Chapter 10

J
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The rest of the night went smoothly, but the morning after was hell.

I felt a tickle on my nose and went to scratch it, but got a face full of shaving cream. I snapped awake and found the entire Hermes cabin laughing at me. I was angry, but it let it go.

Then I realized where I was.

My entire bed had been moved into a chariot strapped to two pegasi.
One of the Stoll's slapped a pegasus and they both took off, dragging the chariot, and me, with them.

I went into a full panic as the pegasi gained altitude. I was frantically looking for the reins when the pegasi decided to make a loop.

I fell out of the chariot and strait towards the ground.

This is how I die. I thought. A stupid prank from the Stoll twins.

No! Hissed the voice in my head. Fly!

Fly?! I screamed inside my head. You think I can fly?! Are you insane? I can't fly!

But I had heard stories of Jason flying like Peter Pan, so I tried that with no luck.

See? I can't fly! I'm not Jason and I don't have wings! I thought.

As if on cue, I felt a sharp pain from my shoulder blades.

I looked over my shoulder and stared in amazement.

Sprouting from my back, were two large, leathery, bat wings.

I snapped myself back to reality and spread my newly acquired wings. They instantly caught the air and slowed my fall.

"Jake!" I heard someone yell from next to me.

I looked over and saw Jason himself, flying next to me.

"You have wings!" He screamed in amazement.

"I'm just as shocked as you are!" I shouted back.

We both glided down to the earth and landed.

Well, Jason landed, I flopped to the ground and rolled to a stop.

A large crowd had gathered and they were all staring at me. I stood up and spread my wings to their full length.

I had about an eight foot wingspan and they were solid black with bleach white claws at the joints.

The other campers were all keeping their distance, none of them would make eye contact and some had their weapons drawn.

"Jake."

I turned around and saw Chiron standing behind me.

"I think it'd be best if you came with me." He said.

Chiron lead me to the big house and into his office. However, on the way in I knocked over two vases, four lamps, three chairs, a table, and a now busted bust of Zeus with my newly acquired wings.

Eventually, we got to his office and sat down.

"Jake, do you care to explain how this came to be?" He sighed.

"The Stoll twins prank went wrong, instincts took over, and now I have wings." I said, still dumbfounded.

"I see." He said. "Do you remember anything else?"

"No." I said.

"Okay then. Have you tried to get rid of them?" He asked.

"Yeah, no luck."

"Try imagining yourself without them."

I did as told but had no luck, it was no different than imagining yourself without arms or legs.

"Nope." I said. "Nothing."

Chiron thought for a moment.

"Try burning them off." He finally said.

"What?" I asked in shock.

"I imagine that you have some control over fire, so ignite them." He said simply.

"Okay." I said, unsure about the idea.

I closed my eyes and imagined my wings catching fire.

My body reacted and my wings actually did catch on fire.

At first, nothing happened. But after a few seconds, my wings started to burn away. When they were completely gone, two scorch marks were left on my back where the wings had been.

"Thanks, Chiron. How'd you know that I had control over fire?" I said.

"There are certain monsters that have control over fire. All of them are very dangerous and unpredictable." He said gravely.

"Got it." I said meekly before I hurried away.

The day only got worse.

People at camp had starred at me before, but now they were glaring, and if you think that there's no difference, you're wrong.

I'd been starred at for my entire life, I was always labeled the "problem child" with "daddy issues". Whenever I would walk past someone, I could always feel their eyes on my back and hear them talking to each other.

"That's the one with the whore for a mother." One would say.

"Oh that poor thing. Mark my words, he'll either end up dead or in prison." The other would respond, acting like she actually cared.

I'd gotten use to people starring at me, but not glaring. Glaring was different. It wasn't the "poor, pitiful him" look, it was the "you're a disgrace and shouldn't have been born" look. Glares were full of bitter hate and make you want to curl up into a ball and hide from the world for the rest of your life.

I walked to the Hermes cabin and sat on the love seat in the room. The Stoll's saw me and ran up.

"We're so freakin' sorry!" Said Travis.

"Yeah!" Said Connor. "We didn't mean for that to happen. Jason was going to catch you, but you kinda..." He trailed off and looked at the ground shamefully.

"It's alright guys, it was just some revenge for locking you out of the cabin the other day. I get that. Besides, no one saw that coming." I said, halfheartedly.

"Still." said Travis. "We're sorry."

"I know," I said. "And it means a lot to me that y'all are this upset about it."

"Y'all?" They asked in sync.

"Yeah, southerners use it all the time." I said in slight confusion.

"It sounds... weird." Said Connor.

Once they both started saying the word over and over again, I left.

I wandered into the woods and made a beeline to the rock pile. When I got there, I was surprised to see Madison sitting on the rock with a guitar and a notebook.

She was obviously in the middle of writing a song, so I crouched down and listened.

She sounded beautiful and played amazingly. Eventually, I stood up and walked up to the rocks. She still hadn't noticed me, so I rested my head next to her notebook.

