Chapter 9 Letter of the Day is 5

I got this chapter finished a lot sooner than I expected, and I may have another Chapter up tomorrow or the day after. Hope you enjoy the story. -Kate

Remember

Perry Johnson = Percy Jackson

As Perry walked away from the Pomerium, he thought about what the Male Praetor had said to him about talking about the Quest, that he should try to keep it to only those who needed to know. He remembered the older man saying that, the past few quests had always lead to something bad happening to the quest. He was also told to begin the quest as soon as possible as the quest would be announced after the war games later that day.

Perry had been with the legion for under 24 hours and he was expected to go do a quest and recover some kid, and have someone die before his eyes and for some reason Percy felt that this was somehow par for the course. Perry knew that his mind should be used on learning on how to fit in with the fifth cohort. He arrived at the section for the fifth cohort, and James walked into the tent and said "Alright legionnaires we have a new member his name is Perry and he is," James stopped talking because he didn't know the answer he looked towards Perry and mouthed the words 'how old are you?' In response Perry held up 10 fingers, and James gave Perry a look that just said 'of course he is ten could this cohort get any worse. James let out a heavy sigh, and Percy just had a look of guilt on his face. James then said "and he is 10 years old."

There were more than a few groans from throughout the tent and a voice called out saying with much disdain in his voice, "Why do the Praetors hate the 5th cohort so much? Ah yes, let's allow an underage kid, whose only accomplishment is getting beaten up by some monsters, into the legion. Let's put him in the legion that is full of awful legionnaires, then once he becomes decent we will end up moving him."

The Centurion, instantly was marching towards the back of the tent to give a punishment to whomever had said such things about the camp's leaders. Perry watched him stride and pick up a man off of a cot and drag him towards the front of the tent, and watched as the Centurion through him out of the tent. Then pick him up out of the mud that sat right at the edge of the tent. James then stared him in the eyes and said. "I ought to have you flogged for saying such words about the Praetors. I will not, but mark my words you will the next time you do." Then James let go of the legionnaire and let him fall back into the mud, the legionnaire got up and tried to make himself more presentable. Meanwhile the Centurion had continued his lecture, "Well, at the very least we won't have to find anyone to clean our bathrooms for the next week, glad you volutered, Crassus. I expect those bathrooms to be shining in 2 hours."

Perry watched how the legionnaire, that he now knew as Crassus, ran off in the direction of a nearby building, Perry assumed to get to work. James walked back into the building, and said to Perry, now that we have got that troublesome Legacy out of the way. Perry turned to James with some gut feeling at least somewhat responsible for the punishment, feeling like he had been the one receiving unjust punishments more often than not, and said "Why did you call him troublesome, it was just one comment?"

"Well you see, Crassus when he joined the legion was a member of the 1st Cohort and was, do to being the son of two Praetors, he was put on the fast track to Centurion, maybe even Praetor one day, but he couldn't keep his mouth shut. It wasn't long before he was off the track to Centurion, and about every couple months he would be sent to a lower cohort. He is a couple steps from being banished from New Rome all together." Said James, shaking his head, "Shame, he will never become a Centurion too, he is a good fighter and a great leader, he has almost served his entire pledge in the legion. If he wants to stay for much longer after that, he will have to join the Triarii, and those guys won't put up with his mouth."

Perry felt even more guilty, thinking that, on his first day, he set someone one step closer to getting kicked out of their home. This thought vanished as his train of thought was derailed as James brought up the war games that were to be done later that night and the thought of the quest afterward.

As the time of the war games drew closer Perry felt more and more nervous, and was already beginning to tired from the weight of his gear and the knowledge of the upcoming battle. His gear, which had been given to him earlier in the afternoon, easily out weighed the boy. He had been given a gladius, a pair of Pilum, armor, a helmet and a shield. All of this weighed heavily on Perry, he hadn't really had time to train at all, all that he had the time to learn was a few tricks from James, the only Legionnaire who was even talking to Perry much. The pointers included, your shield is your friend, stay behind it, a gladius is best used at stabbing, but isn't bad at slashing either and is always an option, and to remember that you won't be on the front lines for long, when the whistle blows go to your right and go back to the end of the line. (This is an actual roman tactic found it pretty cool)

As cohort marched out, the Centurions started to bark out the plan of battle, it would be the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th cohorts job to assault a fortress, that was being protected by the 1st cohort, the Triarii, and the Velites, the skirmishers, masters of the bow, and thrown weapons and most dangerously the scorpions that were mounted all along the walls of the fort.

"Remember to watch out for the Triarii. They are bigger, stronger and better fighters, than you, they will hold till they are unable to, then hold it for 15 more minutes, they are BAD dudes. They won't be pulling their punches and neither will the 1st, fight hard and fight fast. We will be assaulting the gate alongside the 4th Cohort." Yelled James as they marched, Perry's body growing tired from the extreme weight he carried, the burden of the quest and the long day he had already had. He thought he would be lucky if he was still awake at the end of the battle.

