Olympus and the Methods of Rationality
Disclaimer: I do not own Percy Jackson, if I did this would be book canon.
Chapter 1: Dam Expectations
When Harper's class took a field trip to the Hoover Dam, he had few expectations. When the class got there, he found the place fulfilled most of them, but there were other things he didn't expect. Unexpected, however, was probably the understatement of the month. It was like the universe was just chucking stuff at him, exploring how far he would believe his eyes.
A huge dam?
Check.
Loads of water?
Check.
Boring trivia from a boring tour guide?
Check.
Dudes in armor, wielding swords?
Not really, but he did hear something about a play...
7-foot sea lion people climbing up the side of the dam?
A prank, perhaps?
A battle between the swordsmen and trident-wielding sea lion people?
A stunt for the play?
Sea Lion people bursting into dust?
Um...
By this point, everyone was screaming and running around like headless chickens and Harper's teacher was screaming at the class to follow her to the stairs.
"Man," muttered one of his classmates, "gunman drills at school, and what do we get? Gunmen at a dam."
Gunmen? thought Harper, They're using swords!
It only got worse when the police arrived.
They came up through the stairs, causing quite a bit of confusion and separating Harper from his classmates.
"Freeze!"
To his surprise (and probably the policeman's), the fighters froze. One of the sea lion people looked at the officer and said "Freeze? We're not liquids, why would we-" He (or she, Harper couldn't tell) never got to finish his sentence as a (human) swordsman with a purple shirt and blond hair cut his head off.
The speaker burst into golden dust and the fight continued.
Harper had the creeping feeling that he ought to go, but he couldn't. He wanted to see what would happen, and why he saw them using swords while everyone else, it seemed, saw that they were using guns.
"Drop your weapons or we will be forced to fire upon you!" shouted another officer.
The fight didn't stop, but a girl around Harper's age stopped shooting sea lion people with her bow, walked up to the policeman and did something very wierd. She raised her arm, and snapped her fingers, sharp and clear. He could feel something radiating from her hand.
"I am lieutenant Grace of the U.S. Marines," she said, "and these are my men fighting the terrorists. You will tell your men to help me evacute the dam."
The policeman nodded, saluted, and then proceeded to give his men the order.
Harper hesitated, shrugged, then walked up to the lieutenant, knowing he'd regret it.
"Lieutenant?" he asked.
"Yes?"
"I'm sorry about bothering you, but I have some questions."
She shrugged.
"Go ahead."
"Do the U.S. Marines usually use swords and bows?"
She seemed perplexed by the question.
"What? Uh, no, but why'd you ask?"
He pointed at the blond kid, who was in the procces of shearing the arms off a sea lion person.
" 'Cause that's either a sword or the world's biggest toothpick."
She looked like she was trying to hold back a grin.
"Oh, yeah. Uh, what's your next question?"
"Just what kind of terrorists are those? They don't look like prototypical jihadists to me."
"Oh? And what do prototypical jihadists look like?"
"Well, they're human, for one."
She gave him a dry smile, "Oh, I'm sure there's a lot of people who disagree with you."
"Perhaps, but you didn't answer my question."
She looked him over.
"Come with me, kid."
"Wha-" but she was already walking to the fighters, who had by then killed all the sea lion people.
"I know eskrima!" He said, walking towards them.
"What's. . .Ice cream?" asked a raven-haired boy.
"Es-Cream-Ah," answered Harper, "it's a form of martial- hey wait, aren't you Percy Jackson?"
"How'd you know?"
"You did make international TV around 5 years ago."
"Oh yeah." he said as if it was the first he thought about it, "Yeah, I forgot about that. Anyway, what's your name?"
Harper stuck out his hand, "Patrick Harper O'Malley, but everyone calls me Harper."
Percy shook his hand, "Well, nice to meet you. You probably have a few questions, don't you."
Harper grinned, "How'd you know?"
"Newbies usually do."
"Newbies?"
"You'll see."
Just then, the lieutenant walked up to them.
"Time to go, Percy." she looked at him, "come on, kid."
"My names Harper."
"Harper, then. Let's go."
The group started walking to the exit.
"Where are we going and why should I go with you?"
"We're going to the only safe place in the world for people like us." answered Percy.
A blond girl with grey eyes and a knife nudged him, "One of the two safest places, seaweed brain."
"Oh, yeah. Huh."
They walked down the stairs, and passed the officer who the lieutenant gave the orders to. He saluted to her, "Thank you very much, lieutenant."
"You're welcome, seargent."
The blond kid with the sword said "Lieutenant, huh? What did you tell them, Thalia?"
"I didn't tell them anything, Jason, I used the mist."
Great, thought Harper, another thing to ask them about later. As if I don't already have enough questions buzzing around in my head.
"What do you call it," asked Percy, "'Mist-snapping'?"
"To be honest, I don't really know," answered Thalia, "but to answer Jason's question, they believe that I am Lieutenant Grace of the U.S. Marines, commanding this counter-terrorist squad."
She seemed to notice Harper. "Oh, but you don't what the mist is, do you."
"No," answered Harper, "I don't."
"Well, the mist is what keeps the mortals, or regular people, from seeing what they do not understand. You might have noticed how other people thought that we were shooting terrorist with guns?"
"Yeah, so it's kind of like in the Discworld books, how people's minds just took out what they thought could not possibly be there."
Thalia just looked confused, but the blond girl nodded.
Harper pondered this for a few moments before realizing something.
"Wait," he said, frowning, "so, you guys are immortal?"
Jason snorted as if he found the idea unattractive.
"No," said Jason, jerking his head at Thalia, "just her."
Thalia just rolled her eyes at him.
"Like Jason so kindly and completely explained," said the blond girl, glaring at Jason, "Thalia is the only immortal among us, and that's because it was given to her by lady- a god. The rest of us, you included, are half-bloods. Half-human, half-god, that is."
Harper looked at her skeptically. "Right, so what religion is this again?"
Jason grinned. "Ancient Greek, ancient Roman."
Harper studied them, trying to figure out wether they were telling the truth or what.
They're crazy, said the rational part of his mind.
But what about that thing- the mist? Asked the more open-(ahem)minded part.
The rational part shut up.
"Which one?"
"Either, both. They're just different aspects of the same gods."
"That makes sense. . . I guess."
"Gods! I forgot," said the blond girl, "we haven't introduced ourselves yet!"
"Yes, I was wondering when it would come around to that."
"I'm Annabeth, daughter of Athena," she said.
"I'm Thalia, daughter of Zeus and Huntress of Artemis," said Thalia.
"Jason, son of Jupiter, Praetor of New Rome."
"Percy, son of Poseidon."
By then they had already exited the dam. There was a group of girls wearing the same thing as Thalia; silver parkas, quivers, etc.
A girl of around 15 stepped forward. "We've been wondering when you'd come down, were the Telkhines more than you expected?"
"No, milady," said Thalia, "we found a half-blood."
"Get ready to meet your first deity," whispered Jason, "Artemis."
Another thing to add to that list of unexpectations:
Meeting an ancient greek goddes?
Hell no.
AN:
It's kinda short, but I just wanted to get the first chapter out of the way. Tell me what you think.
This is my first story, so don't do flames, and just give constructive criticism.