Chapter 24

Percy POV

"So they didn't know anything?" Annabeth asks, looking up at me.

I give her hand a slight squeeze as we walk. "Nothing."

She groans, throwing her head back.

Right now Annabeth and I are walking along the edge of the resort's golf course, enjoying the sight of the green as we make our way back to the road. The course is usually packed, but for whatever reason, it seems to be deserted today. The hills roll on in front of us, and usually I wouldn't be looking forward to the walk, but the warmth of Annabeth's hand in mine makes me want to walk the course for eternity. Plus, the walk is finally giving us a chance to talk about the conversation I had with Thalia and Jason last night. I was trying to find out if they know anything about whatever fishy stuff the resort board has been up to, but unfortunately, they knew absolutely nothing.

"I just don't know where we're supposed to go from here," Annabeth says, swinging our interlocked hands anxiously.

I kiss her forehead lightly. "We'll figure it out."

Annabeth smiles up at me and I feel like my heart momentarily contracts in my chest. We've just dropped off Annabeth's step brothers, Bobby and Mathhew, for an evening golf lesson down by the children's putting green, and we're now on our way back to the main part of the resort.

Bobby and Matthew are adorable. Trouble makers, for sure, but adorable. It was the first time I had met Annabeth's family, which is kind of crazy now that I think about it. I'd seen her mom a couple of times here and there, but she'd never introduced me to her dad and her step family. I know she hasn't always had the best relationship with them, so it's made me really happy to see her doing so well with her dad. For Annabeth's birthday, he got her this pair of cute little silver owl earrings, and ever since she got them, I haven't seen her take them off once.

"So, what did your dad mean when he said 'see you tomorrow,'" I ask Annabeth. "Do you two have plans?"

She groans. "Oh, I totally forgot to tell you Percy. Tomorrow night my dad is having this bonfire thing with my stepmom and a couple of work friends, and I told him I'd go." Annabeth bites her lip. "He said I could bring some friends if I wanted, so I was wondering if maybe you'd want to…" she trails off.

I shoot Annabeth a smile and squeeze her hand. "Of course I'll go."

Annabeth grins. "Thanks seaweed br–"

"Under one condition."

Annabeth stops in her tracks, looking hurt. "What–"

I smirk and take her other hand in mine so that we're facing each other. "That you stop calling me your friend," I say. "I should hope that you see me as a little more than that by now. Or have I just been misinterpreting all the hand holding and kissing and–"

"Oh shut up," Annabeth says, rolling her eyes. She leans in to give me a light shove with our clasped hands, but I quickly dodge it, making her laugh. I spin Annabeth around under one of my arms so that her back is against my chest, her arms crossed tightly across her torso. She lets out a surprised laugh and leans back into me, her hands still clasped firmly in mine.

Up in the sky, the sun is just beginning to set, casting the beginnings of a golden glow over the golf course. The entire green is completely empty, just long stretches of hills and sand and water pits that roll over the grass. A little ways away, a golf cart is being silhouetted by the sun, the Olympus Resort logo shining brightly on its side.

I pull Annabeth tighter against me and bring my lips down to her ear. "Actually make it two conditions," I say, smirking.

"Oh yeah?" Annabeth grins, turns her head towards me. We're so close, I can feel her breath on my face. It sends a distracting fluttering feeling into my stomach. "What's the second one?"

"That you and I take that golf cart back down to the resort," I say, lifting our interlocked hands to point to the golf cart a couple feet away.

"Are you nuts?" Annabeth asks with a laugh.

"Definitely."

"Percy we can't take someone else's golf cart." She says, pausing before she adds, "Plus we don't even have the key."

"It's a resort golf cart. They don't use keys. And there's no one around for acres. They definitely just left the cart here in the middle of a game, and frankly, I see it as our civic duty to return it."

Annabeth smiles and leans back into my shoulder, shaking her head. "You're impossible."

"So that's a yes?"

Annabeth raises an eyebrow at me. "Of course that's a yes. Your logic convinced me. And do you really think I'd miss out on a chance to ride a golf cart on an empty course? That never happens."

I spin Annabeth back around so that we're facing each other again. "Then let's go," I announce, grinning.

She tugs my arm and we jog off down to the golf cart. We both hop in, and I press the button that starts the ignition.

"I hope you steer this thing better than you steer a shopping cart," Annabeth teases from the passenger side.

"Ha-Ha," I say sarcastically. "Hold on!"

