In a room several feet away, Andrew and Connor were also having their skulls attacking by Eurial, and a helper that she had waiting in the room, which she later introduced as Jessie, the part time employee. Jessie had been assigned to Connor while Eurial was Andrew's washer.

"Ow, ow, okay ow! The water's too hot, and your nails are too long!" Andrew complained, forced himself in a sitting position; his wet hair slapping his forehead. Connor tried to say something but it was incoherent, seeing as how his entire head had been forced underwater and Andrew could only make out gurgles. Eurial sighed, standing aside and folding her arms together.

"Oh, I guess it's useless. You guys aren't the one we need anyways."

Connor stopped struggling. Andrew heard what he assumed was 'What?' gurgled out of the water. Eurial smiled, tossing back her hair. "Jessie, you can leave now."

Jessie suddenly stopped washing Connor hair and looked to Eurial, her eyes glossy and movement robotic. She left the room, and Eurial slammed the door and locked it. Andrew jumped out of his seat and yanked Connor out of his, brandishing his sword; alert and brewing for battle.

"Oh, you can put those things down; I don't plane to fight you." Her eyes gleamed purple, and her skin turned into a sickly green colour. "Funny, how easily you fell into our trap." Her black hair came to life, a wave of hissing and snapping black rat snakes.

"Euryale!" Andrew gasped, adrenaline kicking in. He mentally kicked himself for not realizing it sooner: Eurial=Euryale. Blubbering idiot! And you call yourself a child of Athena? "You're a sister of Medusa." He immediately dug into his pockets and pulled out the earplugs he'd taken from their recent hotel trip, and put them on.

Connor already had his sword in hand. "What do you want with Eirene?" He noticed that Andrew had his hand behind his back, and it was wielding two ear plugs. Without knowing why, he took them and slipped them on too. "And what happened to your cheese n' crackers business?"

Euryale groaned as if that was a bad memory. "Oh stop, don't bring that atrocity up again. We've upgraded, and the business fits, don't you think?" She gestured to her mane of snakes, piled around her head. "We're known for having the most memorable hair in all of Greece."

Andrew scoffed. "I preferred the cheese and crackers. At least you were feeding people rather than making their skulls bleed."

She pointed her long, sharp nails at him. "Quiet, boy; that was the best hair scrub you'll ever receive."

"Enough of this!" Connor sliced a chair in half, grabbing her attention back. "What do you want with Eirene?"

"We don't ask questions, we just do as we're told." She slipped off her gloves and smiled; her rows of teeth turned sharp and threatening. "And we were told to capture the girl, and kill the boys." She opened her mouth and let out a blood curdling scream; one that shook the entire walls of the store.

From the other room, Eirene jumped up when she heard the scream and felt the store shake. "What was that?"

Seleno sighed, patting Eirene's hair dry with a towel. "Oh, Euryale, ever the impatient one! I didn't know she'd reveal herself so quickly."

Eirene suddenly felt chills spread out her body. Something was wrong, very wrong. Seleno brought a hair dryer to Eirene's head, but out of fear, Eirene knocked it out of her hand. "Where are my friends?"

Seleno pretended as if she couldn't hear her. "Okay fine: Don't let me dry your hair. I'll let you see the result wet, then." She swiveled Eirene's chair to face her mirror and Eirene gasped at the result: Her hair was dyed pitch black.

Selena stroked it, a smile spreading on her lips. "The colour brings out your blue eyes, doesn't it?"

Anger flashed through Eirene, turning her eyes green and causing the black colour in her hair to burst, once again replaced with her blonde locks.

"Hm. Well that's too bad; they specifically asked for you to have black hair." She shrugged. "Oh well." And her eyes flashed yellow, her skin turning a sickly green as her red hair was replaced by a bundle of red coral snakes. Eirene attempted to get out of her seat, but found that her arms and legs had been trapped. She snapped her head up and gave Seleno the dirtiest look she could imagine.

"Who's 'they'? What do you want with me? Where are my friends?!" Eirene struggled against the restraints, and they got tighter. "Who are you working for?"

"One questions at a time, child." She spun her chair to face her, her yellow eyes lit. "I'm not allowed to mention who I'm working for, but I assure you they paid me a lump sum of drachmas to kidnap you."

"Kidnap me? For what?"

Seleno waved her hand in the air. "Details don't matter. But to make your last moment more pleasant, I'll tell you a little story." She cleared her throat, the snakes on her head rattling with hisses. "My name is Stheno, and I'm a gorgon. My sister over there is called Euryale, and she's most likely killed your friends by now."

