The Oracle's House looked just like Percy remembered it. It had been built right after the Battle of Manhattan for the camp's new Oracle, Rachel Dare. It was a startling reminder of happier times. Caroline led the group to the door and opened without knocking, if as they had been expected to drop by at some point.
The first thing Percy noticed when he stepped inside was a woman in her mid-thirties meditating on a rug in the center of the room. She wore a tie dye shirt, had unmistakably fiery red hair, and when her eyes suddenly fluttered open, they were a mystical emerald green.
"Rachel?"
The woman stared at him for what felt like an eternity. Her eyes shifted bacl and forth to look somewhere behind him, as if making sure this wasn't some kind of optical illusion. Finally, she spoke in a hushed tone.
"Oh my gods...you look just like him."
"It's him, Rachel, I know it is," Caroline said.
Rachel still seemed not to believe her own eyes. "I mean- even I was skeptical about that line, guys, and I do this for a living...it shouldn't be possible."
"That's what I said," Keno chimed in helpfully.
"For what it's worth, I'm just as confused as all of you," Percy said.
Rachel looked up at him again, Percy hadn't seen her eyes that wide since he'd nearly bisected her at the Hoover Dam. "Percy...you look just like I remember you- how old are you?"
"Um...eighteen," Percy responded uncertainly.
"Right after the Giant War..." Rachel mused to herself. "That must've been about twenty years ago."
Percy's breath caught in his throat. "Twenty years?"
So that was it. He'd fallen asleep and woken up two decades in the future. But why? Now that he knew that he and his friends had died at some point in the past, he wondered why he hadn't woken up there, in time to save them. What cruel game were the Fates trying to play here? Or...or had there been some mistake? Was it possible that the Seven were somehow still alive? If anyone would know, it would be Rachel.
"My prophecies don't usually involve time travel...I have to admit this is a new one for me," Rachel confessed.
"Rachel...I need to know- you have to tell me...did I die? Did Annabeth die?"
Rachel looked at the floor sorrowfully, collecting herself. "You did. I'm so sorry Percy...I tried to stop this, I-"
"What do you mean you tried to stop it?"
Rachel took a shaky breath. "You guys...you wanted to find Harmonia as quickly as possible. The spirit of Delphi had left me due to Apollo's um...daddy issues, so I couldn't issue a prophecy, and- you went without one."
"Without a prophecy?" Percy asked in disbelief. "That's suicide!"
"That's what I tried to tell you," Rachel explained, "but you were determined, you couldn't go on knowing that thousands of people were suffering and dying every day at the hands of Eris's army. I let it go, and you went. I guess a part of me still thought you were somehow invincible," Rachel smiled ruefully after the last part, then the smile quickly faded. "Not a day goes by that I don't regret that decision."
"I'm sorry," Percy said softly, and now he felt even worse, knowing that what happened could have been prevented, and that Rachel had been carrying that guilt for all these years.
"We all made mistakes," Rachel explained. "But Chiron was the one who paid the heaviest price. He had approved the mission, which tells you how desperate we were. When the Olympians found out, they were furious. They immediately recalled Chiron and declared that he and the Seven had acted treasonously. They were going to send all of you to the fields of punishment, even Chiron. Then...then the most amazing thing happened. Mr. D went up there and defended you all."
That might've been the most unbelievable thing Percy had heard yet. Mr. D, the same Mr. D who loathed every second of his job and who treated his demigod charges like nuisances?
"That was our reaction too," Rachel said, noticing Percy's facial expression. "He said that the Seven had acted irrationally, but with good intentions, and deserved at least Asphodel, and Chiron had just been looking out for the best interests of civilization. The gods came to a compromise eventually, but Mr. D was also recalled. We haven't received any contact from the gods since then."
"Wait...so there's not even a camp director anymore?"
Caroline shook her head. "It just comes down to seniority at this point."
"And we've lost most of our experienced campers," Keno added.
