Now, it's not like I haven't been in the Sea of Monsters before. But this time felt…different. Like if I stared at the water too long it might suck me in and drown me. Every few miles I saw another spine covered body slip out and then back into the water. Like crests of a wave; you wouldn't really notice if you weren't looking for them. I had been standing at the wheel for what seemed like an eternity after Butch left, I was starting to feel tired. My eyelids were getting heavy from staring at nothing but the ocean for the past few hours. Suddenly the door behind me opened and Annabeth walked in with Nico right behind her.
"You should go rest. Jason told me you didn't sleep well last night." Annabeth walked up beside me and placed a hand on the wheel. I knew I couldn't protest so I moved aside and said 'thanks'.
"What's Butch up to? Is he feeling any better yet?" I asked.
"He is bowling. If you could call it that; he throws so hard he breaks at least 3 pins every single time he is up." Nico replied, crossing his arms and taking a seat near the door. "Annabeth is right, Terra, you need to sleep. You look like you're about to pass out." I was about to protest when he stood up and grabbed my arm like I was about to fall. "Don't worry; I'll take you to your room." I wasn't in the mood to fight him so I figured I might as well let him lead me to my room, not that I had even picked on out yet.
We went two levels down and walked to the end of a long hallway before he finally opened a door and led me inside. The room was amazing! There was beautiful curtains made of silk that hung from the enormous windows behind the bed. Every time the curtains moved it looked like lightning flashed across the deep purple fabric. The bed was ultra-mega-king sized. All four of us could sleep on it and never touch. The sheets were white with shell designs on them, fish that seemed to swim across it. In the far, right corner of the room was a gigantic fish tank which held a lot of deep sea fish. Each one was beautiful. I noticed there was also an octopus sitting on the bottom of the tank, watching me check out the room. It creeped me out but was still pretty cool. The walls were white with a deep purple, plushy carpet, the same color as the curtains. All this time Nico was watching my reaction, he must have picked this room out especially for me.
"Each room on the ship is different. I thought you would like this one the best." I turned and saw him smile for a split second until he noticed me looking and it faded back into his neutral expression of not caring. "Well, I will leave you to sleep." He started to leave when I reached out and grabbed his shoulder.
"Nico…can I ask you something?"He looked confused but nodded. "Why have you been acting so cold towards me the past few days? Ever since you met with Rachel…" I shifted my eyes and stared at the floor. I had forgotten all about that till now. He apparently didn't know I knew because his cheeks started blushing. "I mean…are you two…?" I cut off my sentence, not wanting to continue to say 'together'. I was selfish to think that way since I told him I love Luke and still believe he is alive, but still…I couldn't help but feel jealous.
"No!" He said quickly, looking straight at me. The pink in his cheeks faded immediately. "That's not it at all, I promise. We are just friends. I just- asked her something is all." That didn't do anything to clear up why he was being so rude.
"Well that's nice, but you didn't answer my question. You have been acting cold to me, why?"He shifted his feet and ran a hand through his hair. I could tell he was nervous and didn't want to tell me what had been going on. "Actually, its fine, you really don't have to tell me if you don't want to. If it's between the two of you then I don't have to know." I smiled at him, trying to reassure him that it didn't matter, even though it did.
"Thanks, Terra. It's not really important anyway. But it has nothing to do with me and Rachel; I can absolutely promise you that." We both smiled, trying to hide how uncomfortable this conversation was getting. Finally after a few minutes of awkward silence he said "well, get some sleep. I am going to go help Butch find some more bowling pins to smash." And with that I was alone. I fell onto my bed and crawled to the pillows. I was out almost as soon as my head hit one. And then I started to dream.
It was dark, as usual. I heard chains and voices but I couldn't tell where they were coming from. I was walking…when I had I started moving? I somehow knew exactly where I was going. I knew there were rock walls all around me and that the tunnel was hardly big enough for two people side by side. I knew all this even though I couldn't see a thing. I kept walking, the voices got louder and louder till they were screaming in my head, yelling things to me that I couldn't understand. I felt crunching under my feet with each step which caused tingles to run up my spine. In my head I was freaking out, wondering what was under my feet, but my body did nothing but move forward at the same slow pace. All at once the voices and the crunching stopped and I felt the ground fall away. I was falling and I couldn't see anything. I had no control and I was about to die. I saw a speck of light which rapidly grew bigger until I was blinded by it. I knew the ground was coming up fast. I was going to die from the impact. I couldn't control the air, it was useless. I gave into the inevitable.
