CHAPTER Thirteen: Apprehend
ALEX.
"My name is Issa Ntuwah. I'm an Amazon sent by Queen Hylla to find and apprehend the descendant of Achilleus…" Was the dramatic ancient name really necessary? "…and use whatever means necessary."
"And I'm Nico di Angelo. I firmly believe in the multiple meanings of 'apprehend'."
The boy extended a friendly hand to Alex May, and she took it, shaking it slowly.
They were all standing in Chiron's office again. The leopard-head on the wall, Seymour, looked exhausted at having so many visitors over the past couple of days. Alex couldn't blame it. After shaking Nico's hand, she retreated back to the wall again, right next to Seymour's head. Seeing a jar of Cheetos on the shelf next to him, she took it out and started feeding Seymour. She caught Chiron's eye once, and he just nodded at her with a smile, giving her permission to continue.
Everyone else went to interrogate Issa and Nico. And by everyone, there was Piper, Riley, Mags, Leo, and now Calypso too. Not exactly the warmest of welcome parties.
Alex felt guilty having everyone else deal with the talking and the negotiations while she just stuck to the side, but she was also so so grateful. Contrary to popular belief, she hated confrontation. If everyone waited for her to speak up, they'd be waiting a long time. When it came to verbal fights, she was always more likely to just back down than to stand up for herself.
And if it had been Alex talking to Issa for the past five minutes, she probably would have surrendered to the Amazon already and let herself be arrested.
"I'm with Nico on the other meaning of 'apprehend'," said Mags, frowning at the Amazon. "Your mission should be to understand someone first, rather than attack at first sight."
"Excuse me?" Issa arched an eyebrow. "She attacked first."
Nico sighed, exasperated. "No, she didn't. You did."
"So much for being all buddy-buddy, di Angelo," Issa snarled.
"Enough," Chiron lifted his hand with a sigh. "Nico, how did you become part of an Amazonian envoy?"
"I wasn't. I was already on a mission to find Alex Estrada, sent by Reyna after Ella found something in the Sibylline Books."
Everyone else seemed to just accept that piece of information but Alex, Riley and Mags all looked at each other in confusion.
"I'm sorry -" Riley raised his hand like he was in class, "the what now?"
"Books that tell the future, basically," Leo explained, shrugging.
"Oh. Awesome. Clears that up entirely."
"Then how did you two come together?" Chiron gestured between Nico and Issa. Issa rolled her eyes.
"I can explain that." Calypso stepped forward. "My sister, Coronis. We're…distant but I thought I could reach out to her since I heard she joined the Amazons. Once Alex May's ancestry was revealed, I told Leo I could reach out to the Amazons to avoid any misunderstandings. I spoke to Coronis and she and Hylla agreed to see Alex May first before attacking," she said, looking pointedly at Issa.
Issa's frown deepened. "And that's not what I did?"
"You disobeyed direct orders, Issa."
"I did what was needed to be done, and you saw what happened, we all did!" Issa retaliated. "That girl you're protecting is a danger to us all! She destroyed the camp!"
"And she wasn't alone!"
Alex flinched. She held a Cheeto so tight, it crumbled to dust between her fingers and Seymour lowered his head sadly.
"Enough!" Chiron said again, louder. He stepped in front of the Amazon and the titaness.
"I will not tolerate any finger-pointing or accusations in this room," Chiron frowned. "This is a room of diplomacy and deliberation. Now, I believe Calypso and Nico." Issa opened her mouth to reply but Chiron stopped her. "And I know from personal experience that it is not the will of the Amazons to attack before knowing who their true enemy is. I will accept that you are here to investigate Alex May, but I will not accept senseless attacks based on personal prejudice."
He waited for everyone to understand. Everyone nodded.
"Good," the centaur said, stepping back behind his desk. "Calypso, please continue."
"Thank you, Chiron," she said respectfully. "As I said before, Queen Hylla agreed to the mission. They had already heard from someone in Camp Jupiter that the line of Achilles had resurfaced, and that descendant was the ones who battled in Seattle. But the Amazons only agreed because of the possibility for peace. They wanted to see for themselves if they could negotiate with Alex, after what an Amazon saw in the airport."
