Hey guys :)

I know I haven't updated in a while, and, as usual, I feel really terrible about it :( I'm sorry I left this for so long but...I've been really stressed out lately. I'd tell you why, but I'm sure that you'd all rather just read on right? It has been a long time after all and I'm sure that you'd all like to know who's going on the quest and what their plan of action is...

So, without further ado, here's another chapter of SON :)

Son of Neptune

Chapter: 11

Leo

"Alright, alright, quieten down!" Chiron shouted over the noise and hammered his big hoof on the marble to get everyone's attention. Leo instantly looked up from his checklist of things that needed to be done and started distractedly peeling off the outside off his pencil. He couldn't stand this; sitting around the table with the other camp counselors while there was still so much he had to do. He now had a deadline, and if he didn't reach it-

"As you all know," Chiron said, cutting off Leo's panicked thoughts, "the Argo II is set to sail in exactly 12 hours and we still need to decide on the crew. So far, we know that Jason, Piper, Leo, Thalia, Annabeth and Nico are going, which leaves two places, according to the Oracle."

"Wait, how do you know for sure that Annabeth and Nico are going?" Connor Stoll asked, raising his eyebrows.

"Chiron managed to contact them while they were at Percy's apartment and told them the new plan," Jason explained.

"Which is?" Will Solace from the Apollo cabin asked, stretching out the word 'is' and leaning forward.

"Leo?" Jason prompted.

"On it," Leo said, reaching into his tool belt – which he now had a habit of never taking off – and pulling out a small piece of paper about the size of his palm that had been folded an impossible amount of times.

"You're kidding, right?" Piper asked, looking at the paper cynically. "Couldn't you have found a bigger one?"

Leo smiled knowingly. "Wait for it," he said before starting to skilfully unfold the paper, stopping a minute later when it was the size of the ping pong table, revealing a huge map. Piper stared at it in wonder but didn't ask questions – they were so used to weird stuff happening that nothing seemed to surprise them much anymore.

"So anyway," Leo started, his finger starting on Long island and then travelling to New York. "Our first stop is going to be over New York where Chiron arranged to meet up with Annabeth and Nico. And when I say 'over' I mean it literally. I know the mist is powerful stuff, but I think it's probably safer to keep the boat, well, floating while we pick up the 'runaways,'" Leo explained before tracing the red line that Jason had drawn earlier until his finger stopped over the Gulf of Mexico. "Then we'll land on the Gulf of Mexico for the night, find a nice secluded spot and then rest up before heading off in the morning." His finger continued along the red line and stopped on Colorado. "Our next stop is in Colorado where Jason agreed to meet Thalia, and then from there we'll head straight to…" he tapped the Bay area with his finger tip and smiled. "Any questions?"

"Great plan," Clarisse said slowly, her voice dripping with sarcasm. "But what I want to know is what's going to happen when we get there. I mean, didn't any of you listen to what I told you before? If a giant flying ship shows up those Romans are going to go crazy and attack us!"

Leo looked over at Jason and they shared a knowing smile.

"We'll fill you in on that as soon as we know who's going," Jason said, folding the map up at best he could and handing it to Leo who rolled his eyes and started to refold it to keep his fingers busy. "But that's the basic plan. So who's in?"

"I'm coming," Clarisse said, her spear hitting the marble loudly, and the tip sent off a small spark making everyone jump in their seats. "I want to know what this plan of yours is and see if it's stupid and idiotic enough to fail and start a full out war between the Romans and us."

"Well that's a great excuse to go," Leo muttered and Clarisse glared daggers at him.

"I'm going too," Grover said, standing up. "I'm not about to let all of you go off to rescue Percy without me."

"So I guess that's everyone then," Piper said, beginning to count on her fingers. "Me, Jason, Leo, Annabeth, Nico, Thalia, Clarisse and Grover. Everyone ok with that?"

Thankfully there were no objections and Leo felt his attention span finally snap.

"Great, thanks for coming everyone. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a ship to build," he said, standing up so fast that he sent his chair clattering to the floor and headed out the door, ignoring Jason and Piper who were calling him back.

