The Ever Twisting Wind: Of Monsters and Titans

by Engineer4Ever

Andromeda Potter has found a refuge for her anguished soul. But as challenges new and old arise, will she able to survive as her world continues to change all around her? Book 2.

6. Chapter 6

Disclaimer: I don't own Percy Jackson or Harry Potter.

The Ever Twisting Wind: Of Monsters and Titans

Chapter Six: Family Feuds

Beta: ShadowofAxios

---

Ice cold lemonade washed down Andi's throat as she sat in her seat across from Chiron on the porch of the Big House. The daughter of Zeus had just finished a few foot races with the dryads when she got word that the Camp's Activities Director wanted to speak with her. So the drink that the trainer of heroes had offered her upon her arrival was greatly appreciated.

Now, Chiron had been a busy centaur when he came back. According to him, the normal processes of camp were completely in disarray, probably due to Tantalus' laziness. So the Trainer of Heroes had to clean up after the spirit, with no help from Mr. D as per normal. The god might be the Camp's Director but, probably because he resented his job, he never did anything unless he absolutely had to.

Looking at the bearded immortal, you could just tell he was glowing over being back home. Honestly, it had been weird not having him around. So the daughter of Zeus was glad that he was back.

"Do you want a second glass?" His voice tinged with amusement as Andi polished off her drink.

"Yes please!" She eagerly said while holding up her empty cup, and he passed her the pitcher. Taking a sip from her refilled glass, she asked. "Glad to be back, huh?"

"You have no idea, my dear." Chiron smiled fondly.

Something tingled the back of Andi's mind and she couldn't resist asking him about it.

"So, what'd you do with GLaDOS? Haven't heard her grating voice for a while."

"Ah, yes." Chiron's bright face darkened a touch at the mention of the AI. Letting out a tired sigh, he replied. "Well, we've put her up in the attic for the moment."

"For the moment?"

"Yes, I've been trying to get in touch with someone about her." Chiron said evasively.

"Her daughter?"

Chiron raised a brow. "Eavesdropping, Andi?"

"It's not my fault that I have super-hearing." She replied, her cheeks feeling hot.

"You need to learn to be more responsible about that power, Andi." Chiron said, making a noise of disapproval.

"Yeah, learned that the hard way with your boombox."

The centaur smiled knowingly at that. If Andi had to guess, he probably knew just how much the campers hated his choice of favored music and had chosen it precisely because of said dislike.

"Good that you do." Chiron said as he once again adopted a stern visage. "Even if you inadvertently overhear something, remember that it is not meant for you and keep it to yourself."

The daughter of Zeus just sullenly sipped her lemonade.

"Fine. Whatever." Andi said dismissively. It wasn't that big of a deal, why is Chiron making it out to be one? If she knew she would be coming for a lecture, she would have busied herself with something else.

Apparently unsatisfied with the flippant reply, Chiron pressed. "Andi, eavesdropping has killed people. How do you think spies learn sensitive information that their side can then use against their enemies?"

"It's not like I'm putting my ear to the ground to listen to the gossip or something." Andi mumbled out in her own defense.

"It's the principle of the matter, Andi." Chiron explained. "If you can't stop yourself with the small things, then what's going to stop you when it's something important?"

"Okay." Andi ducked her head at that. She hated feeling chided, but Chiron just seemed to have a mastery of the art. He always managed to make her feel guilty for the littlest things. "So, what did you want to see me about? Besides a share of lemonade?"

"Well, squeezed beverages aside, I had a talk with Clarisse over the quest in the Sea of Monsters."

Try as she might, Andi couldn't stop the small shiver that went down her spine.

"I heard you got pretty hurt. Are you feeling better now?" He asked with a worried look.

"Fit as a fiddle." She chirped, she was moving perfectly fine thanks to him and Cabin Seven after the Fleece did the bulk of her healing.

"Physically, yes. I can see that." He smiled, like he knew something she didn't. "But I was talking about how you felt mentally."

Andi's face gained a frown. No matter how many times she was asked, she just didn't understand why people would just ask about how she was feeling. No one asked her that before she came to Camp, ever. Not the Dursleys, not the staff at Hogwarts, not even Ron or Hermione.

But it was like they wanted her to be more of an open book here at Camp.

Honestly, it made her scratch her head in confusion.

"What's with all this talk about my feelings? I mean everyone asks me about it all the time."

"I look after the welfare of all my campers, Andi. Both physically and mentally." Chiron stated factually, a finger in the air. "You went through a traumatic experience. It's hard to just come away from that clean."

"I was fine, I toughed it out. I got better. The end." Andi answered in a clipped tone. She stared as condensation rolled down the glass in her hands.

"No, it's not." Chiron retorted.

She bristled. "It is. Water under the bridge, over and done with."

"Really?" Chiron said skeptically. "Then you haven't developed an aversion to flying?"

"Wha? Psh, of course not." Andi snorted trying to play it cool, but she was sweating bullets. After what happened, Andi hadn't flown at camp once. Something that a lot of people had noticed too. It was hard not to when she'd previously regularly zipped through the air from one activity to another just for the heck of it when the mood struck her.

Now? She felt like a dodo. Flightless.

It bothered her, Andi wouldn't lie to herself, but she wasn't one to bother others with her problems. She'd deal with them in her own way, at her own pace.

"Andi, there's no need to pretend otherwise." Chiron said in a soothing tone.

"I'm not pretending!" Andi ground her teeth, her shoulders hunched around her head.

Chiron gave a tired sigh, before he began ticking off his finger. "One, you've stopped flying around camp. Two, you've not flown even once when you train with your powers. Three, even when you evade attacks during spars you've not used flight. Need I say more?"

Andi looked away, unwilling to admit anything even if she knew she'd been caught in the act.

"There's no need to hide the truth from me, Andi."

"Fine, okay!" Andi snapped, her eyes dampening. "I'm afraid to fly, the one thing that I loved so much. Now, I feel like I'd shite myself if I got more than five feet off the ground. I took pride with being able to fly freely through the sky, and now I'm a total failure! All because of one fuck up." She glared at him with watery eyes, streams pouring down her cheeks. "There? Happy? Anything else you want me to say?"

"That one mistake almost killed you, Andi." Chiron offered comfortingly as he placed a hand on her shoulder. "It's normal for it to have a long-term effect on you."

"It shouldn't, I shouldn't feel this, this pathetic over it."

Chiron looked her in the eye for a long moment as if considering something.

"No you shouldn't." Chiron said after a long moment. "You've faced death before and it didn't have this kind of impact." The centaur hummed a bit at that. "And you got away, but not without cost."

Andi winced.

"The cost?" Chiron said his eyes narrowed. "This has affected you so badly because it left you paralyzed?"

The daughter of Zeus' mind skittered away from the mere mention of the word. Her hands shook and if the centaur had not steadied them, she'd have dropped her glass.

"I'm sorry." Chiron said with a sad smile. "I should not have mentioned that."

With a sniffle, Andi nodded. The whole experience, of being paralyzed was still too traumatic for her to even think about.

"I wouldn't have minded dying." She freely confessed after calming herself down. "At least I'd go out a hero or something, get my job with Hecate. But just being stuck like that for the rest of my life? I-I couldn't do it." Andi shook her head. "Not walking, being looked down on or just seen with pity? No way. I couldn't stand it, it'd make me feel worthless."

"Which for someone with your Fatal Flaw would be the worst fate imaginable." Chiron acknowledged with a knowing nod.

Andi looked away, unable to look into her mentor's understanding and sad eyes.

Chiron gave Andi a moment to recollect herself, before he continued with his questioning. "I have to ask though, Andi, if you were feeling this way, why didn't you talk to someone about it?"

"It was my prob-" Andi began to deflect but cut herself off at the raised brow and overt skepticism that Chiron radiated.

"Fine." Andi said in a whine. "It's because the whole thing about the paralysis? When it first struck me, I'd just thought that Annabeth, Percy and Tyson had just died and all I could really think of was myself? How selfish is that?" Her shoulders sagged, sounding bitter.

"I see. Is being selfish why you always run from your issues?"

Andi winced, thinking over the question. Do I? Oh gods, I do.

"Calm yourself, Andi." Chiron said, patting her hands calmingly. "Even if it is, it's not necessarily a bad thing. It's very normal. Suffering people rarely think of others. And you've suffered more than most. I'd imagine that to live through that you've had to think only about yourself, if you wasted effort on thinking about others you wouldn't have survived."

Dursleys, Dursleys, Dursleys! What else could he be talking about? Why can't they just leave me alone already!? Andi thought to herself as she tried to figure out if what Chiron said was true. She honestly couldn't be sure, but it sounded right, so she nodded along.

"Well, I still think it makes me a shitty person." Andi confessed in a quiet, weak voice.

"You are not a bad person." Chiron said with a surety that Andi wished she shared. "But if you want to be a better person, I do have a few suggestions."

"What?" Andi said eagerly. She honestly didn't like the way she sounded. So needy, so desperate. But she couldn't help it, she really, really wanted answers on how to make things better.

"Well, first, you'll need to be more honest with yourself. I know it's hard, painful even, but it will help you immensely as you work through your issues," Chiron said sagely. "And beyond that, you will also need to take the feelings of other people into consideration more as well. Doing so will improve the quality of your friendships a great deal."

