Author's Note: Sorry for the delay. This is the second to last chapter, and I really hope you like it. Thanks to all those who reviewed, favorited, or subscribed. Disclaimer: I do not own Percy Jackson and the Olympians.

Chapter 8

"Are you sure that's going to work?" asked Rachel after Annabeth had finished telling her the plan.

"It has to. What alternative can you think of?" replied Annabeth grimly, locking eyes with Rachel.

"We could just ditch you… I'm kidding, relax!" teased Rachel.

"Okay, when I give the signal, go." Rachel nodded and wandered back to the garden, where Piper, Clarisse, and Thalia were still bickering with the nymphs.

"Listen, I don't give a fuck if you don't want to tell us, I'll make you tell us. Now, where's Annabeth?" snarled Thalia, holding her spear to one nymph's throat.

"I can tell you," said Rachel quietly. She suddenly spoke in a raspy voice, similar to the one she used when the spirit of Delphi spoke through her.

The place where the daughter of wisdom is

is the place where a magical elf lives

There, no birds fly in the sky

and weeping willows look as if they cry

"What the hell?" muttered Thalia.

"I think she's faking it," whispered Piper.

The Hesperides stared at her.

"Is this supposed to be a distraction?" wondered Clarisse.

Meanwhile, Rachel kept making up some BS poem about a really depressing place, and the nymphs stared. Suddenly, they heard Annabeth's voice whispering in their ears.

"Guys, it's me, Annabeth. Rachel's just trying to distract them. Here's what we're going to do." And she quickly whispered the rest of the plan.

"Wait, is this really going to work—" started Piper, but before she could finish, one of the Hesperides spoke.

"You do realize that we aren't fooled, don't you?"

There was an awkward silence. Then Annabeth tore off her invisibility cap and yelled, "Now!"

After that, it was pure chaos. Each girl took out their weapons and charged the copper-colored, many-headed dragon. The Hesperides, being cowardly nymphs, shrieked and vanished.

Ladon the dragon snarled, its many heads hissing and looking entirely ready to breathe fire. There were so many heads that it was impossible to focus on just one. And they all had a set of razor-sharp, venom-coated fangs.

Obviously, none of them wanted to get near it. But they had to get the apple.

"Remember the plan!" called Annabeth. She ran at one of the heads, and held her knife in its face. Oddly, she didn't strike at the creature. She waved it about as if she just wanted to get its attention. The head lunged, and she dodged quickly.

Thalia pulled out her bow and fired several arrows into the eyes of the dragon, but it was like sticking a needle into someone's finger: it just made it angry. Four heads came at her at once, and she somehow managed to roll, sidestep, and jump over the necks. It was a bit like those Whack-A-Mole games, except the moles surrounded them completely and were highly poisonous. She was feeling pretty optimistic about the plan—something she rarely felt—until a fifth head lunged at her from behind and grabbed her by the ankle.

She crashed to the ground and felt the teeth sinking into her leg. Luckily, Clarisse moved it with her spear and the dragon let go quickly.

"Thanks," gasped Thalia. She sprinted away in the opposite direction, with a few heads still chasing her.

Piper, meanwhile, had done something that was either totally brave or a completely retarded idea: She had run up to the nearest head and jumped on it. She was already regretting her decision three seconds after she'd done it.

"OH MY GODS!" she screamed as she hung on for dear life. The head she was clinging to flailed around spastically, trying to get her off. Several other heads came to attack her, but they only ended up getting their necks tangled together.

"Good move, Piper! That's the idea: get the heads tangled!" called Annabeth from the ground as she dove to avoid two heads at once. Surely enough, the heads were tangled together.

This was no help to Piper, who felt like she was on an extremely deadly roller coaster without a seatbelt. She tried slashing at the dragon's neck, but its scales were impenetrable. Finally, the head she was clinging to slammed into the tree and Piper toppled out. Fortunately, she found something to break her fall. Unfortunately, that something was Rachel.

"Sorry! Are you okay?" apologized Piper. She quickly dodged another head.

"I'm fine! Watch my back while I climb up and get an apple!" called Rachel.

As she tried to avoid getting killed, Annabeth surveyed the scene. Her mind was racing, which was always a good sign. She noted that the dragon was slowing down and getting its heads tangled together, but it would take a lot more effort to keep it that way.

Rachel slowly began to climb the enormous tree, but that wasn't easy with a hundred-headed dragon snapping its jaws around her. She grabbed another branch and pulled herself up. Using a knot in the trunk for a foothold, she reached up and swung her leg around a tree limb. The apples, of course, were at the very end. Rachel slowly shimmied out onto the branch. The apples were closer… closer… only a few more feet… WHAM!

Several dragon heads slammed into the tree at once. The whole thing shook dangerously.

"You want some more of that, punk?" yelled Clarisse. "Die!"

Thalia raised her spear, and an arch of lighting flashed and took out several heads at once. "Nice one, Thal!" called Piper, her hair standing on end. But there were still many more.

Meanwhile, the tree branches were still shaking dangerously, and Rachel was still out on a limb. The apples were inches away from her outstretched hand… she reached out and found herself inches from a staring dragon.

Rachel looked at the dragon. The dragon looked at Rachel. Rachel wished she had a blue plastic hairbrush to throw at its eye. The dragon wished that it could bite Rachel's head off. After what seemed like an eternal staring contest, the dragon came to its sense and lunged. Rachel had the sense to lunge away and seize the apple. Maybe this wasn't such a good idea, because she nearly fell off the branch.

"Rachel! You got the apple! Come on, let's get out of here!" exclaimed Annabeth, diving away from the dragon's jaws.

"I can't! In case you didn't notice, I'm still dangling from the branch!" screamed Rachel.