When she turned to write down some more lyrics, she saw me, screamed, and quickly snatched up her notebook.

"Don't sneak up on me like that!" She said.

"Okay." I said with a grin as I climbed up the rock and sat next to her.

"How long have you been here?" She asked me shyly.

"What day is it again?" I said jokingly.

She playfully hit me on top of the head with her notebook.

"What was that for?" I asked.

"For spying on me!" She said in the same playful manner.

"Fine, I won't spy on you anymore. Okay?"

"Good."

"You sounded great though." I said.

"You're a liar, Jake Fuller." She said back.

"No, really! Can I hear the whole song?"

"No."

"What? Why not?"

"Because it's not done."

"When it's done can I hear it?"

"No."

"Fine, be that way." I said sarcastically.

"I will!" She said warmly.

Needless to say, that was the only bright part of my day.

Z
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H

I had been climbing the rock wall when I heard it. A loud, high pitched scream.

I quickly repelled down the wall and strapped my sword to my belt before running to investigate.

The scream had come from one of the Demeter kids. At first I thought that someone had just stepped on one of her plants, but then I saw what she saw.

About thirty feet away was a gigantic dog. It's shoulders were about five feet off the ground with dark, matted fur, and blood red eyes.

But that wasn't the scary part.

This dog had two heads, both filled with very large and very sharp teeth. Both heads were sniffing the ground but would occasionally look up, snap at each other, then go back to sniffing. It also had a long, serpent like tail rather than a normal furry one.

What scared me the most, was the way that it moved with a purpose, as if it were here for one thing, and one thing only.

Some of the other campers had shown up and were all starring at the dog (or dogs, whatever you'd call it) and all had weapons drawn.

Percy Jackson charged the beast, but it moved quicker than anyone imagined.

It stepped out of the way, then lunged at Percy, tackling him to the ground. The dog quickly pinned Percy and opened one of its huge mouths, ready to rip Percy's throat out.

The dog barely made contact with Percy when I heard a single word, "Stop!"

The dog was extremely confused and pulled its heads back to look for the sound. Jake stepped foreword.

He had his sword drawn and slowly moved out of the small crowd, closer to the beast.
The dog snarled from one head and then the other.

"Maybe I am." Said Jake. "Who's asking?"

Again the dog snarled.

"Well, that's certainly an interesting title. The fact that you listed "brother of Cerberus" as one of your achievements doesn't really help you out much, though." Said Jake.

Is he... talking to that thing? I wondered.

The dog snarled again, this time much angrier.

"Calm down, Fido. I was just trying to help you out." Jake said defensively.

This time the dog barked a few times.

"Tempting, but you just tried to kill one of my friends, so I'll have to say no."

The dog snarled again and moved away from Percy, towards Jake. Most of the archers nocked an arrow and took aim at the dog.

"You're lying!"

This time the dog snorted a few times, which might have been a laugh.

"No! I don't believe you! He's never cared about me before! Why would he start now?" Jake screamed in anger.

More snorting.

"Try curses!"

The dog snarled once more.

"I. Said. No!" Jake screamed in defiance.

The dog barked and lunged at Jake. When it did, all the archers in the crowd loosed their arrows. The dog was completely shredded by the time it landed on top of Jake.

Jake, was forced to the ground by the weight of the dog.

Another volley of arrows finished off the dog and it turned to dust.

I ran to Jake, as did Madison and Percy.

"You alright." I asked him.

"Y-yeah. I'm fine." He said.

He was far from fine, whatever that dog had said to him had left him pretty shaken up.

"No you're not. Now what hurts?" Asked Madison.

She seemed to be more worried about him than the rest of us, more urgent and firm.

Apollo is the god of healing or something like that. I thought. That's probably why.

"Nothing hurts." Jake said.

"Okay, then what's wrong?" I asked.

"Nothing!" He shouted.

"Okay then, nothing's wrong. We're just worried about you, okay, Jake?" Percy said soothingly.

Jake took a deep breath and his shoulders loosened up.

"Were you talking to that thing just now?" I asked.

He looked confused.

"Yeah, are you deaf or something?" He asked me like I was stupid.

"Wait, you were talking to that monster?" Asked Percy in amazement.

"Yeah, could you guys not hear him?" Asked Jake.

"We heard." Said Percy. "We didn't understand."

Jake starred at us in shock for a few seconds, then flame jumped away.

A/N: And so the plot thickens! Jake can speak monster? What!? I actually thought that one up at about 3 am on a Wednesday night (or Thursday morning) and rushed to my computer to write it down.

In other news: a family of squirls has decided that my wall is the nicest wall on the market right now, so I have some annoying new roommates to say the least... and I actuallu lost a follower after I posted chapter 9! So I cried muself to sleep that night.

Once again, please review! They don't even have to be nice! I just like to read your opinions and "constructive" criticism.

Oh, and one more thing, I went through and revised all the chapters so far, so they'll sound a LOT better.