As they marched off to their starting location, Perry suddenly felt better, as they crossed the little Tiber, a river that flowed across the battlefield and marked symbolically the entering of Rome. They took their positions and were told that the attacking force was going to be led by the Praetor Melissa, and the defense by Praetor Fred. Perry largely drowned out the 10 minutes of talking about the rules, as for some reason he felt already knew them.

Before he knew Perry was marching towards the gates of the fortress, and ready for a fight. Not long after their marching had begun, large bolts started to rain from the wall, and quite accurately at that. The legionnaires were told to raise their shields and keep marching at a quicker pace.

When fighting began, Perry had hardly even known, it was only once they brought up the ram and he was assigned to it, that he really noticed. Perry had, thoughts, that he had fought before, but he still was prepared for what happened at the gate when ram busted it open. A rush of legionnaires through a narrow passage, a volley of pilum one way, then in return, screams as men near him got hit and fell down, Perry at first didn't know what to do, but soon it came apparent, keep the grinder moving forward.

The 4th Cohort which had been the first into the fort, had been almost wiped off the battlefield, and the remains of the 4th piled in with the 5th were directly facing off against half of the 1st cohort that after shredding the 4th, was beginning to look rather thin. Perry heard the whistle blow and he took his spot at the front of the line and began to fight with a younger member of the 1st Cohort who happened to have blonde hair.

Perry quickly seized the upper hand in the one on one conflict and dispatched his opponent with a sharp stab to the gut, which was responded to with a wail and the man falling to the ground. Perry began to feel confident, he saw that there were few Legionnaires standing in the way. Perry spurred on by his sudden rush of confidence thought about it and decided to try and get through the line to assault the rear of the formation.

Unknowingly Perry was putting himself in a horrible situation, as watching from afar, Praetor Fred, saw that the line had begun to falter around the gate. Fred said with no remorse for what was about to happen to the 5th cohort, "It has come to the Triarii", and signalled to his Trumpeter, who blew the horn.

Perry heard the horn, but at first disregarded it, as he tried to find his way through the line, having to use his shield as a battering ram and duck under a few blades Perry got through. Just in time to see a wall of Spears coming at him, Perry didn't even notice the men behind the spears, all he saw was a wall moving all as one. It might not have been the scariest thing, but at a gut level Perry was terrorfied, he didn't know how to fight something like that. All he could think was run, but he was trapped, between the line of the 1st cohort that he had fought so hard to get through and the wall of spears.

Perry pushed and shove with all his might to try and get past the legionnaires standing in his way, starting to panic. This panic was not yet shared with the rest of the 5th, but it soon spread as the unbeatable Triarii came their way. Perry began to realize he would have to fight them, and turned to face the Triarii, as there was no way to escape as the pile behind him was too full of the men and bodies.

The next thing Perry knew, he had managed to get past the initial line of spears, he didn't know how he got there, and neither did the Triarii. Perry didn't even have time to react before he had a couple spears in his face, defeated in seconds.

Fred who was watching the assault of the Triarii, turned to his assistant, and said, "The Triarii have a feeling of invincibility, they have never lost a fight, they are the old guard, the real men, and watch how they take the 5th cohort and destroy their morale." Then handing a pair of Binoculars to his assistant.

Perry woke up back in the infirmary, he was greeted by two familiar faces, Matt and Peter, both of whom had become injured in the war games, both still in bed unconscious. Perry sat up in bed and let out a yelp in pain, as a stab wound to the side had yet to fully heal. He looked around the infirmary and saw many faces which he had seen throughout the battle. He sighed heavily as he laid back down in his bed. He heard heavy steps approaching him, Perry not wanting to experience the pain a second time, didn't want to sit back up and see if the person was approaching him.

Not much time had passed before the man was hovering over Perry, and Perry realized that it was actually a group of older men. The man who arrived at the bed first turned to the men following him and said, "This is the kid that got through that front line of spears. Still don't know how he managed to do that, it should have been impossible."

"That's not what I think happened, I think the kid just beat you, maybe you just didn't want to stab the kid, or maybe you have lost your touch old man." Replied another one of the men, playfully punching the leader.

"The kids awake why don't we just ask him?" Replied another man.

AN Today this story reached 10k views, I would just like to thank all of you, it means a lot to me. Secondly I would just like to say that I still love it when I get reviews, I will try to answer your questions and use some of your ideas. Also you might be asking yourself Percy seemed kinda helpless in battle, trust me there is a reason and it will be explained. Now it's time to talk about reviews

HarmonyHarpshine7, said "Yay! Prophecies! Adventure! Excited to see what happens next!"

Glad to hear all of that, I have had a lot of fun thinking about where this story could go.

Time for me to sign off and remind you guys that the next chapter is coming soon. Hope you enjoyed this chapter, and you have a nice day! -Kate