Everyone in camp knew that if Percy Jackson picked up a bow and arrow, you ran for cover.

All of the kids in the Apollo cabin had tried to teach Percy how to shoot, even Casey, a small eleven-year-old daughter of Apollo had given it a shot, in the end, though they had all come to the same undeniable conclusion.

Percy Jackson couldn't shoot.

Chiron had tried in vain to teach him, the trainer of heroes having to pick arrows out of his tail every time he tried.

Some people had even been sent to the infirmary with minor wounds, some failing to get out of the way fast enough, others being too reckless on where they landed after jumping away from a stray arrow.

The problem had gotten so bad that Chiron banned him from picking up a bow and arrow without warning everyone within thirty feet first.

No one, not the Apollo cabin, Chiron or even the Athena kids could figure out why he couldn't shoot a bow.

His stance was right, almost perfect really; he had had it drilled into his head every time someone thought it would be a good idea to try and teach him archery again. So no one could argue his form was wrong.

There were no problems with the bows or the arrows either; Will Solace always made sure that they were in perfect condition.

So it was an increasingly frustrating mystery.

Chiron had asked Percy multiple times if he felt like something was wrong when shooting or if something had happened in his life that made him a lousy shot. Confused Percy had said that nothing had ever happened in his memory to make him have a bad shot.

Later Annabeth had explained to him how Chiron had suspected that maybe one of the gods had cursed him without him knowing.

So when the campers were on a boat on Long Island Sound has a mandatory archers competition, people were dreading Percy's turn.

The competition was simple, targets were set up along the beach in a line, and the campers from the boats they were on would have to try and shoot at them, the person to get the most accurate shots got a special dessert at dinner.

When it was Percy's turn, the people on his boat scrambled to get behind him, some of his previous victims even going as far to have shields to protect them in case of any stray arrows.

Percy for his part just rolled his eyes and prepared to make a fool out of himself, again.

But when he grabbed the arrow and placed it on the bow, something was different. He could feel it.

So, he took the proper stance that had been drilled into him, pulled back on the bow and focused on the target in front of him and released the arrow.

There was no screams of pain, no scuffling to get out of the way, and no splash of the arrow falling uselessly into the water.

Instead, there was a dull, thunk! As the arrow landed solidly on the innermost rim of the target.

There was a stunned silence.

Chiron wheeled forward to get a better look, then he turned to Percy, his eyes wide.

"By the gods, do that again."

Percy complied, grabbing another arrow and pulling back the bow. Another thunk! Met their ears as another arrow joined the first.

Chiron studied him carefully, thinking hard.

None of the other campers had said anything to him yet; they had settled for murmuring amongst themselves as Chiron thought about this new turn of events.

Finally, Chiron spoke. "Percy, when you shot, did it feel different to you?"

Percy nodded, recalling how he had felt different before shooting this time around.

"Well, Percy I do believe we have just solved why you are such a bad archer on land." Chiron's brown eyes shone with mirth as he continued speaking. "It seems that when you shoot on land, you try and compensate for the movement of the waves like you would do on a ship. However, when you are on land, there are no waves, throwing your shots off course. Thus, it appears you are bad at archery when, in reality, you can shoot a bow and arrow fairly well."

Percy smiled. "This is great! I'm not horrible at archery!"

Annabeth, who had been standing off to the side for the original purpose of trying not to get hit by Percy and his dreaded arrows (again), spoke up.

"That makes a lot of sense. It's too bad that means he still won't be able to shoot on land though."

All of the previous victims of Percy's archery groaned and shuddered in horror realizing that now Percy would want to shoot arrows more often.

Percy smiled at them.