"Terra, wake up! There entrance to the Sea of Monsters is ahead!" My mind was too groggy to register whose voice it was. My door slammed shut and I was alone. I rubbed my head and stretched, trying to shake the memory of the dream I had just experienced.
When I finally arrived in the steering room Butch was driving and Annabeth had a worried look on her face as she ran to hug me.
"Are you alright?" She said while she placed a hand on my forehead. "You feel fine now."
"Now?" I was confused.
"You have been asleep for almost 2 days. You were running a fever the whole time." Nico explained. He was standing near Butch with his arms crossed again, but he looked relieved to see me standing there.
"What? I just fell asleep a couple hours ago. I couldn't have slept for 2 days. That's impossible."
"Well I guess now we know the impossible is entirely possible." Butch said without turning away from the wheel.
"Well, who just came and woke me up?" I asked. They all seemed to shocked to see me up here.
"No one…We have all been up here for at least an hour now." Annabeth placed her hand on my forehead again. I sighed.
"Annabeth, I am not sick. Someone came into my room and told me we were approaching land and then slammed the door. I heard it, I am not insane."
"Well, maybe that was part of your dream still? Did you see anyone?" Nico asked.
"No…" I was even starting to doubt myself. "Whatever, I am awake now. How close are we?"
"The island of Scylla is right ahead of us. And her sister Charybdis is right next to that. How do we want to go about this?" Butch asked.
Annabeth and I looked at each other. Last time we had tried to enter the Sea of Monsters we almost got destroyed by Charybdis and then eaten by Scylla when her sister blew us into the cliffs. And then our boat exploded… This was going to be difficult.
"Angle the boat towards Charybdis but try to stay in the middle of the two." Annabeth said. "When Charybdis sucks in, we will be forced closer to her, but when she spits the water back out, we will be, hopefully, moving with enough momentum against the waves to stay far enough away from Scylla." It sounded like a perfect idea in theory. But then again Clarisse's idea to attack Charybdis had sounded possible as well, and then didn't end up so well.
"Well, we have to try something, so let's give it a go." I replied when the boys said nothing. "Maybe you should take the wheel, Annabeth, since it is your plan and you know what you want to do." Butch let her take the wheel without any back talk. Both Butch and Nico knew Annabeth and I had more experience in the Sea of Monsters, even if we had only been here once. They knew they should differ to us when dealing with certain monsters.
"Stay inside this cabin no matter what. We don't need Scylla snatching anyone up if we get too close." Annabeth said. We continued toward the gap between the two sisters, slowly picking up speed and being pushed back again with each inhale and exhale of Charybdis. "Let's hope this time will be different since we are in a god's boat. Maybe it is stronger than the one Clarisse had." Even Annabeth didn't look like she was too sure of this. Not many heroes make it through the Sea of Monsters. Most die at the entrance.
Then everything happened at once: we were sucked right into the whirlpool. Now we could see right into the giant monster's mouth. Wreckage of ships were stuck between her teeth and the sounds emitted by the giant mouth made it hard to hear when Annabeth yelled to brace ourselves. The mouth closed up tight, the lips curled up at the ends in a cruel smile and then BAM! All the water exploded out of the mouth in a tall column of water that shot us backwards, way too close to Scylla's cliffs. If it weren't for Annabeth's quick maneuvering we would have slammed right into them and been shattered into a million tiny pieces. But instead she cranked the wheel in the opposite direction causing the ship to narrowly miss the cliffs. She kicked the godly yacht into high gear. Nico, Butch, and I flew backwards against the back wall. The only thing keeping Annabeth upright was the wheel she had a firm grip on. It was impossible how fast our boat was speeding along. Any mortal yacht this tall, going this fast, would break apart…or explode. But this one just shot through the gap between the monsters like it was no big deal. Charybdis shot out another spout of water and we shot ahead even faster. Soon we were out of range of Scylla and her sister, the cliffs fading into the distance. We all steadied ourselves as Annabeth slowed the boat back down to a normal speed.
"That was easy enough." Nico said, rolling his shoulder, trying to get the kinks out from being slammed into the wall. Butch and I rubbed the backs of our heads and sighed.
"A little too easy…" I said. "Way easier than the last time. I wonder if we just got lucky-"
"Or if someone is helping us along." Annabeth finished. We all shared a meaningful look. Could the gods be helping us even though Zeus forbade it? Or was a more sinister force trying to lure us deeper into the Sea of Monsters?
