Oh! MY! GOSH! I just found out I might be going to a Paramore concert! I'm addicted to the band! And I'm writing Chapter 22! This is awesome, and so exciting! Ok, calm down .BEASTXx . So some of you are saying that the bus ride is a trap… well, it is in a way. Every person in there is a clueless mortal, but they are unknowingly leading our dear characters into a predicament. So, I'm tired of putting a disclaimer on every chapter so I'm just going to put it on my profile. Tell me if you want more Percabeth, because I'm good at writing it, but I don't know where to put it in. I have ideas though. When I do put it in, don't laugh at my cheesiness. Here's chapter 22.
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The bus was heated, exactly what I needed in the cold winter. It had started to frost in some areas, making the road slippery. I was surprised that it was actually warm enough earlier to keep the water in the tank in its liquid state. Not that it would have been a problem with my powers. The bus driver which I had found out was also the director of the group had roused everybody to sing a very loud but in tune number. Even Annabeth and I had joined in.
After only 13 hours of no traffic and snow, we were finally entering Washington. Everybody was now asleep, except the driver, due to the time. But I couldn't sleep. Only a few more hours and we would be in Seattle and find Nico. But how would we find one kid in the middle of a busy city? Annabeth seemed to notice my worry.
"Calm down, I shouldn't be that hard to find him."
"It's one of the busiest cities in Washington. It could take a while." I said.
She shrugged. "We could always I.M. him. Do you have any golden drachma?"
I groaned and hit my head against the back of the seat. "What's wrong? Are you ok?" This time she was the worries one.
"I'm an idiot. We could have Iris Messaged him the entire time! Why didn't you tell me about this earlier?"
"Well, I assumed you knew." She crossed her arms and faced out the window, refusing to look me in the eye.
"Fine." I sighed and pulled a drachma out of my pocket and made a thin mist in the area in front of us. The I threw in the drachma and said a silent prayer. "Nico Di'angelo. Seattle Washington." I said. The next thing I knew, there was giant black room with a motionless figure attached to the wall by what looked like chains.
"Nico?" I asked quietly, both for his safety and ours. The figure moved his head a little bit, but didn't look forward. "Nico." I said again, a bit louder. He looked up this time and looked straight at me.
"Percy?" He asked.
I nodded. "Are you ok?" Annabeth asked from next to me.
"Physically, yes; but I can't move from this wall. I haven't eaten anything for a full day and I've only gotten a sip of water."
"Where are you?"I asked next. "Who took you there?"
"I'm in the tip of the Seattle Needle. I'm not sure who took me, all I know is that it's not a mortal or a half-blood."
"We're coming to get you right now. We'll be there as soon as we can." Annabeth told him.
"Be careful. Whoever this is might be dangerous."
I rolled my eyes. "When are they not?"
Annabeth ran a hand through the I.M. and faced me. "So how are we going to find out what took Nico?"
"The way we always do. By accident."
"No Seaweed Brain. We need an actual plan this time."
"Fine." I said, throwing my hands in the air, and with that we started making plans. Well it was mostly Annabeth with her amazing extra wisdom.
We entered the city limits while we were asleep, but we woke up to something much less peaceful.
There was a crashing and then a screeching noise that woke everybody up. I could feel my body falling forward from the abrupt stop of the bus. I managed to catch myself on the seat, but Annabeth was beginning to fly out the side of the seat. Without thinking about it, I reached out and grabbed her around the waist and pulled her back into the seat right before a burst of fire went through the center of the bus. There were screams from people around me.
After making sure that Annabeth was ok, I looked over the seat to see a Hydra. It had two of its heads sticking inside the broken windshield and the rest were trying to rip off the bus' roof. I stood and uncapped Riptide, making cyclone grow heavy on my head. Annabeth stood beside me and pulled out the ice sword.
"Everybody, get out of the back emergency exit and run. We'll take care of this thing." I said.
There was a frightened woman sitting in then seat across from us staring at us with wide eyes. "You're one of those kids. The one's that fight off the monsters!" She yelled. There was a boy around 19 sitting next to her. "MOM! WE NEED TO GET OUT OF HERE NOW!" He yelled, grabbing her hand and beginning to pull her up. She was just about up when a head came in and grabbed him by his shirt pulling him away.
"Matthew!" She screamed after him. Then she looked at Annabeth and me who were trying to fight off one of the heads. I looked back at her. "Please, help my son! You have to help him! Please!" I looked at the head that was pulling the boy away, and then at Annabeth. I couldn't leave her alone or something would happen to her.
"Come with me." I said
She looked at me shocked. "What?"
"Come with me." I said grabbing her arm and pulling her with me. We went after the head as the woman watched anxiously.
"How do we defeat this one?" I asked.
"I'll distract it. You try to find something to kill it with, and remember, don't cut off the heads." I nodded and looked around for something to do. I could always stab it, but how would I be sure that it would die from that? I tried feeling around for any water that would be anywhere. The only water I found was in the air and in bodies of things around me. How could I kill this thing without harming anything else?
The kid screamed and I saw him being flipped in the air. He didn't have long. That's when I got the idea. The monster also had water in it. I focused on my new powers and soon the hydra looked like it was dripping sweat. Then, I froze all the water that was in its body. The monster froze into place. I walked up to the head that was holding the guy and I cut him loose. His mother ran to him and hugged him tightly. I turned away from them to give them some time together, capped Riptide and walked over to Annabeth.
"That worked. How did you do that?" She asked.
"I brought all the water out of him." I replied. "The cold just did the rest."
Suddenly, I was attacked from behind, but not by a monster. It was the woman hugging me. "Thank you so much. Please, there must be something I can do to repay you!"
"No, it was nothing. I deal with this sort of stuff on a daily basis. Just try to stay away from these things." I replied.
"There must be something." She objected.
Don't worry about it. It was actually probably our faults that this monster was here. He can smell out blood."
"Well, thank you anyways. We'll repay you someday."
"Actually, once we finish our journey, nobody will remember any of this. I'm sorry. But at least you're both safe."
She nodded and walked back to her son who was standing among the group of singers. Annabeth pulled out a golden drachma. "Percy, could you…"
I made a thin mist from the water in the air and Annabeth threw the drachma in. "Apollo, mount Olympus." She said.
"Why him?" I asked.
"He can get them a bus to ride in from here on." She replied.
Apollo answered with a haiku as usual, but agreed to send a bus to come. After we saw it coming Annabeth and I began walking to the needle that was easily seen above Seattle.
"Nico should be in the very tip. We're going to have to be careful if we're going to be that high up. We don't want a replay of last time we visited a national monument."
She agreed and we began our 4 mile walk to save Nico.
Please review. I really like reading them. I'm sort of mellow right now because tomorrow, we were supposed to start my vacation with my cousins, but at the last second, they called and said that their dad wouldn't let them. But, on the upside, we're going cabin camping, which means… internet! I can update new chapters while on vacation! The 8 hour drive should be boring, so I'm glad I have a laptop I can type on!