"'But its only Wednesday.' Annabeth sounded nervous. 'That's just strange.'" –seagurl3, "Parallel Perspective"

Piper glanced at her quizzically. "Well, it would have to be its only some day of the week, wouldn't it?" she said. "A trecena only has thirteen days, so the seventh and central day is necessarily…"

"But why Wednesday?" said Annabeth. "Xaman-Ek has been planning this for years; he could have picked a tzolkin when the seventh day of the Eb trecena fell on any day of the Western week. Why would he go out of his way to attack Olympus on a day specially influenced by Hermes, when it's supposed to be Hermes that he especially wants to take out?"

Piper blinked. "You know, I hadn't thought about that," she said. "You're right, it's weird. Of course, it could have something to do with the haab, but I don't see how – and the only other possibility…" She trailed off, and shot Annabeth a frightened glance. "You don't think…"

"Isn't it possible?" said Annabeth. "The Maya were a notoriously scholarly, clerkly nation – just the sort that the Lord of Mercury would find it easiest to dominate. What if all that business about the two rival gods of the road was just a cover, and really they're not rivals at all, but… the other thing?"

"You do think." Piper sounded sick. "You really think one of our own gods is trying to sell out the West to the Mesoamericans. And, being you, you're probably right." She groaned. "Well, what do we do now?"

"Notify Olympus, of course," said Annabeth briskly. "You have a drachma?"

"I'm undecided who the pairing should be. So here's a pole to help me decide." –Berathoralghoul, author's note to "Champion of Hell"

"So how does this work again?" said Berathoralghoul nervously.

Erato sighed, but indulgently: she was accustomed to this sort of reluctance from first-time writers. "You see this pole?" she said, brandishing the ten-foot wooden rod she was carrying. "I am going to use it to hit you over the head, thus causing my inspiration to flow into your brain, and allowing you to discover a novel and exciting pairing to use in 'Champion of Hell'. It's a very rare privilege that I only grant to my most favored writers, so you might wipe that deer-in-the-headlights look off your face and try for something suitably grateful instead. Now, are you ready?"

Berathoralghoul hesitated a moment, and then nodded; Erato took the pole in both hands, reared back, and – WHACK!

For a moment, all that Berathoralghoul was conscious of was a sound like the ringing of a million fire alarms; then the ringing resolved itself into a single word, and the young writer uttered a glad cry. "Lupon!"

Erato arched an eyebrow. "Indeed?"

"Of course!" said Berathoralghoul. "Lupa/Chiron! The masters of the two camps, burning with a secret passion for each other! Never seen that before! Thanks, Miss E., you're the best!"

Erato acknowledged this homage with a gracious wave of her hand; Berathoralghoul darted from the room, and a few seconds later came a clatter of word-processor keys to indicate that creation was in progress. With a satisfied smile, the Muse of Love Poetry shouldered her pole and departed, whistling a few bars of "Annie's Song" as she went.

"What happens after a few years, the camp faces a new fret." –Flamez of the Fading, summary to "Forgotten Savior"

Nobody, not even Mr. D, knew why an enormous guitar had suddenly appeared one morning just over Camp Half-Blood's eastern property line. Everyone agreed, however, that it was a terrible inconvenience, blotting out the sunrise every morning and causing half the camp to wake up late and miss breakfast, and all agreed to help try and drag it away.

And so the work began. Hephaestus rigged up an elaborate system of pulleys, gears, and steam-powered turbines; Demeter contributed a team of supernaturally powerful oxen, and each inhabited cabin took turns coming out in the afternoon to add their own half-divine elbow grease to the effort. Result: by the time that the youngest of the demigods present that morning were released into the world, the camp that they left, which had originally faced the guitar's fourth fret, now faced its third.

"Well," Chiron philosophically observed, "Athens wasn't built in a day."

"The fawn was walking cautiously through the sand, his hooves sinking." –MarvellouslyWondrous, "He Who Would Know"

Then Zoe shot him, and she and Artemis enjoyed his roasted venison as the moon rose over the Sleeping Bear Dunes.