Annabeth was playing with the flag in her hands. The Athena-cabin had won the last round of Capture The Flag, but they weren't up against the Ares-children. Instead, Chiron had got the idea to set his newer campers against his old students. It might seem like the campers had an advantage - the campers that stayed year-round were with 32, the old students were with 18. Plus, the newer campers had far more diversity in godly parents, making them able to do a lot more things.
Yet, these demigods were famous for a reason - they had all done great things, although most of them later in life than their current age. The most of them were at least good fighters, in a lot of different ways. Annabeth sighed deeply by the thought of having to fight one of them one-on-one.
Chiron marched onto the field where everyone was standing together, Newer demigods on the right with the blue flag, and old demigods on the left with the red flag. He let his gaze go over all the demigods before he explained the well-known rules: 'Hide the flag in your own area, no killing or maiming, come back when you hear the horn. If you're to wounded to stand up straight, come back and my helpers and I will get you back to good health. Now, Demigods, GO!' Before Chiron had even reached the word 'Go,' the two groups had sprinted into the forest.
Clarisse ran next to Annabeth. 'Hey, Annie, I think we need to work together. Don't get me wrong, it's just for this one time.' Annabeth looked at her, trying to see if Clarisse meant it. After a few seconds, she decided that she did. 'Just this one time, then, Clara,' She agreed, 'We are going to need a strong team to beat these people. From what I've read, a few of them will trap all of us in one place while the rest of the group goes of to find a flag.' Clarisse shrugged. 'If the old stories are anything to go by, they could come up with it.' She got a strange smile on her face. 'Unless, Of course, we do it first.'
On the opposite side of the forest, the older demigods had already hidden their flag. They were now looking at how they should arrange the group. Atalanta, one of only two girls in the group, had taken the lead. Surprisingly, the boys were actually listening to her. 'So, Hercules, Achilles, Theseus and Perseus are our best fighters, so they attack the other group. In the meantime, the rest of the physical fighters, with the exception of Cyrene and me, do the defending of the flag and they back the others up if it looks like fighting gets to hard on them. Cyrene, Asclepius, Actaeon, Dionysus and me try to set up a trap for the, er... newer demigods.' The group around her nodded, which she almost didn't see in the darkness.
Annabeth and Clarisse were in the meantime also rounding up people to do the exact same thing. A few kids of Hephaestus got some strong rope out of their pockets. 'I always carry this with me, just in case,' Nyssa confessed, 'If I need it, it will turn into a net.' The Hephaestus kids, together with some other strong people, tied the rope in between the trees. It reached all the way from the Grounds of Maenads to the edge of the forest. 'At some point, someone is going to fall for this,' Clarisse said to Annabeth. The daughter of Athena nodded, more hopefully than completely sure of it.
While the rope was being put in the trees, few demigods were paying attention to what was happening around them. Yet, Malcolm from the Athena cabin noticed something moving around in the trees. He decided to follow it. The person darted through the trees, all the way back to the other ancient demigods. Malcolm looked from behind a tree trunk, at saw Atalanta telling something to Cyrene. The figure he had followed jumped out of tree; It was Phoenix, a hero that didn't really have a lot of stories, but was some minor player in the Trojan war.
'They have put a rope between the trees. I think it is something magical.' Atalanta nodded thoughtfully. Cyrene looked at the two heroes for a moment, before saying: 'And did you find that person we wanted to catch? Did you follow you?' Malcolm tried to get away so fast that he didn't even see Phoenix's confused expression. Before he put five steps back to his team, something had grabbed him around the waist and was hurling him to the rest of the opposite team.
Malcolm looked up, and saw that the person pulling him away was Hercules. He sighed. 'I guess I already ruïned it,' he whispered to himself. He looked at Cyrene, who just gave him a bittersweet smile. Atalanta walked over to him and stared Malcolm straight in the eyes. 'What are you doing here, prisoner?' Magnus looked behind is back. 'Being a prisoner, I guess.' Atalanta shrugged. Asclepius came running by. 'I can watch the prisoners. If I stay here, I might be able to heal everyone who is wounded as well.' Atalanta nodded thoughtfully. 'Good plan.''
On the opposite side, nobody had noticed that Malcolm had been captured. Clarisse and Annabeth had been to busy working out a decent strategy, and the campers were surveying the area for any spies. After a few minutes, they heard something unfolding, a bang and someone groaning. Nyssa jumped up, and ran towards in the sound. A few minutes later, she came back with Aeneas. 'This just ran into out little trap,' She told Annabeth and Clarisse. Annabeth gestured one of her siblings to come closer. 'If you could just guard the prisoners?' She asked, not really paying the attention. The girl still nodded.
Perseus bit his lip. 'So they really have a net. You know, I think it might be smarter to get defensive than offensive, because we can never break through something made by a child of Hephaestus without losing the upper hand.' the rest of the group nodded. 'At some point, they'll have to send out people to come catch our flag. We can try to fight them then,' Achilles suggested. Atalanta shrugged. She looked like she was thinking. 'We try that. Does anybody have an idea for a trap on our side?' she asked. Dionysus stood up. 'I could try to manipulate the plants in such a way they'll grow in front of any attackers,' He suggested. 'It might work. Just take Achilles with you for backup.
'They're not coming,' Clarisse whispered to Annabeth. The daughter of Athena sighed deeply. 'I agree. Let's send some people to the opposite camp; They are not going to be the ones to attack first. I guess they know what happened to Aeneas. Clarisse stood up, and rounded up a few Ares kids, and asked Jason to come along. Annabeth got a few Apollo, Athena and Hermes kids to join the little group. Ten people set out to search in the area of the enemy, not knowing what to expect.
