If you'd like to read these chapters whole, I post them on Tumblr too with no book editing under the username HalothentheHorns

Favorite chapter of this book! There is no particular reason I'm telling you this.

PJOPJOPJOPJO

"Well that's-"

"Don't," Percy cut off what Will was about to say. "Do not say it sounds nice, or relaxing. I don't want anyone to jinx the garden gnome's coming to life by your predictions anymore!"

Thalia hid a grimace well, Annabeth had specifically mentioned she'd run into Medusa her first trip out with Percy at some weird statuary place, and she wasn't looking forward to details of this side trip even knowing they'd all survived.

'So the gnomes are going to try and kill him with fishing rods and plastic pink flamingos, right?' Hearth grinned while Magnus laughed and Percy narrowed his eyes at the two.

Alex and Jason exchanged a look, deciding they needed to learn ASL already while Will was still biting his lip to stop from laughing and Nico just decided to get started.

"I still think in your case it's both," Thalia reminded.

"Still not helping!" Percy protested.

"Dragged to eternal torment is fine?" Magnus muttered in concern.

'Right, that's the loss,' Hearth frowned at this odd guy putting cash above edible garbage he could find on the side of the road.

They all watched as Percy glowed. As if his natural element wasn't water at all, but Annabeth finally giving him a compliment. They sort of wanted to laugh, but his expression was just too sweet.

"The quest would be over for her too if she died!" Thalia protested.

"But luckily you do know better," Will laughed uneasily, Annabeth had never let anyone see her as anything but confident. Even after Mount Saint Helens, she'd been distant but stoic. He was beginning to wonder though if anyone knew the real Annabeth besides Percy.

"Is that all it takes to impress you?" Nico mocked.

"Being blonde obviously doesn't hurt," Thalia joined in.

Percy rolled his eyes at the teasing and just waved them to get on exaggeratedly.

"The only Hilary Duff song I've ever wanted to learn," Alex snickered.

"I don't think any demigod has that ability," Will said helpfully.

"I think I'd risk going on a quest just to hit a buffet," Will nodded.

"I'll remember that next time," Nico scoffed.

"I'm not even going to pretend to read that," Nico said. "It's pure gibberish."

"Guess we should count ourselves lucky the rest of the book translates just fine for you guys," Alex sighed.

"She likes to forget she is too, but the headaches don't make it easy," Thalia smiled.

"Should I be worried the chapter title arrived so soon?" Nico frowned.

"Yes," Percy promised, that tingling sensation of something going wrong was increasing by the word, and no promise of cheeseburgers was alleviating it.

"Why do I feel like it's a bad thing those two are agreeing on something," Jason frowned.

"In this case, I think the enemy of my enemy will still be the enemy," Alex nodded.

Magnus wished he could reach out and pull Annabeth back to that burning bus now, but he also knew what it was like to be hungry enough to brave a situation. It could cloud the judgment like nobody but a fellow survivor would ever understand.

"That did nothing to deny a vegetarian lifestyle," Magnus frowned oddly at him.

"Vegetarians are weird man, point proven," was all Percy seemed to hear.

'Is kelp better or worse than seaweed?' Hearth asked.

'I think it's still the same thing, in this case,' Magnus chuckled.

"I'm getting creeped out vibes the more I hear about this place," Will muttered.

"I'd love to visit this place!" Alex shouted, apparently finally on board with a visit to New York just for the odd statuary.

"Okay, you're an-" Jason began.

"Wait for it," Thalia said patiently. "Hunger makes people desperate, not lax, give him a chance to figure out it's a bad idea."

"Nah, you're an idiot," Thalia declared.

"Savor that," Percy sighed, "that's the last time I ever give you permission to do that."

"It most definitely was not," Alex said at once.

"I'm on the fence," Jason admitted. If Percy couldn't notice such a detail as being locked in, who knew what else he was imagining in his head.

"You guys never introduced yourselves," several people said at once.

"I plead the fifth," Percy sighed as he saw hands twitching as if wishing for weapons already while he could still only recall eyeing that fryer.

"I'll decide later how much credit you get for that by how much you practice these mistakes," Thalia sighed.

"This is practically a How to Spot Monsters for Dummies book," Nico muttered.

'This is officially torture,' Magnus frowned at the book and the empty room once more. They'd already run through their supply of food in their first few minutes here, and now they were being teased with such delicacies! 'I'd brave my first monster for some falafel right now.'

'Please don't tempt fate yourself now friend,' Hearth pleaded.

"Such a minor problem to you on most occasions, you're forgiven," Thalia tried and failed at a joking tone as she sat on the edge of her beanbag waiting for the fight to start now. Surely Medusa would pounce while they weren't paying attention and eating.

Hissing, something nagged in the back of Percy's mind about hissing. Right before he'd been yanked in here, he'd been chased around by two crazy old ladies, and he'd often heard their approach before he saw them, because of a hissing noise...

"That circus caravan is a better and better lie by the second," Nico muttered.

Nobody was relaxing. All eight of them were starting to fidget nonstop, and Nico's own ADHD was getting quite distracted by Will not, sitting, still! Forcing himself to pay attention to only the words in front of him, he was regretting having taken this book more every second. He probably sounded like an idiot to Percy, reading all this stuff to him!

Percy's breath hitched uncomfortably, there was definitely something there, something he swore he should be remembering about those two crazy Bargain Mart ladies chasing him- but Nico was still reading with a quiet intensity that demanded all attention.

