All right, chapter 4 done. Next chapter will feature some old enemies to kill Bryan and friends :) -Kaerneif
We all sat in the back of the van as Argus drove us through Long Island, heading for Central Park. He remained silent, instead putting some depressing, 70's music which seemed to come from the time my dad was born.
-"How's it going?" asked Aeneas, who put his hand up. Erin quickly high-fived him and introduced herself.
-"Erin ... Daughter of Apollo."
-"Aeneas Kahale, probatio from the First Cohort. Oh, and son of Venus." he added cheerfully.
-"Probatio?" I put in, joining the conversation.
-"Yeah," his face shifted, becoming serious. "It means I'm not a full member of the Legion yet. I was in the First Cohort, but they kicked me out after "selling the match" in capture the flag."
-"Oh yeah, we won." Erin said with a kind of cocky grin. Aeneas remained silent after that. "What about you, son of Hades?"
-"Please don't call me that." I growled back.
-"Alright, Underworld kid?" she giggled. I sighed, then rolled my eyes.
-"And I'll have to stand this the whole quest? Awesome.." I blurted out, prompting Erin to laugh. How is that even funny? See, this is why I think she has a crush on me.
We all remained silent after this. I stared through the window, and it wasn't soon until Aeneas fell asleep on top of Erin who fell asleep on top of me. Her head was now in my lap, her bronze headphones glistening, which made everything the more awkward. The traffic was horrible as soon as we left the highway. We reached Queens, with cars and taxi's at every turn we made. Manhattan wasn't any better, but it wasn't soon until I fell asleep too, my head resting on the window. It was a short nap, so no scarring nightmares this time.
-"Wake up, sleeping beauty." said Erin's voice right into my ear, which did the trick. The sky was a shade of caramel and red, late evening, with the usual line of cars and taxis in New York. Argus had driven us to an avenue I couldn't recognize. The signpost was blurry.
-"3.14 Avenue? " I said as I glanced over at the sign.
-"No, it's called PI avenue. It's made for demigods going to Central Park, helps you dodge the traffic." answered Aeneas.
-"Yeah, apparently they made it after the Titan War to make it easier. It's hidden by Mist so mortals can't see it." Erin added.
-"Neat." I cut in, as Argus parked us at the side of the street. There were no cars nearby, and there was a huge sign held by two posts, "D.O.O." it said. We dropped off, carrying our backpacks as Argus waved with his creepy eyed hand. The eyes winked, and Argus drove away. We all crossed the street, until we reached the D.O.O sign.
-"What does that mean?" I asked, but none of us dared to step in. It seemed weird that were three young kids alone in a dark street when it was getting dark, any mugger could come in and take our money or worse, but no one seemed to notice us. The Mist was sure a strong force.
-"Not sure. You're the Underworld expert here, you should know." Erin retorted.
-"Let's just go in!" Aeneas said excitedly, and then walked through the mini-arch. Nothing happened, so we both followed. As soon as I entered, I subconsciously put my hands to my temples, and something seemed to click. I gasped, my eyes widening and my pupils dilating.
-"What's wrong?" Erin asked.
-"West." I barely barked, my heart racing now. The blood in my veins seemed to flow faster and faster.
-"Let's go East." said Aeneas, as if to contradict what I just said.
-"No, no, no. It's west from here, about two hundred steps." I said, as this weird sensation seemed to wear off. Then I remembered what Nico had told me some hours before:
-"Children of Hades can sense the Underworld. As soon as you get close to the Door of Orpheus, you'll know where it is exactly. It might take some time to get used to, but you'll be able to sense the dead after that.." Nico's voice echoed in my mind.
-"That's it!" I exclaimed. "The Underworld sense or whatever it's called, it's working!" as soon as I said that, I had a miniature headache, followed by intense coughing and a migraine.
-"Okay, then where to go?" Erin asked.
-"Wait guys, we HAVE to go over there, it's very important." Aeneas put in, pointing at the exact opposite direction I was feeling.
-"Why? It's not like there's another door or anything over there." I said, but Aeneas ignored me. He simply sprinted through the pathed way before we could get him back.
