MALLORY
I woke up some time ago. But even so, I just stared at my rooms ceiling still lying on my bed. It had been a difficult night to sleep, especially after the TJ's funeral. it's not every day that some Einherjar receives a Viking funeral, especially considering that, no matter how many times we die, we always come back to life if the death happened inside Valhalla. Unfortunately, this wasn't what happened for TJ.
I sat on my bed and stretched. I took a few seconds trying to find the courage to get out of bed and face that fucking day ahead. With a sigh, I got up, showered, changed my clothes and left. I didn't want to look at TJ's bedroom door but, fortunately, my gaze was drawn to Halfborn who was right in front of my door with arms crossed, probably waiting for me to leave.
"Waiting for me?" I asked.
"Yeah" he said with a heavy sigh.
I noticed how his gaze went to TJ's door. I hope he, like me, was hoping for a good old revenge on behalf of our friend. Neither of us had gotten along very well with TJ at first. When I arrived in Valhalla, TJ seemed to me somewhat annoying. However, as happened with Halfborn and TJ, I ended up being friends with TJ.
"What you do want?" I asked.
"Do I need a reason to see my girlfriend?" he asked with a confident smile as I rolled my eyes.
"As if it were normal for you to stand in front of my door waiting for me to wake up without a reason."
"Okay. You got me. I heard the noise from the shower and I figured you'd leave soon" "he explained. "I thought it was a good idea to see if you were all right. "
"I'm ok ... Or the best I can be considering the situation..." I replied, averting my face.
Perhaps motivated by the difference in height, he then thought it would be a good idea to put a hand on my head and mess up my hair. The bad side of being redheaded? My cheeks were stupidly and obviously red, which made him let out a slight laugh and continue to mess up my hair. Disgusted, I shoved his hand away and went to Magnus's door. As much as I feel flattered by Halfborn's concern, I think it was worth checking how the two youngsters of the floor were, especially considering that Magnus was feeling guilty.
As I approached Magnus's door room and didn't hear anything, I wondered if it was worth knocking on his door and risking waking him up. This decision was taken from my hands as one hand pushed me slightly to the side.
"I got it!" said Alex as she approached his room.
Without a second thought, she knocked twice on the door but was soon coming in without waiting for an answer.
"MAGNUS CHASE!" exclaimed Alex entering the room "TIME TO LEAVE HE BED BECAUSE WE HAVE LIFTS TO DO AND ASSES TO KICK!"
"Remember me to never leave the door of my room unlocked again," whispered Halfborn beside me under the door's portal as we followed Alex with the eyes as she went to Magnus bed, where he was still lying down.
"Only if you give me a copy of the key" I said to Halfborn.
Halfborn's laughter echoed loudly in Magnus's room as I hid myself in my own redness. All the excitement there made Magnus sit on the bed and look at us with a typical sleepy face while his hair looked more like a bird's nest.
"Will you wait for breakfast at least?" Magnus asked.
Alex did a great job of getting Magnus out of bed. After that, in the blink of an eye, we were all together eating. However, it was no longer a breakfast, as it took us so long to get out of bed that we arrived at lunchtime.
"Your mouth is dirty," Alex said, pointing to Magnus who quickly turned his attention away from the food and cleaned his mouth with a napkin.
"Thanks," he said.
"You know ..." said Halfborn, approaching me and whispering in my ear. "Part of me thought Alex was going to clean with a kiss or something."
I almost spit out my apple juice. Trying to hold back the laughter, I looked at him with the most serious face I could manage.
"It doesn't sound much like Alex." I said, speaking quietly as well. "Did you 'thought' or 'expected' that?"
"Who knows..." he said with a shrug.
"Are you reading any strange books again to get these ideas?"
"I haven't read any strange books since my doctorate in German literature." he muttered, quickly devouring a fat sausage. "Any new at least."
"Though I bet you have been re-reading one or another."
"Friedrich Hölderlin is not strange."
"... Isn't that the guy who sometimes wrote about Greek gods?" I asked after taking a few seconds to remember the time he had mentioned the writers he was studying while he was doing his doctorate.
