Chapter 14
I was really happy with the number of suggestions that came in, it really showed me that people really do care about the direction that this story will take. It's probably a result of you guys that I managed to get this chapter up at all, so you can all give yourselves some well deserved pats on the back.
Ouranos' POV
True to my word, I intended to guide young Jackson away from the camp that morning, but there was one more thing that I decided could be done before his departure. Although I had even greater plans for the next few days, there was another thing that could crush his will even further: what if his last true friend decided that they were angry with him as well? I licked my lips deliciously, noticing that the girl who I needed was on her way to the camp at that very moment. Everything was going according to plan.
Thalia's POV
It would be an understatement to say that I was disappointed with Percy. I had always seen him as the most honourable of all men, but the fact that Artemis had told me that he had intentionally flirted with one of my hunters, Briony, directly disputed that firm belief. In fact, part of me could still hardly believe that it was true. The idea of Percy flirting with any girl, let alone one of the hunters, just could not formulate in my mind; it simply wasn't comprehensible. But, Artemis was my leader and I had to trust her on this one, otherwise the whole system which I lived my life on would have fallen apart. The word of Artemis was law, even when insulting my friend. To be fair, it did appear to make sense that this could have been the cause of her odd behaviour the night before because I couldn't see many other ways that the two of them could have fallen out so suddenly. So, after convincing myself that Percy was guilty of the charge against him, I made my way to the camp with the express purpose of putting him right. Nobody flirted with my hunters, not even my best friend.
I got a few odd looks in my direction as I walked through the morning camp scene, nobody used to having unscheduled visits from hunters, and more than a few campers thought that it would be funny to boast loudly about their victory in capture the flag the night before. Of course, had I cared too much about their tiresome and pathetic self appraisal, I would have been quick to remind them of the outcomes of the fifty six matches beforehand. The thought of putting some of them in their place put a smirk to my face.
Arriving at cabin number three, just about fifteen-twenty metres separating me from the building where I'd used to sleep, I politely knocked on the door. I was surprised upon hearing commotion inside the cabin, and soon after the voice of my friend telling me to enter. If there was one thing that I was sure about Percy, it was that he still had the classic teenage aversion to mornings. Seeing him up and about before eleven, apart from when he was in the middle of a quest, had come to be seen as a kind of rare phenomenon, so him being even awake enough to tell me that I could enter was certainly a surprise. Shrugging my shoulders, I pushed the door open gently and entered the cabin of the sea god.
He looked at me, a mild caution seeming to prevent the usual smile from breaking over his face. I guessed that he knew why I was here, and his reaction perhaps proved his guilt.
"Oh, hiya Thals." He said with a fake joviality. "Didn't expect to see you this morning."
I willed my eyes to darken in the way that they normally did in the heat of battle. My plan was to intimidate my friend into promising that he would never, ever even think about approaching one of my hunters again. "Why did you do it, Percy?"
Judging my the lack of surprise on his features, I guessed that my assumption had been correct; he knew that I was there to talk to him about what had happened with Artemis the night before. "I don't know what she has said that I've done, Thals, but I can almost guarantee that it is not true."
"Don't insult Lady Artemis in front of me, Jackson." My voice was authoritative and cold in a way that I imagined a policeman's would be like when talking to a criminal. "I have every reason to believe that you are as guilty as she says."
"Jackson?" He spat incredulously. "Why are you calling me that suddenly? Seriously, what am I supposed to have done?"
Although still sure that he knew exactly what I was talking about, I decided to play ball. "You flirted with one of my girls, Jackson, and you know it."
"Did she tell you this?" His face moulded into an expression of disgust at the thought of the leader of the hunt.
"I assume that you are talking about Lady Artemis, and yes. She did." I replied, firmly standing my ground.
In his eyes I saw the spark of a madness that had never been cured, a blaze which only lit when he was at his angriest. Unfortunately, that seemed to be quite often at that time. For the first time, I wondered whether I was doing the right thing in telling him off; whether he was guilty at all. Disgustedly, he barged past me and stepped out into the open. I followed, grabbing his shoulder and trying to pull him back inside. The last thing we needed was an audience.
"Look at yourself for one moment, Thalia." The demigod shouted at me, animosity dominating his tone. "Why would you believe her lies? When have I ever come even close to flirting with one of your hunters? Gods, I thought that at least I could rely on you to believe me."
A crowd had begun to gather, people interestedly looking on at the fight between me and him, two children of the powerful big three. Our conflicts were always the most interesting to watch; people were probably passing bets around at the outcome already. "Then just tell me what happened, Percy." I pleaded with him, still trying to drag him back out of sight.
He threw my hand off his shoulder. "Just ask Briony. She'll confirm everything that I've said."