I can negotiate, I can DEFINITELY negotiate, Alex wanted to say, but Issa had focused such a piercing gaze on her, her tongue was caught in her mouth.
Issa's eyes flickered back to Calypso. "Imogene."
"Yes, Imogene. She was the Amazon sent by Hylla to relay the message to Alex May and her friends. I think they believed Alex was already aware of her parentage, and they thought that was why they were all planning to head to Camp Halfblood."
All eyes turned to Piper.
Piper looked uncomfortable. "Actually, it was just me planning to go back. They went there to stop me."
Chiron nodded, as if he'd heard that before. Calypso's eyebrows rose in surprise, but she continued her story. "Nevertheless, they were aware of Alex May. Once I explained that they would be at Camp Halfblood, safe and secure, Hylla called for an Amazon to take the mission and…for some reason…" Calypso muttered, "Issa took it."
Issa turned back to Alex with her lip curled, like she was looking at a cockroach she needed to squash.
Issa cleared her throat, crossing her arms over her chest, her voice coming out in a bored drawl. "The information provided to us from Camp Jupiter said she was dangerous. Knowing the history of Achilles' descendants, and Achilles himself…"
"What do you mean Achilles himself?" asked Leo. "What, you met him?"
Alex had never seen a face look so 'done'. Issa scowled. "No. But unlike mortals and civilian demigods, we don't glorify him as a hero. He was a machine and a murderer, unleashed by Agamemnon and the gods who sided with Greece in the Trojan War. That's all. And I decided that it would be better if the warrior who takes the mission is someone who could do what needed to be done.""
"And what exactly needs to be done?" Piper asked.
"To end the line, once and for all," Issa shrugged. Alex pressed herself against the wooden wall, wanting to disappear forever. "To do the job that we believed was already finished. Because someone was sloppy." Here, she turned to Chiron.
Chiron furrowed his eyebrows at her. It was just a warning look but a remnant of the angry Chiron she'd seen that first night came back in a flash. She worried he might burst from such a throwaway comment. An angry Chiron still scared her, but she had no reason to believe now that he would ever become that angry again, at her, without good reason. And, as far as they had talked about, Chiron had no reason to hate or despise her anymore.
She'd grown to really love that old centaur. She had never seen someone so protective over a group of weird kids like herself. Someone who could deal with the temperaments of Meg, Harley, and also Alex's deep issues.
That first night, when they walked around camp until it was well past midnight, he didn't ask her about herself or pressure her to make an agreement to change, to make a decision about her future. Nah. He'd told her about the campers. Who loved archery the most, who loved to do art more and hated fighting. Who could cook a mean burrito. He knew them all. And he also told her about Achilles.
From Chiron, the image of a young, inexperienced, pressured Achilles grew in her mind. Someone who also had to deal with big expectations. Someone like any other camper here.
She could see how much hearing about his death hurt him, and how much it hurt to also have to kill Flynn, someone he could have helped, someone he should have stopped earlier.
Chiron was not someone who was naturally angry.
So to hear Issa just make an insensitive jab about how he didn't kill a kid well?
Alex placed the jar of Cheetos loudly on the shelf.
Everyone jumped from the sound. Issa had her hand on her sword.
"Don't talk to him like that," Alex found herself saying. "You have no idea what he's been through. I know you have a problem with me so just - so just say it and we'll be done."
"My problem? My problem is that you need to be controlled," Issa stated. "I don't know what kind of spell you've put upon everyone here, but they're treating the issue too lightly when we Amazons know the true consequences of what treating people like you lightly are. You know what your family has caused the world? Death. Death and suffering for something as ludicrous as glory."
Alex clenched her fist at her side, but then out of the blue came Piper, holding her arm down.
"Death and suffering is what every demigod goes through," said Nico calmly. "And if you'd all just stop yelling, I'll tell you what I came here to tell you. If it's okay, Calypso," he glanced at Calypso and she shrugged. "I met up with Calypso and Issa when they stopped at Camp Jupiter. And we were already having problems of our own there before Ella brought up something she read in the Sibylline Books."