"That sounds doable." Andi said hesitantly.

"It won't be easy." Chiron reminded her seriously.

"I know that, Chiron." She offered a tiny smile. "But I think I can manage."

"I'm sure you will." The centaur said with an encouraging smile of his own. "Just remember that I'm always here to talk to if you need it."

Andi nodded.

The two spent the next few minutes sitting on the porch in companionable silence as Andi finished her drink. Chiron offering his silent support and Andi basking in it.

Not for the first or last time, Andi felt grateful to the gods that she'd made it to Camp and met great people like Chiron.

---

What am I doing here? Thalia thought in her head, arms crossed as she and a few other campers gathered around the canoe lake dressed in swimsuits. They were having a swimming lesson of all things. Like I need to learn to swim. What am I? Five.

She glanced at Andi, who was chattering with Percy, the son of Poseidon. It still made her snort mentally, of course Poseidon would break the oath too. But no, her sire had to break it thrice before his brother got in on the action.

And don't even get her started with how clingy the girl acted around her, like they were the best friends or something. Thalia gets out of a tree and she just barges in before she could even get her bearings?

Seriously, you'd think someone would have installed a mute button by now.

"So, you want a kickboard?" Percy asked Andi, a smile on his face.

Andi's cheeks puffed up, like the bratty kid she was. "No, they're for kids. I can handle this, Baywatch."

"Learning to swim is for kids too." He shot back, making the small girl's face pink.

Exactly. So why am I here again?

Thalia glanced over further down the lake, a gaggle of campers were parked there. She knew that they were friends of Andi, which explained why some were giving her kind and encouraging looks or tossing around a few words of guidance and so on. It just felt annoying to the elder daughter of Zeus.

I could be in the arena training or something. You know, something productive. But I have to 'listen' to my Head Counselor.

Thalia still called foul on that. She was older than Andi, which in her mind meant that she should be in charge of Zeus Cabin. But that didn't seem to be the case. Andi was here first, and had finished two quests and that meant that she had right to rule the cabin. So unless Thalia got a quest under her belt, she couldn't even challenge the runt for that right!

The punk girl was already regretting getting out of the tree. Seven years and the world was just more annoying and a hassle.

She just stood ankle deep in the water, watching disinterestedly as some of the younger campers tried to do the crawl or the stroke. Percy was helping those who were having the most trouble, like Andi. Big shocker.

Her arms were crossed, her finger tapping her bicep as Thalia's frustration built. In fact, it built to the point that she released a static charge.

Not a big one mind you, just a small one. Andi and Percy were the only ones close enough to even feel the shock. That didn't stop them from making it a big deal.

Percy let out a pained cry, "Ah, what the heck!"

Andi got to her feet, looking at him in concern. "You okay?" she asked.

Percy held his chest, nodding as he turned to glare at Thalia.

She just narrowed her eyes right back and turned around, stalking off. "This is a waste of my time."

I'm so over this.

"And this is why you're my favorite daughter of Zeus. At least you don't try to kill me." Percy's voice sounded off, no doubt trying to bug her.

Like I care whether you like me, you sea spawn.

Thalia could hear whispers from the other campers.

"Another Mount Zuesette?"

"Wha? Nah, way tamer. Not even close to being flashy enough."

"True. I guess Andi is still more scary."

"Totally."

Her fist balled, Thalia just headed back to her cabin to change. They were just talking bullshit. There was no way that the little brat -who wouldn't stop calling herself her little sister- was more powerful than her.

Right?

---

Andi breathed out her nose, Skyline clasped tightly in her hand. The blue static veins giving off its usual glow as she fiddled with the wind string. Glancing over to Thalia, she could see her taking instruction from Chiron.

"Now, just like that." The trainer pointed out and Thalia let an arrow fly. It let out a thud as it hit the target, its placement on the third ring. It was pretty mediocre, even if it was her best shot of the day.

She noticed that Thalia would keep shifting out of the stance Chiron showed her, as if trying to get comfortable. Andi had seen it before. Thalia was a novice with the bow and arrow -if Andi was feeling generous, she really was a rank amateur - and like other novices she was still having trouble maintaining a proper stance.

Her feet were too spread, she looked stiff in the shoulders, and was pulling as far as she could on the bow for each shot.

Each one as mediocre as the last. Not one bettering the third ring shot from earlier.

"You just need a bit more practice." Chiron told her with an reassuring smile.

An idea formed in Andi's mind. Thalia was always going off about wanting to focus on learning things that could help against monsters. Archery was something that fit the bill.

So if Andi helped her with it. Helped her with something she wanted to learn. Maybe then Thalia would start to warm up to her.

When Chiron called her up for her turn, Andi decided to spring her plan.

Taking her stance, Andi created a wind arrow. It was second nature to her, as natural as breathing for her. Quickly, she fired at the target in the lane to the left, and as soon as it left her bow, Andi made a second arrow, firing it to the right.

The two arrows curved, flying right towards the target in Andi's lane.

Andi pulled a third arrow, and let it fly.

As one, in a feat of incredible timing, all three arrows struck the dead center of the target, making a tight cluster.

She beamed at the success and turned towards Thalia, as Chiron gave her an A+ for the shot.

All the youngest of Zeus' daughters got was a stony face, Thalia's jaw tight.

With butterflies doing acrobatics in her stomach, Andi asked. "So, you want me to help you with your archery? I know a few tricks."

Whatever hopeful feeling she had over this idea, sank faster than her in water. Thalia just tossed her bow to the ground and walked away.

"I don't need help from a damn show-off."

She couldn't lie, that stung. Andi fought back the urge to cry a little. She turned to Chiron, confusion written all over her face and asking what happened.

"It's ok Andi." Chiron said with a soothing smile. "Thalia just wants to find her own place at camp."

Andi noted that the centaur had not pointed out that Thalia hadn't meant it. They both knew the older daughter of Zeus very well did.

"B-But I was just trying to help!"

"I believe she wanted to do it on her own."

Andi shook her head. "I'm her sister, I should be helping her."

The centaur pursed his lips. "I believe she's still adjusting to the fact that she has a sibling."

"But I am her sister." Andi repeated.

Chiron frowned a little at the vehemence Andi said that, but did nothing else to indicate the growing discomfort Andi could sense from him. Instead, he continued in a calm voice, "I would suggest going slow with her, Andi."

That didn't make her feel any better, but the sky child merely nodded. "Fine, I'll convince her eventually." With that said, she dashed off to her next lesson to make herself feel better.

In the process, completely missing Chiron's worried look.

---

Seated in his wheelchair disguise on the patio of the Big House, Chiron was looking at his wristwatch with a frown. "He's late. Again."

Andi snorted. Unsurprised that Percy was running late. The boy had a tendency to do that.

She and Thalia were seated on either side of him at a table overlooking the whole valley in which Camp resided, as they waited for Percy for their lesson on how to manipulate the Mist. It was Thalia's first, and actually Percy's as well.

Only because he kept missing them. If it was on purpose or not, no one knew.

"He's probably caught up in something. You want me to hear what he's up to?" Andi asked Chiron carefully, knowing he was still upset with her over how she often used her superhearing recklessly.

"No, it's quite alright." Chiron said sending Andi a mildly chiding look at the mere suggestion.

She just shrugged back, she was just trying to help.

A satyr bounded over to them, he had an annoyed look on his face. "Percy asked me to tell you that he's sorry, he can't make it. Some campers threw some litter into the lake, the nymphs are pissed to the point their hair is boiling. He's trying to smooth things over."

Chiron pinched the bridge of his nose. "How many times do I-! Well, I know what movie we are all watching tonight."

"An environmental one?" The satyr perked up.

"Yes, prepare the most agonizing one you can find."

The satyr smiled and ran off on his furry legs, even as both girls groaned. They were so gonna make those idiot litter bugs pay for this.

Chiron clapped his hands together and smiled at the girls, ignoring their pained noises. "Well girls, it seems Percy will have to make up this lesson at a later date. Still, let us not be deterred by this."

Andi cheekily added with an impish smile. "Oh, he will. But only if he isn't forced to dodge it. Again."

Chiron gave her a smile of amusement at this.

At the easy camaraderie between the two, Thalia eyes shone with something that Andi refused to put a name to.

"Well, let's get started shall we?" Chiron said with a smile. "Andi, why don't you go through the exercises we did last time as a warm-up while I help Thalia get started?"

Andi nodded and did as she was told, conjuring some Mist and weaving them into some simple illusions. At the same time, she spied on what Chiron was teaching Thalia.

It was the basic stuff, but Thalia still looked like she was having trouble trying to get a handle for it.

Andi could understand how tough it could be for someone without some magical know how. Andi's magical studies at Hogwarts had helped her learn about manipulating the Mist before she had even known what it was. While it was true that not all magic involved the Mist, enough of it did that Andi had something of a head's start. She had lucked out it seemed.

Moistening her lips, Andi tried to offer some minor suggestions. Just tips were fine, right?

"Maybe try not focusing so much on your feelings when you're shaping it. You gotta push them aside and really connect with the Mist." The youngest of Zeus' children suggested. That wasn't showy, right?