After fifteen minutes of seeking, they decided that it couldn't be a lot. There weren't any traps, no enemy camp, no flags as far as they could see. Jason had looked at the forest from the air for a long time, and couldn't see anything. Mark, a boy from the Ares cabin, said: 'Maybe we should go back. They are either very well hidden or extremely unorganised.' Keira from Athena nodded. 'Let's go.' Just as she said it, the plants seemed to move. Probably nothing, she thought, until she saw ivy slowly grow up her leg. 'Guys, I think we just stepped in a trap,' A hermes child said. Mark growled. 'They're plants, just cut them in half,' he said while pulling out his sword.
Dionysus and Achilles had counted on the enemies trying to do that. Cutting plants in half might seem like nothing to the ordinary person, but if you knew dryads existed, it was a whole other story. The dryad who belonged to the ivy-plant had only agreed to let Dionysus temporarily manipulate her plant to trap the enemy as long as no-one cut it down. Mark not doing that was not something she liked. Therefore, she let her plants grow around his body so quick he couldn't hold his sword. The rest of the group got the same treatment. Jason tried to fly up, but it was no use. After they were stuck, Dionysus and Achilles strided out of their hiding spot to capture them. Achilles bound them all together with the little bit of rope the ancient demigods got, while Dionysus thanked the dryad in advance.
When the searching group had not returned in thirty minutes, Clarisse decided it had been enough. 'Annabeth, let's just attack. We are with far more than them. They probably all jumped on our scout group. Annabeth agreed. This game of Capture-The-Flag had to progress someone, and sending out scout-groups only for them to get captured one by one didn't seem like a fast way to do that, nor was it a winning strategy. 'Let's go.' They rounded up all the campers, with the exception of the Apollo camper who had to make sure Aeneas didn't run away, plus a few people to make sure the flag didn't get captured. Nyssa and the other Hephaestus kids got the net from the trees, and the newer demigods stormed the area of their ancient siblings.
When they saw the enormous group of demigods running towards them, Atalanta and her group squared up to dual. 'I don't care who, but somebody needs to go check the opposite side of the forest to find their flag!' Atalanta screamed. Achilles taped Dionysus shoulder. 'You can make the plants grow to make it look like no-one is walking. After we find the flag, you can go back, therefore making it look like no-one was gone, while I run back to the start with the Flag.' Dionysus nodded. 'Let's do that.'
The group of demigods was running through the forest. Some of them accidently cut down plants. The dryads had all heard the story of the Ivy-plant, and started fighting against them. When a demigod cut something down, that person got pushed against a tree, without being able to move. Percy was trying to find the flag as soon as possible. Yet, he crossed paths with Bellerophon, and the demigod might be clumsy, he was very much capable of fighting Percy for quite some time. While Percy was caught up with that, Piper tried to charmspeak her way through the ancient demigods. It worked good, until she came face to face with Atalanta, a huntress who seemed to have the same brain as Reyna; unable to charmspeak your way into.
Just when Atalanta held up her knife to smack Piper out for a few minutes, they heard someone play a song. Orpheus had started a solo. It made enemies everywhere on the left side of the forest fall down, cry and hug each other. The dryads let their victims go, but they didn't run away. Animals from the forest started crowding around the warriors of the game.
In the meantime, the people on the left side of the forest were absolutely not bothered by the music, because they couldn't hear it. Achilles had pushed away one small group of defenders, but their wasn't a lot of opposition on his and Dionysus secret attack. Achilles still thought it was weird that a child of Zeus could have a strong affinity with nature, so strong that he was able to control plants to cover up the fact that they were walking here, but he didn't question it. If he had to be honest, he just thought it was because Dionysus had as much physical strength in his entire body as the Son of Thetis in his little toe. Of course he would try to find other ways to fight.
Yet, it worked, and they found the flag. Achilles picked it up. 'I am going back to the left side. You run to Chiron,' Dionysus said. Achilles nodded, and the demigods went their separate ways. Achilles was a very quick runner, and he would have gotten the flag to Chiron in no time if it wasn't for the fact that he suddenly heard Orpheus singing. He wanted to resist, but he couldn't; he was drawn to the master singer. The same happened with Dionysus.
Orpheus saw Achilles walk over to him, with the flag, seemingly hypnotised. Orpheus dug two tissues out of his pocket. He kept singing, while ordering Achilles to put them in his ears so he wouldn't hear him sing. Although a lot of sound gets through tissue paper, it worked, and Achilles seemed to get out of his trance. With the flag, he tried to ignore the singing and run back to the start. It didn't go as fast as he hoped; Orpheus' music was to good, he just needed to listen every now and then. Yet, he got back to the start, with the flag in his hands. Chiron looked at him, and smiled. Of course Achilles had been the one to capture the flag.
He blew the horn. Orpheus stopped playing, as the horn blew a second time. The demigods woke up, realised the game was over and that the ancient demigods had won, and started walking back to the start. The newer demigods congratulated the old ones with their victory.
Piper walked up to Chiron. 'I think some people are stuck in there. Who is going to get them out. Chiron looked around, and saw Dionysus standing in the group with the other Ancient campers. 'I think I am going to get Mr. D out of his room and explain what is happening. He'll get them out, as usual.' "Chiron, how come that he didn't just break out?" "Well, Piper, I thought Lord Zeus was joking about the magical locks which he truly can't open, because not even Zeus himself can open them without the key, but I guess he wasn't. It did work in this panic situation, though." Chiron smiled. 'Also, I finally found a way to send these kids back. So tomorrow, everything will really be all as usual.'