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Off We Go

Percy surveyed his surroundings. He recognized the place all too well. Saratoga battlefield. He recognized the Revolutionary War cannon he had accidentally set off when he was merely a fifth grader. In a flash, Percy drew Riptide and pressed it against the throat of the approaching intruder.

It was Aphrodite.

In place of the blonde ringlets that Percy was used to seeing the goddess of love wear were thick red waves of red hair.

"Well, what a pleasure to meet to you too," she laughed, looking upon him in amusement. Percy froze. For a moment, he was reminded of Hick, when she had laughed with him at the fishes atop the roof of THRESHER.

"What do you want? Why are you showing me this place?" he asked, retracting Riptide back into its pen form. The goddess' smile vanished.

"To deliver a warning."

All of a sudden, the old battlefield was teaming with people – tourists snapping pictures, children whining, teachers yelling – and then he saw her. Young Hick Valkyrie, no older than ten years. Standing still amidst a sea of strolling strangers.

Percy took a step forward. He stopped in his tracks. Her little hands were wet with crimson blood, and they were holding onto a pulsating heart freshly ripped out of a living being. Lying before the girl on the ground was a slain drakon. She gave a jolt and dropped the now stilled organ, as if just breaking out of a trance and realizing what she had done. She stood and stared into space, wounded and traumatized, her dull violet eyes starting to brim with tears.

Percy felt his heart sank and he didn't know why. But it seemed to knock the breath out of him. And he found himself walking towards her, ready to pull her into a tight embrace.

All of a sudden, a boy with hair the colour of pale butter came into sight. Percy recognized him. It was Ryan. The same guy Hick hung out with at her college camp. The young boy's kind blue eyes met Hick's, and she buried her face into his shoulder as he hugged her. Percy froze. The blood drained from his face.

"Love hurts, doesn't it?" the goddess spoke up, and the scene stilled. Everyone had ceased moving. Even the rustling trees had stilled and hushed. Percy stared on at the image of Hick in Ryan's arms. He felt horrified, miserable, angry… jealous.

"No… No, this can't be. Annabeth is the one I love," he protested, turning to face Aphrodite. The goddess looked sorry for him, and resembled Hick so much it unnerved him. He snapped. "You did this, didn't you? You made this happen!"

"For goodness' sake, boy," the goddess rolled her eyes. "I control and arouse love and passion in others, but I do not create and intervene with every single romantic link. "
"WHY ARE YOU SHOWING ME THIS?" he roared.

Aphrodite remained unperturbed. That didn't assuage Percy's frustration at all.

"To warn you of the chaos that will stem from this infatuation of yours. It'll destroy you if you're not careful."

And then darkness took over, swallowing the sunlit plains of the Saratoga Battlefield.

Percy could literally taste the salty sea breeze on his tongue. He immediately snapped his gaping mouth shut and wiped the drool streaming down his chine. The horse storm spirits had halted mid-air.

"Morning, sunshine! Had a good sleep?" Hazel called out to him. She held up a palm full of what appeared to be a clump of green mush.
"What's that?" he frowned down at it.
"Apparently, a concoction made by the mermen of Camp Fish-Blood. It's gonna temporarily turn us into merfolk," Hick replied, taking a tentative sniff at her very own clump of green much. A series of gags and shuddering followed, much to Percy's dismay.
"Oh gods, just eat it already. Nico's waiting for us inside the whale," Jason muttered, grabbing up the green mush from Hick's grasp and, while she was gagging at the green mush's stench, shoved it into her mouth. "Don't you spit it out! Now come on!"

As soon as Hick had gulped it down, Jason grabbed her hand leapt off his storm spirit horse, pulling her along with him before she could register what was going to happen next.

Percy swallowed down his own green mush and gagged. It tasted simply horrendous, and left an overbearing stench in his breath, like the stench of a rat's corpse.

"Come on, then," Hazel said, leaping off her storm spirit horse into the ocean.

Upon impact with the ocean water, Jason felt his breath knocked out of his chest and he thrashed about in panic, trying to swim to the surface for air but his body just wasn't buoyant enough. He could feel his legs starting to merge in the most curious way, pushing and ripping his jeans apart at the inseam. He let out a yell as a sharp pain surged through his legs, his muscles expanding and contracting, twisting and burning.

