Shade opened his eyes in an unfamiliar place. He blinked, and sat up. The room spun, then settled once more. He was in the boy's tent, like always. With a sigh, he started to struggle up and get ready for another day of travelling. Rino was already dressed, and bent over Luke's prone body. Shade could guess enough that Chiron had ordered Rino to knock Luke out the night before. "Don't wake him up," Shade suggested wearily. "Chiron will only want to put him under again later. And it will save us all some dignity. In fact, put him really well under, so we don't have to worry about him for a while." Rino nodded disgustedly, but did as Shade recommended.
Claire woke up loudly in the girls' tent, the same way she always did - waking up Luna. "Atrociously good morning to you," she said cheerfully (and loudly, of course), ducking a swat from Luna.
"Shut up," Luna said, muffled into her pillow.
"Naaaaaah. Besides, everyone else is awake."
"Now," Annabeth called from her sleeping bag. Claire was very noisy.
"Yes yes yes. You all should be thankful I'm acting as your ultimately annoying alarm clock."
Ayden groaned into wakefullness, but started to get ready. She joined her brother outside and helped him get Luke situated on Blues the pegasus. Then Rino got up behind him, and Ayden followed him.
Once everyone was situated...
Rino frowned at Luke's back, and decided that the boy couldn't cause trouble from a horse's back. So, he woke him up. It didn't seem right, to leave him unconscious and not knowing where in the world he was going.
Luke woke up instantly, and glowered at the horse in front of him. "I'd say good morning, but I hate mornings and first I want to know why I'm on a horse." Well, he definitely wasn't sleepy.
Rino wasn't very surprised at Luke's instant 'lights on'. "You're on a horse because Chiron decided to move camp. How do you feel?"
Luke considered it. "Bored," he decided. "You woke me up to ask me that?"
"It could be worse," Luna spoke up from across the clearing. "Claire could have woken you up."
"Don't be ridiculous. There's nothing out here to make things explode with." Claire scolded.
"I'm sure if you tried, you could have found a way." Luna sighed.
Alex and Sky trotted over excitedly. The little girl and her strangely mixed species friend seemed way too wide awake. "I want grape juice," announced Alex, to be ignored by basically everyone.
"Great, kid. Thanks to Rino had the brilliant idea to wake me up. If that's all, can I go back to sleep?" Luke continued scowling at Blues.
"You know what?" Luna said. "Claire, find something to explode anyway."
"Yay!"
Luke groaned.Rino shrugged. If Luke wanted to sleep, that was his business. "Sure." Rino brushed his glowing fingers against Luke's temple, and steadied him against the horse he so despised. "Any last words?" he asked the almost asleep boy.
"Shut up?" he offered, and went the rest of the way into slumber.
"And here I was thinking it'd be along the lines of, 'don't blow anything up,'" Luna commented.
"We will anyway."
"Just make sure to give everyone plenty of warning."
Rino busily ignored the twins and occupied himself with staring at Luke's back in a disappointed fashion. He leaned back against his twin behind him. "Wake me if anything happens," he ordered, and dozed off. Ayden barely registered her brother, too busy with Apollo's twins. "What if we don't want a warning?" she asked. "What if we'd prefer to die in our sleep?"
"Then we'll be sure to tell you," Claire said cheerfully.
"Don't worry," Luna said dismissively. "She doesn't blow things up that badly. Mostly all they do is scatter fire all over the place. It's easy to put out."
"Luna, there are two ways a bomb can kill you. Shrapnel and sound waves. I never have shrapnel. You can't put out sound waves."
"And you actually know that how?"
"I forget," Claire grinned.
"She better not blow up the forest," Grover muttered, not loud enough for anyone to hear. "It's bad enough when humans are just being selfish. Worse when it's for fun."
"I'll plug my ears, then!" Ayden offered, shifting her brother's weight.
Luna shook her head, ignoring Grover. "That'd make it worse. Then your eardrums might pop from the pressure."
"The trick is to be all relaaaaaxed," Claire grinned, not bothering to keep a straight face. "Like, if you clench your jaw, boom, there goes all your teeth." She promptly dissolved into giggles.
"Shut up," Ayden sighed.
