CHAPTER 14: To Be a Hero

Annabeth was sitting on the ground in the park, deep in thought after the news she had just heard. Piper was sitting next to her, her brown-haired head on Annabeth's shoulder, and her face stained with tears. Jason was sitting to the other side, a comforting hand around her back. Hazel sat silently, her eyes unfocused and watery. The rest of them were sitting nearby, all gathered before a cloud of mist with a rainbow reflection.

They had just reached Charleston, South Carolina, when Chiron had urgently sent them an Iris-message, informing them of some grave news. They were still digesting the information, and Chiron was silently waiting for them.

Finally, Annabeth spoke up. "Are you sure that they are all captured, Chiron? Maybe they're just away."

Chiron shook his head. "No god or goddess would be away from Olympus for so long, Annabeth. And not all at once. Something is certainly wrong!"

"I'll say," Percy muttered. "First Reyna, Nico, and Rachel go missing, and then Apollo and Aphrodite are said to be captured, along with, wait, which minor gods?"

"All of them," Chiron answered. "And it's not just on Olympus, either. I got word that Hades and Persephone have gone missing as well. This has serious repercussions! The security in the Underworld will weaken. We may have dead spirits roaming freely if Hades isn't returned!"

"So what can we do, Chiron?" Jason spoke up. "Whoever has taken this many gods is way beyond us."

"It doesn't matter," said Chiron firmly. "We still have to try and find them, no matter what. I've received direct word from Zeus. He has instructed me to send all of the demigods I have to search for the missing gods. He told me to tell Praetor Zhang that those instructions apply to Rome as well."

Frank stood up abruptly at the comment. "And what, we're just supposed to stop looking for Reyna and the others? They're missing too!"

Chiron spread his hands. "I am merely relaying instructions, praetor. Zeus is very frantic and irritable at the moment, so I would not ignore him."

"Is it possible that whoever captured the gods also has Reyna and the others?" Leo asked. "Maybe we can kill two birds with one stone."

"I thought we agreed that they ran away on their own, Leo," said Annabeth. "Though it's possible that they did get captured some point after, explaining why they haven't turned up."

"It doesn't matter," said Chiron definitively. "Both camps have all of their demigods out looking, whether they look for gods or campers makes no difference. They can easily keep their eyes peeled for both simultaneously. I will merely inform them that the stakes have risen considerable, and I advise that the Romans should be told that same."

Suddenly the cloud of mist disappeared, as Chiron had ended the message.

Percy sighed. "We can never get a break, can we."

Annabeth felt the same sentiment. It had been less than two weeks since the end of the Giant War, and now there was some new enemy out there, an enemy capable of kidnapping gods.

To her left, new tears were forming on Piper's face. "They took my mom," she sobbed quietly. "First my friends go missing, and now my mom."

"It's okay," Jason whispered to her quietly. "It's all gonna get worked out, you see."

"Guys, come look at this," Frank called suddenly, standing over a patch of grass. Everyone, save Jason and Piper, hustled over to where the praetor was standing. Annabeth peered at the ground, and her eyes widened.

It was the burnt outline of the chain, the same as by the Great Salt Lake.

"This again," said Hazel softly, still upset at the news of her father. "What does it mean?"

"A chain…" Annabeth mused. "A chain. Chains are used to capture people."

"Yeah, people," Percy replied. "Not gods."

"Percy, look where we are," said Annabeth. "We've been here before. It's the same park that Hazel, Piper, and I saw Aphrodite. It's the same park where she's known to appear, and she's one of the goddesses who's been captured! It can't be a coincidence!"

"So, wait," said Frank. "We trace Reyna to Salt Lake City, and we find an outline of a chain. We go to Charleston, and we find the same chain in the place where Aphrodite likes to hang out. Maybe they were captured by the same person."

"I was thinking the same thing," said Annabeth. "And I have an inkling of who it was that captured them." She slowly reached into her pocket and pulled out a certain squashed top hat, a top hat that bore a lot of confusing words, but among them was one name. Suzy Turquois Blue.

Rachel's jaw was agape as she slowly wandered through Sunday's Elysium. Since they had been at the whole god-napping thing for a while, they had been given a longer break than usual, by House time. They had returned safely and uneventfully to Saturday's office via Improbable Stair, where Saturday's Dusk along with a cadre of Sorcerous Supernumeraries escorted Athena to where she would be held. They were then given freedom of the House for twenty-four hours House time, after which they would embark again on their next missive.

Rachel spent the first twelve hours of her break sleeping. Catching gods was tiring work, and she hadn't realized how exhausted she was until the collapsed upon her bed. Her sleep was dreamless and deep, the best kind. She then woke up, had some tea and biscuits for breakfast (surprise, surprise), and then took to wandering the Elysium, her favorite part of the House.