Without another look in my direction, he started to sprint away as quickly as he could, as if there was no place where he would less rather be. Glaring daggers at the onlookers, I tried to follow him.
He looked back at me one last time, speaking emotionally. "I am sick and tired of being betrayed by everyone I hold most dear."
Before I had the opportunity to speak, the air around Percy suddenly started to shimmer and he started to disappear, he himself looking as surprised as everybody around him. Slowly, his body began to fade like a hologram dying out and it wasn't long before he was totally gone, the ground where he'd been standing lying untouched as if nothing had happened.
A few confused murmurs sounded from the stunned crowd. "What just happened?" Where's he gone?" "Has Percy Jackson just been disintegrated?"
Unfortunately, I didn't know the answer to a single one of the three questions. It didn't look as though he had been harmed, more like a teleportation, but who was I to make assumptions? I'd never seen anything like it; demigods could not teleport like the gods could. Wherever he was, I just hoped that he was okay.
Ouranos' POV
Witnessing the morning's events, I knew that the situation could not have gone better if I'd organised it myself; it was almost as if Artemis and her hunters were trying to give me dominion over the young and powerful demigod's mind. I could see that he had never, ever felt so alone in his entire life, and therefore his mind was totally ready for my control. I did not need to take control over Perseus' entire body, all I needed to do was to have the ability to place ideas and objectives in his mind. That was exactly how my plan was so ingenious: to the onlooker, Perseus would act no differently to how he had ever done, but it would be me telling him exactly what to do. There was just one more thing that I needed, a grand finale, a beautiful crescendo which would leave him completely dedicated to finding the Olympians, my arrogant descendants, and killing them all. Wiping them from the face of the planet. But that would take place another day. Transporting the demigod from Camp Half-Blood through air travel, I was the true Lord of the Sky after all, I lay him to sleep and rest my palace in the sky. When he awoke, he would be ready to receive my blessing, the powers that he would need to take down the Olympians. The final part of my plan would go ahead, and Olympus would be as good as mine.
Artemis' POV
"What do you mean, he just vanished?" I asked her doubtfully, obviously taking her story with more than a pinch of salt. Immediately I felt guilty; our relationship was based on trust, and she certainly had no reason to lie.
Thalia threw her hands up despairingly. "I don't know how else I can describe it, he just vanished in front of our eyes. The air around him shimmered a little bit and he definitely looked confused – I don't think that he vanished himself. But you can ask anyone there, they'll all confirm exactly what I've said."
I nodded, showing my trust in her words. "Okay, so we need to work out who or what teleported him. This is very concerning indeed."
"Ares?" Thalia suggested, mirroring my own suspicions.
"He certainly has a motive," I agreed, rubbing my chin wisely, "But he's still on the run, isn't he? Do you think that he'd take such a risk?"
My lieutenant put her face in her hands worriedly, showing me that she was a lot more concerned than she was letting on. Although I knew that the two had been arguing before he had vanished, still she had not decided to indulge me as to what their spat was about. However, if she'd gone and blamed him for what I guessed that she had, then there was no doubt that she would be partially blaming herself for making him angry in the first place. I felt that guilt too, of course. This argument was my fault, and mine alone.
"I just don't know who else it could have been!" She said sadly, the frustration of not being able to help a friend obviously affecting her greatly. A pang of sorrow ran through me; I knew that this entire situation could have been avoided if I hadn't blown up at him the night before. To be fair, though, he should not have been acting so intimately with one of my hunters.
Perhaps not wanting to show any more emotion in front of me, Thalia quickly excused herself from my command tent, mumbling something about needing to think. Well, that made two of us. I knew that the answer to this riddle was lying in the back of my mind somewhere, there had been something that Perseus had told me a few nights ago and I was sure that if that memory could be reappear then I would finally understand. Cursing my slowness, I just hoped that I could work it out before it was too late.
Percy's POV
Appearing on a familiar Manhattan street, the last thing that I remembered was inexplicably vanishing from where I'd been standing at Camp Half-Blood, but I knew that something must have happened since then. I could remember that that had occurred in the morning, yet now night was upon me. Street lights were gleaming brightly, reflecting light from the numerous puddles which were scattered across the quiet roads, eerily deserted. I quickly put the doubts behind me, something clicking in me which forced me to not care as to where I'd spent the day. What mattered was what was to come.
Looking around more carefully, I recognised the street as one barely a block away from where I had used to live with my mum. It had been my home for many years, and a horrible pang of guilt coursed through me as I realised that I had not gone to visit my dear mother even once since my return. She must have been worried sick, not having seen me for half a decade. I was the worst son ever. At least, I reassured myself, she would've had Paul for company. My brain telling me that this would be a good point to go and make things right, I found my feet carrying me down the road towards the Jackson residence. It just seemed like the right thing to do.
