"Who comes up with this stuff?" Percy voiced the complaints in his muscles.
He was getting tired, and he still had one more baddy to go. Star had face planted and skidded over the edge (still funny) and he skewered Omega before he could get another punch in. Percy thought Omega had broken his jaw earlier when he punched him. He was strong, but he was slow.
And now, he got to fight the one guy who avoided his earthquake. Ari, the winged werewolf.
That's right. He's a werewolf.
With wings.
Percy wonder if "All Dogs go to Heaven" would apply to dog-men as well.
Percy yelled and charged like a maniac. Ari fluttered away and dodged his swings like a pro. Well, maybe not the same way Max does, Ari was a little clunkier in movement. Maybe he wasn't born with the wings in mind.
Now that's a disturbing sci-fi movie waiting to happen.
Percy soon tired himself out. He let his sword dip and resisted the urge to put his hands on his knees. He was out of breath.
"Is it my turn yet?" Ari snarled.
"Uh...no?" Percy answered hesitantly.
Ari swiped at him anyways. The first in a flurry of scratches and punches that Percy wasn't prepared for. His eye was bruising, his shirt was raked across the front, and his arms were soon covered in cuts and even newer bruises.
Meanwhile, Max defended herself against Luke desperately. The shield helped, but she wasn't trained in how to use it. She sluggishly brought it up to defend herself, and barely makes it each time.
Percy felt more offended about Luke being here than about the beat down he was getting from Ari. Luke, the real Luke, died right in front of him to keep Kronos from destroying Olympus. He used Annabeth's knife to do it.
Annabeth...
Percy hit the ground with a thud. Ari stood over him in his combat boots and army fatigue. He held up one of his claws.
"Giving up?" He taunted. He brought his claws down on top of him.
Percy held up his sword arm and parried the killer blow.
"Not. Yet." He breathed, pushing Ari back and getting back up.
He had to see this through. For Annabeth's sake, he needed to make sure that the Luke he saw here was fake.
Percy needed a pick-me-up, badly.
He charged Ari, but instead of trying to hit him, he struck the ground a few feet away, and the ground split in front him, spewing a geyser up at the wolf kid. Then he jumped into it and rode the new current up towards Ari. Striking above Ari.
The look on his face was priceless.
He sliced off one wing, which exploded in a cloud of shadows, and sent Ari spiraling like a helicopter leaf in the fall. Percy ran over quickly with his new found energy and finished the fight.
Ari turned into a dissipating black mass under him.
"Thank you."
He turned around to see that Max had finished her fight. Luke's foot was twitching and there was a shield imbedded into the ground where his neck should be. Percy was thankful he couldn't see the head from this angle. The body was thankfully turning into shadows as well.
"Dang," he said, "You're brutal."
"Yeah, well," she shrugged, "he called me a lousy flier."
Percy nodded to her. "Thanks," he said, "Some things...just need to stay buried, ya' know?"
Max nodded as she watched the last of Ari fade away.
"Yeah," she agreed, "Ari died a long time ago. It's about time he had his rest."
"WAVE 3 BEGINS!"
Percy then spotted something emerging from the shadows. An old enemy. The Minotaur stomped into existence with its armor and a big axe. The blade of the axe was still shaped like an Omega symbol, and it still had the camp necklaces looped into the blade.
Before Percy could go back to being angry, Max tapped his shoulder.
"Gozen," she pointed.
Percy turned to see Frankenstein's Monster on an unhealthy diet of steroids. He stood eight feet tall, had one arm longer and bigger than the other, and had metal plates bulging from under his skin. Some skin on his arm had torn to expose the metal under it.
"You have got to be kidding me," Percy readied his sword.
"How do you beat this guy?" Max asked him, standing at his back.
"Deep stab in his gut should do the job," Percy answered, "How do you beat this behemoth?"
"Uh..." Max thought for a second, "There was a hurricane involved..."
"You don't say..." Percy wondered smugly.
They charged their opponents with a new resolve and gusto, screaming at the tops of their lungs.