Thalia just grunted. "I've got this." She said, a white mass of Mist fluxing between her palms. "I can do it on my own. Go do your own exercise, you busybody."

The British girl was hurt by that, feeling confused on what she did wrong this time. Not wanting to make more of a mess of things, she zipped her lips and focused on her own work. Even as she heard Chiron chide Thalia for what she'd said.

Seriously, anything I say just makes her angry with me.

After a few minutes, Thalia made a sound of triumph and exclaimed proudly. "Yes! Got it."

Hovering in front of her was a mass of Mist which to Andi looked indistinct but which must have looked to Thalia and Chiron like whatever illusion the older girl was working to create.

"Very good, Thalia." Chiron said with a slightly strained smile. "Now then, keep practicing with that while I check on Andi."

He did so, looking around for what the magical girl had been working on. Andi just shot him an innocent smile at him, hinting to him that he needed to find it himself.

Andi ignored how Thalia snorted at her little game.

"Hm," He mused at her, a twinkle in his eyes as he pointed to the card table where a lone diet coke can sat. "He always finishes it, Andi. And amazingly cleans up after himself. Good try though."

She just snapped his fingers at him. "Oh well, next time for sure."

"I relish the challenge." Chiron said with an almost mischievous look in his eyes. "How about trying again? This time on a slightly bigger scale?"

"How much bigger?"

"Hm, how about a whole scene? That should be a nice step up from simple objects."

"Isn't that a big step up?" Andi asked a little uncertainly.

"Perhaps," Chiron said challengingly. "But are you saying you aren't up to the task?"

Electric blue eyes narrowed. "Get ready to have your horseshoes knocked off."

Inhaling softly, Andi spread her arms out, flickers of Mist wafted on her palms. Softly pushing forward, the gathering Mist flowed off her form and covered Chiron in a light haze.

While the illusion was supposed to be a whole scene, in the grand scheme of things it was pretty simple. As all the best illusions were, something Chiron had taught her once. After all, the more complex the illusion, the easier it was to find faults in.

In this case, the illusion made Chiron believe he was facing off against Mr. D in a good ol' game of pinochle. Something helped along by the fact that they were all already seated around a table on the porch of the Big House where the two played such games so very often.

Andi was half tempted to have Mr. D win, just to see a stunned look on Chiron's face. But sadly, she had to keep this somewhat believable.

She and Thalia were still there too. Just that instead of being the focus of Chiron's attention, they were just sitting on the sidelines, practicing the Mist while the centaur and the god dueled for supremacy.

Chiron examined the scene for a moment, before he waved his hand and dispelled the haze.

Looking greatly amused he offered his critique. "A clever scene. Though there was a number of flaws. First and foremost, the splendid hand. You're better off giving your target something more believable, something less generous. Any doubt, any skepticism over even a small detail can spell failure. Even if it's doubt over good fortune."

Andi bobbed her head. "So just make it more close next time?"

"Yes, in this scenario." Chiron said with a nod, even as he groaned in frustration. "But you need to remember to not just focus in on this scenario but apply this idea more broadly as well. To avoid failure, you need to make things believable to your targets. So avoid scenarios that are too much in their favor or too against them."

She just clicked her tongue at that.

"Don't be afraid to let your target fill in the blanks." Chiron continued after giving Andi a moment to let that sink in, "That's half the power of the Mist. Just craft the bare bones of the scenario you want and then let them think what they want to think."

He then proceeded to critique and nitpick some minor details until Thalia's voice chimed in.

"Are we done with the lesson now?" She asked the centaur, making the other two break away from the conversation that they had become so engrossed in. She had her chin resting in her palm, a bored look on her face.

Andi was a little startled by her announcement, she had almost forgotten Thalia was there. A frown tugged on her lips though, feeling somewhat put out. She had been pretty patient when it was Thalia's turn. Was it really so hard to wait as she finished her own?

Chiron had a disapproving look on his face, but just sighed. "Yes Thalia, you may go."

With a parting wave towards the centaur, the elder daughter of Zeus hopped to her feet and marched off to do something else.

The trainer turned back to Andi. "Apologies for the interruption, now, let us continue"

Andi waved it off tiredly, a sag in her shoulders. "It's fine...can we call it here? I'm feeling kinda tired."

In truth, she just wasn't into the lesson that much anymore. Not after yet another reminder that her sister didn't like her.

Releasing a breath, Chiron nodded. "Yes, go enjoy yourself, Andi. You did well today."

Funny, she didn't feel like she did.

---

It was time for weapons training in the arena. Usually, Andi's weapons class consisted of the cabins with less campers. Cabins One, Three, Four, and Twelve. But it was just cabins One and Twelve today.

It was Chiron's idea. He didn't want Thalia to have too many gawkers. Something about making her get more comfortable at camp.

Clarisse had taken over the class this summer as the instructor and clearly relished it.

Thalia seemed to be in the zone, surging with excitement. Literally, she was sparking a bit.

Andi on the other hand felt nervous as she slashed up her practice dummy with little to no enthusiasm.

Something that her buddy from Cabin Five had noticed within three minutes.

Clarisse came over, a scowl on her face and arms crossed. "Come on Potter, you've hacked that thing to bits. You don't suck this much."

Andi's pitiful swing proved that as she missed a decapitation.

Sighing, Clarisse rubbed her eyes with her fingers. "Okay, what's your beef?"

Andi looked around her, nervous someone might overhear. She motioned Clarisse to come closer. Complying to her request, Clarisse leaned down.

"I'm, I'm not feeling that into a straight up fight anymore." She confessed, looking embarrassed.

The daughter of war knitted her brow. "This because of Scylla?"

The youngest daughter of Zeus just gave a small nod.

Clarisse grunted, a frown on her face. "Well, we've got to work on finding you a new combat style that you will feel better with then." Her beady eyes squared on Andi. "You just love making my job harder, Potter. But for now, just continue with what you've got, you'll need something to fight the monsters with."

Giving a nod to her instructor, Andi began to contemplate what she could do to change some of her tactics up.

"Hey, teach." Thalia called out, though the way she referred to Clarisse as the instructor was perhaps a touch condescending. "We doing some spars or what?"

"I don't know, Mosshead, you going to go shock happy like you did with my cabin?" Clarisse sent a sneer the punk girl's way.

Thalia just shrugged in an uncaring fashion. "They said I could give them hell, so I did."

Clarisse just mumbled curses under her breath that Andi didn't need super-hearing to understand. "Sure, whatever." She looked at the Dionysus twins, who quickly backed away from Thalia. "Nope, not them I guess."

The eldest of Zeus' demigods nudged her chin at Andi, making the little girl's throat tighten. "How about my daring Head Counselor?"

The daughter of war looked ready to axe that idea the second it was said, probably in consideration of the problems Andi was having with her current fighting style, but Andi spoke before she could.

"Yeah, sure."

Clarisse turned and raised an eyebrow at her. Andi just gave her a tiny nod. She didn't know why, but maybe just having a fight with Thalia would get her some respect from the older girl. Honestly, Andi had no clue what to do with her sister at this point. But if she wanted a fight, well okay.

The instructor scowled, but allowed it.

The two daughters of Zeus stood in the center of the arena. Both brandishing their chosen weapons. To make things fair and to prevent fatal injuries, they were banned from using magical weapons and were using issued practice weapons. Thalia had chosen to go for a spear while Andi elected to go with a sword.

"Okay, make it clean. Got it?" Clarisse ordered as she eyed each combatant in turn.

"Whatever." Thalia answered flippantly, Andi just nodded.

"Right then, fight!"

Thalia flashed her palm forward, a blue static bolt shooting down her arm and through the air to strike Andi.

On impact, the electricity crackled around Andi, who was completely unharmed, as she shot an amazingly unimpressed look at her sister. "If electricity doesn't hurt you, why would it hurt me?"

Thalia's freckled face tinged an angry red, as if they just realized they were related or something.

"That was just to make sure you your head in the game, brat." Thalia said as she charged.

As soon as she got in close, Andi called on her powers over the wind and leapt backwards, landing a safe distance away.

Thalia frowned at her, charging at her once more, spear primed for stabbing. "Stand still and fight, you show off!"

Nervousness filling her, Andi leapt once more over Thalia, waving her hand under her. A gust knocked up dust, making a visible cloud condense around Thalia, who ended up hacking and coughing as the vapour filled her lungs.

"Come on Potter! Punch her in the face!" Clarisse shouted at her in encouragement.

"Aren't you supposed to be impartial?" Castor asked.

"Screw that, the tiny one's more bearable."

"Can't argue with that." Pollux agreed.

"Shut up!" Thalia shouted at the spectators even as she discharged a burst of static to disperse the cloud.

At her getting distracted, Andi sent a squall right at Thalia, knocking her off her feet to fall flat on her back. It was the perfect opportunity for Andi to close and finish the still disoriented Thalia off, but the mere thought sent Andi's stomach churning and she hesitated.

The hesitation was more than enough to give Thalia the time she needed to storm to her feet, glaring at Andi. "Can you stop making me look like an idiot!?"

"You do that all on your own already!" Clarisse jeered, even as the Dionysius twins snickered into their hands.