And again, there was those books. Alex guessed they would be explained later, and what it had to do with her. She felt something against her hand and, looking down, she saw Piper was still holding her arm, but her hand had slid down to her wrist, her fingers resting lightly on the back of Alex's hand.
She felt herself relaxing.
Nico explained that there had been issues in California and the Mid-West, even so far as Texas and Florida, of mortals and reported legacies obtaining big amounts of celestial bronze. The black-market operation was almost as big as the issues with the Triumvirate a few years ago (whatever that meant, Alex thought). The problem was, no one could figure out what was being made and for what purpose. Also, no one was actually attacking the camp, and no threats had been made to anyone, so 'technically' there was no danger. The source remained a mystery, but everyone seemed to be just sharing. Sharing, or waiting for something bigger to happen.
And then the Seattle Airport incident happened.
Over the past week or so, people started to upload monster sightings to Youtube and other video-sharing websites. There were even videos of people fighting them. But the uploaders were all anonymous, and even the children of Vulcan couldn't figure out why they were untraceable.
The videos were all blurry, or glitching. That was the Mist at work, Nico explained, but there was still enough in the video to make people question. Articles and theories were popping up all over the Internet. Lots of mortals had started doing investigations, in the vein of conspiracy videos and ghost-hunting.
And then the punch-line happened this morning:
"We were getting ready to go. All three of us would travel on Festus and then make it to Camp by lunchtime," Nico said. "But we'd set up a watch on what was happening on the Internet." The way Nico said 'Internet' was strange somehow, but Alex couldn't figure out why. It was like the word was foreign to him, but maybe he just didn't use it enough. "And this morning, someone had posted the locations of Camp Halfblood and Camp Jupiter. For people to just check out."
Chiron's eyes widened.
Leo whispered something to himself, just as shocked. She saw him take out a pen and begin to write things down along his arm, muttering plans to himself.
"So then what happened?" Leo quickly asked, breaking the stunned silence. He only looked up once from his arm, but continued scribbling. "Have they set up something, what are Reyna and the Romans doing about it?"
"They've increased defences, both physical and magical. We weren't too worried about Camp Halfblood because of the power of the Athena Parthenos. Thing still packs a magical punch just trying to long-distance shadow-travel here. It's like it forgets I can do that," Nico rolled his eyes. "But they're relying on mortal ignorance. Hopefully, they'll turn away. The real danger are the Clear-Sighted mortals. The stupid ones, at least."
The room went silent again. Piper had let go of Alex's hand, and Alex felt the absence of it. But when she saw her move towards Leo, head lowered and discussing something serious, she couldn't blame her for it. Alex, herself, went closer to Mags and Riley.
"Kinda makes you think how we were planning to do the same thing once," Mags murmured.
"Yeah, but not for this," Riley said. "Not for some massive magical manhunt. Not even a manhunt…people sound like they're doing this for fun, like some Magical Amazing Race. But that's not what we were planning to do. We just wanted people to be aware of monsters in the city."
Alex sighed. "…is there a difference?"
Riley didn't answer.
Everyone seemed to be absorbed in their own, small group conversations. And then Piper was the one to bring them all back together.
"What about Percy and Annabeth?" she asked.
"Tomorrow," Nico answered. "They're coming by late tomorrow. They have to finish things at Camp Jupiter, and then check with Manhattan to see if there was anything wrong there. Actually, Percy's little sister has a school performance at night, so…they might be coming by late-late tomorrow."
"How…" Chiron's voice sounded tired, "…who would share our locations? I don't understand, I don't know of any demigod or friend of the camps who would so recklessly share that."
"That's just it. Whoever did this is…they're no friend. And they knew exactly what they were doing. We have reason to believe that whoever's doing this has a bigger plan in store, and…unfortunately, it may be connected to Alex."
Again, she was in the spotlight. There was a difference between performing and having everyone look at her, and having everyone look at her like they were now. That oh, no, what's going to happen now? sort of look.
Alex took a deep breath and exhaled, readying herself.
"…what's up?" she asked, just as tired as Chiron.
Mags looped her arm around Alex's for support.