All of a sudden, someone had grabbed him by the shoulder and was shaking him sober.

"Snap out of it! Geez! You're gonna get us found out!" Leo's voice hissed into his ear.

Jason opened his eyes to see a blue merman resembling Leo hovering in front of him; his teeth were as sharp as a shark's, and his eyes glowed a luminous yellow. Just over his shoulder was a mermaid with skin and scales of the same bluish hue; her large doe eyes lit up like purple glow sticks. If it weren't for those large, mischievous eyes and flaming red hair, Jason would not have recognized Hick at all in her mermaid disguise. Both Leo and Hick had teeth as sharp as a shark's. Jason gently ran his thumb along the sharpened tips of his teeth.

"How long is this disguise going to last?" he asked.

"As soon as we leave the waters," Nico replied him, swimming up to meet him. Four merfolk wearing silver Greek armor and wielding spears followed him from behind.

A huge splash followed by another occurred, and everyone turned to see Percy and Hazel swimming towards them, slowly morphing into blue merfolk and tearing their jeans apart in the process.

"We have no time to waste," one of the mermaids spoke urgently, as she and her fellow mermen helped the demi-gods fasten on their silver Greek armour. "We must head to the portal now in time for the Rotation!"
"The Rotation?" Percy repeated after the mermaid.
"Y-yes," the mermaid blushed under Percy's gaze. Jason smirked. The mermaid clearly found the almighty son of Poseidon and conqueror of the Great Prophecy dashing. From the corner of his eye, Jason caught Hick clutching her throat, pretending to gag whilst Nico stifled down a giggle, and whacked the girl in the head in disapproval
"It's when the army of sentry standing on guard around the portal exchange shifts with the next army of sentry," Leo explained to Percy. "It happens only once every fortnight because Poseidon's armies have set up huge camps and food stations near the portal for the guards, and they only need to be refilled once every fortnight."
"Woah. This is serious," Hazel said, shaking her head.
"Well, the mermaid's right, then! Come on, let's get going!" Hick exclaimed, clapping her blue webbed hands down on Hazel's shoulder.

And so they swam off. What slowly petered into sight in the horizon took Hick by surprise.

A great castle stood in place of where Hick remembered the portal to be situated. There were no windows at all, only tall hard marbled walls that gleamed slivers of purples and blues, and a great blue castle gate well bolted by heavy golden barricades and locks. Waiting at the mouth of the castle was armies of merfolk, sirens, water drakons and a whole other lot of underwater creatures, standing in their respective rectangular division according to their specie. All five demi-gods turned pale at the sight of the massive arrangement.

"Gods," Hazel croaked feebly.
"They're going to be so pissed if they catch us," Jason murmured. He looked over at Hick. She looked just as unnerved as the rest of them, but it was evident in her eyes that she had set her heart on entering the portal already. There was no going back.

And so they approached the division of well-armed Camp Fish-Blood soldiers. They had amongst them about a dozen massive cargo carts containing either weapons or food, each pulled by a herd of grey horses that had the lower half of a massive silver fish. Percy had said that 'hippocampi' is the name of their breed. "That's also the name of a brain part that plays a major role in memory and spatial navigation," Hick piped up.
"What?" Nico said.
"Geek!" Hazel exclaimed at the same time, punching Hick in the arm. As they approached the carts, a couple of mermen pushed aside a couple of brown food sacks to reveal a dome-shaped hideout made of shells. One by one, the demi-gods crept into their hideout."

"Quickly," one of the mermaids urged her comrades. "The gates are starting to open."

True enough, a couple of sirens had clicked open all the locks and pushed aside the massive bolts, enabling a couple of massive Cyclops to pry open the great blue gates of the castle.

The last thing Jason saw was Leo's face peeking through a gap between the food sacks.

"I'll be going off from here now. Can't do a fortnight of sentry duty without my cabin mates realizing I'm missing now, can I? Stay… Stay safe, you guys."
"Leo," Jason called out.
"Yeah?"
"We'll be back before you know it, you know that."

A pause.

"Darn right you'll come back," Leo smiled. It wasn't a genuinely happy smile, Jason knew, and it made him feel a little depressed.

"See you later," Hick piped up cheerfully, breaking the somber mood. Leo's smile widened into a happier one.
"Yeah. See you later, Hick. Percy, Nico… Hazel…" he replied.