"Screw you, Pigface." The elder daughter of Zeus cried out as she sent a wave static in all directions. Clarisse and the twins ducked out of the way, shouting angrily at Thalia's indiscriminate attack all the while. Andi moved to capitalise on Thalia's seeming distraction again, when unexpectedly a static bolt struck right at Andi's feet. The explosion sent rock and dust flying right at her.

Andi covered her face, pebbles smacking her body and dust blocking her vision and filling her lungs.

Just as she was about to blow the dust away, Andi felt something tackle her from the side. Caught completely off guard, she fell to the ground hard. Groaning in pain, she blinked the dust out of eyes and looked up to see a spear point at her throat. Thalia was grinning down at her, like she had won the lottery or something.

"Turnabout is fair play." Thalia said smugly. "Oh, and I win."

"By being an asshole." Clarisse commented as she came out of cover and marched over. She got right into Thalia's face, literally. She stood so close to the punk girl that their faces were only a few inches apart, Clarisse having a few inches over her. "Class over, get out of my arena."

Thalia just flared her nostrils and turned around, almost smacking Clarisse with her spear in the process. She marched away, tossing the practice weapon at the rack where it smacked against the wood with a loud bang before falling to the ground. Not even looking back, she left to do who knew what.

The daughter of war turned to Andi, and helped her to her feet. "Not going to lie, kinda disappointed. You had her at your mercy Potter."

Andi gave a sad look. "Sorry."

"If it was the old you, you'd have wrecked her." The taller girl stated. "And that would have been a good thing. That girl needs a good boot up her ass. She's a total bitch."

"She's my sister."

"Doesn't act like it." The burly girl retorted, a knowing look in her eye that made Andi turn away.

"Like yours are any better." Andi mumbled out.

"And that's a good thing?" Clarisse asked with a skeptical raise of an eyebrow.

"Clarisse, we're heading out!" Pollux called out from where he and Castor were putting away their practice weapons and cleaning up after Thalia. Clarisse gave them a distracted wave in acknowledgement.

"See you guys!" Andi replied as she gave them a far more enthusiastic wave goodbye.

"It was a good fight, Andi." Castor called back as the two headed for their next activity.

"Like I said, the girl's a bitch. And this is me saying it." The child of Ares grunted. "She acts as if she's something special, even more than you do. But you're marginally more tolerable about it. I mean at least you have some accomplishments to back you up. Her?" Clarisse snorted then. "Woohoo, fought the Furies and a hellhound army, got turned into a tree. Slow clap."

"She almost died." Andi said in Thalia's defense.

"Because she gave up." Clarisse countered. "She could easily have fought a fighting retreat. But no! She just gave up and used the noble sacrifice card to justify herself. Bullshit!" The brutally honest girl snorted again as she walked towards the weapons rack with Andi's practice sword, the other girl trailing behind her.

"But-" Andi tried to cut in halfheartedly.

Her friend ignored her though and continued with spelling out why she disliked Thalia. "Even when you couldn't move your legs, you got weepy sure, but you still tried to get back up. With paralyzed legs! Unlike that bitch, Potter, you didn't give up."

Andi thought back to her talk with Chiron, how she tended to run away from her problems. She felt she fell into that category, but here Clarisse was telling her otherwise.

Andi was getting confused.

---

Andi sat on the steps of the amphitheater as music ranging from beautiful to something that sounded more like someone choking on a wishbone than anything musical filled the air. Or at least it would have were one able to listen to the players individually. Sadly, that was not how sound worked and it was all meshed into a blob of sound and along with her hearing, well, Andi did her best to try and learn how to lower the volume of sound around her for her own benefit.

It was her first music class. It was something that some of her friends had suggested she try. A more relaxing lesson in comparison to all the trying activities that she usually did that would serve as a kinda break. It was either this, or go through one of Annabeth's arts and crafts courses where she'd build skyscraper birdhouses with their own hot tubs and reasonably priced rent.

So here Andi was, taking a class with Cabin Seven at the lead with some from Cabins Four and Ten attending.

Lee Fletcher was head of the class, bobbing his head to the mishmosh of sound, like he could differentiate them perfectly. "Hey, Cyla, up the tempo some more. Brice, come on, you've got a guitar, give me more umph! Denis, bring it back, no solos for you. We had this talk dude."

The daughter of Zeus played on the brass harmonica -or what passed for it, she only really managed to make "toot" like sounds on the thing so far- in her small hands. Lee had presented her with a large range of wind instruments to pick from, since in his words; "You've got the lungs of a Navy Seal. Use them."

"Hey Andi, maybe you should try some string too?" One of Will's siblings suggested as they all took a short break.

Andi shuddered a little at the very notion. It had been enough of a pain to pick the harmonica. From the flute, to anything brass, to an ocarina -Seriously, what was this Zelda thing that got everyone tickled when she picked it up?- to even a didgeridoo, Andi had tried many an instrument.

But none really felt right, so she picked up the small but loud instrument. It honestly still didn't fit perfectly, but it was close enough. And Will may have suggested it to her after the didgeridoo slipped from her hands and beamed someone on the head. Less chance of injuring someone, he had said.

"No, smaller the better." Another said clearly remembering the didgeridoo incident. "I don't want to get bashed in the head by a cello."

"Okay, chill out guys." Lee cut in. "Stick to wind instruments, Andi."

"Yup." Will affirmed. "Practicing with them will strengthen her breathing and vocal cords and help with her sonic powers."

"T-That's not how powers works at all." Someone from Cabin Four said. "That's like saying Jackson gets better with water by swimming."

"Well, maybe not the sound manipulation itself." Will agreed. "But she does need to take breaths between her cries, right?" Andi nodded. "So if she can build up her lung capacity then she can cry longer and more often."

Lee slumped over his acoustic guitar. "Great, she can already take down a house. At this rate? I worry about her in a city."

Andi's cheeks burned hot at that. "I'm not that bad."

"Maybe not yet." Someone from Cabin Ten teased.

"Okay, we can tease Andi some more later." Lee said with a smile even as he ignored Andi's indignant "Hey!" and continued. "Break's over. Let's continue with the lesson."

"What lesson?"

"Jonah don't make me come up there!"

The boy just held up his hands in mock surrender and soon the lesson picked up again.

As it did so, Andi managed to improve enough to pull off an occasional whistling noise, though that wasn't what really caught the girl's attention.

Instead her focus was increasingly wrapped up in how Will, who had stuck close by to coach her along, was looking quite… handsome. She hadn't really noticed it before… but his shaggy blond hair, sky blue eyes and dimpled smile, all combined to make him look very good.

Heat crept up from her neck.

"Hey Will, is your hair getting more and more shaggy lately?" Andi said distractedly during the next break as she stared at his golden mane.

Andi cursed herself for pulling a Motor Mouth Jackson.

Will just blinked, looking very confused. "Err. It's the same as always?"

"Um, yes. Yes it is. Looks good." She gave him a thumbs up.

Oh gods. Shut up, shut up now!

She ducked her head like a turtle, feeling so stupid and self-conscious at the moment.

There was some snickering from all round the amphitheater at Andi's display but they were shushed rather quickly by, surprisingly, those from Cabin Ten.

In fact, a good number of them were shooting her thumbs up.

Will blushed furiously at that, and Andi did too as she realized what the children of Aphrodite were implying.

They can't think that I like Will like that, can they? Andi thought before she froze as she put the pieces together. Oh gods! Do I like Will like that?!

"Okay everyone." Lee said with a grin. "As I said, we can tease Andi later. And now Will too."

"Get a fungal infection, Lee."

"Which you can heal!"

Will just gave his brother a frustrated look, one that promised some form of retribution.

The rest of the lesson passed way too slowly for Andi. Between the teasing looks everyone was shooting her and her own traitorous brain thinking embarrassing thoughts about Will the whole time, it was torture.

She was so distracted that the sounds from her harmonica sounded akin to a dying alley cat. Not that she noticed, not with Will right next to her. Sure he was loads better on his lyre than she was but he was super nice about it. Which didn't help at all.

I want to hide in a cloud.

---

It was August first, the day after the big birthday party that she and Percy had organized for Andi. It had been a great time, as expected of their circle of friends, and the birthday girl had enjoyed herself immensely. It was hard not to. Not when she was also showered with gifts. Mainly normal stuff, but also including a replica of the aviator jacket from Silena to replace the one Andi had lost in the Sea of Monsters.

Andi had teared up a little at that, not even minding as Silena teased her about needing to stockpile more of them with how quickly she seemed to be going through them.

Personally, Annabeth felt her gift was better than the jacket.

After all how could you compare an ancient book on magic with a simple piece of clothing bought from the camp store?

Andi just didn't have any taste.

Besides that, the party was a great success for the most part. The only sour point had been Thalia, who had been grumpy and standoffish the whole time. To the point that everyone, Andi and Annabeth included, were glad when she left early, complaining about it being a waste of her time.

Annabeth honestly wished she hadn't convinced her old friend to stay in the first place. She had hoped that the two daughters of Zeus would just get along, but any attempt Andi made to be friendly was just tossed to the side.

The grey eyed girl was drawn from her thoughts when she heard someone call out to her.

Turning to the direction of the voice, she saw Katie jogging up to her.

