Arianna
4. Making fun of someone's hair, even if it is dyed pink, is not appropriate in times of crisis
I felt kind of bad for Atalanta, she'd been rejected most of her life, by her father and now by her mother. I guess the same happened to me, but my mom used to love me until the 'pinstriped suit dude' incident, so I always told myself it wasn't my fault. I still wondered who my dad was. I thought it might be cool if it was Apollo, I could be Kris and Jessie's actual half-sister, but we quickly ruled out the god of archery when I almost killed Chiron.
Then I thought maybe Ares… I really hope not… Dionysus… AAAAH…Hermes, well I guess that wouldn't be so bad… Hephaestus…besides the fact that I have no idea how cars, planes or trains actually work, why not? ... Oh look we ran out of gods! Well, there are still the big three but last time I checked I couldn't cast lightning down from the sky when Clarisse stole my dessert for the fifteenth time, or send a tsunami to the Aphrodite cabin when they said I would make a very pretty boy, or…well…call zombies from the Underworld to freak out Connor and Travis after they locked me up in the bathroom for three hours. Anyways the big three aren't aloud to have demigod kids anymore.
Apparently I didn't belong to any god, great! I went back to cabin eleven hoping to find Atalanta, luckily I did.
"Hey, are you okay?" I asked as I realised she was crying. I figured it was a very stupid question.
"I finally find out who my mother is and she rejects me!"
"She'll claim you, don't worry! Annabeth told us that Athena waits for her children to prove themselves before she claims them. Annabeth had to wait a month to get claimed!" I told her reassuringly. She wiped away her tears and stood up.
"Whatever!" she exclaimed. "I'm tired of waiting for someone to claim me!"
"Wait! What does that mean? You're going to give up? You're not leaving are you?" she laughed
"No, don't worry; I'm just not going to let myself get depressed over it. I lived without her for fourteen years I can manage a few more weeks, or if she decides I'm not good enough for her, a lifetime!"
"You? Not good enough for her? If I were Athena, I'd have claimed you already."
"Yeah, well if you were the goddess of wisdom, then we'd be in trouble!"
"Thanks!" I said glumly as we walked to the campfire. She laughed. "Who knows, maybe Athena will claim you tonight!"
"Yeah," she said sarcastically,"I totally proved I was wise and smart today! Throwing a scene, running away, destroying fifty dummies, screaming at one of my best friends…"
"Screaming at one of your best friends?"
"Oh right, I didn't tell you, Kris ran after me and tried to calm me down, but I acted kind of… savage!"
"Well, it's Kris! He'll get over it!"
We sat down at our table and had fun talking with a couple of our friends. Some of them, like us, were undetermined. Hanna, a girl who was almost 100 percent sure her mum was Iris (the goddess of rainbows) but being a minor goddess she had no cabin, and never bothered to claim her. Hanna explained that after a while you get used to it, you end up fitting in. It felt good to know that we weren't alone. The cabin eleven undetermined kids were the outcasts that didn't fit anywhere, but after a while the fit in together.
After the campfire songs, led by the Apollo cabin (we had a good time looking at Jessie and Kris singing), Chiron stood up and said it was time for the Ares cabin to surrender their flag. Annabeth decided it was best to give Hermes the flag because it was thanks to Atalanta that we were ready to defend. Annabeth seemed kind of torn about giving us the flag though because she probably knew that Atalanta was Athena's child and that was why Athena deserved the flag, but seeing Atalanta was in the Hermes cabin for now, she had to give us the flag.
We flaunted the flag around the Ares kids, it seemed like Clarisse was going to kill us, but who cares! After that, Atalanta and I walked back to our sleeping bags. As I fell asleep in the cramped room, I thought about my dad, and about one of those spacious cabins, with beds instead of sleeping bags, were you don't have to check that there's no bucket of water awaiting to fall on you every time you step out of a room. Then I thought maybe my dad was one of the minor gods and that maybe, just like Hanna, I would be stuck here for ever. Hanna told us that undetermined kids, almost never got quests either, so there was no way I was to prove myself.
I was half asleep when everyone was awoken by nervous screams coming from outside. Everyone jumped up, and ran out to see what all the commotion was about. We weren't the only cabin to have heard the screams, and we saw waves of people erupting out of their cabin dressed in pyjamas. It was kind of funny to see all these tough and scary people out of their usual armour and in their PJ's. Everyone seemed to be gathered around something near cabin number seven. Atalanta and I pushed ourselves towards what it was, squeezing past the crowds of people. What we saw when we got to the front shocked us.
There was weird green smoke everywhere, and it was circulating around none other than our best friends, Jessie and Kris. There was a weird screen in front of them and pictures were flashing up, it was a plane that seemed to have crashed and a woman was trapped. I could see, even if the women's face was dripping with blood and sweat, that she had the same curly blond hair as Jessie. That was her mom!
Chiron soon arrived and asked everyone to calm down. The green fog soon cleared away, letting us see Kris and Jessie's shocked expressions.
"Dude, your hair's pink!" I exclaimed as I realised the fog must've had some sort of weird chemical reaction. Everyone looked at me like I was an utter and complete idiot. Chiron ignored me and said:
"This is a message from the Gods! They are sending Jessie and Kris on a quest, that is, if they accept…"