She paused for a moment as she walked past a really grand room that contained living flowers that were somehow made of gold. Every now and then she needed to take one of these pauses, to try and wrap her mind around the fact that she was where she was, in a strange, beautiful place, striving to make her own Earth a better place free of meddlesome, greedy gods who caused so much strife. It was all very overwhelming at times, but at those times she paused, took a breath, and kept going. She knew she was doing the right thing.

After a few more minutes of wandering, Rachel came upon the grandest room she'd seen yet, so grand that it made her eyes pop. It was a square room, with walls that were pure white in color. On the walls, written in tiny, golden letters, were millions of words, which closer inspection revealed to be names. Rachel noticed that the names were not constant, either. Each name would be on the wall for a few seconds, then would disappear, to be replaced by another name. This caused a flickering sensation to be seen on all four walls of the room.

What made the room truly impressive, however, were the tall, bronze statues. There were five of them, standing in a circle that surrounded a small fountain and facing outward. Rachel walked closer, looking at each statue in detail. One depicted some sort of officer with long hair, one depicted a young-looking fellow with some small object in his hand, one depicted an old, grizzled sailor, one depicted another old man, this one wearing a toga, and the last depicted a woman with a beautiful face and a piercing gaze.

"I see you've found the Room of Remembrance," said a familiar voice. Rachel turned and found that it was Arthur that stood in the doorway, a wan smile on his face.

"The Room of Remembrance?" Rachel asked. "What's that?"

"Exactly what it sounds like," Arthur replied. "It's a room to remember all of the Denizens who died when the first House was destroyed." A pained look crossed his face, but he continued. "You see, only those who were in the presence of a Key for an extended period of time could be resurrected. And precious few Denizens fell into that category."

"That's sad," said Rachel. She remembered what Lord Sunday had told them that very first day, about how the House was destroyed the first time. "I hope you don't blame yourself for what happened."

Arthur shook his head. "I know it wasn't my fault. There was no way I could've known what the Architect had planned."

Arthur walked further into the room, looking up at the grand, bronze statues.

"Who were they?" Rachel asked. "They must've been very important."

Arthur nodded. "They were the only superior Denizens who died and couldn't or wouldn't be brought back. "That's the Lieutenant-Keeper of the Front Door." He pointed to the officer. "I didn't see him all that much, but he was very helpful to me on several occasions." He moved on, pointing to the young-looking man. "That's the Piper. He looked like that for most of his existence, but was changed when Saturday threw him into the Void. We were enemies, but he was Sunday's brother, and his Children and Rats were amazing, so he was included."

"Rats?" Rachel asked.

"The Piper once gathered a bunch of rats, made them intelligent, and brought them to the House," Arthur answered. He swallowed hard. "Unfortunately, there are no more Raised Rats after what happened. And the Piper's Children…" Arthur but his quivering lip. "There's only Suzy and Fred left."

Rachel put a comforting hand on Arthur's shoulder, hoping to cheer him up a little. She could tell that this room was very hard for him.

Arthur composed himself, and moved on. "That grizzled sailor is the Mariner," he said. "He was a great friend of mine. Sacrificed himself so that I could claim the Seventh Key from Sunday, and he'd helped me a few other times before." A flash of sadness crossed his face, but, again, he bit it back. "Next is the Old One. He also helped me once or twice, chained to that clock of his. He didn't deserve what he got, not at all, but he's part of the Architect, and so dies with Her."

Arthur circled around coming to the last statue, the one of the woman. "And that…that is Dame Primus. The Architect's Will. Part of the Architect Herself, actually. Wanting to die, the Architect turned her remaining essence into the Will, which the Trustees broke and all. You know the story."

Rachel stared up at the figure with a new sense of reverence. So that's what the Architect looked like. In some ways, she was surprised. She wasn't expecting the godlike Architect, who created the entire Universe, to look so human. Yet, at the same time, she wasn't surprised by the Architect's appearance. Her stern face made it clear that She was the one in charge, and those piercing eyes made all those who looked at them want to obey.

"She was one heck of a pain to deal with," said Arthur, gazing up at Dame Primus, "but, strangely, I miss her, too. She did help me out, a few times. You could add her to the list of people I'd be dead without."

"That's the thing about being a hero, Arthur," said Rachel wisely. "We all have lists like that, a mile long. No one can ever do it alone."

"There's one problem with that," Arthur replied, a sad smile on his face. "I'm not a hero." He then silently walked out of the room.

Rachel stood there for ten minutes longer, lost in thought at Arthur's words. I'm not a hero. Was that true? Were any of them heroes?

It was a tough question. Rachel knew what a hero meant in terms of mythology, people who, at the gods' command, went out on dangerous journeys to achieve some end for the immortals that sent them. That's what the seven of the Great Prophecy (which she had uttered) did, the gods commanded them to go save them, and so they went. Without a single thought.

That's not what I'm doing, Rachel realized. No, she was doing what she did out of her own volition. She wasn't some grand adventurer who trekked the world fighting monsters with glorious weapons for some god, she was doing small things, for the improvement of the world. And she was doing them at her own behest.

"He's right," Rachel said aloud. "We're not heroes."

