A/N: Yay, I kind of wrote a long chapter, and not too long after the last one! Wow! I defiantly should be spending more time revising and stuff, but, well, here we are.

Anyway, someone, (leaving the name anonymous for... reasons?) asked me when Naruto would be back, also someone in the comments, go read that if your interested because that will be such a fun thing to do.

Naruto will be back soon, by the end of this book at the latest, but he'll probably show up a bit earlier than that, so don't worry about that. So, yeah, don't you worry about that.

Oh, also, this story mightn't be as long as the last one, and it is done this way because now I'm trying to focus on keeping the timing of this chapter in the same sort of time frame, and it's done chronologically so there's that. I don't have a particular reason for this, I'm just doing it, well, it is partly due to Uncle Rick doing this, and partially just because about halfway through I realised I was doing it, so I stuck to it.

So, now that that is out of the way, on with the story:

When Percy made it back to the Poseidon cabin after an uncomfortable campfire where many campers tried to hide their laughter at him, he was met with an angry Yagura. She was standing in their doorway, hands on her hips and a glare aimed right at him, not as bad as what Tantalus got, but Percy still found himself shifting uncomfortably under it.

"Tyson's asleep." Yagura said with false sweetness. "You know, he was telling me such nice things about how you would always let him come around to yours and play with your pet fox." Her voice now matched the glare. "The same fox you refused to tell me about and have had for more than a year apparently."

"What is it with your guys obsession with Anchor? And Whiskers come to think of it?" Percy asked with a sigh, as the glare increased he was missing Anchors presence. Whiskers said that he would bring him to help find a place for a den suitable for the other fox, near the Poseidon cabin. Annabeth had gone with to make sure they didn't tear each other apart but had shot down Percy's attempts to join them.

"What is our–You–Gods damned…" She took a deep breath and tried to calm herself. "You know damn well that we are on the lookout for them. They are what are going to lead us to our brother, I told you we were looking for him, right?" He nodded at that. "Right, and we told everyone that the foxes were important to that last year when Whiskers and Bandit nearly went nuclear, remember?"

"Wait… What?" Percy eyes gaped like a fish and he looked absolutely astonished, "when… how… what?"

"How could you not have noticed you… slept right through it." She blinked, "and then Chiron ordered no one to talk about it." She scrunched her face up in confusion, "but what about when we discovered about Whiskers over the IM, when you… left to explore the ship." She brought her hands to her temples, and just muttered under her breath in Japanese and Ancient Greek, what Percy did manage to make out wasn't particularly flattering.

"Umm… what happened?" Percy asked, breaking her out of her long string of cursing, Poseidon must have given her the mouth of a sailor.

Yagura took a deep breath and sighed, "okay. So, you know nothing… right." Another sigh. "Well, your fox Anchor, he's my brother."

She paused, and Percy was waiting for her to say, 'ha, got you, I just really like silver foxes.' But it didn't come.

"Your brother?" Percy finally asked.

"Yes."

"Anchor. The fox, is your, Yagura, the demi-gods brother?"

"Well not biologically." Percy felt relieved, his sister wasn't crazy, "no, just in the same way all us jinchuuriki are related." Relief gone, she's nuts.

"Umm…" There wasn't really anything you can say to someone who believes that their brother is a fox. Though, to be fair, since joining the Greek world, Percy had been subjected to a great number of weird things, so for now he may as well go with is. "Right, umm, could you maybe… explain?"

"Yeah, sure." She took her staff off her back and Percy was worried that she had somehow sensed his doubt and was now going to beat her beliefs into him, but instead she grabbed a water bottle and tipped it out. The water hovered in a bubble about a foot from the floor, she used her staff and made a circle motion with it, the water span, following her staff like a cat with a laser pointer. It eventually spread itself out into a rough approximation of a circle, about three feet in diameter. "Sorry," Yagura said, a small smile on her face, "I just feel it would make more sense to you with visual aid."

Percy felt a bit offended and a bit glad. Upset because she thought he wouldn't be able to keep up with her, and glad because he was pretty sure that if it was something complicated, he probably wouldn't be able to keep up with her.

Yagura made some weird movements with her hands and placed her palm on the surface of the water, and it shimmered before morphing into an image. Then it flickered and died, before coming back, it was like a TV flickering between channels, but moving too fast for you to figure out what was going on. Yagura looked at Percy weirdly for a moment.