"The Sibylline Books…" Nico started. And then he took out from his pocket two objects: one, a rolled up paper, and the other, the bronze and gold thing she'd seen him holding at the ant-hill.
It looked like it was a shield fit for just her hand, and even from here she could see the intricate engravings on it. And then Alex had to blink twice, for she thought she saw the engravings move. She thought this would be the source of all her future misery, but instead, Nico unrolled the paper:
"Ella recalled this prophecy just as the news this morning came out. She was with us, the Senators, in the room and she just immediately remembered. Much to the Senate's chagrin, she wrote it down on the marble floor in lipstick:
Child of time, stronger than Father and sun,
Fall from grace, the kindly one,
Aegina's Army tamed, time is dire,
Rally, shall men, to their heart's desire
Worship the one who starts the fire.
Yeah, Alex definitely wanted to disappear.
Once the prophecy was said (she did double-check that was a prophecy and not just Ella the Harpy's poetic stylings), everyone immediately looked to her for her reaction and nobody said a word. It was the worst kind of situation. And just as she was about to say something, Issa intervened and offered to just take her back to the Amazons and have her stand trial there.
And everyone snapped again.
"Stand trial? She hasn't even done anything!" Mags exclaimed.
"Issa, you are way out of line -" Calypso butted in.
Leo had to excuse himself to use the one computer in the Big House that had Internet connection, but he pointed from his eyes to Issa's as if to say: I'm watching you.
Riley was the only one who didn't say anything, instead he had an arm around Alex's shoulders, hugging her for support. Piper's voice was the most calm. Alex didn't think she was using charmspeak but maybe it was needed from how loud everyone had been getting. And no matter how many times Alex tried to speak up, everyone else was still loud.
And then Riley left her side when Issa pointed a finger at Mags.
"Hey, just because you're some Ancient Greek Warrior Queen, that doesn't mean we have to take any of your bullshit," Riley snapped.
"Stand down, mortal, you don't even belong here," Issa sneered.
Nico and Chiron had given up trying to placate the debates; Nico was sighing, leaning against the wall and watching. Chiron sat behind his desk, rubbing his forehead.
"Prophecies have a million interpretations," Piper said. "We're not saying how you're feeling is wrong, we can't disagree with the things the other legacies of Achilles have done, but maybe you could open your mind and just listen -"
"Spare me," Issa scoffed. "You all think yourselves heroes, especially your special seven, but if this sorry group is any indication of the so-called greatness of this generation of demigods, then I'm sorely disappointed."
Piper's eyes flashed.
Alex backed to the wall again. She closed her eyes and took slow breaths, trying to block out the sound of everyone arguing. Mags said something about bringing the Amazons here instead and Issa shouted that they would never stoop so low. Calypso tried to calm Issa down, and Piper threatened to throw her off the Argo III.5. Chiron suggested breaking this up and continuing in the morning but Piper insisted they should try to come to some sort of agreement tonight or else they'd all go to bed angry. Alex heard Nico whisper to Chiron that he could just shadow-travel everyone to their cabins.
Alex blinked once. In the split second of darkness, she saw a different scene - old men in blue and white robes, arguing in a grand room, Alex sitting at the head of the table, but not exactly in the middle. She turned to her left, and she saw the eldest man in the room, a kingly figure with white hair and a beard. He was rubbing his forehead the same way Chiron was.
When she opened her eyes, the scene was Chiron's office again.
Alex straightened her back and stepped forward.
"Hey -" she started, trying to get the closest person's attention.
Riley looked at her but he look away again, trying to finish a heated discussion with Calypso.
"Guys, look, I'll go to the Amazons," Alex said.
Nico looked up, arching an eyebrow. But no one else had noticed yet.
"Hey!" Alex shouted, and everyone stopped to look at her. "I'll go. I'll go to the Amazons and I'll talk with them. They're the ones I need to prove to the most that I'm not a threat. There's no harm in talking. And we'll definitely talk," she glanced at Issa. "If you're okay with that."
Issa narrowed her eyes. "No tricks?"
"No tricks. I - I don't even know how I'd begin to," Alex added jokingly, trying for a smile. Issa did not smile. "I'm not a 'trick' kind of person."