And then another brown food sack covered the gap, plunging the five demi-gods into total darkness.

Hick sat in the dark in silence, nervously fiddling with the fin of her mermaid tail. She couldn't help but play that one phrase Leo had said to Jason: Darn right you'll come back.

What if some of them don't make it back? The prophecy stated that someone was going to die, didn't it? Hick recalled the first line of the Lone Prophecy's second stanza: "The one doomed to death must decide where one stands". She didn't get it, and neither did Annabeth, but Annabeth did say that it'll probably only be understood when some deed is done. The only thing they could gather from the line was that someone related to the prophecy was going to die.

A food sack had shifted, allowing light to filter into the demi-gods' hideout and interrupt Hick's thoughts. The same mermaid who fancied Percy popped into view. "We're nearing the portal. Poseidon has felt your presence and is searching the guards," she whispered. "So ready yourselves. We're getting the cart as quickly as possible to the portal. Swim straight ahead as fast as you can as soon as we push off the food sacks, because that's where the portal will be."

"Got it. Thanks Lana," Nico whispered back to the mermaid.

Everyone waited with baited breath, nervous as to what was going to happen next. The anticipation was killing Hick, and she planted her back against the wall of food sacks, ready to jet off as soon as the merfolks started pushing off the cart's load.

Much to her dismay, Percy had read her mind.

"You're not springing into that portal head first," he hissed, grabbing her wrist. She pulled her hand back abruptly but he only caught hold of it again. He refuses to give in.
"I'm going in first," Percy insisted.

"No. My prophecy, my call. So STAY AT MY HIND, Jackass," Hick hissed back at him.
"Don't call m – "

"Gods, Poseidon is coming over! Quick! Move! We're here now!" Lana whispered urgently.
"Well, I'll go first then," Hazel announced cheerfully.

Before anyone could register what she had said, the girl had shot out of the hideout into the portal.

"Hazel!" Jason gasped and hurtled ahead as well, leaving behind a trail of bubbles. Hick immediately pulled Percy along and swam ahead, with Nico following closely by her side as they vanished into the portal. Out of curiosity, she looked over her shoulder. There was Poseidon, looking extremely displeased as he reached out his huge strong arms to grab on to her tail.

Hick yelped and flapped her fin wildly, dodging and narrowly missing the furious sea god's fingers as the portal sucked her in along with Percy and Nico. And they were gone.

The next thing Hick knew, they were falling down, down, down into empty space. The surrounding wisps of vapour had thickened into a dense mist. Hick could see only a few feet in any direction. She was plummeting downward so fast she couldn't think straight. Much to her relief and dismay, Nico and Percy were still by her side, screaming at the top of their lungs. Their skin had reverted back to their original colour, and their fish tails had vanished; in its place were their original human legs, covered up by what seemed to be a pair of scaly pants.

Hick couldn't control the shadows without any surrounding darkness to wield. How were they going to break their fall?

Then it dawned on Hick. They were going to die. They were going to die plummeting down hundreds of feet. So much for fulfilling the prophecy.

"Hazel! Jason!" Nico yelled, shifting Hick's attention to her other comrades who had leapt into the portal earlier. Jason had emerged through the mist below her, Hazel clinging on to his back. He grabbed onto Nico and Hick whilst Hick pulled Percy in so he could cling onto Jason as well. Hick could feel the fall slow down.

"You can FLY?" Hick exclaimed.
"Y-Yeah…" Jason replied with difficulty. He was really straining under all their weight as he worked on easing their fall. Much to his consternation, he found himself struggling way more than usual in levitating him and his teammates to wherever they were heading atmosphere felt different. He never felt more out of his element in the air. It didn't feel like Zeus' territory anymore.

Meanwhile, calmed by the fact that they'd be safe from falling to their death, Hick tried to gauge their fall. She didn't have a stopwatch or anything like that, but anyone could count time.

"One Mississippi... two Mississippi... three Mississippi ..." At seventy Mississippi she gave up and was beginning to feel really restless.
"Are we there yet?" Hazel whined.
"No," Jason said.

A moment of silence.

"Now?" Hick piped up.
"No!"

Another moment of silence.

"Hey, I think we're landing soon!" Percy announced.