"Can you see anything?" She asked, confusion in her voice.

"Yeah, sort of. It's flickering." He replied.

"It shouldn't be." Yagura muttered, before redoing the weird movements with her hands and pressing the water again. It looked the same. Yagura hummed to herself, "let me try something." She made more hand signs and for a second there was another her beside her, then it flickered and died. "Do you see another me?"

"I did, but it disappeared after a second." Percy replied, "what's all this got to do with Anchor."

"Absolutely nothing," Yagura said, "but it looks like we're experiencing some technical difficulties with the visual aids. It seems you're immune to Genjutsu." She hummed in thought, "or maybe low-level ones, I can't be sure, I'll talk to Roshi about it later, anyway, we're getting distracted." She gestured to the water and moved her hands like a conductor, the water rolled up like it were play-dough and then dived into the bottle again in a strange inverted diving competition. Percy gave it a ten.

"Right, well, where to begin?" Yagura hummed, "okay, my brother Naruto, was working on a project of his, he was trying to work around a small problem we would have to deal with, with death." Percy balked and gaped at her.

"How is death a small problem?" He nearly yelled.

"That was only part of it, it was mainly to fix another problem, but that's not important. So, he found a way to stop someone from dying, theoretically, and, well, from what we can tell, he tested it on himself, but he couldn't exactly test it without, you know." Percy nodded trying to stem the vast flow of questions he had. "Well, there was an… incident, and he was shot in the head." Again, Percy tried to hold the questions in, "the method worked, at least it did what it was supposed to, and he's still alive. His method, was to split himself up into nine pieces. He split himself into nine foxes."

Percy's jaw dropped.

"So, your fox, Anchor; Annabeth's Whiskers; Clarisse's Bandit; whatever the one Utakata is with is called; and," her throat caught slightly, "and Thalia's Parrot." Now Percy could understand, he remembered what happened to Thalia and her fox, they were turned into a tree, to keep them alive, the same tree that helped power the camps borders, the same tree that had been poisoned.

"I…" he couldn't really think of what to say, I mean, how do you react when you find out your best (and for a long time, only) friend, was actually part of your stepsisters 'brother' and another part of him was a tree that was dying.

"Sorry," she said, "I know it's probably a shock."

"B-but Anchor doesn't talk, or…" he was going to say change sizes, but today's actions proved otherwise.

"No offense, but," Yagura began, so Percy got ready to be offended, I mean, does anyone ever start a sentence with that and not offend anyone, "that is probably your fault. Annabeth said she taught Whiskers, I'd assume the others did the same, to some extent at least. English isn't our first language."

"Right, of course, that's always the first thing I think of when I see a fox, 'I wonder if you speak Japanese,' of course." Percy replied.

"No need to be so sarcastic, it might have been something to do with the mist, Annabeth said Whiskers started speaking by copying her, apparently that's what happened to Parrot to earn him the name." Yagura replied. "Anyway, there's something else." She took a deep breath, "they need to be brought together again, we don't know what will happen then, he might forget… you."

Percy felt numb. For a long time, Anchor had been his only friend, even though he only got to see him in the summer and on their short weekend trips up until last year, the fox had been a constant. They only became closer after he moved in, the boredom of the school year became tolerable with his friend by his side, to lose him.

"No."

"Look, I know-"

"No."

"Percy-"

"No. I'm not going to lose him." He moved to leave the cabin, to find the fox, but Yagura placed a hand on his shoulder, stopping him with a firm grip.

"Percy, he could die."

The son of Poseidon froze.

"If any of the foxes were to actually die, he might, we don't know the limits of this, it's completely untested."

Percy didn't move, he just stood there, not looking at Yagura.

"I'm sorry, but we need him back." With that, she turned and left the cabin, going to her boat to talk to the other jinchuuriki.

Percy stood, looking after her for a long moment, before turning back to the cabin, he saw Tyson, snoring away and quietly moved to his bunk. He spent a long time simply staring at the ceiling, unable to sleep. He tried to ignore the tears that fell down his face as he thought about the horrible fate in store for him, either to lose his friend, or to let him die.

