Katie woke up and looked at the morning sun. As she looked she could hear campers playing basketball outside. She decided to go see who it was. She put on her Camp Half-Blood shirt, a pair of jeans and headed outside, careful no to wake her brothers who were sleeping peacefully. When she got outside she saw a bizarre scene.
Outside was Nico, Percy, Clarisse, Annabeth, a few undead skeletons, Tyson, and Danny. On one team was Danny, Percy, Annabeth, and Tyson. On the other was Clarisse, Nico, and two undead skeletons with basketball jerseys. As she watchde Percy fed the ball to Danny, who fed the ball to Annabeth, but Annabeth was being guarded by both Clarisse and Nico and she couldn't dribble past them.
"Annabeth, over here," Tyson yelled. Annabeth fed the ball to him. He started to run to the basketball goal, dribbling the ball as he ran. The two undead skeletons tried to stop him, but they got ran over and their bones clattered onto the ground. Tyson placed the ball through the hoop like he was dropping a load of laundry.
"And that's game, good job Tyson," said Danny. Tyson ran over and hugged him.
"Tyson..can't..breath," gasped Danny. Tyson placed him down on the ground.
"No fair, everyone knows Danny and Tysoan have an unfair advantage," said Clarisse.
"Nico summoned undead people," said Percy.
"But Tyson's a Cyclops and Danny has the edge when he's on the ground," she said.
"True," said Danny. "So what do we do now?"
"I guess get our cabin's up to do activities," said Nico. They all headed to the showers. As they went Percy saw Katie.
"Hey Katie," he said. Danny turned, but then turned back around groaning.
"Katie, you've met Danny right?" said Percy.
"Unfortunately yes," she said, sneering at him.
"Oh that's right he saved you from the gryphons," said Percy. Katie just sighed, not wanting to go into details.
"Percy, can I talk to you?" she asked. Danny just walked over to the showers as PErcy went over to Katie.
"What is it?" he asked.
"Does Danny have problems with any of the kids of the Big Three?" said Katie.
"No, not really. Why?" said Percy.
"Well last night he kind of said he couldn't those kids," said Katie.
"Well after what you said to him last night didn't help," said Percy.
"You heard that?" she said.
"Yes, it wasn't hard to," said Percy.
Katie sighed. "I tried to apologize, but he didn't want to. He said that it didn't mean anything," said Katie.
"Well, his mother is the goddess of the earth. He can tell by people's heart rates if they mean it or not," said Percy.
"That's wierd," said Katie.
"It's a fact," said Percy.
"But I did try to mean it," said Katie.
"Your brain was, but your heart wasn't. That's what Danny can sense," said Percy. He went to the showers, leaving Katie alone. Katie decided to go back to her cabin and wake her brothers up.
"Zetes, Calais, wake up," she said. They both went on sleeping. Katie knew how to wake them up. She placed her fingertips to their foreheads and zapped them with a static shock. Then she pulled her hands away fast so that their reflex would kick in and they would slap themselves on the foreheads. They woke up, grumbling about how she always did that.
"Come on, breakfast is in a few minutes and I need you to get dressed," she said. They grumbled while they dressed. Once finished they were wearing athletic shorts and Camp Half-Blood shirts as well. The conch horn blew announcing breakfast. As usual they walked to the dining pavilion, where cinnamon rolls and orange juice waited for them. Scraping off a portion of their meal for Zeus they sat down ath their table and began to chow down. As she was eating Katie noticed that Danny wasn't there. Percy passed by with Annabeth.
"Percy, where's Danny?" she asked.
"He said he wasn't hungry and went to the sword arena," said Percy. He walked away, leaving her wondering.
"He probably didn't want to eat because you were here," she thought to herself. The thought of that made her mad and she ate her cinnamon rolls with ferocious chomps.
"Woh, slow down sis," said Calais. Katie finished before anyone else and after placing her tray away she headed to the sword arena to give Danny a piece of her mind.
"I'll show him better than to do that!" she thought angrily. As she entered the sword arena she saw Danny standing in the middle.
"Listen here you jerk, I've...," she started, but a bark from a large hellhound stopped her. She looked to the stands where Mrs. O'Leary jumped out of the stands, bounded towards Danny, and chomped her teeth into his body. She flipped him in the air and when he got back into her mouth she bit down hard. He was split in half, his upper and lower halves going in different directions spewing blood and entrails.
Katie, seeing this in front of her, screamed.
"Ms. O'Leary, why?!" she yelled at the hellhound, thinking the hellhound had snapped.
"Excellent work Mrs. O'Leary," said a voice from in the stands Katie looked to see Danny jump out of the stands and pat the dog on the head. She rolled onto her back and let Danny scratch her belly, her foot kicking the air from the immense satisfaction.
"Next time use more aggression and more speed to get the edge, okay girl?" he said. Mrs. O'Leary barked. It was then that he noticed Katie was standing there thunderstruck.
"Is there a problem?" he said.
"But..you were...and..," she gasped, looking at the two halves of him on the ground.
"That was the new practice dummy. I put a wig on it, fake organs, and corn-syrup for fake blood in it," said Danny. Looking at the face Katie saw that it was just black marker scribbled on to look like eyes and a mouth yelling in horror.
"Anyway, why are you here?" said Danny.
"I was coming to know why you weren't at breakfast," she said, her hands on her hips.