"Going where I'm going?" Katie said with a playful smile.

"You know I am, Katie." Annabeth rolled her eyes. "You were there when Andi invited me yesterday at the party."

"I guess we need a party pooper there." The daughter of Demeter stuck out her tongue.

Annabeth grumbled at that, she was not a party pooper.

They arrived at Cabin One and Annabeth knocked on the large double doors. With a groan, one opened, Andi poking her head out, a forced smile on her face.

"Hey guys."

"You wanna go!?" Thalia's voice rang out from in the cabin, making Andi wince.

"Of course you want to fight when you don't get your way." Silena shouted back. "That's the only way you know how to get what you want, isn't it?"

"Oh boy." Annabeth said as she and Katie entered the cabin with a quick prayer to Zeus. Silena stood on one side, an uncharacteristic sneer on her face. While Thalia stood a few feet away from her, blue static jumping around her frame, a scowl marring hers.

"Do we even want to know?" Katie asked Andi in a low whisper.

"Thalia wants to watch the Tele." Andi replied in an equally quiet voice, sounding immensely conflicted. Hunter whined comfortingly as he rubbed himself against her side.

"What's the problem with that?" Katie asked with a confused frown.

"She wants to watch a rock concert. At max volume, for the atmosphere." Andi explained, rubbing her ears a little. "She said she'll be going at it all night. Says she wants to catch up on all the stuff from her old bands that she's missed." Andi said, gesturing to the pile of DVDs - the stuff that Thalia had wasted all the store credit she earned from camp events on - that littered the coffee table in front of the TV in the little sleeping area that Andi had arranged to have set up for Thalia.

It was a pretty nice set up and something that Annabeth knew Andi paid for with her own money. It had a decent bed, a chest of drawers, and a TV all squeezed into one of the many alcoves that Cabin One had. It wasn't very spacious though, and Andi had offered to let Thalia just share her magical wardrobe or for her to get her one of her own. But the older daughter of Zeus had furiously rejected what she called 'charity'.

She seemed pretty okay with all the other stuff though.

"You do realize this was all paid for with Andi's money, right?" Silena asked pointedly.

Thalia scoffed. "So? It's tradition for the Head Counselors of Cabin One to provide this isn't it? She probably just dragged it all out of some storage locker somewhere or used the Cabin's account to buy it."

Silena gave her a look that clearly said that Thalia was crazy.

Annabeth spared Andi a look. The younger daughter of Zeus was shuffling her feet uncomfortably.

Really, Andi? This is how you got her to accept all this stuff?

"Even if that's the case." Katie cut in sounding skeptical, a dry look on her face. "It's time you let Andi have some peace and quiet to do what she wants." The daughter of Demeter gestured at the pile of discarded snack wrappers littered about Thalia's area. "It's obvious you've been at it for hours already."

"The cabin inspection is coming up too." Silena noted cheerfully. "I would hate to dock so many points because of the family slob."

"Well, sorry Miss Prim and Proper. Trying to catch up on seven lost years takes time." Thalia retorted, her voice going up an octave in the process.

A whine from Andi's side drew the blonde's attention. Resting his head on his paws, Hunter growled at Thalia.

"By making a mess?" Katie asked condescendingly.

Thalia glared at Silena and Katie then even as the storm of static around her spiked, "Shut up! Do you even know what that's like? Losing years of your life like that, huh?"

"No," Silena admitted but sounding undaunted. "But it's no excuse for how you've been bullying Andi."

Katie nodded her agreement, even Hunter did. Annabeth barely managed to restrain herself from doing the same.

Thalia squared her shoulders, as if she was making a stand and looked around, spotting Annabeth. The look in her eye was clearly asking for support.

The daughter of Athena felt torn inside, but reluctantly shook her head. Don't look at me, this is your mess.

For a brief moment, Thalia's shoulders sagged as if defeated. But she recovered quickly and straightening once again, she began to stalk off. "Whatever. You want me gone? Fine."

Andi flinched at this, moving as if to say something but stopping herself at the last minute.

Annabeth took note of that and couldn't help the anger that welled inside of her at her old friend. She understood that Thalia was having a rough time adjusting. They had spent a few hours just talking about it, but the others were frankly right. While Andi might have been pushy with Thalia about establishing a family relationship, that didn't justify the outright bullying of the small girl that Thalia was responding with. It just wasn't acceptable.

Andi wouldn't fight back and Thalia would just keep walking all over her.

It's time to talk to her about her behavior, I think. Annabeth decided. But not now.

Which was why she did nothing as Thalia slammed the Cabin's door behind her as she declared that she'd be out picking a fight with Ares cabin.

Hunter let out a triumphant bark, his tail wagging happily that Thalia was gone.

"So, with the family drama over, girl's' day anyone?" Silena asked, looking pleased with herself.

"That sounds great." Katie smiled.

Annabeth knelt down beside Hunter and rubbed the back of his ear.

"Where's Clarisse?" Silena asked looking around and not spotting the daughter of Ares. "Didn't I see you inviting her, Andi?"

"I don't think she's coming." Andi said with a frown, partly, Annabeth guessed, because of confusion over what she was talking about and partly because she was still feeling upset over the fight with Thalia. "When I invited her and told her about how I wanted to talk about Will, she said something about a talk with a shovel and just walked off." Andi knitted her brow. "Honestly didn't get it."

The daughter of Athena's lip twitched. "It just means Clarisse is a good friend of yours, Andi."

Who would have thought that the rough and tough Clarisse had gained a soft spot for Andi? The daughter of Zeus just formed the strangest of friendships at times.

Hunter let out a bark of agreement, making Annabeth look at him.

"Why's Hunter all cooped up in the cabin?" The daughter of wisdom asked as she recalled how she'd not seen the dog around camp much lately. "Shouldn't that house arrest he was given been lifted already?"

Andi walked over to them, patting Hunter's back.

"Mr. D ruled that Hunter could only come out when he's got a chaperone. And he could only come to lessons if permission is given beforehand. He said he liked it better this way." Andi pouted, Hunter whining forlornly. "Something about Hunter not being underfoot all the time like this."

Annabeth's heart went out for Hunter, he was a wonderful dog. But then again when had Mr. D not done something just to mess with a camper?

"That's totally unfair." Katie commented.

"Tell me about it, Hunter loved chasing the satyrs around. Mr. D even said it gave them good exercise!"

"And practice if they were chased by a real monster." Annabeth couldn't help but note.

"True." Silena agreed as she went up to guide Andi over to the wardrobe, and into her room. The others followed, and soon they were all sitting on the couch in front of her TV. "Besides Hunter's a great dog." Hunter barked happily at that, clearly pleased to be praised. "He even has good taste in his favorite daughter of Zeus."

Andi gave the girls an uneasy look. "Hey, was it okay to be all mean to Thalia like that?"

Both Silena and Katie looked stunned at her question.

Annabeth however understood why she had said that. Andi was hoping to build a true sisterly relationship with Thalia and was afraid that fighting with her would scuttle her chances of that. "Andi, Thalia was in the wrong here. She hasn't been treating you right and someone had to point that out to her. Okay?"

The petite girl offered an unsure nod in return.

"How about we just hang out, like we came here to do?" Annabeth suggested in an attempt to switch the subject.

She got a round of agreements.

"Hey, Andi." Katie called out uncertainly.

"Hm?"

"Thanks for inviting me." Katie sent a grateful smile the child of Zeus' way. She was gripping her jean shorts. "I was honestly a little surprised since we hadn't been...on great terms as of late." Katie gulped nervously for a moment, before continuing. "Because of Tantalus."

Andi hesitated for a moment, before waving the matter off.

"Don't worry about it. You were right." An upset look settled on Andi's face. "He was a total creep."

Poor Andi. The child of Athena thought to herself even as she held back the sad expression she wanted to show. Andi was probably comparing Tantalus with Thalia and thinking about how her family always seemed to fail to meet her expectations.

Hunter's head nudged Andi's leg, looking up at her with sad dog eyes.

"So, let's get to the meat of the subject here." Silena cut in as sharp as a knife. She was smiling brightly at Andi. "Your feelings and a certain son of Apollo."

Andi's face turned pink, but said nothing as she just rubbed Hunter's head.

"You said you wanted to talk about them? Does it have something to do with the juicy news I heard about your music lesson~"

"Nothing was 'juicy'. I just sounded terrible, and acted like a right twit." Andi replied as she bent down to give Hunter a belly rub and hide her reddening face in the process.

"Well, it's my diagnosis-"

"Really?" Katie asked with a dry look.

"It works perfectly here." Silena objected.

Andi just looked thoughtful.

"So," Annabeth cut in before the banter could drag out even as she smiled in amusement at her friends' antics. "Andi, what did you feel exactly?"

"I dunno, I just suddenly looked at him and realized he's handsome, has nice hair, and all that. I knew that before of course, but this time it was different. I got all fluttery inside too."

"And by nice hair you mean it was shaggy." Silena teased.

"I know, it was dumb!" Andi cried out, her palms meeting her face.

"And cute." Silena points out. "Guys like some quirkiness. Just look at Annabeth."

"How am I quirky?!" Annabeth said, looking indignant.

