Rory's expression had gone from "I will find a way to strangle you with this lyre" to "I'm not mad, just disappointed" after the conversation with Hermes. [I'm making you sound like a dad? Newsflash: you're a total dad.]

"So, uh… that did just happen, right?" Alec asked. "We're really gonna do this, huh. Hermes actually just approved it."

"Lord Hermes is making the best of a bad situation. I don't think he wishes to lose any more children," Rory said sternly. "Brenna, why did you antagonize Tantalus?"

I rolled my eyes. "Too many people are going missing since he's been here. It's summer, and there's open bunks in the cabin. Not beds, actual bunks. I don't think it's all monsters or sneaking out to get stuff."

"Where do you think everyone's been going? Camp isn't safe anymore. They might as well go home," Alec muttered.

He might've actually had a point. Some people get along with their mortal parents. "That's not it… they think they can find Luke, and join him, don't they?"

Alec laughed. "He's been gone for a year, and no one's seen him around since. How would people know where to go?"

I shrugged. We didn't have time to start arguing about that. "So, do we head out now or do I sneak into the attic and try to talk to the Oracle first?"

I was really hoping that Rory and Alec would be fine with just leaving. Rory knew plenty of tracking songs and Alec was… Alec, did we really need directions from a mummy? But no, they thought that was a good idea. [Okay, yeah, it did seem like a good idea at the time.]

So I left Alec to get lectured and explain what was going on. The Big House was nowhere near the Am-phi – screw it, the campfire, so I didn't have to worry about Tantalus or Mr. D. seeing me… the harpies, on the other hand, would've started patrolling right about then.

Here's the thing: I already said I'm pretty much the worst fighter in Camp Half-Blood. So you'd think getting attacked by harpies would be a major problem, and yeah, if I ever get stuck with just my knife against them I'm screwed… but I have a gun.

A Glock 23, to be more specific. .40 caliber bullets, thirteen rounds in a magazine. I know what you're probably thinking: who in their right mind would give this kid a gun? No one. My mom collects guns, I memorized the safe code, and that one was "my" gun because no one just hands a ten-year-old a gun and says here, store this, I'm sure you know how to do it safely, this is totally legal by the way please don't call CPS. [Rory says of course the one time I memorize something right it's to steal stuff. No comment.]

But yeah, harpies don't like guns. Who would've guessed? I still didn't want them to see me though because they would tell Mr. D. I wasn't at the campfire. So I stuck close to cabin walls as much as possible, then sprinted until I made it to the Big House.

One thing no one ever tells you about the Big House: it's creepy as fuck in the dark. The stairs up to the attic creak more than my mom's knees and everything looks like it's gonna somehow come to life and attack you. I ran up those stairs as fast as I could until I was in the even creepier attic.

The attic is filled with tons of quest trophies and random junk that I had to try my best not to trip over. I shuffled through it as best as I could until I made it to the hippie mummy lady Oracle. Apparently she used to be alive… not actually all that long ago. And then Hades cursed her. Good times.

"Look lady, it's dark and I'm really not supposed to be here, so tell me how to find this stupid bull." No answer. I tried a few questions. Nothing. And then I was extra dumb and said, "Can you just give me a prophecy?"

The mummy lit up green. I might've screamed. [Okay, fine, I did scream…] You have one. Now, go.

I had no idea what that meant but I ran out of there like Hades himself was after me. I didn't stop until I made it back to the Hermes cabin and slammed the door behind me. "What's wrong?" Rory asked.

"Don't…" I gasped, trying to catch my breath, "ask. Let's just go."

"No prophecy, huh? Can't say I'm surprised…" Alec taunted. I ignored him.

"Hey, Rory, how're we gonna get to… wherever we're heading?" I asked. I knew none of us could drive; Rory's fake feet really weren't good for that kind of thing, and Alec wasn't much older than me.

While he thought that over, I started looking through the duffel bag Hermes'd left us. Five gold drachma, a Ziploc bag filled with cash, three bus tickets with a note attached… wait. "Never mind, Dad's got us covered," I said, pulling the tickets out. I handed them off to Rory – he'd be the least likely to lose them – and kept digging around.

There was some gold frisbee thing… I didn't know what it was, but if it was in the bag, we'd probably need it. Other than that there was a few blankets, a tarp, a box of granola bars, and three empty water bottles. How all that stuff fit in one bag, I had no idea, but it still fit when I shoved it all back in so I figured it was probably magic or something.

"It looks like these are for a Greyhound, not Manhattan," Rory said. I was confused for a second until I figured out he was talking about the bus tickets.

"Wait, an intercity bus? Just how far away is this thing?" Alec wondered. "More importantly… how close do you have to be to find out where it is?"

I rolled my eyes. "Dad's the god of travel, and it makes sense that we'd wanna find this thing before it gets to New York."