"But I am." Mags stepped forward, crossing her arms.
"If she goes, she goes alone," Issa said.
"Feel free to remember I'm part of this," Nico frowned.
"Your mission is different from mine, di Angelo. You've relayed your message about the celestial bronze market, you're done here."
"Not so fast, Issa," Chiron interrupted. "We have to discuss the manner in which Alex May will be brought to the Amazons. How you treat her, how this investigation will continue. Now, I am ready to personally vouch for her and to explain in front of the entire Amazonian council my views on the matter."
"And it'd be better if someone go with her," Piper suddenly said. "Chiron, I don't know if you can leave camp if all this other stuff is happening but maybe -" She looked around the room.
Alex's heart dropped a little. She half-expected Piper to offer herself for the position, but maybe they weren't there yet. Maybe they would never be there at all.
But Issa seemed to at least contemplate the idea, though she didn't want to discuss it with everyone else. The discussion was left to her and Chiron, and before they were all excused, Alex made sure to feed Seymour a few more Cheetos. She patted the great leopard's cheek before leaving.
Outside, the three of them - her, Mags, and Riley - sat at the grass in front of the Big House. The sun was already deep in the horizon, the sunset striking the sky in jagged oranges before melting in navy blue.
Mags was the first to talk to her, asking immediately what the hell she was doing.
"It's the only way to clear my name. They'll never take someone's word for it. I need to go there, I need to apologize for what I've done and then they'll see that I'm okay. And whatever else they need me to do…" Alex shrugged, gesturing around, "I'll do it."
"What exactly do you think is gonna happen?" Mags asked, incredulous. "Community service? Pick out the trash from their beach? This is the kind of prejudice that's been going on for generations. The bedtime story Amazonians tell the next little Amazon kids, or however it works. It's part of their curriculum at Amazon School -"
Alex mumbled, frowning only a little. "I don't think they have Amazon School…"
"Fact of the matter is, Alex, you're their wicked witch. And they're not just going to let you go because you smile at them."
Alex stared at Mags. Did she have to be that blunt? Mags had never been one to mince words, but she was usually more compassionate. But sometimes, it seemed that Mags valued her level-headedness more than her kindness.
She turned away from Mags, lying down on the grass so she saw no one and nothing.
"You've been uncharacteristically quiet," Mags pointed at Riley.
"What, I can't be quiet?" he shrugged.
"Usually you're not. Where's the opinion?" Mags asked.
"The opinion is…I'm thinking about it. Weighing the pros and cons, so to speak." Riley joined Alex on the grass, lying down. She wiggled to the left to give him more space.
Mags arched an eyebrow. "Oh, really? And what have you come up with?"
"The pros and cons say…Alex should go to the Amazons."
"You're joking."
"No. No, I'm not. For once, I'm not. Because she's right. Alex is right, and also Issa's right. We don't…we don't know a lot of things about what happens to Alex, to you," he turned to Alex, lowering his voice so only they could hear. She saw his eyes flicker to someone behind Mags, and then back to the two of them.
"Listen," he said. "Alex does get out of control. We downplay that, but we know the truth. Alex, you know the truth," he pointed out. She sighed, nodding. "And we don't know if that's because you just like fighting deep down or…maybe there's some sort of cosmic force making you get out of control. And, not gonna lie, this camp is mainly for kids. Not in a bad way. The Amazons would be built for a war, for dangerous, adult situations. You don't want to cause anyone anymore trouble."
Alex thought about it. And she nodded again.
"Mags?" Alex spoke up, turning her head to look at her, but Mags had turned her backs on both of them.
"All this time, I've been trying to be the smart one here and suddenly you guys have made up your mind. You just want to throw Alex into the fire because why not, right? Alex is fireproof."
Mags stood up from the grass, and walked away.
A/N: I think my main problem nowadays is trying to figure out how to end the chapter so I don't leave you guys hanging for too long! uni's started up, full-swing, so my attention is mainly on work and study but this story will always be on my mind.
please leave a comment or review if you can, let me know what you think, or if you're eager to see what's happening next!
thank you for reading!