The mist started to clear to reveal pitch-black darkness below, and true enough, Hick could make out what seemed to be the sandy coast of a beach. Their fall began to slow and they landed with a muffled thump. The place immediately felt off to Hick.

"Guys, we're not alone," she whispered, unsheathing a hidden pocketknife from her right ankle. It was too late to reach for the brass knuckles in her backpack.

With a snap of his fingers, Nico conjured up a burst of green underworld flames. As soon as they could see, the demi-gods found themselves face-to-face with the largest cockroach they had ever seen. Everyone froze.

Now, Hick had killed some pretty big bugs in her apartment. Ryan's mom, who lives with Ryan just one floor below, claimed a water bug the size of her fist had climbed out of her bathtub drain, and nobody doubted her. But the creature in front of Hick rose at least four feet in the air. Granted, it was sitting up on its back legs, a very unnatural-looking position for a cockroach, but still…

"Smells what so good, smells what?" a voice hissed, and it took everyone a full minute to realize it had come from the cockroach. They were too stunned to make any sense of the strange words.

"Did… Did it just talk?" Nico whispered.

The cockroach appeared to be sniffing at something, its fillers twitching about in the air.

"Smells what so good, smells what?" it repeated.

Hick took a big sniff and immediately regretted it. There was only one thing that could smell like that. Hazel caught on to the whiff as well and glared at Nico.

"You didn't!" she exclaimed.
"I… I think I pooped my pants," Nico admitted abashedly. "It's just, I couldn't relieve my bowels since we left Camp Half-Blood at midnight, and falling hundreds of feet from the sky is really scary!"
"Ugh, dude!" Hick exclaimed, pulling her shirt over nose.

During her stationed stay with Hazel and Nico in Camp Half-Blood's Hades cabin, she learnt the hard way that Nico was a very smelly pooper. It didn't help that he made pooping a morning ritual. Once his stools stink up the cabin's bathroom, the overpowering stench lingers for more than half a day, and no amount of Febreze could get rid of it.

"Ahhh. Closer come can we, closer come?" said the roach, delicately sweeping the space in front of it with a leg.

"We?" said Percy and Jason in unison. Then they saw the other forms rising out of the dark around them. The smooth black bumps they all had taken for rocks were actually the backs of another dozen or so enormous cockroaches. They clustered around Nico eagerly, waving their antennas in the air and shuddering in delight.

"Uh… hi?" Nico muttered, and they gave an appreciative hiss.
"Be he king, be he? Be he king of Sky-dwellers, be he?" asked the leader, dipping its head in slavish devotion.

"King?" Percy repeated after the cockroach.
"I think they like the way Nico smells," Hick whispered.
"Sky-dwellers?" Hazel said.

"Be you not Sky-dweller human, be you? No Land-dweller you," said one torchbearing roach peering closely at them. "Look much like, but smell not like."

Something seemed to dawn on the leader. "Rat bad." It turned to its comrades. "Leave we Sky-dwellers here, leave we?" The roaches left Nico and drew closely together in consultation and all began to talk at once.

"What's going on?" Nico said.

Hick immediately dropped her backpack to the sandy ground and reached for her brass knuckles, safely nestled between packs of sandwiches and a hidden compartment of matchsticks.

"Hick?" Percy whispered. "What are you doing?"
"I don't know what it is, but something's coming. An army," she replied, shouldering her backpack on again.
"The Creepers?" Jason asked.
"No. I don't know. But they intend to kill," said Hick.

Her hyper senses were starting to sharpen. She heard the snarls and scratches she had picked up from the far distance, smelt the stench of rotting corpses and blood. The skin of every inch of her body started to tingle. This was bad. She thought she had it under control for good. Jason grabbed her by the shoulders and looked into her eyes. Her purple irises were turning into an inky black. He knew.

"Oh gods. It's happening again," he said.
"You know?" asked Hick, her throat tightening.
"Fourth grade. When Ryan, you and I visited José and - "
"I know. Remind me to demand the gods return all my memories of you," Hick cut him off, not wanting to recall the past.

"What's wrong wi - ?" Nico began, but was interrupted by the leader of the roaches. They appeared to have reached a consensus.

"You come, Sky-dwellers. Take to humans," said the leader.
"Humans?" said Hazel, surprised. "There are other humans down here?"