"And for your information," Rory cut in, "I have songs that will allow me to locate the bull once we're across the border." Alec didn't look convinced, but I knew Rory wasn't just bragging. He'd used nature magic to find me before, when I stopped going to school. [And all those times I tried to ditch you on the way here, yeah, but it was way more impressive when I wasn't just a few feet away. Sorry about that, by the way.]

"Hey, speaking of that… what time is it?" The longer we stayed, the more likely we were to get caught, and then…

"Nine forty… shit, we'd better get going," Alec answered. "Unless –"

I put on my backpack and checked to make sure my gun was in its holster. I had a concealed carry waistband holster for it, add that to the list of hella illegal shit I own, because unlike everyone's swords and spears or whatever mortals would see it for what it was. "I believe you, now let's get moving."

See, we've got a clock in the cabin, but I don't really know how to tell time. I, like, know when things are supposed to be happening 'cause you can't spend four years at camp and not know the fucking schedule but I like just learned how to read clocks and I'm not very good at it. And Alec likes to tell me the wrong time to fuck with me but I figured if his ass was on the line too he'd get it right. [Oh, shi- shoot, I did say I'd try not to swear as much didn't I… sorry?]

Anyways, the guys followed my lead, Rory picking up the duffel bag even though he was already carrying one of his own. "If we go out past the stables people probably won't see us, but we'd have to somehow find a road… but if we go out by the road, border patrol starts at Thalia's tree, so they'll see us if we take too long…" I muttered.

"They'll see us anyways if we go that way, there's too much open ground," Alec pointed out.

"Not if we go past the arts and crafts pavilion," Rory argued. "It's dark, so they won't see us if we're that far from the fire."

"And avoiding the lake means we won't run into that naiad who dumped you last week?" I teased. [Oh, sorry, you were "on a break". Riiight.]

Rory huffed. "Let's just get going." He led the way out of the cabin, going straight towards the pavilion. Me and Alec followed, staying more in the shadows. Technically, Rory could be wherever he wanted, so he didn't really have a reason to hide.

I could hear singing still, so we weren't too late. Hopefully the harpies were closer to the campfire… and of course I was wrong about that. Just when Alec made it behind the pavilion, I heard screeching. Before I could do anything, Rory signaled us to stay where we were and casually walked around to the side of the building. "What seems to be the trouble, ladies?"

So it was harpies, then… but how many of us had they seen? "Campers are supposed to be at the fire now!" one of them cawed.

"That they are," he agreed, "but I'm not a camper."

"But there was one with you, wasn't there," a different harpy cackled. Oh, crap… they'd seen me! Even if they did buy that Alec and Rory were the same person, somehow… it was pretty dark out… they'd seen two of us.

"Hm, no, not that I'm aware of," Rory said. I pressed myself as close to the wall as I could and Alec did the same. "That's odd… if there had been someone with me, I should have been able to smell them."

Oh no. Why'd he have to bring their noses into it? If they hadn't already thought of it, they sure would after he said that! "Your nose must not be working very well, then." I stepped out from my hiding place and stood behind Rory – it was dark enough that I couldn't see any faces, but I could make out two harpies.

Rory whipped around. "What are you doing here?" he bleated, sounding more resigned than surprised. Which was fair. As much as he didn't like it, he knew I was more experienced with talking my way out of trouble than he was.

Of course, I'm just as good at talking my way into trouble [You know, since we had that "quest" in the first place… yeah, and the dolphin incident, let's not go into that], but we were probably about to get caught anyways so I figured it was worth the risk. "I was just on my way back from the bathroom when I saw you and thought I'd see what you were up to," I lied.

"B-Brittney! You know you're supposed to be at the campfire…we're going back right now! I can take it from here, ladies…" At least Rory hadn't used my real name. I didn't know if there was a Brittney at camp, but the harpies weren't questioning it.

"Ca-ha-ha!" one of them cackled. "We'll see you on kitchen duty!"

The other one must've been a bit more suspicious. "Go ahead, take her back… but if we see either of you where you don't belong…" She flapped her wings, which I guess was supposed to be a threat? I dunno, I couldn't really see what she was doing.

Of course, since Rory shoved me back into cover, the harpies must've stopped watching us. "I feel sorry for Brittney," Alec commented, having done literally nothing to help us. I wanted to yell at him, but that might've made the harpies come back. "She just got off KP yesterday."

"You mean there's actually – never mind, let's keep going!" I whispered. We made it past the magical boundaries without running into any more harpies, or worse, camper patrols, and followed the old road south.

Eventually, if we kept going, we'd make it to the city, but there was no way we could do it in the middle of the night. So we'd be sleeping outside; there was a farm nearby, but the farmer would definitely recognize the guys' Camp Half-Blood shirts, so we couldn't exactly ask to sleep there.