"You go into rambles about things ranging from ceiling tiles to arch designs. You're quirky, accept this truth."

Katie nodded along to Silena's assessment. Even Andi seemed to agree though she was more cautious about it.

"Well, we're not here to talk about me." Annabeth stressed, feeling flustered. "We're here for Andi."

"For now." Silena said with a Cheshire smile that promised a long and painful -In her opinion- talk about her lovelife.

Annabeth was already dreading it.

"Back to you, Andi. What do you think it means?"

"Err… That I might like him? I mean, like like him?" The daughter of Zeus said rather uncertainly, playing with the hem of her t-shirt as she did.

Hunter gave off a clearly unhappy growl at all this talk about Andi's lovelife. But Silena just nudged him with her foot.

"Shush."

In the same motion, Silena gave Andi a round of applause, while the other girls shot her encouraging smiles. "Accepting it is the first step to love."

"Lo-Love?" Andi sputtered.

"Silena." Annabeth warned.

"Puppy love?" Silena adjusted. "Hey, I don't tell you how to craft a strategy or build a house. Leave this to someone related to love."

Hunter covered his ears with his paws, not happy to hear about his mistress' love life. Annabeth however found his actions adorable.

"Still you might be going too fast for Andi, Silena." Katie pointed out.

"Fine." Silena said with a pout at the look of shock still on Andi's face.

"Maybe you can stick to just giving Andi some advice instead?" Katie offered.

"Fine, yes." Silena nodded and offered the little girl a confident smile. "Andi, sweetie, all you need to do is let this take its natural course."

The child of Zeus moistened her lips.

"That's all?"

"Yup." Silena winked. "If this is meant to be then it is meant to be. Or if mom wants it to happen."

"Thanks Silena." Andi said looking visibly nervous. Annabeth could commiserate, the reminder that the capricious Aphrodite was in charge of their love lives made all of them nervous. For a second, she thought of Percy...and how she wanted to kis-no, um, punch him...stupid Seaweed Brain.

"So you good, Andi?" Katie said clearly just as uncomfortable with the topic.

"Err… I think so."

"Good. Then let's talk about something else."

Hunter barked his agreement, much to the girls' amusement.

The girls looked at each other a bit as they tried to think about something else to talk about. Something less emotionally charged.

Finally, when it was clear that no one had a suggestion, Silena reached over into a bag that she'd presumably left on Andi's couch before Annabeth and Katie had arrived.

"How about we watch a movie instead?" The daughter of Aphrodite held up a DVD labeled: The Notebook.

"Seriously?" Katie asked her.

"Shush, Katie. Let me do things."

The daughter of Demeter just sighed. The other two demigoddesses shrugged in response, clearly thinking this was as good an idea as any.

The rest of the night passed quickly as the girls enjoyed their movie with popcorn and a tub of neapolitan ice cream.

---

The Pegasi were flying, the harpies were screeching, swords clanged together, and fart jokes were made. Seriously, there was this Hermes kid who made one during combat class earlier. Andi thought it was okay, but the older campers disagreed and all gave him the stink eye until the poor guy clammed up. And sadly as usual, Thalia was being cold towards Andi, though the witch was sure that she'll come around soon.

Basically, it was just an average day at Camp Half-Blood.

The peace was unexpectedly broken however when a horde of monsters - three dozen of them, at least - suddenly burst out of the southern woods. They looked like women but with flaming hair, white skin, red eyes, fangs, and one prosthetic bronze leg and one donkey leg.

"Empousai!" One of the campers who spotted them first shouted as they rushed past the Archery Range and the Combat Arena on a path towards the Strawberry Fields.

Unfortunately for the Empousai they were running right through a pincer of armed to the teeth demigods.

"Heroes!" Chiron's voice rang out, his call rallying the campers to action. "Archers, take aim. Fire!"

At his command, the various campers who had previously been having an archery lesson with him obeyed. There had been some confusion among the campers - Not that Andi would blame them, it was pretty weird to have monsters just show up from nowhere - but they quickly recovered and followed their orders.

Andi had been there for her usual double lesson in Archery, and had rained down a cluster of her wind arrows, sinking into heads and chests, grazing others. She had launched a few air bombs too, but the monsters were sprinting so fast that they didn't do much damage. Only managing to cause as much damage as her wind arrows did.

Campers in leather cuirass armed with swords and spears poured out of the arena, Percy at the front of the wave as he lopped off an Empousai's head. Clarisse was surprisingly not in the thick of it. Instead, she was running across the path over to the Archery Range at the head of a trio of campers loaded down with weapons to arm the various campers there watching the lesson and who were unarmed.

The campers tried to block the monster's path, but at least half of them suddenly went rigid, as if they were paralyzed by the monster's horrible appearance.

"They're empousai!" Chiron shouted over the chaos. "Don't look at them too closely or you'll be paralyzed."

His warning helped, and the campers were a lot more careful as they engaged the monsters but that caution lowered their effectiveness which meant they they failed to prevent the attackers from making it to the Strawberry Fields. There they began setting the crop - the Camp's source of funds- on fire.

That pissed Andi off. She had worked hard helping the twins out in the fields!

The unparalyzed campers pursued the monsters into the fields and this time, the monsters stood their ground. Though not before conjuring a thick bank of fog around the whole area.

"That's the Mist!" Andi called out, as she tried to pierce through the large bank of Mist.

"Be wary of illusions." Chiron warned even as he let fly with another arrow at the monsters, the other archers - Andi included - following suit.

Their aim was thrown off by the Mist and the other campers closing in, making things too messy to risk another volley. So they switched to targets of opportunity instead, shooting at any sign of the enemy they could make out.

Andi made one such shot when a massive snake head lifted itself above the Mist looking ready to strike at something that she could not see - probably some hapless demigod. Her wind bomb arrow blew the transformed monster's -What else could it be?- head off, reducing it to gold dust.

A few other giant snakes had peeked their heads out of the Mist by that point, but at the sight of their compatriot being destroyed, they quickly ducked their heads back under the obscuring Mist. Their shapes were hard to make out, but that didn't save them from the more eagle eyed archers like Andi and Lee Fletcher who managed to score a number of shots. The shots hit the monsters through the eyes or other vulnerable parts of the bodies of the odd monster or in Andi's case blew whole parts of their body apart.

The Mist was thick and obscuring, but Andi could still, if barely, make out the forms of the campers. Some of them fighting, but others were acting strange.

They look like they're off their rocker or something. Andi thought to herself, before she realized what was going on. Oh bloody-! They must be caught in some illusion due to all that Mist.

Andi made it a point to pepper the area around the frozen campers with arrows, hopefully that would keep the monsters that had trapped them away long enough for them to shake the illusion off. Once, Andi even heard a sharp monstrous cry of pain that told her that she'd scored a kill while doing so.

With all the campers working together, the battle was over quickly. It lasted only five, maybe ten minutes. With the last empousai being dealt with just as the first campers from the Cabins arrived to help.

That was easy, not that there was any doubt about the outcome. Andi mused happily. What were these wankers thinking? Attacking Camp when they were so badly outnumbered and outgunned?

With the downing of the last empousai, the bank of Mist began to clear and Andi took a quick check to see how the campers had fared. As far as she could tell, there were a handful of people with pretty nasty wounds from what looked like bite marks but overall no one looked seriously hurt.

Seeing that the battle had ended, the campers let out whoops and cheers, many looking pleased with their kill counts and bragging all around.

A "chee choo" sound caught Andi's attention and her eyes shot towards a box like object in the middle of the blazing strawberry fields that was in the middle of unfurling or transforming into something else.

Did the empousai drop that? Andi pondered even as she leveled her bow at the thing, just in case it was some nasty parting surprise left behind by the monsters.

With a "choo choo chuh" sound, the thing completed its transformation.

It looked like something that came from the Battle-Cano. It was a humanoid figure that was nearly as tall as Chiron with a head that was shaped like a distorted skull and was punctuated by beady glowing red eyes. It stood on a pair of clawed legs that looked vaguely like those of a bird, which had a whole host of visible pistons and what not installed onto it that clearly implied its great potential for speed. Chrome and gunmetal grey colored its thin body as well as its four arms, each armed with some crazy looking weapons.

The two upper arms gripped a pair of celestial bronze tubes, that reminded Andi slightly of the Master Bolt.

The weapons in the lower arms were what truly grabbed her attention though, they were two of the most exotic looking guns that Andi had ever seen. The right one looked like some kinda alien squid in black, was glowing red and had crimson energy that arcing between the squid arm like prongs of the claw that made up the gun's muzzle. The left was a weapon in gunmetal grey casing built around what looked like some kinda large coil of copper wire with a mechanical claw attached to its front.

"Shit! Is that General Grievous?" Andi heard one of the campers near it whisper in awe.

"Wait, cartoon Grievous, or movie Grievous?" Another camper, clearly a friend of the first, whispered back.

Andi didn't really know what they were talking about, but she did note that whoever built those guns really liked to include claw-like things on the front of their stuff.

"Chiron?" Lee prompted the centaur.

"Hold." Chiron's voice rang out, as if he was knocked out of some kind of daze. "We don't know if it's hostile." Then in a whisper that Andi barely caught, he added. "I hope not."