"At what point do you drop the story?" Magnus mock whispered.

"Right about then," Jason muttered. This monster already knew their names and nobody was keeping up a charade anymore this was something going on.

Poor kid was probably homesick for a mother's touch, Magnus realized, but he was the only one left even still hoping this wasn't some monster attack.

"Probably not the last time that happened, but it's nice to see the first," Thalia muttered.

"Death, death is the harm," Jason sounded eerily confident of that considering he didn't know his own last name, but nobody protested, which was still worse.

"That's surely a coincidence," Will's entirely exaggerated face proved otherwise.

"Now he's catching on!" Nico mock applauded.

"The only lightbulb he's ever had, and it's not even brightly lit," Thalia teased.

"You're all going to be frozen in a glacier when I'm done with you," Percy promised.

"Poor Grover," Alex understood, wondering how often he talked about this missing relative. What an awful way to find out.

"Common sense," Thalia nodded.

"She could see well enough to manage making food," Jason pointed out with a grimace, knowing he probably wouldn't be better in that sort of thrall, but still wishing he could jump in and help.

Thalia exhaled and wished she could hug Annabeth right now, she'd saved Percy's life twice in twenty-four hours, that little kid grew up to be a more formidable demigod than a child of the Big Three.

"Curiosity almost got your cat," Nico frowned at him.

"That's not the saying," Will frowned at him.

"Where is a glass of water to dump on his head when you need it," Alex groaned into her hands.

"How could you have seen this coming!" Magnus protested.

"Would you like that list alphabetically?" Jason huffed.

"Ugh, in some universe it would be less odd taking pity on your ex's kid, but not this one," Thalia grumbled.

"Wouldn't that make him an even more hardened criminal though?" Nico rolled his eyes.

'Is that a common thing to know the sound of?' Hearth asked in concern.

'I'm going to go with no,' Magnus's facial expression made it seem more like a question himself though.

"Whatever gets you moving," Thalia nodded.

"Now do another one just for fun," Alex grinned like a fiend.

"The only sensible thing Percy has ever said in his life," Nico muttered, "and he can't even be commemorated for it." He never thought he'd see anything close to resembling Percy not charging in to slay every monster and win without a doubt, but here was a scared kid trying to make a run for it.

"Says the invisible girl!" Jason protested. "Is there some rule about her borrowing Percy's sword?"

"Monsters can smell us," Thalia kindly recalled for him, "she'd be more inclined to let a child of Poseidon get closer than Athena."

"What is with geniuses never making sense!" Magnus groaned, his own cousin wasn't being clear to him, he didn't think Percy was going to follow.

"Was that so hard," Percy huffed.

"It works on animals too?" Alex looked particularly fascinated at the implications of that, tempted to reveal her shapeshifting ability any chapter now just to spitball ideas of what monster's abilities would and wouldn't work on her like that.

"Oh no, I'm actually quite sure the glass is downplaying it," Thalia assured. "I can show you an image later."

Percy looked disturbed and not at all encouraged by that and just nodded for now to take her word on it.

"She's clearly never seen me in line at an early birds buffet with bacon," Percy challenged back with much more cockiness than he really felt.

"The sound effect was not necessary," Will shivered in disgust.

'Speak for yourself,' Hearthstone signed in fascination. Magnus didn't translate, he usually didn't unless his friend asked him to.

"That moment where walking barefoot around broken statuary is the more appealing option," Thalia wretched.

"He can say that again," James nodded while silently hoping whoever his parent was, might at least not have any enemies this bad.

"Of course it was, it wouldn't be nearly as traumatic if it wasn't," Will sighed.

"Now we know he's serious!" Nico gasped.

"Not the burger, don't waste the perfectly good burger," Magnus chuckled.

"Lovely, figured as much from Annabeth's caution, but lovely all the same," Alex looked way to interested over there about all she could do with a severed head that was now portable and capable of freezing people. Magnus gulped and kept swearing in his head he would never go on a quest with her, even as some little part of his brain laughed at his own lie every time.

"Can't have one without the other," Nico nodded.

"That was really the first response out of your mouth after that?" Thalia demanded.

"Well if she'd been the one to decapitate her, I might have started with thank you," he shrugged.

'She agreed the smell of cheeseburgers trumped the danger,' Hearth defended the satyr.

'Try convincing my cousin she is wrong. Go on, try it and see what happens,' Magnus shook his head.

"Aw," Will looked a tad disappointed. "I was kind of enjoying watching them fall in love."

Percy did indeed look over the moon at least at this part, it seemed so natural to him, so it was odd Nico flipped the page with such violence like there was a second gorgon about to appear.

"You know it's not really a good thing when the monster's made a good point," Magnus frowned.

"That must be a worse gift than even Gabe could ever give, the best wishes part really wasn't necessary," Alex chuckled.

"Admitting you need help is the first step," Will chuckled.

"I don't get it," Percy said with a straight face.

"There's a gift I wish could be returned," Thalia sighed.

"Chapter was done," Nico sighed in relief, he was pretty confident he hadn't made a fool of himself.

Before Will could take the book, a door from no where banged open.

PJOPJOPJO

Wooo, already half done with the first book! I forgot how much I missed doing this kind of series!

This is one last extra update because I'm almost done with All in the Family and enjoy updating on holidays, but as promised, regular updates will resume on August 18th and then updates will proceed every Monday! Happy Fourth of July!