Chapter 23 - Shark Boy and Lava Girl, but Lava Girl is Nowhere in Sight and Shark Boy is a Lovecraftian Monstrosity
As soon as my bubble reaches the surface of the Pacific and hits the cool fresh air, it pops in an audible sound, almost as loud as a tiny firecracker going off. Of course, this is a lot worse of a situation than a simple cherry bomb blowing up, as now there is nothing in between me and the ocean, and most importantly, nothing to keep me from sinking all the way back down to where I came from.
First I notice the crimson sun setting off in the distance, followed by the emergence of stars into the soon-to-be night sky. It is only after that I realize I'm drowning.
Flailing my legs about underwater as fast as I could, and keeping my arms paddling downward ignoring both my collapsing lungs and my limbs crying out for mercy. Bood spooling around the water near my head, as I've resumed crunching down on my lip and blood is coming straight out and mixing with the water my body is churning up to keep afloat.
Intentionally not thinking about the possibility of sharks here, I look around for anything to help me get to shore. Waves crashing into my barely surfaced head doesn't help the effort, as everything around me appears to be empty and the waves don't allow me to look for long before they crash over me and push me down. I think I can see some surfers out in the distance, and there appears to be a couple of boats out here as well, but they are way too far away for me to have any hope of reaching in my current state, and I doubt even yelling could get their attention.
The beach appears to be a mile or so away, so unless I can ride these waves for a long enough time to reach the shore, swimming there is out of the question.
Running out of time, I feel my head fall beneath the water and struggle to bring it back up, relying on my pained body to keep me afloat if even for a couple more seconds.
Worry sets in as I realize that there is no way out of this. Unless a miracle happens, there is no way I'm making it back ashore.
The only idea I have left is one that even Perce would scoff at and call stupid.
Whelp, time to reach for a miracle.
Surrounded by blood-filled water, I take a huge breath (ignoring the feeling that my lungs are getting torn apart), reach into my pocket, take out the drachmae that I've been holding onto for emergencies like this, and chuck it as far as I can out to sea and scream, "OIIIII! OCEAN LADY THAT GAVE US THE PEARLS! CAN I GET SOME HELP GETTING TO SHORE?! I'LL OWE YOU ONE! DRACHMAE'S JUST A DOWNPAYMENT FOR NOW! PERCY'LL ALSO BE HAPPY IF I SURVIVE! I'M GONNA DR–"
Before I can finish my words, the wave overtakes me and ice-cold water fills up my lungs while my body refuses to try anymore and just ceases all movement. With my lungs filled with ocean water, my body not being able to do anything I tell it to, and my eyes stinging from saltwater, I close my eyes and feel my body slowly float down to the bottom.
Who would've known it would be the Pacific Ocean that would kill me. Not the ancient mother of all monsters, not the giant three-headed dog, not even a snake lady who can turn people into stone by just locking eyes with them. No, what kills me is the body of water controlled by my best friend's dad.
That would be funny.
If it weren't so sad. (Portal 2 is a perfect game. Fight me)
Sinking down and down the water gets colder and colder, as my body feels more and more tranquil. The crashing of the waves up top is little more than a whisper, as the true silence of the ocean fills my ears.
I sink further and further down, my eyes closed off from the burning saltwater (never was any good at opening my eyes underwater) and feel my body drifting from side to side as the water pulls me further and further down into the land of fish, sharks, and untold horrors within the depths of the Pacific. The water gets heavier and heavier, colder and colder and I sink for what feels like hours, lower and lower into the depths, the quiet whispers of occasional movement from the surface only barely reaching my ears.
As I float, I wait for death to embrace me and wonder how Perce, Annabeth, and Grover will be after my death. "Well they were fine without me in the books, they should be fine now," I say, out loud to no one in particular. Yeah, they'll be perfectly good without me, I was just hoping I could help them get through some of the tougher parts, and get through all the tricks and stuff the enemies use in the books...
Wait.
"Did I say that out loud?"
There's no water in my mouth, but somehow I was able to talk down here. Wondering what kind of trick I'm in, I open my eyes and they are filled with the blackness of the ocean.
"Well, that certainly helps," I say, rolling my eyes and looking to where I assume the surface would be and see a faint glimpse of the red sunlight coming down into the water, the water changing it from a bright and deep colored red into a dull bluish-black. Painters probably have a name for it, but it's bluish-black to me.
"This is weird."
Last time I checked, Perce was the son of Poseidon, and therefore the only one with the magic water breathing, talking, controlling powers. My dad is the constellation guy. which has nothing to do with water...
Oh yeah, those blessing things.
"About time you figured that out, Son of Krios," I hear an extremely feminine voice say in my head.
"What the he-" I begin to say spinning my head around and searching through the darkness for the source.