(Yagura's boat)

As Yagura sank into the leather sofa of the game room, slightly worn down from constant use by several campers, she thought about her conversation with her brother. She probably could have broken it to him better, but he had kept Nar-Anchor hidden from them for so long. Sure he didn't know, but still. With a sigh she looked up and found B huddled under a few blankets on another sofa.

Poor B. At camp most of the jinchuuriki had someone, Percy for her, and whole cabins of siblings for everybody else. Garra was in New Rome with his siblings and Utakata… they weren't really sure about him. He had given away nothing about his mission, only that he had found a fox. He told them he went by the name of 'Volpe' which they found out was Italian for 'fox' so the person who named him must have been very creative. Anyway, back to B, he had no one here at camp, until he found out about the spirit of his sister that resided in the tree. With the additional news that part of Naruto was in the tree, his siblings soon found out that he would go and talk to Thalia. He was the one to find out about the poison and had been furious. No one was sure who caused the lighting storm that day, B or his father, as news from the Olympian council spread of Zeus's anger, eventually leading to Chiron being fired.

For a few days, B had spent every moment staying with the tree, destroying any monster that dared to come near it. This lasted until Yugito brought him back to his cabin after he had passed out under his sister's decaying branches. She gave him a stern talking to when he woke up, and he begrudgingly agreed that he was just going to end up hurting himself.

Thus, the shifts for border patrol were brought into play. The 'normal' campers, after seeing B keep back all the monsters for nearly a week, figured that one jinchuuriki could work at the same rate as ten normal campers. Though not necessarily true for all monsters, their ability to use chakra did give them an advantage, that, added to their years of combat experience, word had gotten out, meant that even the Ares cabin agreed to this.

So, at any time, there were either, two jinchuuriki, twenty campers or ten campers and a jinchuuriki guarding the border. The bulls this morning caught them just before they traded shifts, but Yagura was running late because she was running the canoeing classes and got held back when one Apollo camper tried his luck with a particularly feisty naiad. After saving his life, she had made it just in time to save Percy and find out that another part of Naruto was at camp.

Coming out of her musing, she glanced to the clock which showed that it was going to be B's turn for border patrol soon. He picked the night shifts and slept most of the rest of the day away, for the most part, he spent his time here, claiming that it was more comfortable than the Zeus cabin.

"May as well wake him up." She muttered before moving and prodding her brother in the shoulder with her staff.

He woke with a bolt. No that's not a typo, he woke with bolts of lighting sparking off him and shocking his sister.

"Sorry." He muttered when he saw her rubbing a burn mark on her hand, it wasn't that bad, but it was pretty painfully.

"It's fine, it's nearly time for your shift." She said, nodding towards the clock.

"Right, anything else?" He asked as he picked up Samehada who had been snoozing alongside him.

"Yeah, new fox." She said nonchalantly.

"That's good." He stopped and turned, "wait what?"

"Percy brought a new fox to camp." She said with a small grin, he deserved to hear some good news now.

"Oh wow, that's great. Time for the mighty eight…" He trailed off, but Yagura's smile grew slightly, that was the first time he had tried to rap since he had found Thalia's dead needles start falling.

"Go ahead and finish it." Yagura said 'it' like 'ate' to get it to rhyme.

B sniggered, "ai'aight, I gotta go, but you listen sis, don't mess my flow." With that, B left the room with the biggest smile he's had in a while.

Yagura sank back into the chair and took a deep breath and waited. Though she wanted to spend the night in her cabin, now that it wasn't so empty: Percy probably wasn't too happy with her; and she had to talk with Roshi about what had happened when she tried her Genjutsu on Percy.

It just didn't make sense. She'd used that technique before, it was simple, but chakra draining, perfect for jinchuuriki, and one of the only Genjutsu in her arsenal, the other being standard clones. And she only learned those to win a bet with Mei.

"Hey." A voice called from the doorway. She turned just as Yugito walked in, "why aren't you with your brother, I thought that's why you left early."

"Tyson's asleep, and Percy's…" She sighed, "Percy's had Anchor for years."

"What?" Yugito frowned, "why the hell didn't he say anything?"

"He didn't know." She explained the rather convenient circumstances that allowed for him to miss out on every acknowledgement that they knew the foxes.

"That's…" Yugito began before just giving up.