"Wir sind nichts; was wir suchen ist alles. We are nothing; what we are looking for is everything." said Halfborn, doing the favour of translating the speech before letting out a slight laugh. "I certainly didn't imagine we would be in this situation with Greek gods when I was reading his poems."
Our talk was interrupted when Hunding approached us. Me, Halfborn, Magnus and Alex stopped what we were doing to look at him.
"I found an exit that seems to lead to the west coast, though I'm not sure where," Hunding said.
"Not being in South America, it helps a lot." Alex said.
"Certainly north." said Hunding.
"Where is that exit?" Magnus asked.
"You know ... I hate to do this but ..." Hunding said with a sigh. "It wasn't very easy to find out this information and ... there's the paperwork for you to go out again …"
"I'll bring you some chocolate! No ... a box full of chocolates!" Magnus said "Of the brand and type you want! Bar, hot, icing, cake or whatever you want."
It was funny to see the sparkle in Hunding's gaze. It was as if Magnus was saying that he would give him a mountain of money. I could almost see the gears of his brain moving desperately choosing a special chocolate.
"The einherjar that arrived last week," he said in midair.
"The swiss girl?" I asked." What was her name?"
"Alina? Lina?" said Halfborn.
"Lina. yeah, her." Hunding sighed. "She mentioned a Swiss brand that she said had the most divine chocolate she ever knew."
"Say the name and how to get on the west coast that it will be yours!" said Alex.
"Lindt. Even a little is good enough." Hunding said, rubbing one hand in the other, probably already looking forward to the chocolate.
"We'll take care of it. And the exit to the west coast?" I asked.
"They say they have one on the eighty-second floor. Somewhere on the floor there's a vending machine for soft drinks. They say you just have to push the number 7 on it." he explained.
"Only that? You are, right?" I asked.
"Yes." he said firmly.
Having this beautiful information to start our day. I decided to trust Hunding's source. So, we finished our breakfast calmly ... or as calmly as it was possible to have in Valhala. In a moment, just before we got up, a fight began over a piece of chicken thigh and then a few dishes, food and weapons flew away. Nothing out of the ordinary.
After that, we prepared to go back to New York and, with Big Banana in Magnus' pocket, we went as close to the sea as Boston could get, we made Big Banana grow and then continued our journey. We had told Blitzen and Hearthstone to meet us, so they traveled to New York with us eager to meet the other pawns on this crazy adventure.
Upon arriving at the Brooklyn house, we were greeted by Carter who opened the door promptly upon seeing us.
"I'm glad you didn't take long. Reyna was already getting worried" Carter said.
"The bed was stronger than we were." Alex said.
"I'm going to call them," said Frank, who was in the living room, and when he saw us he went upstairs to call the others.
We then went to the room where we also met Nico, sitting on the couch but clearly sleeping with his head resting on the shoulder of the blond boy who, if I remember the name correctly, was Will. At the back of the room, we saw someone new. A boy with curly brown hair and a blonde girl. Both were focused on apparently repairing a metal dragon.
"Did you find anything else while we were gone?" I asked.
The noise of us arriving drew the attention of Sadie who left the kitchen and she, along with Carter, explained that they were looking for information in the library they had. They also introduced to us the other people we didn't know, Leo and Calypso, the two at the back of the room, rearranging the dragon that was apparently called Festus. From what I understood, there was one more half-god, Peter, and a satyr, Grover. Satyr, who would have thought! Apparently the two were in the library along with Zia, Cleo, Julian, and Sean looking for more information while they waited for the dragon repair.
"Damn... why can't your father give us a dragon instead of a boat, Magnus?" Alex asked. "It would be a lot more cool. Even if it was a yellow dragon."
"A boat fits more people than a dragon." said Halfborn "Although I recognize that a dragon would be really incredible."
"Hey!" said the boy, Leo, finally taking his eyes off the dragon. "Don't talk to Festus like that! He has feelings and he sometimes feels guilty for not being able to take as many people as he did when he was Argo."
"Argo?" Magnus asked.
" A boat. Of the flying type." Hazel said, smiling slightly.