Leo stood on the deck with a clipboard in one hand, a pen in the other and a white hardhat on his scruffy head. They were meant to set sail in less than twenty minutes and Leo was really on edge. And when he was on edge he needed to keep himself busy, so while Jason, Piper and the others got their gear together, he had grabbed his backpack and decided to inspect the almost complete Argo II one last time. Or maybe two…if he had time.

And then there was still one last thing that he had to do, and he wanted to do it alone. But for now it could wait.

After ticking off another one of his boxes on his list, he leaned heavily on the main mast to check the strength of the wood. Once he was satisfied with the result, he tilted his head up towards the top, his eyes analysing the yard and the large sail which was bundled up tightly with ropes. At this point, he could only hope that Nyssa had checked them correctly so it wouldn't fall and or kill anyone - namely Jason who was to stand just behind the two sails.

He then did one last inspection of the ropes and knots that secured the sails before heading below deck, hitting his head accidently as he went under.

Rubbing his forehead with the back of his hand and muttering under his breath, Leo headed towards the front of the ship where the five cabins – complete with hammocks along the walls – had been expertly built. This way, there were just enough of them for the eight campers on the quest, plus an extra space for Percy upon Annabeth's request, just in case. And although they were built to be very small, Leo had figured that since it was only two to a cabin and everyone would spend most of their time on deck or in the control room, everyone could live with it. It was only two days after all.

After assessing each of the cabins in turn, Leo continued through the ship, walking past the lavatories and heading into the control room which took up half of the whole Argo II. Inside was an old computer equipped to be a GPS so they could monitor their position, and along the main wall was a huge screen which was connected to the computer so they could project whatever they wanted on it. In front of the screen there was a large sofa, donated by the Ares campers who had swiped it from the Big House, causing Mr. D to have a fit – but it was worth it. Not to mention that the idea of sitting on the sofa and watching movies on the big screen while sitting inside the giant flying ship sounded so awesome to Leo. Too bad he was helping to lead the quest and needed to, you know, focus.

The other impressive feature that had been added to the control room was the interactive whiteboard which was hanging on the other wall of the room. This had been given to them by the Athena campers, and although they'd only given it up because it was old and broken, it wasn't too hard to get working once Leo and his siblings got their hands on it. They even managed to give it a heat sensor so they could use it like you would use an iPad. Well, a giant iPad the size of a large window anyway.

Once he'd completed a full inspection of the massive room and resisted the urge to start watching 'Transformers' on the giant screen, Leo turned and walked into the last room; the stables. Well, it wasn't much of a 'stable' – more like two stalls for Pegasai, but they still called it that anyway. Originally it had just been a spare room and Leo didn't really know what to use it for – although Travis and Connor Stoll insisted that it should be used as an arcade – but after Jason and Annabeth discussed a strategy over an IM they had told Leo to use it as a stable. Annabeth had even decided on which Pegasai they were going to take – although Leo didn't really see a difference. The first one was a typical white coated Pegasus called (insert a Pegasus name here until Leo can remember the real name), and the second was the complete opposite as it had a shiny black coat and its name was… something to do with a Casino.

Jeez, when his dad said that he wasn't good with "living organisms" he wasn't kidding. But really, why someone would name a Pegasus after a game that could be played in a Casino, Leo wasn't sure but...Blackjack! His name was Blackjack!

Shaking his head to clear his thoughts he walked out of the room and back up onto the deck, ticking another box on his list as he went.

Back on deck Leo found Jason waiting on the ground below him.

"Leo, would you hurry up already? We really need to get a move on!" He called up and Leo grinned, hiding his nerves.

"Dude, do you want to be crushed by a mast?" Leo asked and Jason shot him a look. "What? It could happen!"

"I'm sure everything's fine."

"And why would you assume that?" Leo teased with a smirk. "Is it because I'm the best ship builder in the world?"

Jason rolled his eyes. "Just get down from there and help me get the Pegasai and the other campers."