Anger coursed through Eirene's veins, and she felt her skin get hotter. She tried to control it, because she wanted to hear what Stheno had to say before she melted her restraints.

"My sister has a particularly gifted ability in the field of screaming you see…it can kill. Euryale has been screaming since we learned how our sister was cursed by Athena. And then centuries later she was given a second chance, only to be beheaded by your accursed friend Percy Jackson." She paused at his name, as if it brought back an on wave of unpleasant memories. "Yes…Percy has caused us a lot of problems. But no matter! We were promised that if we brought you to them, it would cause him harm."

Them? Who's them? Who are you speaking of? Eirene had a faint idea, but she didn't want to accept it as true so early on. She needed more facts.

Stheno continued her tale. "Oh, when news of our defeat at the hands of a teenage boy reached the heavens, we were the laughing stock of Olympus. No one would take us seriously, because our cheese and crackers bit. But it was the best we could come up with at the moment! And it worked! It…kind of worked." Stheno looked embarrassed, and Eirene thought that was a very strange look for a deity with a head full of snakes. "Yes, the embarrassment was real. But we swore we'd seek our vengeance. And when the opportunity came by, we snatched it as soon as possible." She sighed theatrically. "Oh, but you all took forever to finally come along. Weeks and weeks of grabbing at random people, trying to sniff out a demigod scent but having no luck!"

She raised her voiced, her snakes hissing at Eirene. "And then finally, we smelled something. We saw you three, and we caught your scent. And we moved in for the kill!" She flared her snake-like tongue, her eye alit with excitement. "Now all we have to do is contact our bosses."

Eirene thought it was not a very smart think to tell your captive your plans before you killed them. But if she remembered correctly, Euryale was the smarter of the two. For a moment she feared her friends really might be gone, but something in her heart told her otherwise. So she decided to stall a bit more, get answers.

"Why…why did they need my hair to be black?" She hoped this would answer her question of who was really after her.

Euryale shrugged. "Something along the lines off…reminding you where you came from."

Where I came from? Eirene's fear had come true. The only people she'd think would remind her of this…were her sisters.

"But enough with the story telling; Euryale should be here any minute to help me take you away." She grinned slyly, and Eirene cocked her head.

"Take me away? You aren't even giving me a fighting chance?"

"Oh no, sweetheart; we're not lifting a pretty little nail unless we have to. If we can get you to come quietly, then that's what we'll do."

Well then, she was going to be very disappointed. Eirene let the anger she'd been building up flow through her skin, and the heat she radiated melted the restraints holding her down. She leaped from her chair and ran to the door before Stheno could react.

Across the building, Andrew and Connor were fighting for their lives. The earplugs Andrew had provided had worked surprisingly well in withstanding Euryale's bloody curdling screams. Already bloodied and beaten, the boys weren't giving up. If they could somehow reach the door without Euryale's hair snipping and snapping at them. Not to mention the gorgons packed quite a punch.

She flung Andrew against the wall, and Connor tried to charge at her. He sliced at her head but missed; getting only parts of her hair. The decapitated pieces of snakes grew into full-grown ones once they hit the ground. Connor squealed, but killed them with ease. Andrew worked to stand against his thrashing headache; he had to figure out a way to defeat this gorgon and reach Eirene. Only Athena knows what's happened to her.

If fighting wouldn't work, for the gorgon's power was stronger than the both of them, then persuasion would have to do. He'd have to somehow convince her to let them go. And Connor, he too would have to help.

"Wait," He spoke, holding up his hands. "Wait. You don't have to kill us."

"I follow orders," She hissed, then waved her hands and produced two human-sized snakes, ordering them to attack the boys. Andrew stabbed at one, the blood of the snake burning away at his clothing and skin when it made contact. Though Connor seemed to be hiked up on adrenaline; he sliced the snake it have, having it disintegrate, and then worked on killing the second.

"Your sister…Medusa, you're doing this all for your sister, right? Because you want revenge: you want revenge for her death."

"Not just her death. I want Hades to be brought on Percy Jackson for sending us to Tartarus! I want him to experience the pain he causes us!"

Is all of this because of Percy? He shook his head, trying to think. How could he quench their hatred of Percy? Was that even possible? "Percy isn't the one you want. Percy isn't the one you should be after."

She paused for a moment, withdrawing her second round of snakes. Connor now looked close to passing out, and was giving Andrew a confused look.

Andrew looked straight into her violet eyes. "The one you want is Gaea."