[You make fun of me for wearing "too much black" all you want, Rory; what stands out more in a crowd? Neon orange, or… my hair? Oh my gods, we're not having this conversation right now… it's not like it's permanent dye! I lost a bet to Travis and it'll be not-blue by next week, I promise.]

Just, for the record, I do wear my orange t-shirt at camp. This might just be me, but it seems kinda dumb to walk around advertising the fact that we're demigods when there's monsters, like, everywhere. I don't have a lot of other clothes, but, yeah, most of my other tops are black… and my jeans… and my Converse… okay, maybe Rory has a point. [No, this isn't me admitting that I'm emo. I just really like Evanescence and black's been my favorite color for, like, ever, okay?]

But I brought practical stuff with on the "quest", I swear. I think I was wearing my one pair of normal blue jeans and a plain black t-shirt. Anyways… what part was I at? Oh yeah, the first night. We walked until it felt like we were far enough away from camp, then Alec pulled out a flashlight and we looked for a place to sleep.

Eventually we decided two people would sleep by this one big maple tree and the third person would keep watch. It was warm out, and if I thought it was actually warm the other two were probably too hot, so we didn't bother with building a fire or anything; we just put the tarp on the ground and set our bags on the corners.

I must've been really tired 'cause the next thing I remember was waking up next to Alec. Someone had put a blanket over me. At some point during the night Rory must've put on his "I'm totally a normal human" teacher outfit, since we'd definitely make it to the city soon – he was playing his lyre, which was probably what woke me up.

"Did anyone keep watch last night?" I asked, standing up and stretching. If I'd actually fallen asleep quickly, no way did we figure that out. Hell, Alec was still asleep.

"I tried," Rory replied, still playing. [What song was that? …I've never heard of Peter Frampton. "Show Me the Way" makes sense, though.] "I made it… four hours, I think, then I tried to wake up Alec to take over. He wasn't getting up, so I tried to wake you, and that didn't work either."

That instantly put me on guard. I'm a very light sleeper. I ran through all of the monsters I could think of off the top of my head. None of them could just put people to sleep… "Did you play a lullaby or something?"

Judging by the look on his face, he hadn't. I nudged Alec with my foot. He twitched, but it didn't look like he'd woken up. Great. "Okay, you asked for this… Rory, did we bring any water?"

"Did you and Alec have full canteens?" he asked. Oh, right, we'd come from volleyball, those should've been with us… and mine was still strapped to my belt loop opposite where I usually kept my holster (I'm not dumb enough to sleep with a loaded gun on me – I'd put it in my bag the night before. Still not a great idea, but it was the best I could come up with). I unclipped my canteen and shook it – probably around half full.

That'd be enough. I unscrewed the cap and dumped the contents over Alec's head – he jumped up pretty quick after that. "Aagh! Di immortales, I'm up!"

Rory cracked a smile at that. "Ten more minutes, and we can head out. You two should fold up those blankets and the tarp."

"Did you really have to do that?" Alec complained, putting on his glasses. I shrugged.

"Hey, I tried other ways. You weren't getting up." We packed up pretty fast; there wasn't much to do. I dug out three granola bars from the duffel bag so we could eat while Rory finished his song. We didn't say much – I was still trying to figure out why we'd slept so long, and Alec was never much of a morning person.

Eventually, the music stopped. "Its coordinates are 33.7490° North, 84.3880° West, and it's definitely travelling northeast – quickly."

"How long do we have until it reaches Camp?" Alec asked. I was about to ask what those numbers meant, but his question sounded way more useful.

"If it keeps going at this speed, and doesn't stop to eat or rest, we have one day." Rory had put on his more-serious-than-usual face, which didn't bode well. "The problem is, I can't figure out its exact route, so if we want to intercept it…"

"I have an idea," I interrupted. Alec mumbled something under his breath that I chose to ignore. "Let's just hop on a bus to some major city, have you play the song again, rinse, repeat. As long as we keep going south, we're bound to get close enough to predict where it's heading next."

Alec and Rory stared at me in disbelief. "I was going to say we should use those bus tickets your dad gave us, but… yeah, that's a good idea," Rory said. "I never checked to see if they were for anywhere specific, did you?"

None of us had. I dug through the bag to find them, but I couldn't tell what any of the words said so I gave them to Rory. "There's a route circled: 'Port Authority Bus Terminal to DC'. That is a major city that's south of where we are right now…" he began.

"…and Hermes is the god of travel," Alec reminded us, as if we'd forget that somehow.

"So we should keep walking, hail a cab to the bus station, and hop on. If they're not for a specific time –"

"They're not," Rory told me.