"Yeah, but I told him about bringing Naruto back. He wasn't too thrilled."

"I'd expect so." Yugito hummed, "so you're just avoiding him?"

"No, that's not all. I tried to do a minor Gejutsu on him, just to give him a visual aid, but it just didn't work."

Yugito's eyebrows creased upwards, "didn't work?"

"Yeah. He said he saw it, but it immediately vanished, like…" She gained a thoughtful look, "Genjutsu work by messing with the chakra in another person's brain, right?" Yugito nodded, "but the people here have no chakra."

Yugito gained her own thoughtful pose, "hmm, but then why did it work at the start, surely it just wouldn't have started at all."

"Yeah…"

"Oh, Roshi told me to tell you since you left early, he's staying in his cabin tonight. He's talking to Annabeth about something. I think their cabin's just going to be brainstorming."

Yagura sighed, "right, then I'd best go back to me cabin. Percy's probably asleep now."

"Yeah, same here." Yugito said, and they both left the boat.

(Los Angeles)

Bianca was trying to digest everything her brother had said. The gods were real, her dad was one of them, not only that, but he was the ruler of the Underworld, Hades. Her mind kept telling her that this was all crazy, but her brother showed her as much proof as he could, showing her his sword, moving the shadows and explaining everything to try and prove she wasn't crazy.

"Why didn't you tell me earlier? Why do you still want to keep Nico out of it?" She was angry, this was huge, why would he hide this from her.

Utakata sighed, "because knowing makes your scent stronger. I'm not exactly sure why, but if you know, your scent gets more powerful, easier to find. Normally, a demi-god with your scent would have been tracked down by every monster within a five-mile radius, with you and Nico here, ten-mile, plus Volpe, probably eleven… maybe, add me in the mix and you've got most of the monsters in L.A. on our doorstep."

"Then why haven't they found us?"

"They have." Bianca's heart nearly stopped.

"T-then why are we not…"

At this he smirked, Bianca decided that his answer better be worth it, otherwise she would re-arrange his face, so he couldn't smirk, "that's because of me."

"What?"

"Yeah," he actually started looking sheepish, "see, I don't actually have a job. I have been systematically tearing apart every monster in L.A. if they start looking our way."

Bianca looked horrified, "y-you've been fighting off all those… all year?!"

"Yeah." He immediately got whacked on the head by his irate sister.

"Idiota, avresti potuto essere ucciso-"

"Callimiatu… No, calmati." He said.

"You're speaking Italian?" She asked in shock, her point forgotten for now.

"No, you were speaking Italian, I was trying to speak Italian."

"No, but… since when?"

"I started taking lessons last month."

"Why?"

"To… well, to try and learn a bit about your home. I know you don't remember much, but you and Nico seem so much happier when you're speaking Italian. I just thought it'd be nice. It's a bit easier than learning English, but that's probably because it's closer to Latin."

"That's…" She smiled at her brother for a moment before it turned to a frown, "damnit, I can't get annoyed now."

"See, you can't stay mad at me." He said with that infuriating smirk, oh, look, angers back again.

"You idiot, you could have been killed." She said, "is this why you're so tired all of the time?"

He reluctantly nodded. She smacked him again.

"Idiota."

"Right, sorry." He said, rubbing his head, she smirked at that.

"Anything else?"

"Not really, I told you about camp, right?"

"Yeah."

"And the oath?"

She nodded, that was probably what hurt the most, the fact that she wasn't supposed to exist.

"And, the Lotus – oh! Volpe!"

"No. What's wrong with Volpe." She paused, "wait, earlier you said that he would add to the scent the three of us give off."

He winced at that, "yeah."

"So, is he a demi-god?"

"Sort of…"

"What do you mean?" The fact that she didn't even smile when he flinched showed just how serious a question this was.

"He's… well, he's my brother for a start." Before she could un-gobsmack herself he continued, "remember when I said we lost our brother. He shou-would have died. He managed to stop it, by splitting his body into parts using a complicated technique. Each of the pieces became… foxes."

That was enough to reboot her, "what?!"

"Naruto used a technique to split himself into nine pieces. Because of the… situation he was in, each piece ended up somewhere random. We've been tracking them down."