So that explained why Chiron and Mr. D were gone, and it confirmed the awful truth that he and the Seven had perished in a doomed attempt to rescue a goddess. It also put into perspective just how perilous the situation was for Camp Half-Blood. The ranks of the demigods were shrinking, and Eris's army was only growing stronger. Now he just needed to know what they could do to stop them. He'd already let down Annabeth, he couldn't let these kids down too. He needed the prophecy.
"Okay...I'm ready to hear the prophecy," Percy declared, trying to sound confident in spite of his internal anxiety.
"Seven shall go to the mount by the bay
In the Titan's Grave the captive goddess lay
Harmony's daughter alone holds the key
And shall proceed thence with five of legacy
The son of the sea shall once more have breath
And prevail or see god and man's final death"
Percy let the words of the prophecy sink in. Death, why did these things always have to end in death? He realized everyone, even Rachel, was looking to him to interpret the prophecy. Annabeth was always so much better at this...
"Um, okay...so the first couplet, seven shall go...we'll worry about the specifics of that later. Let's start with the mount by the bay."
"It has to be Mount Tampalais," Keno insisted.
"Mount Tam..." Percy whispered, he hadn't thought about that place since the end of the Titan War. "Also known as Mount Othrys." Keno was right, Percy was sure of that. The goddess was being held in the old Titan stronghold.
"The next line- five of legacy. In Roman lore, a legacy is the child of a demigod. But how do we know which five should go?"
He turned to Rachel, then to the group, but was surprised that they all seemed to already know the answer. Once again, he found himself wondering why he had been chosen for this mission when he was always the last to figure something out.
"Percy," Rachel said gently, "I've learned that the Oracle's prophecies almost always leave hints within the lines. Recite it again, from the beginning. See if you catch it this time."
"Okay," Percy sighed. He recited the first line again slowly, then it began to dawn on him. "Seven...the Seven."
Rachel nodded. "The legacies of the original seven, led by a member of the original seven. It's poetic justice, in a way."
"Legacies," Percy repeated slowly. Suddenly he whirled around, ashen faced, staring at the three young people who had struck him with the vaguest sense of familiarity, a sense he had been unable to explain until now. And now, it was all falling into place. "You," he pointed at Caroline. She had blonde hair, her blonde hair. She had his sea-green eyes. He still remembered the very first moment he had laid eyes upon her, laying on that cot in the infirmary, and instinctively, he had called her Annabeth.
"What's your last name?"
Caroline shifted her gaze to Rachel, unsure whether she should answer or not. Rachel nodded, the time had come.
"My last name is Jackson. I'm-"
"My daughter." The words sounded so utterly foreign coming from his lips. They sounded even stranger being directed at a girl who was almost the same age as he was. But it made sense, and it explained everything. Why she had been certain that he was Percy Jackson, even when the others hadn't. Why she had nearly broken down while telling him how he- how her parents died.
He next looked at the boy. His eyes...a golden hue that reminded him of a certain daughter of the Underworld. His features reflected his mixed background, and his Asian heritage was particularly evident. As if all that wasn't enough, he shared Frank Zhang's biting sarcasm.
"Keno, your last name, it wouldn't happen to be "Zhang", would it?"
Keno nodded solemnly.
That left Lucy. She was Hispanic, and he had immediately guessed from her outdoorsy, tomboyish appearance that she was more than comfortable in situations that called for quick thinking, improvisation, and sometimes, more than a little elbow grease. Her exotic caramel brown hair further reminded him of the beautiful Titaness who had once nearly stolen his heart.
"Lucy...Valdez?" he guessed. The silent nod gave him his answer. At least part of the puzzle was completed, the legacies had been in front of him all along, but it had somehow taken him until now to realize it. Now he knew why he needed to do this. These kids were the last surviving link to his friends, to Annabeth, to the original seven. This was his second chance to attone for his past mistakes. He couldn't bring them back, but he could help the next generation avoid the same fate.
"What were they like? Our parents?" Lucy asked.