And the day passed. Later, after the tents had been set up (with struggle), Chiron called the Half-bloods together at the center of camp. "Bring Luke." he ordered. Rino did so, setting the blonde boy's body down in the center of the circle. Chiron beckoned to Claire, Luna, Ayden, Rino and Shade to bind Luke, not listening to Rino's protests. Rino responded with a glowing strand of fire around Luke's hands. "Is there any way to make that look more... rope-ish?" Chiron asked. Rino scowled, and the fire turned into an apparently normal fiberish rope. "Wake him." Chiron ordered. Rino scowled deeper, but touched glowing fingers to Luke's head.
The first thing Luke said was, "Face down in the dirt. You really know how to wake someone up." Rino blushed deeply and turned away, trying to hide his beet-red face.
Claire bent down, poking Luke over until he was on his back.
"Oh."
"Oh," Claire agreed.
"So...I get to be more entertainment?"
"Yeah, we were planning on shaving your hair and selling it to the monkey-boy fans."
"Since when does he have fans?" Luna asked skeptically.
Rino blushed deeply and turned away, trying to hide his beet-red face.
Chiron scowled at everything in general and asked Luke, "So, you want to join us? Perhaps I should make it clear your choices are to join us or... um... die."
"Didn't we already establish this?" Luke asked.
"Dunno, I got lost among all the death threats," Claire shrugged.
"I think that's a yes," Luna said, ignoring her twin.
Chiron closed his eyes, regaining his self control. "How do I know that the instant we release you, you won't turn around and attack us?"
"You know, you really don't," Luke said thoughtfully. Yes. He was being very helpful.
Chiron sighed and buried his head in his hands. He was gathering his nerve to ask another question when Rino piped up. Again. "You know, this is pointless. We're a strong group of half-bloods, all with the gifts of our... divine parentage. We could easily catch one renegade. We might as well just accept him as one of us, or dump his body and send him to Hades." Shade nodded in agreement, Ayden gave her brother a quick hug.
Tyson looked confused. "What about him?" he asked.
Shade narrowed his eyes. "What about what about him?" he shot back, only confusing the situation more.
"We's all got... gifts. What about him?" Tyson struggled to say his idea.
Shade nodded slowly. "Yah, Luke, have you noticed anything weird... that you can... do?"
"He can talk pretty," Claire volunteered, grinning.
"No, that's called being overly melodramatic," Luna countered.
"Nonono, I think Hermes was some god of those talky guys," Claire argued.
"Politicians? Did they even have politicians?"
"Maybe? 'Sides, merchants sell stuff, it counts."
"So...he can talk 'pretty.'"
"Eeee-yup!"
"That's useful."
"He can bore enemies to death," Claire offered.
"Shut up already," Luke grumbled, looking like he would have dearly liked to hurl both of them off a cliff.
"Okay..." Chiron grimaced and put his head back in his hands.
While he looked away, Rino flicked off the cords on Luke and held out his hands. "Want a hand up?" he asked.
"No thanks," Luke sat up, checking to see if the ropes had cut off too much circulation and if his legs could still support him. They did.
"You'll survive," Shade drawled, noticing Luke's caution. "Now that Chiron has declared you're at least somewhat clear... just expect that he'll still think you're dangerous and tell one of us to knock you out at random times."
"I'm thrilled," Luke drawled back. "What could be better than quality time with the dirt?"
"Quality time with emo-boy!" Claire announced brightly, and completely out of the blue.
"That'd be interesting," Luna admitted. "But shut up."
Shade rolled his eyes. "I'm not emo. I'm just normal in ways that you don't understand."
"I don't get it," Annabeth said, exasperated. "When did Chiron get this suspicious and I didn't notice?!"
Ayden raised her eyebrows. "Chiron got this suspicious when he was dealing with the ex-servants of the enemy." she said simply.
"Normal is boring," Claire answered matter-of-factly. "Your name is Shade. Did you pick that, by the way? 'Cause if you did, congratulations, you're emo-and-or-have-no-originality." Despite herself, Luna did look interested by this question and at the same time like she was trying not to be.
Shade put his head in his hands. "Shade is a nickname. I thought you would have figured that out by now. Mom gave it to me when she saw my other-dimension trick. I liked it, and it stuck."
Claire blinked. "Wooooooow. Your mom is emo too."
"Claire, you don't just go around saying that to people," Luna hissed, elbowing her hard.
"I just did, so there! What's your real name? Is it embarrassing or something?"
Shade rolled his eyes, pretending not to have heard anything after Claire's 'wow'. "Shade. As in ghost. Errant spirit of the Underworld. I'm not emo. I do not come from a lineage of people with problems. I'm just strange."
