Secrets of Monochrome

A/N: I guess I felt like adding another chapter. Black Tennis will be continued, I just don't feel up to type it yet and DVP21 has too much school stuff going on. Anyway, here is the next chapter in Secrets of Monochrome!

Some MORE news:

Jelli posted another story on Fictionpress. It is similar to Prince of Tennis yet very different. It centers on a form of martial arts. But it's not one that currently exists in reality today. It is completely made up and fake. The story also has a supernatural powers twist to it. So please read it and tell us what you think in reviews!

Updated: August 9, 2011 (added a few lines)

"Speech"

'Thoughts'

"Japanese"

Disclaimer: I do not own Monochrome Factor and/or the Percy Jackson Series

Chapter 2: Suspicious People

A few days later…

Akira and Shirogane, after seeing the mysterious figure that had somehow melted into the shadows a few days before, set out to investigate the strange going-on. However, Shirogane already knew what was going on; he just did not tell Akira about it, despite knowing the outburst that would be directed at him later on. But, he knew if he guarded that secret well enough until they returned to Japan without Akira finding out, everything would be all right. He had a bad feeling that he would fail though.

They were currently walking around in Central Park. Akira in his shin form. As they wandered, they came across a couple of teenagers with black hair studying a pile of rocks. One had on jeans and an orange T-shirt and the other was dressed completely in black. The teen in black had something attached onto his waist that looked suspiciously like a sword. A completely black sword. 'How interesting can a pile of rocks be? And what's with the sword in broad daylight? Is he also a shin?' Akira thought as he walked closer. As he approached, he heard the adolescent in the orange T-shirt suddenly yell out a name, "Grover!"

Shirogane looked over at Akira when he felt him move farther away from him. He furrowed his brows when he saw the sword the kid in black was carrying around. He knew trouble was store when he also noticed Akira walk slowly towards the two boys. Hurriedly, he quickly made his way over to Akira. "Akira-kun~" Shirogane started as he tried to draw Akira's attention away from the two boys.

"What do you want Shirogane?" Akira asked in annoyance not drawing his attention away from suspicious pair of boys.

"Moe~ you're always so-"

He was cut off by another teenager, who looked about the age of the kid in orange, fall from a tree head-first to the ground. This was accompanied by a loud thud. However, this teenager was not like the other two; this one had hooves, a furry hind-quarters and horns. Akira, now having his fill of suspicious actions, immediately raced forward with his blades drawn and attempted to slash at the kids, thinking that they were some kind of shin working for Homurabi (A/N: I am making Homurabi the Homurabi in the anime. So, to sum it up, a crazy lunatic who does not have any good morals at all). As he neared the suspicious trio, he was suddenly tackled to the ground by Shirogane and the fall was once again accompanied with yet again, a loud thud. Well, this time it was more of a crash. The suspicious teenagers, hearing the lard thud, quickly glanced over to the pair of supernatural beings. They sent them a questioning glance before walking over quickly. In the hoofed kid's case, more like trotted. They were able to catch a part of the conversation that was being shot back and forth in a foreign language. They wondered why everyone was walking by calmly as if the two weirdly dressed people weren't there at all. Little did they know, they weren't far from the answer to the situation at all.

"Shirogane! Get off!"

"Not unless you promise you won't attack those children," Shirogane shot back, refusing to get up.

"Why? Is there something you're not telling me again?"

Shirogane tensed and this movement did not go unnoticed by Akira. "Shirogane…" he growled dangerously, demanding for an explanation.

"Um…well…you see…Akira-kun…" Shirogane stumbled over his words as he got up and slowly retreated away from Akira.

"Hey…uh…is everything all right here?"

Nico POV (A/N: A little POV change for all of you to see the scene from a different perspective !)

Percy and I stood in front of the Door of Orpheus trying to figure out how we could open it.

"How's your singing?" I asked him.

We debated for a bit on how to get the door to open. "I have a better idea," he notified me, "Grover!"

As we waited, I vaguely felt someone trying to sneak up on us but it didn't feel like it was a person. So, I paid it no mind. I could faintly hear a conversation between two people behind me. They definitely weren't from the U.S considering their slight accent.

I looked over to Percy and saw that he had shut his eyes and was concentrating. I assumed that he was trying to get his empathy link with Grover to start up. I decided to try using my Hades' powers to open the door despite what I said about it not going to work earlier. A few seconds passed before Percy suddenly almost fell over. He was able to catch himself.

"What happened?"

"I got through. He's…yeah. He's on his way."

We waited for about what seemed like a minute before suddenly out of nowhere, someone fell out of the tree that was above us. This someone, I recognized. It was Grover. Once he had crash landed on top of his head, I fight a slight wind blow from behind me, as if someone was running at top speed at me. But before I could turn around to see what it was, I heard two bodies fall to the floor. Grover, Percy and my head immediately shot over to look what had made that thud. Our eyes met the sight of two guys; one on top of the other. One had extremely long silver or white hair that was tied into a braid that was secured by a golden band and fell down behind his back. His skin was impossibly pale, almost blending in with his hair. He wore a long black trench coat, a hat, white gloves, and held a cane that was topped with a funny-looking skull. My first thought: the epitome of suspicious people. The other guy – the one that was trying to get the other off of him — had black hair that was somewhat long and spiky. He wore a white dress shirt that was underneath a black vest that fanned out like a cape in the back. His red pants had bandages wrapped around one leg. He also wore combat boots. In his hands, he held what looked like swords but seemed more similar to a saw. A suspicious pair of foreigners. Terrorists? Nah, not likely. Then a sudden thought formed in my head. Kronos' cronies? (A/N: Kronos, cronies? Heh heh? You get it? No? Yes?) Possibly.

As we walked closer I could hear the one with the black hair yelling in some foreign language at the white haired one. I felt that something was off about them. I looked at the ground near their feet and the answer suddenly showed itself to me. They had no shadows. Being the son of Hades, I knew everything had a shadow, take it from experience shadow traveling.

"Percy," I whispered quietly. He looked over in a questioning glance. "Look at their feet."

He looked back at me in confusion, "What about their feet?"

I groaned before hissing out, "They have no shadows!"

Both Grover and Percy looked back over and realization dawned on them.

"Maybe they're some kind of monster we never heard about before?" Percy asked.

"No," Grover cut in, "they don't smell like monsters…in fact…they smell like something different…old and powerful like the gods. But definitely not human."

I frowned at that declaration. We went back to studying the scene; the black haired one growled something to the other and the one in the trench coat tensed and slowly retreated back after getting up.

"Hey…uh…is everything all right here?" Percy asked before I could stop him.

I leave you on a cliffhanger...anyways, I left off here because I wanted to dedicate the next chapter to something else entirely. So, yeah. Don't have much else to say. I just noticed, I say "anyway" a lot.

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