'This is incredibly unfair,' Connor Stoll complained.

'Absolutely,' His brother agreed.

'It might have been fair if half of our cabin was on their side.'

'You are completely in the right.'

An Ares camper had just announced in front of (and for) the whole camp that there would be a prank-off between the Hermes cabin and all the other cabins. It was not very subtle and it was the first time that anybody else had heard of this prank-off, but there was no going back. The Hermes kids had already accepted, convinced that they had already won. The two teams collected on different sides of the camp to think about their plans (Fired on by a lot of illegally retrieved Cola, Sprite and Doctor Pepper). It was on.

Chiron and Dionysus heard it too late, in their opinion. They heard people whisper about it during dinner and immediately knew what was going on. Chiron had seen it hundreds of times before, like during the folly fight of 1813 and what during he liked to call Ye olde practical joke fight, during 1576. He sat back in his chair and looked beside him. This time, he was not alone. This time he might be able to do something before it got out of hand.

When the Hermes kids woke up the next day, the alarm clock one of them kept (as a joke) showed that it was half past ten. However, when they opened the curtains, the world outside was still pitch-black.

'They did something to our windows,' Alice growled.

'I bet they made a deal with Apollo and Helios!' Someone else yelled. Travis shook his head.

'I think Alice is closer to the truth. They probably barricaded our windows as a first prank, so that they have the time to work out the next one.'

'What a nasty prank.'

'Sounds like something we would do. Gross.'

Connor held his hands in the air. 'Let us try to break them down. In the meantime, we can work out the finer details of óur prank.' The Hermes kids nodded, but many of them complained about this mean, mean joke that had been pulled.

'We made our first move, one point for us,' Malcolm told the rest of team half-bloods united, 'But we have to make peace very soon or they will waltz all over us again.' He looked at Jessica and Tyler, who shot each other one last venomous glance before trying to look remorseful.

'So, what is our plan?' Malcolm looked around the group. Nobody dared to say anything. 'Come on!'

'... We could TP their cabin?' an Apollo kid suggested. The others sighed.

'Boring,' someone whispered. The Apollo kid shrugged. He knew it was boring, but he had felt like somebody needed to say something, anything at all. He stared at the ground again.

'How about... we convince the cleaning harpies that the Hermes kids have been assigned every single chore?' A daughter of Veritas piped up.

'Than they will probably check with Chiron and Dionysus. Plus, if they find out we lied they won't be happy, and I am too pretty to end as a harpy snack!' Valentina Diaz hugged her sides. 'What if we... eh... write on their walls with lipstick?'

Malcolms' eyes lit up. 'No, we won't do that, but what if some of us put on make-up, like way, way too much of it, and then we slam our heads into their pillows?'

The others looked at each other. It was a small idea, but at least most of them agreed to it. Maybe they could come up with something new along the way.

The Hermes kids broke out of their cabins just in time for lunch. Considering the fact that neither of them asked where they had been during breakfast, they understood that Dionysus and Chiron already knew what was going on.

They were a lonely island in a sea of other demigods whispering about... something. Travis caught something about make-up, but he could not hear what they were planning to do with it. He took a deep breath. 'Alright, do we all know what to do?'

'Maybe. It sounds like you are just trying to break the uncomfortable silence,' Alice answered. Travis was, but the others did not need to know that.

'Let's go straight to the... place where we need to be,' he answered. Alice shrugged.

'Fine by me.'

Eventually, only two of the Hermes kids went to the lake. The rest went to other places. Obviously, every single group and individual Hermes kid was shadowed by at least two other campers. Every single Hermes kid put the plan to action: wiping a strange cream on seemingly random surfaces.

Everyone, except one of them, who was sitting in their cabin, on social media, hacking into the others' Instagram accounts. On every page, he placed a weird picture of the smallest pony there was, all from different angles. The comments on why he was doing it were already pouring in. He grinned. Sometimes the smallest pranks could be very effective.

As soon as the others realised that they were smearing cream everywhere, they decided that it was probably nothing - just a distraction. They needed to get going with their own prank as soon as possible.

They did while the Hermes kids had archery class. While the Hermes kids did get a nice 'bruh' moment out of it, it was not a huge prank. Camp half-blood united had to come up with something grand next.

It was all whispers during dinner. About the new united prank, about how the Hermes kids had ruined their social media and two of the canoes (Not even the Hermes kids had known that the cream actually did something) and about how long this was going to last.