"Ride you, Sky-dwellers, ride you?" said one roach, flattening itself on its stomach before Nico. A few other roaches follow suit. The roaches were offering them a lift.

"Do we have to?" said Nico, staring at the huge roaches in horror.
Without hesitation, Hick and Jason clambered on.

"They're approaching. We should leave," said Hick, avoiding her teammates' eyes as she tried to shield hers. She couldn't let them see her like this. Not like this.

Nico, Hazel and Percy exchanged looks, unsure of what to do.

"She's right," urged Jason. "We need to move."
"Hick, look at me," said Percy, reaching out to pry her fingers away from her face. "What's - "
"Please!" Hick pleaded.

Sensing the urgency in her voice, Nico immediately climbed onto one of the roaches. "Get on," he urged Percy and Hazel.

The rest followed suit and the roaches took off immediately. Now, Hick knew roaches could move fast; she'd watched her mother swat them and believe me you, it was like watching Tom and Jerry in action. Apparently, these giant roaches had maintained their speed with their massive size.

They entered a tunnel and it began to twist and turn. The roaches veered into side passages and even doubled back to choose a new route sometimes. In minutes, Hick was hopelessly lost, she gave up trying to remember directions.

They had been riding the roaches, on the run for quite some time now. From what, Percy has no clue. All he knew was that Jason and Hick were riding side-by-side right in front of him, and they were conversing in hushed voices. Percy strained his ears to make out the words, but the scrapes and rustles of roach legs on dusty grey grounds blocked out the words.

And to be honest, he was starting to feel tired. They had been on horseback all night in the sky, and while they were in a dim-lit tunnel and Percy has no idea what time it is, it is most likely past breakfast. Which means he's feeling sleepy AND hungry. He shrugged off his backpack and fished out a neatly wrapped gyros sandwich out of his parcel of gyros sandwiches. Maybe he should offer one to Hick. No matter how many fights they had picked with each other at Camp Half-Blood, Hick didn't look too well earlier on at the coast, and it wouldn't be nice to starve her.

"Hey, who wants – "

Jason had just reached out and held on to Hick's hand. Percy stared on blankly. Surely it was merely a platonic gesture, a gesture of concern. Nothing romantic. But he felt his chest tighten. The tunnel's dim lighting made it seemed as if Ryan was the one on Hick's side. An image of Hick in Ryan's arms flashed before his eyes, a snippet of the illusion Aphrodite had shown him.

"Percy!" yelled Hazel. He turned to look at her.
"What?" he asked.
"What's wrong with you? I called you so many times, but you didn't reply," said Hazel.
"Nothing," said Percy. "What do you want?"
"Your sandwich is crumbling into bits," said Hazel.

Percy immediately relaxed his grip on the sandwich as soon as he realized that he was squeeze the life out of it, and scrambled to salvage whatever was left of the squashed, crumbly sandwich into the confinements of its plastic wrap. He hadn't realized that he was clenching it so hard.

He cast a glance at Hazel. She seemed to be watching too closely for his comfort. Just when he was about to tell her to cut it out, Percy heard a familiar roar. At first he thought he was mistaken, but as they drew closer he felt sure. It was a crowd and, judging by the sound of it, a big one. But where could you fit a crowd in these tunnels?

The floor began to slope sharply, and Percy found himself lying face flat on his roach's thin, hard shell. Something soft and feathery brushed against his face and arms. Fabric? Wings? He passed through the stuff, and the unexpected light nearly blinded him. His hand instinctively covered his eyes as they tried to adjust.

A gasp went up from a crowd. He'd been right about that part. Then it got unnaturally quiet, and he had the sense that a great number of people were looking at him. Percy began to make out his surroundings. It wasn't really that bright - in fact, it seemed like evening - but he'd been in darkness so long, he couldn't tell. The first thing he made out was the ground, which appeared to be covered with a dusky green moss. Except it wasn't uneven, but smooth as pavement. He could feel its springiness under his feet. "It's a field," he thought. "For some kind of game. That's why there's a crowd. I'm in a stadium."

Slowly it came into focus. A polished wall enclosed a large oval cavern about fifty feet high. The top of the oval was ringed with bleachers. Percy's eyes traveled up the distant rows of people as he tried to find the ceiling. Instead, his eyes found something else more alarming.

"Oh gods," he whispered.

To be continued.