The dragon had gotten many of its heads tangled, struck by lighting, or slammed against a tree, but there were still enough to make the dragon a threat. A few of the heads snapped their jaws at Rachel, who was hanging by one hand and holding the apple, desperately trying not to die.

"Throw it to me!" yelled Piper. Rachel tossed her the apple, which Piper caught. All the heads turned to Piper. "Maybe that wasn't such a good idea," she mumbled. "Clarisse, catch!"

Clarisse caught it and tossed it to Thalia, who threw it to Annabeth, who screamed "I've got it! Now we should run!"

This had given Rachel enough time to get to the bottom of the tree again. Together, they sprinted out of the garden.

"Is it following us?" asked Piper, trying to look back and run away at the same time.

"I don't think so," said Annabeth, glancing over her shoulder.

They all paused for a moment and breathed a sigh of relief. "Now what?" asked Thalia.

"Now," said a voice from behind them, "You give that to me."

"Hera," said Annabeth. She scowled at the goddess, who was smiling radiantly. "Here's the damn apple. What did you want it for, anyway?"

Hera shrugged. "I was hoping you'd die in the attempt. I still don't like you. Besides, I wanted your last day of being unmarried to be memorable. It's a bit of a tradition: If you can face a hundred-headed dragon, marriage should be nothing."

"Wait, let me get this straight. You did all this just so we could have a traditional night?" demanded Thalia. "Thank Artemis I'm never getting married."

"Well, yes," replied the goddess. "And anyway, I hate you all. I'll see you at the wedding. I've arranged transportation for you." She vanished into thin air.

"But you aren't even invited!" yelled Annabeth. Suddenly, there was a loud snapping noise, and everything around them vanished. Before they could do anything, there was another snapping noise, and they were in the room they'd rented at the Plaza Hotel.

"We're back!" said Piper.

"Thank you, Captain Obvious," replied Thalia. "The next time—Oh, shit!"

"What?" asked Annabeth.

"I just realized: the wedding's in two hours."

Annabeth jumped. "I need to get ready. I can't be late for my own wedding!"

..~0~..

"So how would we lure Percy out?" asked Connor.

"I don't know. I was hoping you would."

"Hmm. The last time we got trapped in a Lotus Casino, we didn't get out for five

"We could just blow it up," suggested Connor.

"Well, someone could get killed in the explosion, and we could easily unleash some kind of dangerous mythological thing," offered Nico.

"Always the optimist, aren't you?" asked Leo.

"I can't help it. It's hereditary."

"Well, we have to think of a way. We only have a little while before the wedding's supposed to start," said Connor.

Grover sighed. "There has to be a way… we just aren't thinking of it. If one of us was in there instead of Percy, he would have found a way."

"A stupid way," said Nico. Everyone looked at him. "I'm not saying he's an idiot!" protested Nico. "But let's face it: sometimes his plans don't go the way they're supposed to."

"True. But they always work, one way or another," realized Connor.

Leo smiled. "Hey, what do you think Percy would have done by now? Driven a car through the window?"

Grover laughed. "Probably flood the place," he joked.

"Or crawled in through the ventilation system. The magic that makes people want to stay probably isn't as strong in there," laughed Connor.

"Wait a minute. Crawl through the vents? That's actually a good idea," said Nico.

"But I'm claustrophobic!" protested Grover.

"It actually might work," said Leo.

"Wow, I'm smart,' said Connor.

..~0~..

A few minutes later, they had found the system and were crawling through.

"I've seen this on TV a lot, but I've actually never done it," whispered Nico.

"I have," whispered Leo. "I once snuck out of a foster home through the vents."

"So have I," muttered Connor. "Travis and I did it when—Oh, never mind, you don't want to know."

"Shouldn't we be seeing something by now?" asked Grover. "I don't like this."

"I think I see a light ahead," said Connor, who was in front. "Hey—look at this!"

He moved aside a little so that they could all see the gleaming marble floor, chandeliers, gilded walls, and all the shiny, awesome, high-tech arcade games that filled the room. The place looked awesome. There were people bungee-jumping from a balcony, watching the movie-theater sized plasma TVs, drinking those weird fruity cocktail drinks, swimming in an indoor pool, and gambling their wallets away. Anyone could see why they wanted to stay forever.

"Where's Percy?" asked Nico.

They looked around. "I think I see him," said Leo.

"Where?"

"There," replied Leo, pointing to the bungee jumpers. Percy was lounging on the balcony, sipping a blue cocktail drink and grinning like an idiot. As they watched, he set the drink down and hurled himself off the balcony. Just before he hit the ground, he was saved by the bungee cord.

"Looks like fun," remarked Connor. They waited for a few minutes. Finally, Percy seemed to get bored with the jumping and went to the ground level. As he passed the vent where his friends were hidden, Connor hissed, "Percy!"

Percy turned around, looking for the source of the noise. "Down here!" called Connor.

Percy looked at his feet and saw nothing. "Shut up, voices in my head!" he exclaimed.

"No, look over here! In the vent, moron!" called Nico. Percy looked.

"Hey, guys! I was wondering when you'd show up!" he said cheerfully. "Come on out!"

"No, come in here!" insisted Grover.

"Why? That doesn't look like fun," said Percy.

"It is! It's great!" lied Leo.

Percy frowned. "Okay… just for a minute." He opened the grate that led to the vent and crawled in. Immediately, he looked like he'd been doused in cold water. "Oh, gods," he whispered. "How long was I in there?"

"Don't worry, only a day," said Nico. "Come on, let's get out of here."

They all crawled back out of the vent.

"Does this mean I'm going to be late for my own wedding?" asked Percy.