A/N: I know you'd rather read the chapter than my apologies. My apologies can wait. Merry late Christmas!

"Gosh, where were you?" Elizabeth the hunter asked, frantic. "We have twenty minutes until midnight! We've got to get to the Coliseum! "

"Coliseum?" I asked, dazed. Percy and I had found our way back to the pavilion party, where ABBA was no longer playing. What a shame. Gimme Gimme Gimme would have fit perfectly. "Oh...for the...energy...thing..."

"We have time," Percy said.

"Not much!" Elizabeth tugged us away from the party, towards a large car. "Thalia says she doesn't mind that you're late, but she's lying. We think the Titan's Army is after us."

"What?!" Percy and I turned to her at the same time.

"Exactly!" she nodded fervently, squishing us into the car.

In the seat next to us, a tall, gangly kid with super-curly hair sat, knees shaking, his arm around a slim sprite.

"Grover?" I said. "Juniper?"

"Hey, guys!" Juniper breathed. She sounded terrified. "Wow, it's been a while."

"How's Tuscany been?" Percy asked as Thalia smiled from the front seat and backed out of the parking lot.

"Very Tuscan," Grover told us. "And very sunny."

The countryside flew by as the car, driven by Thalia, sped to the Coliseum.

"That's him," Thalia whispered to herself, her eyes flying wide open. "Oh, holy crap, that's him!"

"What?! Who?" I swiveled to look out the window, just as Elizabeth, Grover, Juniper, and Percy did.

But I didn't really need to ask.

Luke Castellan, in Kronos form, and about ten billion monsters followed only a mile behind us.

Thalia floored the pedal. It was a pretty decent European car, so we were going...I'd say 130 miles an hour.

"THALIA!" Grover screamed. "WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!"

"That's Luke behind us," she shouted over the roar of the road. "He's not going to be observing any speed limits either!"

Thanks to our new pace, we pulled into the Coliseum parking lot, literally burning rubber off our tires, in about thirty seconds.

"What time is it?" Thalia yelled as we piled out of the car.

"It's 12:01," Elizabeth told us. "Where is everybody?"

Percy, Thalia and I were sprinting for the entrance. "I was an idiot," Thalia muttered between breaths. "I told them to get on a plane to England--that's where the next star is. Gods, I'm an idiot."

"No, you're not," Percy told her. "But we kind of need to quit thinking about it and get the energy!"

Sure enough, a glowing star floated in the center of the Coliseum. "At least it's obvious," I sighed as Thalia made a mad dash for the center. I looked behind my shoulder.

"Crap!"I screamed. "THALIA! They're pulling in!"

She yanked the star out, put two fingers in her mouth, and whistled.

"And that helps us...how?" Percy asked, pulling my hand and running towards her.

"She's got a plan," I told him.

"You must have rubbed off on her," he said.

And I was right. Swooping down from the sky like herons, three enormous creatures thumped down beside us. And I mean enormous, like a cross between an eagle and a huge horse. I've seen smaller minivans.

"Gryphons," Thalia shouted, shoving the star into a fiberglass box she clipped to the slightly large gryphon's saddle. She mounted her gryphon like a stallion. "Get on!"

You don't argue with Thalia when she sounds like that.

Percy swung his leg over the other gryphon and I followed suit behind him. Grover and Juniper claimed the third beast.

Thalia strung her bow, as did Elizabeth and Juniper. "It's only us now," she said quietly. "We can't go to England."

Percy looked as her like she was crazy. "But you just said--"

"I know what I said! We have to go to Greece! The Pantheon!" she dug her heels into the gryphon's side, and so did Percy and I. The gryphons launched into the sky, swishing through the air like feathered frisbees.

"The pantheon?" I repeated. "Are you insane? What happens to the other fifteen half-bloods and hunters when Luke's army follows them to England?"

"Yeah," Grover agreed, his voice shaking. "We...we have to protect them!"

She was trying to look confident, but I detected a hint of uncertainty in her eyes. "They're strong. They can fend for themselves."

Percy looked at her doubtfully. "We should go back."

FWOOSH!

A bullet sliced the air right behind my head.

"What the...!" I turned my head to face the shooter of said bullet and swore. "They've got guns, guys!"

"So?" Thalia, Elizabeth, Grover, and Juniper said in unison.

"As happy as we are for you guys," Percy explained, expanding the shield Tyson made for him. Bullets pounded his shield like raindrops. "Me and Annabeth can still be, I don't know, killed by guns."

Thalia looked at him for a second. Then, "Oh, yeah..."

She steered her gryphon in front of ours, tapping her chain bracelets until her shield Aegis appeared, stopping even more bullets. "Elizabeth! Bronze grenade!"

In one skillful, fluid motion, Elizabeth pulled out and tossed a small oval of celestial bronze to the ground below us. A hand grenade.

The bullet noises stopped.

We didn't look back to see the explosion. Luke would still be alive.

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"That explosion stalled them," Percy was trying to convince Thalia. "We have enough time to go to England."