Percy was caught off guard at first, until he remembered that all three of them would have been too young to have gotten to know the people he had known so well, maybe taken for granted in his old life. He didn't need to think long to come up with an honest answer.
"They were the best friends anyone could ever ask for. And they would have done anything for the people they loved."
"Let's get back to the prophecy," Keno urged, temporarily breaking the tension. "The next line is where you come in."
"The son of the sea..." Percy murmured.
"You see now why I told the others this line couldn't be what they thought it was. And that's exactly what it seemed like-"
"Until you just showed up one day passed out next to the tree," Caroline interjected. "If our patrols hadn't found you before the monsters did..."
She let the sobering thought hang in the air, unfinished, but the implication clear. Percy noted the fear in her eyes, and tried to imagine the feeling of losing a loved one not once, but twice. That had nearly happened to Caroline, and in that moment he resolved to himself that he would not let it happen, no matter what. True, he hardly knew her, but suddenly he wanted to. He wanted to get to know the daughter he'd never imagined himself having.
"Needless to say," Keno went on, oblivious to Percy's innermost thoughts, "the final line makes it clear what the stakes are. If we fail...human civilization will fall apart."
"And Eris will have accomplished what Kronos and even Gaea couldn't, the destruction of Olympus, only this time, it'll be from within, a civil war that will end the modern world as we know it," Lucy finished.
Percy had a basic grasp now of the prophecy, but there were still quite a few mysteries hiding within the lines. In fact, now that he thought of it, there was one line that hadn't been mentioned at all.
"Wait a minute, what about Harmony's daughter? Who is she?"
Caroline looked at the others, seeking a silent consensus. Having apparently obtained it, she shifted her gaze back to Percy. "We'll take you to her."
"Wait," Rachel interrupted, and maybe it was just him, but Percy thought he'd heard a faint tone of urgency in her voice. "Could you guys just...give me a moment with Percy, please?"
Caroline, Keno, and Lucy nodded and exited the Oracle's house, leaving Percy and Rachel alone.
He just couldn't believe how much she'd changed in 20 years, or maybe it was how much she'd stayed the same. He found himself wondering if this was a feeling he would have every time he encountered someone from his past. He pushed this thought aside when he recalled the unthinkable tragedy that was the loss of the Seven. Rachel had said she had once thought them practically invincible, and arrogant as it sounded, Percy couldn't deny he'd subconsciously felt the same way. If even the Seven could be killed, he couldn't count on anyone from his past being alive here.
"You know, I still remember the first time you brought her to camp. Caroline I mean," Rachel reminisced. "She was adorable, she had your eyes and Annabeth's hair. And the way you two doted on her." Rachel laughed sadly. "She didn't deserve to lose her parents the way she did."
Again, Percy felt the weight of his guilt hovering over him. "I know, and I'm sorry. I wish- I wish we had listened to you."
Rachel smiled faintly at him. "We can't change the past Percy, we can only make the best with what we have. Well...maybe your case is a slight exception."
"I'll do better by them," Percy said, a fierce determination welling up in him. "I won't make the same mistakes I made before- or, um, will make in the future." He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "Something tells me this is a lot more complicated than it needs to be."
Rachel nodded. "Things usually are when the gods are involved. I'll be honest with you Percy, an Oracle only knows so much. I can't tell you who brought you here or why, but I know this: those kids look up to you, especially Caroline, she loves you, and she'd give up her life to protect you."
"I won't let her," Percy answered immediately with unshakeable certainty.
Rachel smiled. "That's the Percy I remember. Now you'd better get going, you don't want to keep them waiting."
Percy nodded and walked towards the door, he had just started to turn the knob when she spoke to him again.
"Oh, and Percy?"
He released the knob and looked back at Rachel.
"Try not to die this time, huh?"
Percy grinned, some things never changed. "I'll do my best."
Percy will return in chapter 4. The rest of the group is revealed (for real this time), and we learn more about the prophecy and the characters. To be continued...