"Not until you say it!"

Jason groaned while Leo looked down at his clipboard and half ticked another thing off his list:

Annoy Jason and get him to say that you're the best boat builder in the world. Half check.

"Leo, you're the best boat builder in the world, happy?" He said, obviously growing impatient with his friend.

Check. Leo smiled as he ticked off the second last thing on his list. "Yes I am, Jason. I'll meet you at the stables. There's...something I've still got to do."

"Alright, but be quick," Jason said, racing out the door.

Leo smiled sadly as he reached into his pocket and took out drawing he'd done of the boat as a child, examining it carefully. Everything that was in the drawing was now part of the Argo II. Well...almost everything.

He walked slowly to the stern of the boat and carefully picked up Festus's sad looking head in his arms and carrying it back to the front.

"Do me proud, Festus," he murmured as he started to attach the large head to the front of the Argo II.

As Leo stood on deck and looked out over camp half-blood he could have sworn that everyone at camp had come to see them off. Or maybe they were there to laugh at him if the ship didn't fly…

Leo brushed the thought from his mind and smiled at Jason and Piper. It was going to work. It was going to work. It was going to work…

"Are we going to start sailing or not?" Clarisse asked impatiently, her big arms folded across her chest. Grover stood behind her, chewing nervously on a can. Leo guessed that his whole bag was probably filled to the brim with them and hoped that if he ran out he wouldn't resort to eating the Argo II. Did Saytyrs even eat wood?

"You ready?" Piper asked, looking between Leo and Jason and Leo shook himself awake before nodding.

Leo motioned for Piper to help him untie the knots to loosen the sail while Jason got into position just behind the large piece of fabric.

"Don't do anything until I say so," Leo told the son of Jupiter, letting Piper finish off the remaining knots and taking his place at the tiller. He'd designed the mechanism himself so that he was able to manipulate the sails by tilting the tiller at a certain angle rather than doing it manually. He had also designed the sails in a way that they could be blown upwards – kind of like a hot air balloon, but more on that later – as well as forwards. It had taken a lot of planning and work from the Hephaestus campers, but they had somehow managed to pull it off.

Carefully, he changed the direction of the sails slightly so that they wouldn't smash into Thalia's pine on the way out and tilted them upwards so that the boat would sail up rather than drag along the ground.

"Alright, Piper, your turn," he said handing the tiller to her and standing next to Jason behind the sails. His job was to give the Argo II a bit of an extra boost, but the flying was really all up to Jason.

Everyone who was watching from below and the campers on deck fell into silence as they held their breaths.

It will work…

The boys nodded at each other and then Jason started up the winds while Leo felt his body heat up, sending a tingling sensation throughout his muscles. He was careful about how much heat he used, however, and eventually the two combining powers making the Argo II creek in anticipation.

Come on, come on… Leo thought, biting his lip. It will work, it will work, it will work...

And, sure enough, the boat started to rise off the ground, slowly at first, but then it picked up speed and flew straight into the air. Leo let out a loud 'whoop!' as the crowd cheered and everyone on deck shared some smiles and laughed.

"You did it Leo!" Piper exclaimed excitedly, and Leo looked at her over his shoulder.

"Yeah, I knew it would work," he said proudly, lessening the heat slightly. "Alright Piper, like I showed you. Less up and more, you know, forward."

"First stop, New York!" Jason said, with a grin.

Yay Leo! You finally made the boat flllyyyy!

Yup, I'm tired and need to sleep I think. I'm sorry if there are any mistakes in this chapter - it was sooo hard to write and I'm really tired :( The next chapter gets better - more talk of Percy, Annabeth and Nico will come and there will be a twist! I mean, I can't just let this journey be easy for them, can I? MUhahahaha :)

And one last thing to say about this chapter - I had to specifically draw out flight plans and boat plans myself! I also had to learn all the boat talk...gah, it was so annoying, but cool. So now I have a random map sitting in my folder as a reminder of where they're going :)

Alright, bedtime.

R&R?

-Bell