inside as well.
So far, they had encountered none of the infected. Yet. They had to run from Camp Half Blood when it was burned down to the ground. The infected came from Camp Half Blood which was how it started:
It all started with a normal day at Camp Half Blood. But that was how it always starts. A normal day. After the war, the senior campers had adjusted to normal days. They adjusted too fast. No one could predict what would happen next.
A camper had smuggled in some coke for itself at camp, and drank it hungrily. Of course, the effect had begun immediately after a minute. Change during that minute however, could be seen if you looked hard enough. The camper was immediately hungry for blood, demigods was the only thing on it's mind. It wasn't a he, or a she, it was an it. One of the Infected. And who was the infected you'll probably ask. Who was the person who started the infection? A Hermes camper. To go into specifics, Connor Stoll.
That was the worst day of Travis Stoll's entire life. His own brother had come up to him that day, and ravenously started hungrily eating out huge gory chunks out of his arm. Once his hunger was satisfied, he started to run through dozens of campers who had weapons pointed at him fearfully. He screamed loudly, and within at least 1 mile radius, the agonizing scream could be heard. The campers tried to heal him, but faced the consequences when he started turning into one of the Infected. But they didn't know that. And in just a few minutes, 5 campers were already infected and ready to eat.
Campers tried to fight them, but it was no use. They were the unstoppable. They should have named them, the Unstoppable Infected. Either way, both fit. Screams of pain rang throughout the camp, and everyone crowded around a scene. A scene of where their siblings, friends, family, were now eating chunks of now a dead demigod. Clarisse was yelling at them, but not even with her daughter of Ares strength could she fight them off. And soon they were forced to run. There was no time for fighting, no point. Some campers made the bad decision, and were on their knees, surrendering, while the Infection ripped out pieces of their neck, and savored the taste like wild animals.
The demigods that ran couldn't stay strong and free flowing tears ran down as they left behind their former family that now turned into an Infected. The group consisted of the people who participated in the Titan War. Percy, Annabeth, Grover, Tyson, Clarisse, Will, Jake, Pollux, Katie, Chris, Rachel, and Malcolm were the ones who had ran. Even Clarisse didn't want to take her chances against those 'punks.' Nobody did.
Along the days, they had lost one of them, Malcolm had been a bit too slow, and were taking as a victim who was eaten on sight. Annabeth had cried over the loss of her brother, and not even Percy could calm her down. She saw the death of her brother in immense detail. In fact, the Infected who had had eaten her brother was one of the people that she knew as the Ice Queen. Drew. And that made her despise her even more.
Survival was hard, and food was scarce. And even though humans still lived amongst the bad scenario, one by one, they started eating them too. The Infected might as well have put up a huge banner saying 'Human Disposal by Infection at your Service' for the mortals. And the same thing for the demigods as well. Except saying 'Demigod Disposal by Infection at your Service' instead. But as original as that would have been, they didn't, and that showed that humans around the other side of the world had no idea that the Infected had only just begun their destruction of the Earth.
Those days led up to one more Infected joining this 'wonderful' new world. The victim being Jake, who had tried to sacrifice himself by sticking a large spear through it's neck. The spear stayed impaled on his head. The Infected growled and snarled, while taking out the spear and throwing it with aim on Jake's neck. He fell to the ground, and now he had no will to survive except for demigod flesh.
No deaths were seen in the group, and that was a huge achievement compared to two new Infected in just than more then a few days. And that's where the timeline comes now, back to when Annabeth spoke.
"How can we calm down?" Percy snapped.
Annabeth didn't flinch, but retorted back angrily. "Yes you can calm down! I'm supposed to be the one punching any object I see in front of me! Do you know what it's like to lose a brother?"
"You know what I'm worried about Annabeth? I'm worried about Thalia and Nico! You may have lost a brother, but Thalia and Nico is the closest thing to my family I have. And you know what I just found out? I found out that my mom and Paul are dead!"
"How?"
"I just saw them walking around the town."
"We have to move again?" Chris asked with a tired sigh.
"Yeah. Let's go."
Percy led the group to a presumably safe area while gripping the voice recorder tightly. Annabeth intertwined her hand with his and carefully took the voice recorder into her own hands, since he was going to break it.
"Set up a light camp here," Annabeth ordered, as she saw that everyone was going to collapse if they walked any further. "But we'll have to move tomorrow if we're lucky. If we're not, then we'll move in just a few hours."
The group nodded and rolled out their sleeping bags. They didn't bother lighting a fire, it would only alert the Infected that they were here. Percy was the lookout, along with Annabeth as the rest slept.
"Percy?" Annabeth said quietly.
"Yeah?"
"I'm sorry about your parents."
Percy was about to reply when he saw one of the Infected crawling their way with one leg lost.
"Wake the others and tell them to move ok?" Percy said to Annabeth who nodded.
"Wake up and pack up quietly," Annabeth whispered to the group as she shook them awake one by one.
Meanwhile Percy walked a tiny bit closer to where the Infected was limping to. He wanted to know who the Infected was. He squinted to see in the dark, but stumbled over a branch in the process. He placed his hand over his mouth to prevent any noises. But it was too late. The Infected had seen him. And he had seen the Infected. It was Paul Blofis. His stepdad. He backed away slowly and ran out towards to his friends stealthily, his former stepdad following close behind him.
"Run!" Percy yelled. "Go!"
The group looked behind Percy and without any question, ran. Although Clarisse wanted to try her new torture method on the Infected to see if it would die, Chris dragged her back to the group. Annabeth was the last to run. She waited for Percy to come back, but he didn't. Ironically, the Infected was also gone. Which meant... He had either led the Infected away, or... He had become an Infected.
Annabeth stubbornly refused to believe the second option, and ran out across the dark to look for Percy. The group noticed that their two leaders were gone, and started to head out in her direction. Little did they know it was a trap. And they had gone along with the trap without any second thoughts.
A/N: I hope this chapter is good for you guys. And to all the questions I had received from the first reviewer, all will be revealed in the upcoming chapters.