"Got that right," Claire agreed. "Are you going to tell me your name or not?"
"Don't," Luna warned. "She'll find some way to make it sound stupid."
"Like Loon!" Claire smiled, pleased with herself.
Shade looked a little annoyed. "My name is Jonathan. If you tease me about it, I will call on my powers to give you an extra hard time in the Underworld."
"Butbutbutbutbut - " Claire spluttered.
"Stop it, Claire. You already used Johnny Appleseed on that really annoying kid back home," Luna pointed out.
"Oh yeah." Claire looked a little put out.
Ayden gaped. "Jonathan? That doesn't sound like you! But... in a weird way... it kinda fits..."
Rino shrugged. "I understand why you want to be called Shade." he said mildly.
Luna rolled her eyes. "If we're done discussing names - "
"We're not," Claire interjected. "I still have to think of a way to make fun of emo-boy's name." It was more of an idle threat than anything, but Claire was Claire.
Luna continued, ignoring her. "I want to know what's for dinner."
Tyson thought for a second, brow crinkling over his single brown eye. "Probably burgers, or else 'dogs."
That caught Claire's attention. "Y'do mean hot dogs, right?" she asked suspiciously.
Shade rolled his eyes with a sigh. "No. We're having a poodle for dessert," he drawled.
Claire brightened. "Nice! I hate poodles." Luna rubbed her forehead, looking like she watned to kill someone. "Snakes are better than poodles, though," Claire said conversationally. "Less itchy fluff."
"No, they're too tough to chew," Luna shot back.
"Like gum!"
Shade dropped his head into his hands. "Oh gods, what have I started?" he said to himself.
"Nah, snakes are the main course. Poodles are much more succulent than snakes." Ayden smiled cheerfully.
They ignored him. This was fun.
"What's succulent mean?" Claire blinked.
"All juicy and stuff," Luna said. "So, how are they going to be cooked? Roasted, in stew -"
"Shish-kebobs!" Claire interrupted brightly. "With ketchup!"
"Fried, in a frying pan, in their own fat." Somehow, Rino managed to keep a straight face. "Like McDonalds"
Ayden grimaced. "I hate that place."
"It has good ice cream," Claire offered.
"Only in vanilla," Luna said. "Which sucks."
"Hey, vanilla's all you need."
"I like their milkshakes. And fries." Shade announced. "The burgers are okay too."
Luna groaned. "Okay, can we just stop talking about McDonalds now?"
"Okay. We'll talk about Wendy's," Claire said cheerfully.
"Oh gods no. I hate that annoying girl-mascot-thing. Such stupid hair..."
"The Burger King Mascot looks pretty stupid too." Rino rolled his eyes.
"Yah... Does anyone here like barbies?" Ayden looked around anxiously.
Claire giggled. "I do! Teaching them bungee jumping is fun."
"You forgot the fact they have no parachutes," Luna reminded her.
Rino shrugged and put his arm around Ayden's shoulders. "I think it's fun to strip them and then put them up around her tent while she's sleeping. She wakes up and starts screaming. It's kinda funny. Then she tries to kill me, and that's not so funny, but still." Ayden grimaced and elbowed her twin, who grinned impishly at her.
Claire eyed Rino suspiciously. "What d'you put them up with, tape? Cause that's not original enough."
Luna groaned. "Don't remind me. The Barbie Inquisition."
Claire shrugged. "It was fun. All the nooses and burning and stuff...the neighbors thought we were insane."
"They already did."
"Crazy Glue." Rino corrected proudly. "Then when she tried to take them off, they came off with part of the tent too. Eventually she just had to leave them up there."
Ayden scowled at him.
Claire shook her head, sounding amazed. "You are nuts."
"That's a good thing," Luna said boredly. "Why are we talking about Barbies? I can't decide if Barbies or McDonalds were worse."
Chiron interrupted, clapped his hands loudly and sparing Rino a reply. "Dinnertime - hamburgers or hot dogs by the fire."
Claire grinned. "Where'd you put the fur?" she asked Chiron mischievously, then ran off before he could reply. Luna rolled her eyes and walked after Claire, grumbling something about annoying twins.
Rino sighed, grabbing a hamburger. "If you didn't know her, you would think she actually believed us!" he joked to Ayden. Ayden continued scowling.