Annabeth lets out a yelp as I take off, sending us flying across the green. "You're crazy!" she shouts, but she's laughing like mad, and because the sound of her laughter is basically like crack to me, I press the pedal even harder.

We zoom past the sand bunkers and water hazards, watching them disappear in streaks behind us. I bring us all the way to the far end of the course before turning back in the other direction. I make the turn so tightly that Annabeth shrieks, "If I die today, Thalia's gonna kill you!"

I laugh, sending us right between two streams. "Thalia wouldn't kill her own cousin." Annabeth gives me a look, her eyebrows raised. "Never mind," I say. "You're right. She totally would."

We enter a wide, open teeing ground, and I do donuts in the grass, making Annabeth laugh like crazy. She holds on tight to the handles and sticks her head out of the cart, letting her hair blow behind her like a golden flag of curls. She looks beautiful, and l can't believe that even after all this time, the sight of her smile still makes my heart contract the way it does.

Mostly, I keep my eyes ahead of me, but in one of my brief glances over at Annabeth, I catch her looking at me, a smile the size of Texas on her face. For a short moment, we lock eyes, and her gaze is steady and so full of happiness and appreciation it makes my chest hurt. The idea that someone could ever look at me like that seems impossible, but there it is. And in that moment, I want to give Annabeth the world.

We go around the green a few more times before finally heading back down to the resort. Thankfully, no one questions us as we pull into the lot where they keep the golf carts, and when we leave it there, I'll admit, I feel a little bit like I've just gotten away with something.

And I love it.

Annabeth and I make our way down the road, holding hands as we head back to the Colosseum.

"Wanna take the beach route?" Annabeth asks, looking over at me.

The beach route is significantly longer than the road path, but I get where she's coming from. This day has been perfect, and I think we both just want to drag it out for as long as possible.

I grin at her. "I wouldn't have it any other way."

Annabeth and I make our way down the stretch of road that heads to the beach and start walking along the dunes in a comfortable silence, her head on my shoulder. This stretch of beach is too rocky and narrow for people to sit on, so mostly it's just used as a trail of sorts of runners and joggers. You know, people who voluntarily exercise. I am not one of those people.

Annabeth fiddles with our interlocked fingers as we walk, sending warm shivers down my spine. "I should probably tell the others about tomorrow night, ask if they want to come to the barbecue," she says.

I laugh. "Yeah, Luke will be ecstatic. He's been complaining for months about how the resort's restaurants wouldn't know a good burger if it smacked them in the face."

For a split second, Annabeth tenses beneath me. It's so quick I almost miss it, but I slow us down nonetheless.

"Hey, you good?" I ask, looking at her. We come to a stop, and Annabeth takes a deep breath, forcing a smile.

"You know me too well for either of our goods."

I squeeze her hand. "What's up?"

Annabeth sighs. "It's nothing. I'm probably just imagining things, but for whatever reason, ever since I met Luke, I've gotten this strange feeling. Like I recognize him from somewhere…"

Immediately, my mind flashes back to the day that Annabeth and Luke first met on the pier. I remember how she'd looked at him, almost as if she'd seen him before. It had completely slipped my mind until now. Had this really been bothering her for all this time?

"You think you might know him from somewhere?"

"No," she says. "I mean, how could I? I have no recollection of ever having met him before this summer, and he's certainly never expressed any recognition." She shakes her head and lets out a brief laugh. "I must be going crazy."

I pull her towards me. "You're not crazy." Then, after a moment, I grin. "most of the time."

Annabeth lightly bumps me with her arm, but she's smiling. "Thanks."

"If it's bothering you though, you should just ask him," I say. "At the very least, it'll put your mind to rest."

Annabeth looks at me, pensive, before nodding. "You're right." She grins. "When did you become so wise?"

We begin walking again, and I smirk. "When I started hanging out with you."

Annabeth laughs and pulls closer to me so that our shoulders touch as we walk.

Over the horizon, the sun has sunk low into the sky, its bottom grazing the edge of the sea. There's something beautiful and delicate about it, as though the sun and the sea know they have all the time in the world to melt together, that their eventual consolidation is inevitable, so they're taking their time, enjoying the sweet colors the sunset provides in the meantime.

Annabeth and I walk like that for a while, holding hands as the sun sinks slowly into the ocean. We joke around about funny little nothings, and I steal as many glances her way as I can whenever she's not looking. I try to commit her to memory in that moment, to ingrain in my mind the way the pink sky casts a rosy glare over her cheeks, and how the light wind from the ocean blows the strands of her hair in front of her face.