That night it was time for capture the flag, and the teams were not what you would call... balanced. One of them consisted of all the Hermes kids and on the other team consisted of everyone else. Chiron tried to talk them out of it, but the kids would not be persuaded. This was how it was going to be. Chiron shrugged. 'Whatever you want,' he told them. Did they see it wrong, or did he share a knowing glance with Dionysus?

Only a few kids had seen the subtle exchange and they almost immediately forgot about it as if it never happened. It was time to show the other team what for! The sound of a horn rang through the forest and they all disappeared, roaring loudly.

The united team should have known something was up when they found the flag about four minutes after the game had properly started. Yet, they did not question it. They were with so many, how could they not win by a landmile?

Some of them started to suspect something when they had been walking for fifteen minutes and still were deep in the forest. 'It is like there is no end!' One girl wailed. She was right, for there was no end. That was part one of Chiron and Dionysus' plan to end the prank war once and for all (Well, at least until next week or so).

The Hermes kids, in the meantime, had found a couple of flags as well. 'Is this a prank?' Alice asked. One of her brothers shrugged. 'I have no idea. I only saw one flag when they went into the forest.'

'Maybe they duplicated it.'

'How!?'

'Magic!'

Travis stoll sighed. 'I do not think that it is magic. I think something else is going on.'

'Like what?'

'I don't know! Just...' he looked around, until he spotted someone with an orange t-shirt in the distance. 'Hey! Is that...'

'Hey! Hermes kids!'

With a lot of roaring and screaming, the two groups ran over to each other. 'Wait! They have got our flag!'

'So do they!'

'Wait, where did they get all those flags from?'

'Did they make them to cheat the game?'

'That is not a prank, that is just low!'

Travis Stoll spread his arms. 'Stop! We did not bring more flags into the game, and you guys did not duplicate them either. Then what is happening?'

A few people kept fighting, a few others turned around to give everyone weird looks. Malcolm stepped up. 'Guys! Stop fighting! Something genuinely weird is going on!'

He turned to Travis again. 'Unless this is part of one of your pranks,' he whispered.

'I can safely swear on the Styx it isn't,' he whispered back.

'Alright then. Guys! Something is really up, alright?'

Now, everyone was listening. 'What's up?' a few people whispered. '

'The trees,' was the very hilarious answer of some of their peers.

'Alright, there are way too many flags in this game and we found them way too quickly,' Malcolm deducted. Connor Stoll nodded. 'Plus, we were all about five minutes into the forest, yet we have been roaming around for at least fifteen.'

'What if it is a demon? One that makes you hallucinate?'

'I would not find that weird at all,' Connor Stoll answered. 'Yet, we need to know how...'

'Look! A light!'

The speaker pointed at a little glowing light in the distance. It seemed to be calling out to them. 'I... We should not follow it.'

'What if it is the way out?'

'Are you crazy!? When has following a light ever done anything good?'

'Maybe the Hermes kids should be our test crew. They got us into this in the first place.'

A roar sounded from the Hermes kids. It was not entirely clear what they were saying. Travis angrily shook his head. 'Can we all agree that the prank war is over, or at least put on hold until we are out of this situation?'

There was no answer. Malcolm took a deep breath. 'Are there people who want to see where the light takes them?'

Only a few, uncertain hands went up. Malcolm looked at Travis, as if he was waiting for him to say what they were all thinking.

'...Alright, then you guys go see what is on the other side.' He noticed that there were Hermes kids and other kids in the little group. It was like a symbol, them walking off to an uncertain doom.

The kids walked towards the light. It was really bright for a moment. Then, all they saw was their beloved camp. Chiron and Dionysus were sitting on the porch.

Dionysus shifted. 'Alright, a few of them figured it out...'

'Maybe we can let the others do that too?'

'Chiron, that sounds like something I would come up with!'

The kids looked at them, confused. 'What...'

'Oh, we just did not feel like having to sit through yet another prank war,' Dionysus explained. 'So we decided to prank you kids, so that you would stop trying to destroy each other.'

'That is kind of a... simplified way of saying what our idea was,' Chiron quickly cut in.

The kids looked at each other, perplexed. Three other kids just showed up, with faces just as confused as the others. Alright, the lesson was clear: keep the prank wars more under the radar next time.