-"Aeneas!" Erin called, but he kept running. Without a second thought, we trailed behind him, though he was fast. We passed by trees, some tourists who didn't steal a glance, and even the Bow Bridge, where Erin nearly tripped over and I had to catch her. We both had lost track of time, until it was so dark only the lamposts illuminated our way. Aeneas stopped in front of a Victorian-style fortification, which I have read about in brochures, the Belvedere Castle. He turned to face us.
-"Here it is guys!" he shouted as we approached. Erin was panting, and so was I. The darkness again seemed to coil around me, making me feel lighter and stronger.
-What..is..it..?" Erin panted. Her bronze headphones gave off some light, though I wasn't sure if she was listening to music all-day. Some ruffling could be heard in the trees and bushes around, probably owls or small animals. Some frogs were croaking. I could barely sense the Door of Orpheus right now, only a slight tingling in the back of my head.
-"There's a running legend in Camp Jupiter, about the Belvedere Castle." Aeneas began, the light of the lamposts illuminating his eleven-year old kid face, giving it a sinister but kind of childish glow. He smirked, then kept talking. "The Castle was built by Roman demigods, two children of Minerva-"
-"Who's Minerva?" I cut in. Then I realized how ignorant that had sounded. The croaking and ruffling ceased, total silence now filling the castle entrance.
-"Roman Athena." Erin whispered over.
-"As I was saying, two children of Minerva who fled Camp Jupiter. They thought Minerva was too..undignified by the Romans, who favored other war gods like Mars, Bellona, the list goes on. So they built the castle and other places in the U.S, but they hid something in this place. Something important."
-"So, what did they hide?" I asked.
-"I don't know." Aeneas laughed. Okay, this officially got sinister. The lamposts started to flicker aritmically, making this look like a scene from a horror movie. The total silence didn't help either. Suddenly, the lamposts all turned off, though it meant no problem for me as I could see perfectly in the dark.
-"Well, let's go in!" Aeneas decided, stepping up the stone stairs, as we followed him.
The castle wasn't really impressive, for the work of roman demigods. There were cracks in the stone all over the place, vines crawling in the walls and several locked doors, that we didn't care about. Aeneas kept leading us around, his imperial gold gladius illuminating the way, as if he knew exactly where to go. It was humid and cold by now, and the place seemed to go on forever with the locked doors.
-"Here it is." Aeneas suddenly stopped, while he pointed his gladius at a small room, with some words in Latin I couldn't read.
-"Minerva. That's what it says." Aeneas read. He opened the wooden door with an horrible creak. Inside, there was nothing but some skeletons and a few tables with blueprints.
-"There's nothing here." Erin put in. "Don't try talking with the skeletons Bryan." she added, and Aeneas giggled.
-"Haha, very funny." I said, with a dead serious (no pun intended), look on my face. I stared at a skeleton, pretty sure I couldn't talk with it. The skeleton had a crooked grin on it's face, making it the more creepy. It's hollow eye sockets stared back at me, and I simply turned away. Aeneas took the blueprints and put them away, saying that it was important for Camp Jupiter. We walked out, with Aeneas again on the lead. The tingling from the Door of Orpheus came back, pointing me the direction it was in. As we went out of the castle, the trees ruffled even more, though there was no wind. The tingling turned into a mini-headache again, my Underworld sense kicking in.
-"Something's close." I said, my heart racing and seemed to skip a beat.
-"What is?" Erin asked.
-"I don't know..but it's certainly not alive."
The trees ruffled again, as several "things" lept out from them. It was impossible to recognize them, as if the shadows were melding around them. Aeneas shrieked, as a very not-alive and bone-chilling screech hollered in my ears, and probably theirs too. Then my Underworld sense simply stopped, as what I saw made me want to scream. There was a bald, clad in black garments, humanoid creature, followed by many more, about five of them. which circled us. Their eyes were blood-red, and their skin was as pale as snow.
-"Strigoi!" I said, though I wasn't sure how I knew. Similiar to how I knew the spartus' name, I seemed to know the vampires' that surrounded us. They bared their fangs, and hissed, as if ready to kill us.
-"That's impossible..they aren't Greek monsters." Aeneas said, while smacking one of the vampires with his gladius. "They are Romanian monsters. How did they get here?" The vampire hissed back, and all of them lept in synchrony, about to end our quest for good.