"Wow! Boats that fly! And they say Vikings are great navigators!" exclaimed Blitzen, who was fully equipped with his suit that protected him from the sun.
Hearthstone then gestured something that Magnus did translate for Carter. In fact, throughout the whole conversation, Magnus's hands were busy doing a simultaneous translation for Hearthstone. I have no idea how much the elf's lip reading abilities can capture from a conversation. Especially with several people involved, which was just the case, especially after all the others joined the conversation.
"Hearthstone wants to know if he and Blitzen can stay here while we take the others to the west coast." Magnus said. "Hearthstone would love to learn at least a little about Egyptian magic."
"I don't know," Carter said, thinking. "I mean, I have nothing against you waiting here. I just have my doubts about the learning part. it's not something so frivolous and that can be done by everyone. I'm bad at it for example. The magic stuff are more with Sadie."
"I see no problem in exchanging some basic information." said Sadie, sitting on the sofa's arm and putting a lollipop in her mouth.
By this time, Nico had already woken up thanks to everyone voices, but he kept quiet looking at us with dislike on his have due to having his snooze interrupted even though he still had his head on Will's shoulder. Hazel, Frank, and Reyna, our passengers, already seemed ready to leave. They had backpacks and guns in their hands. My favorite types of passengers, those who know how to defend themselves.
"I just hope we don't have any problems. A trip down the Panama Canal is kind of long." Reyna said.
"We got another route. Were are going to have to go up to Boston and go through Valhalla. There are several passages scattered throughout the nine worlds. We found one for the west coast." said Magnus.
"That's more practical than the portals!" cried Zia.
"Isn't so practical because it's hard to know where is one and where it will take you," said Halfborn with a shrug.
"I think you might call it a lucky day." Magnus said.
"Demigods don't have a lucky day. You can be prepared, something is going to go wrong." said Reyna.
-"Don't even talk, please!" cried Hazel.
" Hey"! said Grover. Maybe I had pictured him as the satyr who appeared in the Hercules movie when they mentioned him, but he wasn't like Phil, the satyr in the movie. Well, to begin with, he wasn't as tall as my knee. "If they're going up to Boston, they can take us to somewhere closer to the Camp."
"It would be good to find more pieces to fix Festus for once ..." Leo said with a sigh.
"Can he walk or go as far as the boat is?" Calypso asked.
" A short flight carrying only me ... I think so ... maybe." said Leo.
"Is there room for four people and a dragon in your boat?" Grover asked.
"The boat is no problem. The biggest concern is to pass you three for Valhalla. Considering Amir has already been there, I don't think it's such a big problem ..." Magnus said quickly pointing at Hazel, Reyna and Frank.
"Amir was a guest of honor. It's different. We'll find a way without Hunding or Helgi complaining.
"I think this is where the chocolate bribe comes in," Alex said.
I nodded slightly, agreeing with the idea of bribery. I hoped Hunding would understand the current situation.
"I think we can go then, right? Or is something missing?" asked Halfborn.
"Ahm ... since wer are leaving ..." said Leo looking at Sadie "I'm worried with the possibility of your boyfriend planning methods to get my head off."
"Nah, he's more a putrefying foes type ... but why do you think that?" Sadie asked even though I was lost in the reason of the worriness.
"Because hen't returned yet," Leo said.
"Busy in the underworld?" Will said with a shrug.
"Hardly... The Egyptian underworld is having a customer shortage problem..." Sadie explained. "But no, relax. He just ... said ... he wanted to be a little alone. But I don't know where he is either."
"Any more unfinished business before we go?" I asked.
"I!"Peter said raising his hand "I wante more hot chocolate!"
And, truth be told, he had a mustache made of chocolate. And, probably also solving some unfinished business, Hazel approached Nico and Will and hugged them both at the same time.
"Take care of yourself, brother," said Hazel.
"You too, sister" Nico said with a crooked smile.
"We can get hot chocolate on the way." I said.
And with that, it began the difficult process of taking the dragon out of the house to continue our journey.
O0o0o0o0o0o0o0
Sorry for the big delay. I had some problems, some of health, and then I got too busy with university. The good news is that I finally finished university now! Yeeeey! 3