Only a few parts were sticking with Bianca. "So, when I let Volpe lick my cheek, he's actually a…"

"No, he is very much a fox. Volpe is a fox, Naruto is… a person. He seems to have no memory of being Naruto and is his own person." He scowled for a moment before lightening up.

Now that Bianca had got over the initial shock, something seemed to click with her, "so, you only agreed to look after us because we had Volpe?" Her voice wavered, that hurt to even think about, that her brother, who had been so caring, who had helped take the load of raising Nico from her only cared about Volpe.

"No." He said, moving closer beside her and bringing her into a hug, she pushed him off, "I do actually care about you, you're my sister."

"But, you came for Volpe." Even though she was the one saying them, the words felt like fire.

"Bianca I-"

"Tell me the truth." She interrupted, "did you come here for me and Nico, or Volpe?" She was absolutely terrified of the answer, even after asking, she felt like trying to take the question back.

"Bianca-"

"The truth." She couldn't stop herself, the fear just got worse.

Utakata sighed, "just let me explain, okay."

That was his answer, he had never cared about her, or Nico, he probably didn't care about their family, he just wanted his brother back.

Bianca stood up, "unlock the door." She whispered, she hoped that turning away hid the tears crawling down her teeth, and the whisper hid the fact that any louder would make her voice crack.

"Bianca, I-"

"Now!" The anger was like a red-hot poker, her eyes burned with tears, her throat was hoarse and her chest her hands were shaking.

"It was both of you, I only-"

"Shut up and o-open the door!" She croaked out, anger and sadness fighting for dominance.

He sighed, "I'm sorry." He placed his hand on the knob and opened it, Bianca shouldered passed.

"I don't care." She ran to her room, passing Nico who frowned at the tears.

"Sis, what's-"

SLAM

"-wrong?"

"Leave her for now." Utakata said, placing a hand on the younger boy's shoulder.

"What's… what happened?"

"I… I told her something, it's best if you don't know." He sighed.

"But-"

"Just… leave her be for now." Utakata said, "I'll talk to her later."

"Alright."

Bianca cried into her pillow, the tears wouldn't stop. How could he? Why did it hurt so much?

She heard a soft whimper from her bedside table but ignored it. Another whimper, she ignored it again. This time something wet touched her ear. She turned and found a small black nose, followed by a flash of silver.

"Volpe?"

The fox yipped and licked her cheek, brushing away the tears. He put his paw on her hair and tapped it a few times. She remembered hearing somewhere that dogs do that to pet humans, since they enjoy being petted, they try and reciprocate the feeling in their owners by petting them. She smiled despite the anger and sadness.

Then she remembered what her brother… Utakata had said. Utakata's wasn't a fox, he was part of a human. Looking at him, she just didn't believe that, she could only see him for what he had been for her. Her best friend.

She sat up and brought the fox to her chest, the tears still fell, but she didn't feel as sad. Volpe would always be there for her.

(Monongahela National Forest Park, Virginia)

The hunting troupe of four decided to set up camp for the night. The commonwealth was one of the most visited places in the country for the hunt to go. This was mostly done because it was named after their leader, but it also had one of the best forests for hunting in the state. So long as you ensured you didn't hunt any of the endangered species residing in the forest.

For now, though, Yugao was less interested in that, and more interested in her current reading materials. The diaries started from when he was about eight and went on until the day before they came to this new world.

Why? Why would they let this happen to me? All I wanted was to help them. I wanted them to be happy and they did this to me…

She had skipped much of it, refusing to intrude in her godson's privacy and had gone straight to the last book, working backwards to try and find anything that might help them. So far, she had found nothing. She skimmed back to the start of the third book, the only one that still had spare pages and tried from there. He started this one just before he left the village.

I'm so sorry that I had to leave them, Yugao, Anko, Kurenai. I never wanted this to happen, but it's done now. I wish I could go back and just talk to them. Maybe I could… no. It's too late. I can't go back. Not yet, I'll go back someday. Until then I'll deal with this, I'll go back.

It broke her heart to read. But she still read on, hoping for something that may give her some insight into helping him. So far, there was nothing.

Today we finalised our plans to finish of the Akatsuki. Soon, it'll be time to go to war, until then, I'll stay with Shinrin and Katsu. They've been a big help, even with all this going on.