And the thought made her happy.

The skies above Central Park were clear and blue. Annabeth was atop Blackjack with Percy, her hands around his waist, both for safety and for comfort. The rest of the group was nearby, either in the air or close to the ground, as they followed the two metallic dogs that were their guides.

Not twenty minutes after their conversation with Chiron, the two dogs had begun sniffing the air, and took off northward. That was late Thursday evening. It was now Friday morning, a clear, beautiful day, and the dogs had led them to Central Park in Manhattan. Annabeth smiled to herself as she recalled the memory of the dogs hounding across the George Washington Bridge, nearly causing a traffic nightmare, but her fond memory didn't last long, as she recalled the seriousness of the current situation.

Percy guided Blackjack onto a small field in the park where Aurum and Argentum had stopped. The rest of their friends also gathered in that area, and the metallic hounds were circling a single spot, sniffing intently.

"What do you think is down there?" Annabeth asked Percy, indicating the spot that the dogs were sniffing at.

"I'll give you three guesses," Percy replied.

Sure enough, what awaited them was another burnt outline of a chain on the grass, in a corner between a boulder and a hedge. That, however, was the least surprising revelation in the field. More toward the center was a giant, circular black patch on the ground that everyone stood gaping at. It didn't look burnt, it was as if all of the grass had suddenly disappeared and was replaced by some black circle. There were a couple of other burnt patched throughout the field, though these were not definitively shaped.

"It looks like another god was captured," Frank said grimly. "And right under the gods' nose, too."

"I wonder who," said Leo. "I hope it wasn't Calypso…"

"Calypso can take care of herself," said Piper, putting a comforting hand on his shoulder.

"It seems like some other stuff happened here, too," Jason pointed out. "First off, what the Hades is that?" He pointed to the large black defilation.

"I don't know," said Percy. Slowly, ever so slowly, he crept toward the patch and leaned down. He stuck out a finger, and placed in on the patch.

Suddenly he recoiled. "Ouch!" he exclaimed.

"Percy!" said Annabeth, rushing to his side. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," said Percy, sucking on his wounded finger. He took it out of his mouth and showed it to the rest of the group. It looked mostly undamaged, but there was a small, unmissable scar at the tip of his index finger.

"Okay, stay away from the black stuff, got it," Leo noted.

"Do you have any idea what it might be, Annabeth?" Hazel asked. All of the others' eyes turned to her as well. At first, she was confused, why were they all asking her? Oh, right, daughter of Athena.

"I've, uh, never seen anything like this," she answered. "I've never read about it either."

"Okay, so we don't know what this stuff is, only that it's dangerous," said Frank. "It doesn't matter, we just have to keep following the hounds."

The hounds, however, had sat down, and were unmoving. Clearly, this Suzy Turquois Blue hadn't moved. Which was good, since it meant she was probably nearby.

"It doesn't look like the hounds are going anywhere anytime soon," said Annabeth. "It means that whoever we're looking for is in the city. We should just wait here, rest up a bit, and then maybe search the nearby area."

Jason nodded. "Resting up a bit sounds good to me."

"But not for too long," said Piper firmly. "I want to find the person that kidnapped my mom, and Reyna and the others."

Suddenly a burst of mist appeared out of nowhere, a rainbow reflection with it. Annabeth knew what that meant. She fished through a pocket of hers, and found a golden drachma, which she tossed into the mist. It disappeared, and the rainbow was replaced by Chiron's face.

"I see you are in New York City already," Chiron said, not bothering with any greetings. "Good. The Olympians will need the nearby aid if it becomes necessary."

"What is it, Chiron," said Annabeth. "Is there news?"

"Yes," said Chiron. "And like the rest, it's not good news. In fact, it's the worst news yet."

"Oh boy," Hazel muttered.

"Strange things happened at camp last night," Chiron explained. "It all started not an hour after we finished speaking last night when you were in Charleston. I ended the Iris-message, brooding over these dark times. I was in the Big House when I suddenly heard a popping noise."

"A popping noise?" Percy asked, raising his eyebrows.

"Indeed," said Chiron. "I rushed outside, as did most of the camp, but I didn't notice anything wrong immediately. Then my attention drifted to Half-Blood Hill..." Chiron trailed off.

"Chiron," Annabeth urged, "what happened?"

"The Athena Parthenos," said Chiron slowly. "It was gone."

There seemed to be a collective inhale of breath from the group.

"That's not all," Chiron continued. "Not too long after, I received a message from Olympus. Athena has been taken."

Annabeth's eyes widened, and her vision began to blur. At first, she wasn't sure that she had heard correctly. Athena? Captures? She's too smart for that. But then it began to settle in. She had not misheard, and Chiron had not misspoken. She was in a complete state of shock, unmoving, and unresponsive.

"Annabeth," Percy called in a gentle tone. "Annabeth!"

No response. She couldn't register anyone speaking, she could barely hear a thing. Only one thought reverberated through her head, that her mother was gone.