When we finally reach the stairwell that heads up to the Colosseum, we're about to turn and head up, when all of a sudden, Annabeth grabs my arm.

"Percy!" she whispers.

I stop in my tracks and follow her gaze. Off in the distance, past the beach boundary, a figure makes his way across the rocks, climbing over the jagged boulders rapidly and with sure steps, like he's done it a million times.

When the figure turns his head, his face comes into view, and I gasp. "That's–"

"Octavian," Annabeth finishes. She tightens her grip on my arm. "Percy, remember what Dylan said a couple of days ago?"

I quickly think back to what Dylan had said about Octavian earlier this week after the pool incident, how he'd complained to Drew about her spending time with Octavian.

"He said that Octavian was hanging out in some caves," I conclude, looking at Annabeth. "You think that's where he's going?"

She shrugs. "Only one way to find out."

The two of us make our way past the boundary, sticking close to the wall as we begin to climb the rocks. Luckily we're both wearing jeans and tennis shoes, or this wouldn't be going very well.

The sun has completely sunk behind the horizon by now, leaving only faint blue of twilight, and it's difficult to see where we're stepping. Annabeth climbs above me, and at one point she slips slightly, her foot connecting with my face.

"Ow."

"Sorry!"

As we follow, we make sure to stay hidden behind the rocks so that Octavian doesn't see us, though he's so far ahead, I doubt he'd notice us unless he looked really hard.

Nothing we're doing is terribly dangerous, the steeper rock formations are miles ahead, but I'm definitely starting to get the feeling that we shouldn't be climbing rocks this close to the water this late at night, when we can barely see where we're planting our feet.

In front of me, Annabeth stops abruptly. From where I am, I can't see Octavian, but Annabeth's eyes go wide. "Percy, he's turning into the caves now."

"Let's go then," I say.

Annabeth scrambles up the last stretch of rocks, and I follow her up until we're both standing on a long, thin stretch of beach, arched caves looming to our right. We keep close to the wall as we enter, moving at a steady pace so we blend with the shadows.

"Where is he?" Annabeth whispers, her voice so quiet it's almost indiscernible.

"I don't know. I don't see him anywhere–" I've started to say, when all of a sudden, Annabeth gasps in front of me, stumbling forward slightly. Without even thinking about it, I protectively throw my arms around her, pulling her back.

"What the–" Annabeth remarks.

In front of us, the cave drops off in a massive cliff, overlooking a deep pocket of darkness. I can faintly make out a stretch beach down below, and I just now notice the lethargic drone of waves crashing, echoing slightly off the cave walls.

"You good?" I ask Annabeth, turning her so I can see her face. She looks pale and slightly shocked, but mostly I recognize the look of inquizition being her eyes, her mind desperately working to make sense of the situation.

"Yeah," Annabeth mumbles. "I just–this doesn't make sense logically. The water level should be about where we are now. Not ninety feet below us..."

I look down over the cliff and realize she's right. If we just came from the beach, how could there possibly be waves crashing so far below us?

I glance around, looking for where Octavian might've gone. "Look," I say, tapping Annabeth's shoulder.

She turns her head in the direction of my stare. "A staircase?" she remarks. "But this area is so remote. Why would anyone go through the trouble of building out here?"

"I guess we're about to find out," I say, and begin leading the way over to the staircase. As we get closer, I see that the stairs line the wall of the cliff all the way down to the beach down below. "Jesus."

Annabeth and I make our way down the stairs, careful to avoid creaks and keeping an eye out for Octavian. It feels like forever before we're finally on the ground, and when we get there, Annabeth's eyes go wide. "Percy look."

She points at the waves that roll up onto the sand, marveling at them.

"Uh, yes Annabeth. That's called water."

She gives me a glare. "I mean look at the direction they're coming from. The ocean to the West. These waves are coming from the East, from inside the cave." With a start, I realize that she's right.

"What does that mean?"

"It means that someone's created a tunnel system under these cliffs, one that takes the water in from a different point and directs it to these caves from the opposite direction."

"So wherever the water is coming from–"

"Is where Octavian went," she finishes.

"This is crazy," I mumble as we begin to trail the water.

The waterway kind of reminds me of the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disneyland–all long river-like streams flowing through dark, enclosed caves. Along the walls are these thick pipes, gigantic metal cylinders coated in barnacles that we follow all the way down the water. We've walked for a couple of minutes before Annabeth hisses, "There he is."

