Disclaimer: me? Rick Riordan? uh no. you got the wrong person.
Neither Jason, nor I, had been able to put a word to what exactly we were to each other at this point. Yes, we were friends and 'business partners' (closest term to whatever the Hades we were doing), but like. Were we dating? Were we engaged? In the end, we decided to forgo the label.
We were weird. That's it.
Other than that, things were going as okay as they could be. Dad was angry, Hephaestus and Aphrodite didn't hate me, and Leo and Piper weren't calling me anything but Mom (which was, I admit, not at all a problem). One thing though – it was June. The Bolt hadn't been found.
This meant only one thing. Except, what happened was sorely unexpected.
"What?" Luke yelled.
"Luke, perhaps you might want to calm down," Chiron instructed.
"But- but- but," he spluttered, "I didn't steal the Master Bolt! I was with Jason and Percy the whole time."
"Nevertheless, Lord Zeus suspects you."
"He's a son of Hermes," Jason pointed out, "Not dumb. Not even the greatest thief would dare to steal a god's symbol of power for some kind of fame."
"Demigods have tried doing worse before."
Oh right. That one time a demigod kidnapped Persephone. Stupid, really.
"So what now?" I asked.
Of course, I knew what. It was 10th June today. The quest to return the Bolt would be given to Luke, and I was definitely going with Jason. We weren't about to abandon him.
"I think you know," Chiron said, staring into Luke's soul. I always thought that the horse dude was deep and knowledgeable and he definitely knew something was up with the theft.
Maybe he just sent the trio into the Underworld to confirm his suspicions. Which, uh, rude, but I guess he had no choice.
"A quest," Luke murmured. Right. He had bad memories with quests.
Then Chiron continued with the explanation he'd given the original Percy about Hades and the Underworld.
"Do you accept?"
Luke thought for a moment. But I guess something deep inside him still wanted to make Hermes proud, because he nodded; "Yes."
"Jason and I will go with him." I stated. No need to make it a question.
You shall go west and face the god who has turned,
You shall find what is stolen and see it safely returned,
You shall be betrayed by one who calls you a friend,
And war shall begin, in the end
The only line that had changed was the last one, mostly because Sally Jackson was no longer in this equation. But in any case, the prophecy wasn't really giving us much luck.
We were trying to stop a war here, and the Oracle has the audacity to tell us that there will be a war. Granted, we were talking about different wars, but Luke didn't know that! That was, like, unnecessary stress for him.
The send-off was pretty cool, with minimal crying- actually, no. There was a lot of crying. Mostly from the younger ones.
Ethan and Silena (I don't even know how I became best friends with her, but I guess I did need a girl my own age to be close to – she also protected Piper from Drew) could handle themselves, but Annabeth wasn't leaving Luke's shirt.
"Take me with you, then!" she demanded.
"No, Annabeth. This is dangerous. You're safe here."
"Fine," she huffed.
On the other hand, Leo was clinging to me like glue, and so was Piper.
"We'll be back, kiddo." I said.
"Really?" Piper sniffled.
"We pinky-promise," was Jason's response.
Leo accepted that, and then gave us honest-to-gods phones. That didn't attract monsters. And had unlimited calling and internet. He'd made it, but Beckendorf had helped.
I couldn't thank him enough.
Finally, it was time to leave, and see the world again.
I checked my arsenal one more time: Riptide? Check. Pirouni (the trident - yes, I named it fork)? Check. Illegal gun? Check. The phone? Check. Clothes? Check. Ambrosia and nectar? Check. Drachmas? Check. And last, but not the least, a thick stash of human money (thank you, Hermes cabin)? Check.
Welp. Time to go on a life-threatening quest to save the world.
A/N: the lightning bolt quest begins! what will they do differently, and what will remain the same? who knows? after all, the power of plot is strong, and yet, so are jason and percy. next chapter coming soon. read, review, follow and favourite!
~ Arty.