Walking through the streets of my childhood gave me a welcome chance to reminisce, and I realised quite how much I had missed the great city in my five years of isolation. The Olympians had caused caused that, I reminded myself mentally. The sports shop where I used to browse for skateboards, the corner shop that I'd used to stock up on sweets, the clothes shops which I'd been forced into by my mother. For all of those years I'd taken them for granted, even complained about them (in the case of the clothes shops), but only now did I realise how lucky I had been to have them, and how harsh it had been of the Olympians to take them away from me.
I reached the tall apartment block which housed hundreds of relatively poor families like my own, offering small but functional apartments for a cheap price. There had been nothing wrong with the building at all, and it had had everything that we had needed to live, yet it had not been furnished with very much at all above the things that were required. A stark comparison, I noted, to the blatant and proud lavishness of the Olympian home. Opening the door with a deep breath, I walked to the lift and pressed for the third floor. As it whirred into motion, groaning in protest at the effort of working, I wondered and rehearsed what I would say when I saw my mum again. An apology, of course, would be necessary, and an explanation of what had been happening over the last years that I hadn't been able to see her.
"Hi mum!" I said quietly to myself, checking how it sounded. No, I decided. Just going in and greeting her wouldn't do the situation justice, but how else was I to say hello? I could hardly just walk in and say 'sorry about the whole going missing thing.'. Too soon, the lift ride was over and I was left with no plan of action. Probably wishing for the first time ever that our flat was on the top floor, I decided that I would just have to wing it. It had always worked wonders for me in the past.
My footsteps echoed more than I had remembered them doing ever before as I walked down the empty hallway, internally remarking that I still hadn't seen a single soul since finding myself in the city. I found myself at the familiar flat number twenty-three, and with a deep breath I rapped loudly on the door. Why I was so nervous, I had no idea; she was my mum, after all! Nobody came to answer the door, nor did I hear any movement from inside the apartment. Knocking once more to check, I guessed that they were probably out and made to leave the building.
No, something in my head told me, use the spare key! Not questioning why my mind was suddenly talking to me, I figured that it wasn't unreasonable to guess that my mum hadn't changed the location of where she had always hidden the spare key. Looking around me as if in some kind of covert operation, I lifted up the loose floorboard which had been at the entrance to our flat for as long as I could remember. As soon as we'd found out about it, we'd both agreed that it would be a safe place to put a key for that awkward situation when you forgot to bring one out with you. Sure enough, the simple key of bronze and silver keys sat where it always had done, shining dimly as it reflected the sparse light from the ceiling of the hallway. Clicking both of the locks, I pushed the door open tentatively.
"Mum?"
Artemis' POV
It was as I lay in bed that night that finally, the answer saw fit to emerge from hiding from the very depths of my memory. The whole day had been one of frustration as I'd impatiently tried to wring the solution from my head, and inevitably I'd forced my bad mood on all of my hunters by taking my anger out on them. I supposed that they were probably used to it now, having been metaphorical punch bags for my annoyance on numerous occasions, but I was still sorry for it. I took a note to cut them some slack as soon as this issue was resolved, maybe give them a day off or something.
As soon as I'd remembered it, the answer had seemed obvious. Who else but Ouranos would have been able to influence the air in the way that Thalia had described to me? He was, after all, the original lord of the sky, and although Zeus would probably have been able to control the air in such a manner as well, I didn't see any motive behind him doing it. As far as I'd been able to see, he'd been acting much more civilly at the mention of the son of Poseidon in recent times, probably because of the fact that the demigod had saved his daughters life. And I had been suspicious of the fact that Ouranos had helped Percy all along; he had never been known for his charity. Nothing he did was out of the goodness of his heart, and nothing was to benefit anyone else. He'd let Perseus return to life because he'd required his services, and he definitely hadn't done it to help the young demigod. If I was right, then said son of Poseidon would be in grave danger and so would Olympus.
I did all that I knew I could. "Hunters! To arms!"
I bet that you've got a loooooooooooooooooooooooot of questions after that chapter. Hard luck, I'm not going to give anything away. Sorry to those of you who don't like the whole suspensey cliffhangery thing, but I've got to keep you all interest somehow, don't I? I suppose that if you really want to find out what happens sooner rather than later, reviews might help me to work more quickly...
Big thanks to those of you who left ideas for plot in the reviews and my inbox, I read and considered them all very carefully. I am especially grateful to 'Zeuswillknockyouup2' and 'NightingaleTrinity', both of whom showed a touching interest in the story by writing up some amazing ideas in great detail. More than a bit of what has happened in this chapter, and what will happen in the chapters to come, has been from their brains. So thanks!
Hope that you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it, and hopefully I'll see you all again before the weekend.