She skipped it, it didn't seem to be too informative. The diaries weren't as helpful as they thought, sure there were some things on seals, but they had nothing to do with what she wanted to know.

I've finally finished the seals for the box.

Now this was interesting, was this the same box they found in the mask with the diaries?

They should be safe here. No one knows about it, the others seem to have forgotten about them, or at least that I have them. It was a pain getting each of them to put chakra into their seals, but I managed it. Kurama might know what I'm doing, but so far hasn't said anything. I think it's for the best, they should stay hidden.

Okay, now she was even more curious about what was in the box. Something that he kept hidden from even the other jinchuuriki. What could it be?

This seal is probably the most complex one I've ever done. Hell, it was harder to make than what I tried to make for saving us.

Is this it?

Well, not harder to make. This one was easy in theory, but damn near impossible to actually make. The other was impossible in theory but easier to apply. I should probably find a way to test it, but it seems a bit of a waste now since it wouldn't work with the new plan. But that doesn't matter.

"Damn it." Yugao muttered to herself.

"Something wrong?" Anko asked from the fire. How long had she been reading for? The others were already making diner, the remains of the hunt from three days ago still lasting.

"Nothing, he just mentioned it, but stopped." Yugao muttered, bringing her hands to her forehead and rubbing her temples.

"Take a break." Kurenai said, "you've been reading that every chance you get. I know it's important, but you need to take a break for now."

"Right, sure." She said, her neck was killing her from being hunched over like that and her legs had pins and needles.

"What doeth thou find?" Zoe asked.

"Not much that we didn't know, just that it's complicated and he never got around to testing it by the looks of it. Also, even he thought the theory behind it was impossible."

"Well, at least that's something." Anko said, taking some meat off the fire and tearing into it.

"But it's not helpful." Yugao said.

"Yeah, but it proves he said something in the diaries, that means he might have written more."

She sighed, "fair enough. But I just feel like I'm getting nowhere just reading it. And it doesn't feel right."

Kurenai frowned to herself, "maybe, but it's necessary."

"I suppose." Yugao agreed, "but it still doesn't make it feel any better."

"Yeah."

They lapsed into silence, the fire crackling was the only sound in the woods.

(New Rome)

Garra sighed as he sat down on the sand that spontaneously turned into a chair for him. One of the handier aspects of his abilities. He rubbed his temples as he looked at the list in front of him and barely held in a groan.

The bride had, at the last minute, decided she wanted white roses instead of red ones. Why they wanted roses instead of the lotus blossom he suggested just boggled the mind.

Oh, right, context, that's always important.

Garra had been given the 'honour' of planning the wedding of two citizens of the city, who had served in the legion for many years and were now settling down. Marriage was one of the few things that had been modernised in the city, for some reason.

Which put him in a bit of a bind, since he had never seen a wedding, never mind planned one. Thankfully, though, Temari had been a big help. She said that both her and Kankuro had each performed their own service when they came, being a child of Juno was enough to qualify you for the position apparently.

So, since Temari was busy being Praetor, and Kankuro was 'busy running the cohort,' though Garra suspected his brother just found it funny to watch Garra struggle.

After a year of living in the camp, he had earned enough respect for the happy couple not to downright refuse him as their planner, he didn't have enough respect that they wanted to be near him and help him. They simply gave him a list of things to do, or, more commonly, sent one of their minions (bridesmaids) to give him the list.

Since they changed their minds so much, he was getting sick of ordering everything and then having to change it when it just didn't fit their tastes. Now he was just too tired to care.

"Why?" He questioned the sky, kind of hoping the gods knew he was being rhetorical and wasn't expecting them to come down and lecture him on what exactly he did to deserve it, he imagined it was quite the list by this point.

"You'll get it done fine, Garra." Mary, perhaps his favourite of their minions, said. She was at least polite as she handed him the long list of changes, the others either just stared at him, or kept their eyes off him, looking scared. The girl was a legacy of Ceres, with dirt brown eyes and honey blonde hair. Her parents moved into New Rome twenty years ago to have her.

"I know I'll get it done, that's the part I'm looking forward to, it's the doing it part I'm not so fond of." He drawled out, leaning back in his suddenly recliner made of sand.

"They're just nervous, the weddings in less than a week." Mary said.

"I know, which is why last-minute changes are becoming such a pain."