-"Vampires? Pfft, easy." Erin cockily said, with a sly smirk on her face. "Watch this, son of Hades." and then a burst of light surrounded us, so bright I was blind for a full minute. I heard screeches and wails, then the sound of a deep hiss. The sound of a monster disintegrating, or in this case, monsters. I rubbed my eyes as my vision cleared, and all around us were heaps of ashes and dust. Aeneas and I turned in awe to face the Daughter of Apollo.
-"How did you do that?! That was amazing!" yelped Aeneas in excitement, as he rushed to Erin. Her face still had that huge grin, her waist-length black hair falling over her face. But she seemed a bit tired, her face growing weary.
-"I'm a Daughter of Apollo, I can control light you dummies." she put in, though it was the first time I've seen someone do that. "Not all of us have that power, though. In fact, I'm the only demigod I know that can do that." she explained.
-"That was..impressive." I said. Then I remembered our quest. "We've lost too much time, we have to go back to the Door of Orpheus." More ruffling, and then a whole squadron of strigoi lept at us. I casually slashed my sword at one, disintegrating it instantly.
-"These guys are weak.." I said while pursing my lips. Aeneas swung his gladius at another one, sending it straight to Tartarus. We rushed back to the Door of Orpheus, slicing and disintegrating strigoi as we went. They were vampires for sure, but they were very weak monsters. In about another hour, without saying a word we arrived to a pile of rocks, where my Underworld sense buzzed to the maximum.
-"Here it is." I said, pointing my sword to the pile of rocks.
-"Great, you found a pile of rocks Underworld kid." Erin replied.
-"This is the Door of Orfius?" Aeneas asked as he approached to the rocks, poking them with his gladius.
-"Door of Orpheus," I corrected. "And yes, this pile of rocks will take us to the Underworld. Someone has to sing though." Both Aeneas and I turned to Erin, who looked completely innocent. "Daughter of Apollo?" I said with a sarcastic tone and a smirk.
-"Ah yes, of course." then she started singing A whole new world from Aladdin. Her voice was definitely sweet, but I hated that song. Time passed by as she sang, but the pile of rocks remained the same. She sang more Disney princess songs, making this entrance to the Underworld look like a Broadway musical. I looked around to see if any tourist or security guard saw us, thinking we were a cult singing to the rocks, but no one around. A strigoi approached behind me, and I stabbed it in the chest sending it to Tartarus.
-"These guys never learn.." I said. Erin turned to me, her eyes disappointed.
-"It doesn't work, son of Hades." she broke in. My left eye ticked at this nickname.
-"Don't call me that." I replied. Aeneas had crouched to the rocks, still poking them with his gladius to see if they reacted.
-"Open sesame!" he yelled. Nothing happened. "I think it wants YOU to sing." Aeneas pointed out.
At this thought, it was an instant reply. -"Sorry, no. I'm not singing to a pile of rocks. I'd rather just go to Los Angeles and take the stupid weapon from there and-" as I said that, I remembered Rachel and Erin's cabinmates. Her gleaming, brown eyes were full of worry and sadness. I sighed. Since when do I care about that? I thought to myself.
-"Fine. I'll sing, just don't tell anyone about this, or I'll bring you myself to my father down there." I snarled. Both of them laughed, with Erin whispering to Aeneas things like "Get the camera!" or "Watch the windows shatter". At first, I didn't know what to sing. I mentally pondered my playlist, which was mostly Death Metal.
-"Okay, now I know." I managed to say, with the jitters crawling in my stomach. I opened my mouth, and a melody similar to a dying cat or a Justin Bieber song came out. I sang Dumb ways to die in the most silly manner. Aeneas was barely not laughing, and Erin had to look away to not die from laughter. That could be another dumb way to die, I thought. When I finished, the ground started to rumble, making all of us fall on our butts.
-"It worked!" Erin shouted.
-"Oh gee, I didn't notice." I remarked. The ground stopped rumbling, and the pile of rocks had disappeared. Instead there was a dark, marble staircase which seemingly had no end. We got up, and I entered first, the light of my sword and Aeneas' gladius lighting the way.
-"Wait guys, let me lead the way." Erin suggested, but I grabbed her arm. -"I'm the Underworld expert here, so no.."
-"I can light the way, it's fine." as she said that, a sphere of light formed in her palm, alighting the staircase completely. I mentally sighed at her stubborness.
-"Okay, I'll tell you where to go."
And then, we climbed down the seemingly infinite staircase to the Underworld.