She huffed out a breath. "Fine. I suppose you're right. It'll take time for them to get reinforcements."

Yesss! I thought silently.

"England it is," Percy nodded, letting out a deep breath.

We charted a course for Calais, France, where we'd cross the shortest part fo the English Channel possible and find our way to London.

"This could take a while," Elizabeth yawned. "Feel free to sleep."

I wasn't so sure, but Thalia and my fiance didn't need to be told twice. Percy leaned forward, resting his arms and head on the gryphon's fluffy, pillow-like back and was dead to the world in about two minutes.

I stayed up, keeping watch. Elizabeth chuckled. "You don't have to stay up, Annabeth," she told me. "I'll make sure you guys don't fall."

"You sure?"

"Positive."

I yawned too. I hadn't slept in what seemed like forever. Wrapping my arms around Percy's waist in front of me, I rested my head on his back and felt my eyelids flutter shut.

The last thing I thought I heard before falling into a deep, deep sleep was Elizabeth saying what a beautiful ring.

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"Annabeth?"

I opened one eye sleepily.

"Annabeth, wake up."

I swatted Percy away with one hand.

"We're at the Strait of Dover!"

Oh.

I sighed, dismounted our gryphon, and climbed in our medium-large motorboat we'd rented next to Percy. "Thanks a lot," I patted the gryphon gratefully. Then I turned to Thalia. "How long is this strait again?"

"Here? Twenty-one miles at its shortest point," she told me. "So we should get there in a little under twenty-five minutes, at least with this boat."

"Basically, short," I summarized.

Clouds were gathering on the horizon, rolling angrily like a bottled-up storm. We started the engine and were speeding off to England. Remembering what Elizabeth had said, I surreptitiously turned the diamond under my hand so you could only see the platinum band, which, hopefully, wouldn't be as obvious.

We made nervous small-talk for about fifteen minutes. Yes,I thought as the seas were mostly calm. Please, please just let the rest of this trip be this smooth.

Of course, two miles from England, the sea got hellish.

It started slowly, maybe four miles back. Tiny raindrops here and there. Small waves rocking the boat a little bit. Salty wind.

"Kind of rainy, huh?" Elizabeth asked, walking to the edge of the boat and peering over.

Percy and I exchanged looks.

Thalia put her palm out to feel the raindrops, giving us suspicious stares. "Yeah," she agreed. "Kind of...wet..."

"Um. So, Juniper, bring back any souvenirs from Tuscany?" I asked hopefully.

Her eyes lit up. "Yes! They make the best wine there...well...I mean, technically Grover and I are old enough, you know..."

Grover snorted into his furry hand. "Juniper loves her wine."

Everybody laughed as she smacked him. I was just happy we'd gotten rid of the suspicious looks. Well, at least until a minute later, when the crack of lightning made all of us jump in our seats.

We dashed to the edge of the boat -- a wave taller than my house was about to crash over the boat.

"What?!" Juniper squeaked. "I checked the weather forecast before we came...it was supposed to be sunny and calm on the Channel..."

"Steer, Elizabeth!" Thalia yelled, dashing to the control board. She flipped a bunch of switches and Elizabeth steered like crazy, but the wave wasn't stopping.

With a SWOOSH, gallons of salt water poured into our boat, soaking everyone but Percy.

"AHHHHHHHH!" Juniper and Grover shrieked, clinging to each other in the glacier-cold water.

I felt like screaming, too, but I just shivered and ran to the sprite and her boyfriend. "You guys OK?" I asked.

Grover tried to give a thumbs-up, but Juniper shook her head miserably.

I pulled two thick blankets from under the padded seats around the rim of the boat and wrapped the two in them. I dug the extra life vests out of an open compartment under the seats and pointed to it. "Get in there," I told them. "There's another wave coming!"

I was right. Lightning flashed, thunder rumbled, and a huge wave threatened to make me into Annabeth soup.

I wasn't scared, I was effing furious. Furious. Sixteen years of fighting monsters and surviving attacks, and then die from a stupid tidal wave?!

I shouldn't have wasted my time worrying though, because Percy caught me in his arms and turned me away from the wave. Being impervious to water, he was kind of like a...I don't know. Like an anti-water force field.

So Grover, Juniper, Percy, and I stayed dry and relatively warm, but I can't say the same for Elizabeth and Thalia. Thalia wasn't mad because she was cold, though. She was just stunned, and I wondered why.

Mouth hanging open, she walked toward me, still safe in Percy's arms--oh, yeah, she thought we weren't going out anymore--and held up my left hand.

I gulped as she turned the platinum band around to see the diamond. Her eyes grew as big as god-sized bread roll plates while I yanked back my hand protectively.

"Annabeth, Percy," she whispered slowly. "What did you do?"

I felt Percy's grip on me tighten.

"I'll fight for the gods, but I'm not their pawn," he told her. "And we're not taking orders from anyone. Annabeth and me, we'll make our own decisions, thanks."