"– it shouldn't be too hard to find a bus headed to DC in the middle of the summer tourist season." Hey, I used to live in L.A., and Mom didn't own a car. I know a thing or two about buses. And cabs. "Do we take our chances with the Gray Sisters, or hail a normal cab?" I asked.

Alec shuddered. "A normal cab, please."

So we found one, and I don't remember much of the cab ride. We talked, I guess, then Rory paid the driver probably a bit too well and we started trying to navigate the bus depot.

The bus schedules were all in small letters that I couldn't really read, so I let Alec and Rory deal with finding out where our bus was. I took on the all-important job of finding us some real food.

Once I got my five-finger discount from the snack shop (seriously, fifteen dollars for a PB&J? That's the real crime) the guys were ready with the bus info: we needed to get to Door 6 and we had ten minutes to do it.

Thankfully, it had a huge sign that even I had no trouble seeing. We didn't have any problems getting on the bus once it arrived, either, which was really weird considering Alec's crossbow. I chalked it up to the Mist, which was… huh. It felt so strong, as in, like, I could feel it, period.

"Rory, can we wait for the next bus? I've got a bad feeling about this one," I whispered, even though the three of us were the only ones who'd boarded.

"What kind of feeling?" he asked, because he takes this kind of stuff seriously. "The Mist is pretty strong right now…"

"I think that's it."

Alec rolled his eyes. "Yeah, of course it's strong, I'm holding a strung crossbow on a public bus. I guess the driver thinks it's a book."

Rory raised an eyebrow. "You mean that's not a copy of Ovid's Metamorphoses?" Before Alec could respond, he added, "All right, you do have a point. I'll be on the lookout for anything… strange…"

I turned to see what he was staring at. A very tall, very fat person had just boarded the bus. I didn't think that was too weird until I noticed their necklace. Were those teeth? Like, human teeth?

"Oh shit, Brenna's paranoia was right for once," Alec whispered. "Oops."

"I only get to gloat if we live," I pointed out.

Rory had turned away by then. The last few mortals were getting on the bus, and he didn't react to any of them. So, one monster. More than enough, really, but we could maybe –

"This is bad," Rory muttered. "She isn't interested in us… specifically. She'll kill everyone on this bus if we don't stop her."

Most monsters didn't care about mortals. I could think of one glaring exception off the top of my head. "Cannibal giant?"

"Actually, they're called – MMPH!"

"Alec, you can't say that word!" I exclaimed, removing my hand from over his mouth. "She'll definitely notice!"

Rory facepalmed. "Keep your voices down! Do I have to separate you two?"

"Pretty sure we'd just be louder then," Alec said smugly. He was kinda right though…

I kept waiting for things to go wrong. For the Laistrygonian to block the doors off and set the bus on fire. But every NYC stop (there's a lot) went off without a hitch. Alec and I passed the time by playing rock-paper-scissors. I could tell he was on edge because he threw rock every single time and kept looking over at the Ladygonian. I bet he was glad he'd strung his bow already. I don't know why he did if he didn't think we were in danger but I sure wasn't gonna complain about it.

We were two stops away from DC [thanks, Rory] when the monster made her move. She'd been at the back of the bus, but she was moving up to the middle. Right by us.

The seats across the aisle from Rory were empty. Emphasis on were. The second she sat down I wanted to make a break for it, but I was in the window seat so I was stuck.

"I know my Joe Bob is gone, darlin's. I don't know if yous did it or who did it, but I'd 'preciate it if y'could tell me."

That was… uh… not what I thought she'd sound like. Her voice was almost musical. It didn't go with her (definitely, now that she was up close) human-tooth necklace, old tank top, and rotting-meat smell. Yeesh, no wonder Rory was onto her right away.

"What are you gonna give us for that information?" Alec asked. There was no way he knew who killed this "Joe Bob" guy. Was he gonna throw someone under the bus? [Gods, I didn't mean it like that!]

"Your lives, of course, sugar. We Laistrygonians don't have to eat demigods, y'know. Mortals do juuust fine most of the time." She was looking us over, oh gods, that was terrifying.

[I'm glad you agree; also can I just say that it really sucks that like all the monsters keep trying to eat us? Thanks to this summer, getting eaten alive is my biggest fucking fear.]

"Although," she continued, "you three definitely look good enough to eat."

[See what I mean? That was just… ugh, why? Why am I doing this? Rory, I don't wanna… I can't… we're not even at the really bad stuff yet! How'm I supposed to talk about… I… I…]

Future me, if you're wondering, I just cried for I don't know how fucking long. I need a fucking break.

Author's Note: ...this is basically how I'm gonna end up figuring out where chapters start/end with this fic because I didn't actually write it in chapters. Also just a heads up, unlike The Gods' Silence, this fic won't have trigger warnings outside the disclaimer in chapter 1 because I have no idea how to even categorize some events.