Before I can finish, another woman's voice angrily says, "No point looking for us down here, little idiot. You really are dumber than that stupid lion."
"Be quiet sister, of course, he would be confused," the other voice says, in a much more calming tone than the aggressive anger the previous one had.
Saying in a loud and as confident voice that I can muster in this odd situation I ask the question, "Who are you two?"
"Really. You really can't figure this out? I know we all hate the Titan dude, but at least he figured it out first try."
"Well, that's because he already had Virgo's blessing. It's no surprise little Alex wouldn't know. He's only received blessings from non-speakers..." before the voice can continue, I set some things straight with the other voice.
"Well I know you two are somehow related to the constellations, I'm just tryna figure out which two you are, and you aren't helping that much..."
The other voice then interrupts saying, "Not helping my ass. We just saved your puny mortal self from drowning, an extremely lame death for the friend of the sea god's spawn, and your monkey brain can't figure out who the two of us are? Lemme help you a little here, cause you'll never find it out normally. You have all the powers of a fish down here in the water. That good enough for you Mr. 'You aren't helping that much'?"
"Pisces?" I ask, slightly upset by the unneeded anger shown towards me.
"No, we're Cassiopeia... no shit we're Pisces!" the voice yells at me.
"Tone it down Liaros, we're not helping him just to start a fight," the calm voice says. Well, I know which one I like.
"He's mocking us! He almost drowns, we grant him our blessing and save him, and now he has the gall to try and start a fight with us!"
I interject and say, "I wasn't trying to start a fight, I just got confused..."
"He did just almost drown, Liaros. Let's cut him some slack and get him to shore. While we're headed there, we can explain some things."
"Fine, but you better apologize, mophead."
The calm voice asks, "Mophead?"
"Yeah, cause his hair looks like a mop under here. All flowing around and stuff despite the scales," says the aggressive voice, starting to laugh.
The calm voice gives a deep sigh and says, "Very funny Liaros... anyways, Alex. I am Kolios, and this is my sister Bakaliaros. The two of us saved Aphrodite and her son Eros from Tiphon, so Aphrodite releases us into the sky, and we became the Zodiac of Pisces. You were granted our blessing when you fully began to drown, with no hope of survival. As my sister said previously, our blessing is the complete power of a fish. Now it's a little dark down here but..."
"You look like a fish, mophead, or should I call you scaly-ass," says Bakaliaros suddenly, bursting into laughter again.
"What?" I ask, confused by what she meant.
Kolios then responds saying, "The power of the Zodiac blessings are too strong for a mortal to handle, so they sort of forcibly morph your body to suit the blessing's power." She then quickly adds, "Don't worry though, as it is only temporary and your body will turn to normal once the blessing ends."
"It might not though. Mophead could be stuck as an ugly grey scaled fish boy for the rest of his life... then what'll I dooooo..." Bakaliaros says as I can hear her rolling her eyes wherever she is right now.
Ignoring the high school bully, for the time being, I ask, "So how are you talking to me then?"
"Liaros alluded to this, but the Zodiacs and all other constellations with the ability to communicate via language can speak to you using the blessing once you have called upon it."
"Not that I would want to. Right now I'm just a husk sitting on that uncomfortable throne, and that damned lion is probably doing peeing on me right now if I know him well enough, so I would like to finish this off and soon, please."
"So what do I do?" I ask, mostly asking the person who would actually help me.
Thankfully the one I was asking, responds by saying, "You are a fish now. Faster than even a shark in the water, and can swim to any depths. Just make your way to the shore."
"In case if you care, numbnuts, the shore is to your left," says Bakaliaros. "And try to move in a straight line? I only have so long I can keep this up for..."
Kolios and I give a simultaneous sigh, as I turn a little to my left and move my strained arms and legs in a forwards crawl, underwater which is extremely weird.
Bakaliaros keeps hurling insults at me as I swim forward, while Kolios stays silent and I really begin to feel sorry for Kolios. Having to put up with that obnoxious and angry personality has to be a full-time job.
It's surprisingly not hard to swim at all and my muscles don't feel like they're on fire anymore. I can actually move, which is pretty great.
I'm really interested in seeing what sort of monstrosity my body looks like right now, but it is still far too dark to do so, but all of a sudden there is a sharp pain in my forehead and a sudden ball of light appears right in front of my eyes.
"Woah, there... what is this?" I ask, getting ignored by Bakaliaros who is now deciding to list the species of perch that could beat me in a fight, while Kolios remains silent.