"Idiots, its a droid, so it's the N-K Necrosis." Someone corrected the two campers that had been arguing earlier, as they formed up into a loose circle around the automaton.

"Dude, whatever. Same-" The guy who had first identified the automaton spoke up, but he never finished his sentence as the automaton raised its guns and fired. The blast from the gun in its left hand punting him into the friend he'd first been bantering with, sending them both to the ground. The poor guy had been impaled through the heart by his mate's sword.

As horrifying as that was, the bark of the squid gun that followed seconds afterwards was worse. It was aimed towards the combat arena and the crimson orb of energy it fired landed in the middle of the structure. A second later, a good chunk of the building was vaporized in a mushroom cloud of red energy as the rest just collapsed.

"Okay, all in favor of avoiding that?" A panicked camper shouted even as she ran away from the mechanical monster.

"Aye!" A number of campers muttered in agreement as many started to flee from their new enemy.

"Scatter!" Chiron ordered rather unnecessarily to the various campers in the fields.

Neither Chiron's orders nor the camper's own initiative helped them escape though. The automaton didn't let them. The archers unleashed a rain of arrows to slow it down, but their assault was stopped dead in its track. The automation simply activated the twin tubes of celestial bronze that it wielded in it's upper arms, causing each of them to emit twin blades of red energy, which it proceeded to use to lazily defend itself. Any arrows that might have harmed it were cut down while less dangerous shots it allowed to get deflected entirely by its armor or failing that just get stuck in it. Even Andi's wind arrows were being taken out as the droid disrupted the constructs with its energy weapons.

"Lightsabers!" Lee gasped. "Fucking dual-bladed red lightsabers? Sith! Sith!"

Andi wasn't entirely sure what those were, except being something from the Star Wars movies she'd heard about, but judging from everyone's reactions they were bad news.

Weathering the barrage from the archers and freaking everyone out as it did so, it closed the distance with the nearest campers with frightening speed.

Two brave souls raised their weapons to block the glowing swords, but one was sent flying thanks to the grey gun, landing in a painful thud. He got off lucky.

The other camper was sliced to bits in a matter of seconds by the whirling blades of the lightsabers, his celestial bronze sword unable to stand up against the power of the exotic weapon and ending up in the same condition as its wielder.

Andi and her fellow archers could do no more than pepper it with their arsenal, desperately praying to the Twin Archers to hit something vital. But clearly this was a top tier automaton, because between its armor and the deadly dance that it moved its swords in, it easily dealt with anything that was fired its way.

Andi bit her lip in frustration as she was about to let another arrow rip, they weren't accomplishing anything. Their arrows weren't even distracting the thing as it ran towards another camper.

Just then, Andi saw something that made her stomach drop. Thalia had arrived and was making a mad dash straight towards the automaton.

"I've got this"! The elder daughter of Zeus declared as she shouted, "Aegis!" Her bronze shield, stamped with the horrific face of Medusa, quickly transformed from its disguised form and was leveled at the machine. The sight sent all the nearby campers around Thalia running in a panic.

It however had no effect at all on the automaton which ignored it -and Thalia- entirely as it closed on a camper.

"Nice job." Percy said snidely to her as he lashed out a hand towards the cooler by the Archery Range. There wasn't much water left in it, but the son of Poseidon shaped what was left into a whip and cracked it at the automaton.

The droid just countered in a fluid motion, brandishing its grey gun which barked with a long bang and hit the water with some kind of blast that both dispersed Percy's construct and sent the water that had made it up flying in the opposite direction.

"It just had to be a flipping gravity gun. That's so not fair." A daughter of Apollo hissed near Andi, even as she drew another arrow from her near empty quiver.

A member of Cabin Six ran up behind them, his arms holding a bundle of quivers. Panting, he said. "Here guys, grabbed as many as I could."

He got a short round of thanks as all the archers snagged their new quivers, filled to the brim with fresh arrows.

"Where's Annabeth?" Chiron asked the son of Athena. "We could use her strategic skill."

The blond pointed over towards where Clarisse and Annabeth were trying to organize the still panicking campers. Apparently Thalia was still trying to use Aegis on the automaton, both of them were shouting at the elder daughter of Zeus to stow away her shield but she seemed to be ignoring them. Though now that Andi was looking more carefully, Thalia actually looked like she was using the shield's power to keep campers away from the droid. The machine noticed Clarisse and Annabeth though and raised the gravity gun in their direction, firing a shot that sent both girls flying.

Clarisse managed to get her bearings enough mid-flight to roll as she landed to bleed off the momentum and was back on her feet pretty quickly. Annabeth however landed badly, hitting her head hard against a piece of masonry from the wrecked Arena.

"Well, she's out like a light." The son of Athena grimaced at the sight.

Andi just saw red, wanting to hit the automaton with an entire volley of wind bombs that could level a hill, but stilled her need for wanton destruction.

"Damn it, if only the thing wasn't so fast or so close to the other campers." Andi cursed, her grip on Skyline turning her knuckles white. "I'd blow it up with a wind bomb if it wasn't."

"Patience, Andi," Chiron said in a cold, furious voice. "You might yet have a chance."

The youngest child of Zeus nodded, eagerly waiting for said chance.

Apparently satisfied that it had dealt with the threat of its opposition organising itself, the machine returned its attention to hunting down the fleeing campers around it. Much to the horror of Andi and the other archers, an easy target quickly presented himself. A demigod caught in the throes of Aegis' magically induced panic was running right towards it.

However, the boy got off by the skin of his teeth as Thalia let out a yell, firing a static bolt right at the machine.

It staggered back from the elemental attack and that saved the camper's life. He didn't get off scot free though as he was caught up in the blast too. Which sent him flopping to the ground with terrible electric burns, and very clearly unconscious.

With the boy no longer a threat, the automaton switched targets and turned to sprint towards Thalia.

For a moment, Thalia froze. Her eyes locked on the badly burned boy.

"Thalia!" Andi shouted, enhancing her voice with her powers.

That snapped the elder daughter of Zeus back to reality and her frame crackled with electric power as she fired another bolt from her spear. The machine however jinxed away from Thalia's clearly telegraphed attack at the last minute, not once breaking stride as it closed in on her like a cheetah.

Eyes wide, the spiky haired girl aimed her spear for another blast, but it was too late. The automaton was already on her like a hungry lion and with a last leap closed the distance. It immediately lashed out with one of it's lightsabers for a stab through her chest. The child of Zeus desperately raised Aegis, and it saved her life.

The glowing blade was blocked, making the machine tilt its head. If it was possible, Andi would have thought it was stunned that its blade did nothing.

Whatever it was, Thalia took advantage of it. With a mighty war cry, she counterattacked with her spear, sending the glistening spearhead right through one of the elbows of its blade arms, cutting it clean off.

She looked ready for a follow up, as she pulled her spear back for another jab. Unfortunately, her successful attack had got the machine's attention and it quickly responded by firing the gravity gun point-blank at her.

"Fuck." Thalia said and let out a cry as she was sent airborne, landing in a thud on her back, Aegis rolling away from her.

Fear for Thalia gripped Andi's heart at the sight but she held it in. Now wasn't the time, not when getting Thalia off the field had finally lifted the panic that had overwhelmed the campers and had previously negated any attempts to organise them to fight the monster.

A monster that was currently distracted as it tilted its head to examine first the smoking and melting remains of its severed arm and the damaged stump that remained attached to its body.

Percy, the brilliant bloke he was, rushed in to take advantage of this lack of focus. Before the automation knew it, the son of Poseidon was right inside its guard and had swung Riptide with perfect precision. In a single perfect stoke, he amputated the other lightsaber arm.

"Dude, stay in your terrible mo-" Percy never got to finish whatever quip he was making though, as the droid responded quickly and gun whipped him in the side, sending him reeling back.

In the same motion, the monstrous machine leveled its squid gun at the cluster of archers while the other was aimed upwards.

The same archers who had capitalized on the droid having lost its lightsabers and had just finished unleashing a volley on the now vulnerable droid. Seeing the the droid's deadliest weapon pointed at them, they panicked.

Andi acted on sheer instinct. Calling on her aerokinesis, she immediately detonated a wind bomb in the middle of the crowd of archers, sending everyone, even Chiron, flying. They might have gotten hurt from the blast or the fall, but that was better than being vaporized.

Meanwhile, the archers' last volley was mostly sent flying in the other direction as the automaton fired its gravity gun at the mass of arrows. Only a handful remained on target after that, and they just peppered it uselessly even as it's much more powerful gun fired.

This proved to be its last hurrah however, as its focus on letting the last shot off left it open. Something that Thalia and Percy, recovered from their earlier blows, used to rush in to stab it from both sides, skewering it right through the chest.

Not that this helped the archers much, as a mushroom cloud of red energy burst into being in the middle of their ranks, thankfully thinned due to Andi's quick action. Despite that, there were still quite a few people caught up in the explosion. The campers -or parts of them- were sent flying.

"Olympus will fall!" The droid screamed in a sharp metallic voice as it finally shorted out and began melting into slag. Percy and Thalia backing away quickly as their opponent turned into a pool of molten junk.

---

After the entire battle, all the head counselors gathered around the Ping-Pong table in the Big House. Chiron sat at the head of the table, while Mr. D loafed off in the corner on his napping couch.