Up ahead, standing in the middle of a large enclosure is Octavian. The enclosure is filled with catwalks and tons of equipment, all elevated far above the water. The catwalks are also lined with dozens of shipping boxes, all of them sealed tight and stacked high.

We crouch down behind a rock formation in the shadows, watching Octavian as he paces around the enclosure, a clipboard in hand.

"What's he doing?" I ask, keeping my voice low.

Annabeth narrows her eyes. "I'm guessing he's taking inventory of some sort. Of whatever's in those crates up there."

"Why are they so high up? Wouldn't it be easier to store them down by the water for transportation reasons?"

Annabeth thinks for a moment. "The tide," she says. "They must have to keep it so high so that it doesn't get drenched when the tide is high." Her eyes go wide. "And that must be why everything is made out of stainless steel. It doesn't rust. The staircase, these catwalks, all of these pipes–they're all made out of stainless steel to prevent water damage."

I look at her. "You're a genius, you know that?" Annabeth grins, the darkness of the cave casting shadows over her grey eyes.

"I know."

We turn back to watch Octavian as he scales the catwalk, reading the labels on the boxes and checking off stuff on his clipboard.

"This is crazy," I say. "They created an entire tunnel system under the caves so that they could transport in whatever is in those boxes discreetly?"

Annabeth runs her fingers along one of the thick pipes that lines the walls. "We just have to find out what it is they're keeping in those boxes."

"Do we open one of them?" I ask.

Annabeth shakes her head. "Too risky. They would know someone is snooping around in their business if they see that one of the seals is broken."

"So what should we do?"

Annabeth thinks for a moment before turning to me, her eyes wide. "The inventory list. All we have to do is look at the list."

I grin. "Okay, let's do this."

We wait for what feels like hours for Octavian to leave. In reality, it's probably like twenty minutes, but sitting and waiting is certainly not one of my strengths with ADHD and all, so it feels like forever.

When he's finally done, Annabeth and I watch as he makes one last walk down the catwalk, leaving his clipboard on a desk that sits elevated on the platform, before he heads past us and back up the stairs where we came from.

Annaebth and I wait a couple more minutes just to make sure that he's really gone before we come out and make our way up to the desk where Octavian left the inventory list.

I run my hands along the thick pipes that line the walls as we walk, amazed at how they seem to go on forever. Some of the pipes are no bigger than my fist, but others are as wide as cars, and something about their enormity sets me off.

When we reach the desk, Annabeth jogs up, taking the inventory list in her hands like she's handling a lottery ticket. After a few seconds, however, her face contorts into confusion.

"What? What is it?" I ask.

"I–" Annabeth stammers. "I don't understand. These are all completely normal, legal things to be shipping in."

I look over her shoulder, and sure enough, everything on the list seems absolutely arbitrary to me. Just a bunch of construction equipment and materials–probably for the resort expansion.

"Maybe we were wrong," Annabeth says lamely. "Maybe we're just trying to find something wrong when in reality, everything is perfectly normal."

After a moment, I shake my head. "No," I say, placing my hand on hers. "Maybe this isn't what we were looking for, but nothing about this situation is normal."

Annabeth looks at me and smiles slightly. I brush a strand of her hair behind her ear.

"You're right," she remarks. "But we should probably be heading back. It's starting to get late."

"I couldn't agree more," I say, taking her hand. Together, we walk back down the catwalk and make our way back through the tunnels, heading for the stairs. Again, I trail my hands along the pipes as we walk, astounded by their enormity.

Walking in this direction is different, and I start to notice different things, like how the pipes get lower and lower the further we walk, and by the time we're by the original staircase that leads back up to the main beach, the pipes are almost touching the floor. And they don't seem to stop. They head right through the rock, out in the direction of the ocean.

Beside me, Annabeth groans. "I just don't get why they went to all that trouble to build this place to hide what they're transporting in, when what they're transporting in is perfectly normal."

I narrow my eyes, looking forward at the big cliff that looms over us. Dozens of pipes lead into the side of the rock, solid pipes of all different sizes, all heading out towards the ocean.

I stop in my tracks. "Annabeth," I say, realization taking over me.

Annabeth turns towards me, her hand already on the rail of the staircase. "Yeah?"

"What if they aren't trying to hide what's coming in?" I ask.

She cocks her head to the side. "What do you mean?"

"What if," I say, turning my heads towards the pipes, "they're trying to hide what's going out."

Annabeth follows my gaze, and her eyes go wide. "Holy shit."