"You'll do fine." She said with a grin, "besides, by next week, it'll be over, and you won't have to deal with me anymore."

"Yeah, joy." He drawled.

"Why don't you take a break, go for a walk or something, get your mind off it."

He took a deep breath and hummed to himself, "yeah, sure."

"Right, I'll hold down the fort." She said, reaching for the ring binder that held all the wedding details. He pulled it away and held it to his chest. The binder was strange, well not strange if you were a camper here. It had the insignia of Juno, what looked like a flower surrounded by a circle. Around that were the words Senatus Populusque Romanus written around it in golden script, with a purple background. The planner wouldn't stand out too much in the legion, but what would stand out is what it was used for.

The binder was actually his shield, or his scutum. The when you opened the binder and say the word 'Lucina' the shield his mother gave him would appear in it's true form. This really freaked him out the first time he tried it (mostly since he wasn't given any warning, and was confused when he woke up and found his shield replaced by a ring binder with a few pages in it, the one on the front reading 'Lucina')

The fact that he could use the binder to keep track of the wedding details was just a happy coincidence.

"I'll keep an eye on this," he said, "but could you go in to the florist and ask for Sarah to change the order of red roses to white ones."

The girl winced, "she won't like that."

He snorted, "I know, that's why you're doing it."

"Fine," she groaned, "since you're so nice to me, but it is going on your tab, along with whatever else I decide to buy there." She ran off before he could reply.

"I don't know what's worse." He muttered, "the fact that they change their minds every few hours, or the fact that I now have a tab in a florist."

With a deep sigh, he wondered off to find something to take his mind off the hell that was wedding planning.

And immediately ran into Jason Grace.

The boy was apparently a big deal around the camp, he was a son of Jupiter, though he thankfully didn't rap like B, and was under the blessing of Juno. Though Garra wasn't sure of the details, he figured the blessing wasn't because she wanted to get closer to her step-son.

The boy was red, clearly doing a small job for his sister. That was another thing, it seemed that Temari was grooming the boy up to take over for her, she had asked that he be her personal messenger until he gained a higher rank. She wasn't subtle, purposefully so, she knew no one would directly act against either her, or the sole son of Jupiter in camp, so his job as messenger was a mere farce to let him experience the political world of the camp. Something he would clearly need, as even as a kid, it was clear that he was a warrior, not a politician.

Of course, only those versed in politics would recognise the move, but people seemed to think he deserved the position, simply for being a son of Jupiter. The masses seemed easy to please.

"Garra." He said after a deep breath, not bothering with the formalities like 'ave romana' or anything.

"Yes."

"Your sister has summoned you, urgently" He breathed out.

"Right, okay. Lead the way."

The boy started walking down to Temari's house, the perks of power, leading the son of Juno to his destination. They ignored the other campers, as the busied about getting ready for the inspection that was coming up.

Jason went to knock but Garra simply opened the door, if his sister called him urgently, she expected him to be there.

His sister was waiting, ignoring his questions she simply grabbed his arm and dragged him away, dismissing Jason with a wave.

She sat him down in front of her desk but didn't take a seat herself, opting to hover to the side of the desk, she bit her lip and stared at the pages lining her desk.

"You called me, Praetor." Garra drawled out.

"Yes," she grabbed a few papers and set them in front of her seat and finally took her place in front of him, she looked him right in the eye, "have you noticed anything odd going on around camp?"

"Odd?" She nodded, "not really, I've been busy with the wedding. Should I have?"

"I suppose you wouldn't have noticed as much, you have only been here a year." She sighed and lifted a sheet of paper, "as you know, Lupa sends the campers to us, normally one at a time, sometimes in small groups of no more than four if there are siblings or just demi-gods who show up to her at once." She lifted one page with a list of numbers on it, "now, the number of demi-gods coming per month is never particularly high, normally no more than five or ten, this is just the average, due to the spike in summer, it is probably closer to five than ten."

"Right, okay."

"This year however, it's different." She handed him the sheet, "read that."

The list showed the number of demi-gods who came to camp over the year, by month, starting from last August. And it was showing a worrying trend.

"There are less campers making it to camp." He noted.

"Yes, now this wouldn't be so bad, there have been years like this, some campers just don't make it, they leave Lupa and die, sad, but true. But, I talked to her, or rather, she sent a messenger, those on that list are the ones who made it to her or her wolves found."

