They landed in San Francisco six and a half hours later. It was getting late, so the group decided to get a room somewhere and wait until morning to continue. They got two rooms, one for Prescilla and one for Charlie and Sophia.
Charlie had a dream that night. He found himself at camp half-blood. He was in what he knew from the tour was the war room. The head counselors were sitting around the ping pong table discussing what to do about the messenger and its message.
They were going back and forth, all throwing out different ideas as to what it could mean. Chiron cut through them all. "ENOUGH. This is getting us nowhere. Now, Jeremy, any news on our missing campers?"
The kid who must be Jeremy shook his head. "No. it's like they just vanished. We found some monster dust on the ground near the edge of camp though, so they must have encountered a harpy."
'We didn't run into a harpy. Must have been Prescilla.' Charlie thought.
"Alright," Chiron continued, "anything on the children of the Jackson's?"
"No. either they don't exist, or they really don't want to be found." someone told him.
"Hmm," Chiron grumbled. "Is there any chance they were here in the past few months? Can you think of anyone who would fit as a child of those two?"
Everyone was quiet for a moment before a blond kid with grey eyes spoke up. "What about those two kids who came in a month ago. They show up suddenly, act like loving siblings despite supposedly having different godly parents, and then disappear the day after a messenger comes and says that Percy Jackson and Annabeth Chase are alive. It has to be them."
Everyone thought about it and started nodding their heads. Charlie had to give the dude credit, it was pretty much exactly what happened.
Chiron opened his mouth to say something, but his voice isn't the one that came out. It was Sophia's, and it was loud. "Wake up Charlie! We got things to do!" he awoke with a start.
After catching his breath, he looked at Sophia, who was standing by his bed. "What was that for?"
She laughed. "You weren't awake yet. It's like ten in the morning right now. We have things to do."
He pretended to clean out his ear. "Yeah, I think the people in the adjoining rooms heard you."
She shrugged and left, leaving him to get dressed in new clothes. When he got outside, he saw that Sophia and Prescilla were ready to go and discussing plans.
"We could go in there ourselves, but if there is a giant or a titan there, we're gonna be outmatched." Prescilla was saying when he walked up.
"If it's just one, then we can probably handle it. Two might be pushing it, and any more and we would probably get destroyed. Especially if there are titans."
Prescilla nodded. "Yeah. individually, the titans are more powerful."
"We could probably take down one titan," Charlie put in. "or a couple of giants. Any more than that would be difficult. We can't kill giants on our own, and we can't kill titans at all. At least not easily."
Sophia nodded. "So we get a god or goddess to help us."
"How?" Prescilla asked. "They won't do it for free. Many of the gods aren't the biggest fans of your parents. According to all accounts, your father especially isn't super popular among the gods due to being disrespectful.
"Besides, they left this world behind. The gods weren't too happy about that." She finished. Charlie took all of this in quietly.
"Alright, let's go find out what we're dealing with and go from there." He said. the other two nodded, and they set off.
A couple of hours later, they were almost to the top of Mount Tamalpais, the current location of Mount Othrys. They were nearing the remains of the palace when they heard voices.
Charlie put a finger to his lips and motioned them to move forward. They crept up to a vantage point a little bit over an open area. The giants and titans had cleared up some of the rubble so they could walk around better.
There were only two giants there now. One had green hair with weapons woven into it, while the other had black hair with bones woven into it. They both had reptilian legs and twisted armor with strange engravings.
The black-haired one had eyes the color of marble and the green-haired one had dark eyes. The green-haired one wielded a trident and weighted net while the other one wielded a spear.
They were arguing when the group came up. The green-haired one was the one currently speaking, "We should have just killed them! If they are alive, then they are a threat. Besides, I want my revenge."
The black-haired one raised a hand in a placating gesture. "Patience, brother. They will die eventually, and we will both get our revenge. Our king has told us to wait, and so wait we will."
"I can have my revenge now!" green-hair shouted.
"But won't it be better if you slaughter his children in front of him? It's only a matter of time before they arrive. I want revenge too, but it will be better if they are completely broken when we do so."
"Mmm. I guess. Graaah!" he stabbed his trident into the ground, causing a geyser of sickly green liquid to form.
"Brother, control yourself. It won't be long before they arrive. We must be patient."
Suddenly, a man came running up to them, careful to avoid the poison. It was Chrysaor.
"My lords! I have received word from my spies in the city that the children have arrived. They are with a third half-blood, though I don't know what their parentage is."
Black-hair looked and green-hair. "See? They will probably be here soon." he sniffed the air. "Unless…" he looked around. His eyes landed on Charlie and stopped. "There! They're right there! Get them!"
Chrysaor shouted to his dolphin men and drew his sword. Charlie got up quickly and started to run. "Let's go!"
Sophia hesitated, "what about mom and dad?!"
"We can't help them if we're dead! We need to go!" he shouted back, as he was already on the move. She hesitated a moment longer before joining him and Prescilla, who had also started running.
"Split up! Meet back at the hotel room! It will be harder to track us that way!" he called to them as he split off, going right.
The girls called back confirmations before going their separate ways.
He heard fast approaching footsteps from behind him. "Come on, come on," he chanted under his breath. Then he tripped on a root that had stuck out from the ground.