"I just didn't want to go. The earth is my nourishment at times," he said. "Anyway, why do you care so much?" For this Katie had no answer. Instead she made one up, but it wasn't good.
"Just, next time, don't miss anymore," she said.
"Wow, look at you sounding like my mother," he said.
"You are the single most annoying person I've ever met!" she yelled.
"Oh I'm annoying! What about you acting like 'Thanks for helping me now piss off' yesterday," he said. Katie grew red in the face from the anger bubbling inside her. This guy was just plain insufferable.
"Why can't you just cooperate with me?" she yelled.
"Because last time I checked, I don't take orders from whiny brats of Zeus," he yelled.
"Go to Tatarus!" she yelled.
"Already there now that you're here," he said.
"Well, at least I don't call a pile of rocks my mother," she said. She turned around to walk away. She didn't know it, but this really ticked Danny off.
"Sick her," he whispered to Mrs. O'Leary. The hellhound got on her feet and barreled towards Katie. Katie had time to turn around before she got knocked down by Mrs. O'Leary and she began to lick her.
"Get..off!" she said. Mrs. O'Leary continued lick her until she was wet with dog saliva. Seeing that Katie had had enough Danny whistled for her to get off. Mrs. O'Leary got off and bounded back towards Danny. Katie got up, covered in dog spit, to seeing Danny triumphant, gloating face.
"Next time, you might want to consider who you talk to like that," he said.
"I can't stand you!" she yelled.
"Just remember, you're on my turf. That's yours up there," he said, pointing to the sky. Katie was lost for words as she stomped off. Along the way she passed Nico.
"What happened to you?" he asked.
"Ask him and your dog!" she yelled, walking towards the showers, leaving a bewildered son of Hades very confused. When she got in the showers she vented all her anger out in one long sigh. Never had she met someone more impossible in her life. It was like he could take everything someone said to him and hurl it back ten times worse. As she took off her clothes to shower off she knew that deep down she deserved it after what she said. It was stupid of her to wonder why he wasn't at breakfast when he had just said that he didn't want to.
"Why do I want to hurt him so much all of a sudden?" she thought as the water poured on her, the steam curling around her. She didn't know why, but she knew one thing. This was probably going to continue.
(Later on)
"Okay, first thing in combat is to always be on your guard. Never let your opponent get the edge on you," said Percy to his class. The sword excersise combat was under his teaching and right now he was teaching four cabins: Zeus, Apollo, Hecate, and Gaia. Danny and Katie stayed as far away from each other as possible. Everyone was wearing Greek battle armor for the occasion.
"Now, I want you to go into pairs and we'll draw straws to see which pairs fight. Also, no using your cabin's powers, only sword, spear, shield, and sweat. And another thing, you can only choose people from other cabins. Pick," he said. Everyone started going for their friend. Katie went over to her two friends, Hunter a son of Apollo, and Jennifer, daughter of Hecate. The bad thing was they had already picked each other. Now everyone had picked their partners, and their was only one person left.
Katie, I see you don't have a partner so I guess you have to be paired with Danny," said Percy.
"Aww shit," they both thought. They moved tensely towards each other, knowing they were two least friendly people at the time.
"Now, draw straws," said Percy holding up his hand filled with bendy straws. A person from the nine pairs picked the straw. Katie went and got hers. Once the straws were all collected she saw that she had drawn the shortest straw.
"Can this day get any worse?" she thought.
"Danny and Katie, seeing as you've drawn the shortest straw, you two will go first. The person to disarm the other determines the match," said Percy. Danny walked over to one side, fixing his helmet on. Katie slowly walked to the other until she was opposite him. Danny was flexing his sword around in his arm, letting it hiss through the air. Katie took out Jolt and held him ready.
"Okay, remember no maiming or cutting. Start," said Percy. Katie charged towards Danny. Danny held his ground, holding his sword ready to defend. She struck with Jolt. He blocked the blow with Lithos and came back at her with an attack from Seismos. She deflected the blow and came back by slamming Static into him. He blocked it with a counterattack by smasheing Lithos into Static, and used all his armpower to hit Jolt and send her stumbling to the right. Infuriated now, she ran back towards him, Jolt ready in her hand. Taran went down on his knees, and slammed Lithos on her legs, sending Katie falling through the air and landing on the ground, Jolt out of her hands.
The others watched in stunned silence as Katie hit the ground.
"You owe me two drachmas," Zetes said to Calais. His brother grudgingly gave him the bet money.
"Excellent job Danny. Using your opponents body weight and momentum to gain the edge is sometimes the most crucial thing you can use," said Percy, helping Katie up."That is the end of the lesson today and we will pick this up later."
Everyone went back into the armory to hang the borrowed armor up. As Danny was putting his away Katie walked over to him.
"Do you enjoy making me suffer?" she asked.
"Well if you keep things up the way they are then yes," said Danny. Katie just groaned.
"What do you have against me?" she asked.
"Let's see, the 'I don't need your help,' the 'You don't ever miss anymore meals,' and lastly 'At least my mom's not a pile of rocks,' quotes. You're off to a lousy start right now," said Danny. Katie groaned.
"Damn, what is your damage?" said Katie.
"Right now, you," said Danny, hanging up the rest of his armor. "Oh, and be thankful I went easy on you today." He walked off to his next activity, leaving Katie fuming in the armory.