I stop paddling forward, and reach up to grasp the small ball of light, and am shocked. First off, my hands, their fingers have webbing and are covered by silver-grey scales. Not cool dragon scales, no, no, no, lame fish scales that do nothing but require a fancy knife to cut off. I really have turned into a fish person (or fish boy as Bakaliaros so eloquently put it). Secondly, I have an angler light. Like the one from Finding Nemo. A weird ball of light attached by a cord of some sort right into my forehead.
I look down towards my legs and see I don't have legs. I have a mermaid tail... tails. Not one, not two, not even four, but five mermaid tails are coming out of my shorts. Each one a fishtail with two little other fins at the bottom, but I have five of them. I bend down to look closer and notice they're all different types as well. One is really long and skinny with tail fins, another is wider than my torso but incredibly short, and another just looks like a tentacle without the suckers and with two tiny fins at the very tip of it.
I let out a sigh and spin around to reface the beach and continue along my way to shore. I am hideous...
Coming up with a scary idea, I stop paddling forward with my arms and only use my "tails" to propel myself forward, as I use my arms to reach up to my back hoping that what I think is there isn't.
As my hands grasp around a medium-sized triangle appendage, my fears are realized. I have a shark fin.
"Yeah, you look hideous, you abomination of nature, but back to the list, Bluegill would easily beat you, Sturgeon could win..."
"Ms. Kolios, are you sure all this will go away?" I ask, hoping for an answer.
"Oh, sis left a while back. It takes a lot of energy to stay here chatting, and I'm the stronger one so she left while I stay here monitoring you," says Bakaliaros.
Oh, lucky me then.
I swim forwards for about half an hour until I finally see the floor of the ocean rapidly rising up, and assume the beach is approaching os I ask Bakaliaros, "I think we're almost to shore. What do I do now Bakaliaros?"
"How come my sister gets a 'Ms' but I don't? And you still haven't apologized for earlier, fish boy."
Clenching my webbed fist I say, "Okay, I'm sorry Ms Bakaliaros, can you please tell me how to disable the blessing. I could never figure it out, it usually just goes away."
Laughing, Bakaliaros says, "Well no duh it just 'goes away'. It's an ancient magic blessing you halfwit. When you don't need it, it leaves you. Nothing special about it."
Practically grinding my teeth down, my mouth fills with blood.
"I wouldn't do that if I were you, mophead. Those Baracuda teeth are sharper than normal human teeth..."
Of course I have Baracuda teeth.
Before I can say anything else, water fills my mouth, and pain once again (for the umpteenth time this trip) covers my body, as I feel it turn inside out. Hurts a lot less than fighting with Ursa Minor though. That is one thing I never want to do again.
After a brief couple of seconds, I feel my body begin to float up to the surface, and once again close my eyes due to the saltwater. The rise is quick, as the surface was already quite close nearby, and I feel my body not only reach up to the surface but also land upon the sandy beach.
"Hey Alex, you alright man? Where are Perce and Annabeth? Why were you in the ocean? What's happening? Where's the bolt? What..."
I groan and block out the sounds of Grover's questions, and open my eyes. I've arrived at the Santa Monica beach, only a couple hundred yards away from the entrance to the pier. As always during the summer, the sand is filled with people out getting stuff done, but due to the end of the day and the setting sun, there are a lot fewer people than usual for one of the most popular beaches in the US.
"Ughhh..." I groan, and then ask, "First off, Grover, why are you here? You're supposed to be waiting by DOA..."
Grover sheepishly (I guess goatishly) grins and says, "Well all of a sudden I got this huge whiff that smells just like a cross between you and a fish, so I rushed over to where it was to find you. I've been waiting at this beach for a while now, and you just showed up, but the smell left."
"Wait, my smell and fish. What is my smell?"
"Uhhh... I dunno, kind of like a hotdog but more... human?"
I sigh and put my head on my head, "Of course it is..."
Grover then clears his face and grimly stares at me, "So what happened down there?"
I lay on my back for a couple of seconds, when all of a sudden the ground begins to shake and rumble. Grover feels it too and stares at me in terror while I can only grimace and say, "I kind of killed Lord Hades' precious pooch..."
AN - Wow it's been a long time since I updated. The last chapter came out a month and a half before finals season started up, so that's a reason for the lack of updates (I literally had an ACT, SAT, and 3 AP Tests...), but the main reason is I kind of got addicted to osu, but I can totally quit whenever I want to... This chapter was short, but next one is gonna be a big fight (duh) and I've been looking forward to writing it. Never really liked how an actual child who has only touched a sword for a couple of months could beat the literal God of War, so things'll be very different next chapter, and probably as brutal as the Cerberus fight. Don't expect anyone else from here on out to go down as easy as Medusa. BTW, it's totally gonna be a running joke where Alex is about to die in a stupid way, but all of a sudden get's a blessing that saves him. I thought that was really funny. Thanks for reading!