"But… there are three months here were no campers showed up. Hell, last month only one kid showed up."

"I know, as far as I can tell, there are three explanations: the gods have decided to stop making demi-gods, very unlikely; the monsters are getting better, very worrying; or…" She looked him in the eye, "someone else is taking them."

"Someone else?"

"That is probably the most likely unfortunately. I've got in contact with some campers who have left camp, they reported no rise in monster activity, in fact, they said if anything, monster activity is lower than normal. And I doubt the gods would ever stop having so many kids."

"You said the monster attacks are lower, would it be possible they've given up on older demi-gods and start focusing on them when they're younger?"

"That's what I thought, but that kid who came in last month gave me some worrying news." She shifted uncomfortably in her seat. "He said someone came to him, a demi-god. He tried to recruit him, the guy brought monsters with him. Two werewolves." She took a deep breath, "what I say here, doesn't leave this room, got it?"

He nodded.

"The demi-god claimed that Saturn was rising." Garra's heart tried to tear itself free from his ribs, the room seemed to be darker, the shadows longer, a cold shiver ran down his spine.

"Are you sure?"

"No, the kid may have misheard, or… something. But, this warrants investigation. If there is even the slightest possibility…"

"I understand."

"The jinchuuriki, you can contact them with the mind… thingy?" He nodded, "good, tell them to keep an eye out, and that they should come back. They'll be safer here, and the camp would be safer from them."

"I'm not sure that they'll listen, but I'll tell them."

"Good, but, ask if they've heard anything. It's probably… no, more than likely wrong," she didn't sound too convinced, "but just in case, ask if they've heard anything."

"I will. But I doubt they'll come back, from what they've told me, their closer to finding him than ever. They won't give that up."

"I know, but it would be better if they were here. For everyone."

"Have you told Kankuro?"

She put her head in her hands and sighed, "no, Kankuro's being more of a pain than usual. I don't know what's going on, but's he's annoyed at something," Garra could guess who, he hadn't gotten over the problems his arrival had given him in the election last year, and was still acting bitter about it, "he's acting irrationally about everything. He also has less experience than you in this."

"Right… I'll tell the others, they might know more about this." Garra said as he left the room, moving quickly back to the barracks, fearing what his siblings hadn't told him was going on, on the Greek side of things. He ignored Mary when she passed with a few receipts from the florist, instead going to his bed and assuming a meditative position to enter the mind-scape, they were probably already there, due to the three hour difference between New York and San Francisco.

A/N: Well wasn't that a nice cheery chapter?

Hey, so I have a theory, it has absolutely nothing to do with this chapter, or, even this book. No, I just had a thought about Hera/Juno and the whole 'doesn't like Hephaestus/Vulcan' and is disappointed in Ares/Mars thing.

When I was reading the lost hero and son of Neptune, I noticed that Hera sort of knows who the seven were when they were kids. And, looking in the books, you can see that the only ones she personally visits, even though they're babies, are Frank and Leo.

Hazel's dead and she didn't visit before she died, so she's out.

There is no mention of anything like this for Piper, so she's out.

We don't see anything like this for Annabeth, so she's out.

Jason... maybe, but only because she kidnapped him, but it isn't done in the same sense, he's more like a... sacrifice to appease him? And I don't think that she likes that, so he's out.

As for Percy... well you could make the argument that the snake that attacked him when he was a toddler was from Hera, since she did it with Heracles/Hercules, but that seems a bit... extreme.

Don't get me wrong, putting a kid in fire is extreme, and so is telling a kid his life is tied to a stick that is currently burning in the fire is also extreme. But they are a bit different, Leo is fire proof, and (I hope) Hera knows this at the time, or at least has an educated guess towards it.

And for Frank, it was a warning really.

The whole snake thing could also have been sent by Gaia, since her sacred animal is the serpent, and she did have moments were she was more awake than she should have been (when she caused Leo's mom's death) so it could have been an attempt to get rid of him early on.

Anyway, it was just a nice thought, I know that Hera/Juno isn't the most well liked in the series (with a whole lot of good reason) but there are small things that could make her out to be a nicer person.

Well, I went on for a while there. Thanks for reading, see you next time.