Most everyone was covered in bandages. Even Chiron was injured - he had a twisted fetlock - and was recovering in his magical wheelchair. They had ran short of nectar and ambrosia and Apollo Cabin had been forced to resort to rationing it so as to make sure only those most seriously injured had enough.

All was quiet as the last of the counselors, Lee from Apollo arrived.

"The final count is eight dead and thirty seven wounded." Lee informed Camp's leaders grimly, without prompting as he entered the room.

Everyone, even Mr. D, looked pained to hear the news. That meant that practically every camper had at least been hurt.

Giving Mr. D the stink eye, Percy turned to the god.

"Where were you?" He demanded, his voice raised. "Eight are dead, and dozens are wounded. Why didn't our resident god made a godly appearance!?"

Mr. D paused in his turning of the page of the magazine he has been reading. Putting the magazine aside, the god returned the son of Poseidon's accusatory eyes with a surprisingly serious look of his own.

"Percy." Andi said in a low whisper to her cousin, tugging on his sleeve to remind him that it was a good idea to not antagonize their resident god.

Her twit of cousin ignored her.

"While you played with the wind-up toy, I was busy making sure nothing else spewed out of the summoning circle in the forest." The god raised a brow. "Or did you want any more little nasty surprises, Peter?"

The daughter of Zeus felt that Mr. D wasn't being completely honest. Nor was he lying outright.

Though, to be fair, she couldn't really complain about him even if he was lying through his teeth. Hunter could have been a great help in the fight, but in the heat of the moment, she had completely forgotten about her faithful dog.

Percy fumed at the god's reply, his whole demeanor putting out a dark aura. Most of the other counselors weren't happy with the explanation either but nobody tried to refute it or press Mr. D for more.

"Let's focus on the matter at hand." Annabeth said, who was holding an ice pack to the back of her head. "Who or what sent that automaton and why."

"I have my suspicions." Chiron said with a tired frown on his face.

A scoff from Mr. D said that he had an idea as well.

"It was her."

"We have no concrete proof." Chiron shot back with an almost hopeful tone in his voice.

"You're being too soft, Chiron." Mr. D chided with a wag of his finger. "Hephaestus always did produce the crazy ones. And here I thought I was the mad one."

The Head Counselor of Hephaestus' Cabin, Beckendorf, did not look pleased by the comment at all. He was this huge African American bloke with a permanent scowl on his face, a ton of muscles and huge hands that reminded her of Hagrid, which were calloused from working in the armory all day.

"Oh, save your petty anger." Mr. D said with a dismissive wave of his hand. "We both know your sister did this. After all, her mother is missing from the attic."

"Mother? Attic?" Silena said voicing the confusion of the majority of the counselors.

The puzzle pieces started to fall into place and Andi stated her conclusion.

"You mean GLaDOS?"

"The annoying thing, yes." Mr. D nodded.

"Mr. D!" Chiron cut in, sounding annoyed. "As I said, we have no proof Chell did this. She wouldn't hurt her fellow half-bloods like this."

"Please, for their little mortal parents?" Mr. D pointed to the demigods accusingly. "Some of them would do just about anything."

Chiron looked ready to continue to protest, but Beckendorf cut him off.

"No Chiron, Mr. D is right. It makes sense." The son of Hephaestus sadly nodded. "Those guns, the lightsabers, even the strange automaton design. It's her usual MO."

"But what about the empousai?" Katie asked with concern.

"Summoned." Travis Stoll said, playing with a key lock.

"By Lucas Gascone we think." Connor added as he took the lock from his brother.

"Who?" Andi asked with a knitted brow, the name not ringing any bells.

"The new Hecate kid." Travis explained.

Connor picked up from there.

"He's disappeared. Must have been a plant."

"Great, another spy?" Percy frowned.

That made the room fall quiet, they had no idea who Luke's spy was and now they were faced with another one.

"Could Lucas-"

"No way, Katie," Connor said with a shake of his head. "He only showed up a couple weeks ago."

"Let's not waste time on speculation. We need to focus on what we need to do. The wounded need attention, the dead need a pyre, and we need to build a new arena." Chiron listed off, trying to change subjects.

"Yes, plenty of work." Mr. D commented disinterestedly as he stood. "Work that I'll leave to you miscreants. I've got the strawberry fields to tend to."

With that the god walked out, leaving Andi and the others to handle everything else.

---

It took hours to work out the details for everything. By the time they were done, Andi was dead tired, both emotionally and physically. She stumbled back to her cabin, something she only managed thanks to Percy's help. Though considering how tired he looked, the assistance went both ways.

Hoping for some sense of peace today, Andi pushed the door of her cabin open and shuffled in. Sadly, the moment she set foot inside, Thalia was right there with crossed arms and a scowl.

"What happened during the meeting?" She demanded, not even bothering with a 'How are you feeling?' or even a 'Hello'.

Andi wouldn't lie, a sense of resentment filled her at that moment.

"Well, Head Counselor?" Thalia said with a sneer, clearly not caring about how Andi felt. "Aren't you going to tell me?"

Hunter padded forward, trying to squeeze between the two daughters of Zeus. But Thalia just kept nudging him to the side.

Frankly, feeling dead tired, Andi just walked past Thalia without so much as a word, going right to her wardrobe.

"Oh so you're just going to ignore me? Some counselor you are." Thalia said with a scoff. "I bet I could do loads better."

Andi's hand gripped the wardrobe's doorknob in a white knuckled grip, she ground her teeth at Thalia's attitude. Looking over her shoulder, she gave Thalia a withering glare.

"We've got eight dead, over thirty wounded, and you know the only thing that I'm hearing from you? Me me me. Give it a rest for once, Thalia."

Without even bothering to listen to Thalia's heated retort, Andi closed the door on her sister and drifted to her bed. Falling face first onto her mattress, her blue eyes fluttered closed.

The head counselor of Cabin One was too tired to deal with Thalia. There had been too much to deal with today already, she couldn't take her sister's crap too. Not today.

---

Hey hey hey~! Guess who's back with a super long treat for you guys! *Thumbs to himself* This guy! Oh, and the other guys too.

Thalia's back, back again, from the tree, to live again! And judging from the title, you guys could hopefully figure out that not all the things here today was sunshine and rainbows. The kiddies of Zeus do not get along, at all. It was bound to happen honestly, they just don't meld together well. Andi is too clingy, Thalia is too gruff and not willing to reach out to make a family bond after her brother, mom, and Luke.

Nameless: So as some of you might have noticed, we've gone with a rather unorthodox interpretation of Thalia's character. Now before I dissect our reasons, let me remind you that we're going with plausible interpretations not exact ones. In canon, we don't get much depth into Thalia's characterization so this an extrapolation of that with the changed circumstances represented by Andi. Ok, here goes.

Our first reason for making Thalia a bitch to Andi is one of pride. Thalia is driven by a desire for power, it's her fatal flaw. So seeing Andi being more powerful than her (more experienced at camp, has friends there, is Head Counselor) is going to piss her off. Especially because she comes across as the spare in the dynamics of the Big Three kids at Camp so far. She wants to be the star, but clearly isn't. This causes her to lash out, not only at Andi but at Camp in general, especially when reminded of her 'junior status'.

Second, Thalia doesn't want a new family. In fact, she's actively afraid of it after what happened to her 'conventional' families in the past. (Luke betrayed her, her mum was a helpless drunk, Jason disappeared, etc.) We see this from her quite cool, considering their circumstances, reaction to Jason in canon and her complete embracing of the Hunters (a group who have no family but each other which is unconventional enough that it seems to be ok for her). With Andi desperately trying to push a family relationship between them, which she doesn't want, of course she'll be pissed beyond belief.

So yeah, any attempt for Andi and Thalia to be genuine sisters was doomed from the get go. We just decided to play this out in the extreme for the drama. Well, that and to buck the fanon trend of Thalia just being OOC and readily accepting to any and all new siblings.

E4E: But we've still got Jason guys! XD Fingers crossed.

Though my readers, fear not! For not all is rain and thunderstorms! For we have ships, ships for days! Andi's music lesson being a big example of it. Now, Andi's knowledge of love could fill a thimble. Silena is her love guru. So, she has no idea why she's getting all fluttery over bishie Will (He's Apollo's, he's a bishie, deal with it). The girl talk helped steer the ship out of port and brace her for the dangerous seas and against such fleets as Solangelo (which ppl please don't bother me over. I had this pairing way before that was even canon!) and such.

Nameless: Also for our more logical readers, you'll realize that with a MC close to Silena, her story will change. How? Well, keep reading to find out.

Dude, shh. Don't point it out! We'll have to deal with the theorists!

Anyways! We had some Star Wars going on. Oh! And, one of the guns was the Blackstar Reaper from Mass Effect 3, while the other was a Valve classic from our all time fav Half-Life (HL3 confirmed) the Zero Point Energy Field Manipulator! We had a fun lil debate between the demigods as they tried to identify all our references...until it thinned the herd at camp. Yesh, man, talk about harsh banter killing.

Well, not much else to say except to smash that review button with your thoughts and feels, no flames, and to peace off until next time! Laters!