Somebody had gone to get Chiron, which was a good thing, because the Oracle didn't want to seem to speak unless he was present.
Rachel stared, not saying anything. Except it wasn't really Rachel. Her eyes glowed green with power, and she seemed to hover slightly off of the ground.
Finally, the sound of galloping horse hooves was heard and Chiron cantered into the area.
As soon as he did, the oracle began to speak. It's voice was ancient, raspy, and seemed to come from everywhere at once.
Nine half-bloods will be the ruler of doom's demise,
From inner demons a hero will rise
An impossible choice will lead to destruction
To a new changed life true love must make introduction.
Once she had finished, Rachel collapsed to the ground, the eerie green light leaving her body.
Some Apollo kids rushed forward to help her, leaving everybody else to ponder the words of the prophecy.
It didn't sound good.
An impossible choice will lead to destruction?
And what inner demons? Were the eidolons going to make an appearance? Or was it something more?
Percy was snapped from his thoughts as Chiron addressed the crowd of campers that had gathered around.
"A prophecy has been spoken! It is late. We should all now go to bed, and maybe our dreams could give us insight into what it might mean".
Percy and Xavier shared a glance. They knew what it meant. Ruler of doom? Demons? Destruction? That could only be referring to the rise of Tartarus.
This prophecy was exactly what they needed to start on the quest. And the part about the nine half-bloods only confirmed their suspicion that they would need the help of half-blood campers to succeed.
Chiron had already retreated back to the Big House, though. Apparently dead set on mulling over it himself before making any decisions.
By any rate he was right. It was too late to do anything now. The only thing they could do was go to sleep and talk about it in the morning.
The fire of the bonfire died down and then went out, and soon all the campers had gone back to their own respective cabins.
"Goodnight, Percy", Annabeth said. They were outside the door to her cabin, and even though she had said goodbye they still hadn't let go of each other's hands yet.
Percy leaned in closer. He so badly wanted to kiss her right now, but he couldn't.
Over her shoulder, Malcolm was hanging out of the cabin's window glaring daggers at him, not to mention he could feel Xavier smirking at him from behind.
He pulled away. "What's the matter?", she frowned slightly, her eyebrows furrowing in that cute way that they do when she's trying to solve a problem.
And right then, Percy just didn't care.
More quickly than before, he leaned down and their lips met. They only pulled away when Malcolm made a disgusted sound and stormed away.
"Get a room, you two!", Xavier said from behind them.
"I sincerely wish that we could", Percy replied, turning the insult back on him.
Annabeth blushed furiously, and for once, Xavier shut up.
"Goodnight. I love you". This time he actually let go of her hand, and he and Xavier walked off together towards the forrest.
Xavier made fun of him for practically the entire walk there. Taunting him by making kiss noises and mocking what he had said in a fake high-pitched voice.
Overall, he made Percy so embarrassed his skin actually began to steam.
Finally, they reached where they had planned on camping out for the night.
There was an area, in the far corner of camp where the forrest met the beach. This was where they had decided to sleep.
When they were sleeping, they had almost no control over their powers. It would leak out in big bursts and then sometimes not at all.
Because of this, Percy was forced to sleep somewhere where he wouldn't be in danger of hurting anyone via flash freeze. And Xavier was forced to sleep somewhere where he wouldn't be in any danger of burning anything down and starting fires.
This place was perfect for that. Percy would sleep high up in one of the trees, far away from the reach of the spikes in his aura. Xavier would sleep completely surrounded by the sand on the beach. Sand wasn't flammable, however it wasn't uncommon for him to wake up some mornings completely surrounded by smoking newly formed glass.
Normally, choosing a spot to sleep wouldn't be so difficult for Percy. But his powers tended to react rather… violently with his emotions. So every night, when he was forced to relive those two awful years of torture, he tried to separate himself as much as possible from his domains of power.
High up above the ground and away from any water.
That night, despite the fact that Percy must have been almost 100 feet above sea level, the waves seemed to crash on the shore with just that much more violence.
His nightmares were the worst that they've ever been, rivalling those that came to him during his first few days after waking up after Chaos first rescued him.
His gaze flickered in and out, falling, falling, for 9 whole days he was just falling.
It flickered again, he was screaming, his arm felt like it was being ripped off and was slowly being burned away.
A voice rasped close to his ear, causing him to flinch, "That will teach you to complain of your injuries, boy". The presence laughed as he screamed out again, begging it to stop.
It changed again. Now he was running, he felt like he was always running. He could hear them gaining on him, an entire pack of hellhounds, told to rip him to shreds if he was found. They pounced, and an unimaginable pain ripped through his back as though he was being cut in half while still conscious.
Finally he awoke, he was drenched in sweat and breathing heavily. Once he realised that it was a dream, that he was awake now and none of that was real, he began to calm down.
The entire top of the tree that he was sitting in was frozen solid, each leaf and branch coated in an inch of ice and frost. The bough that he was sitting on groaned beneath his weight, made brittle from the sudden ice flashes.
He opened his wings and flew away from it before it could snap and break off altogether. As he flew, he struggled to reign in his power, but it was uncontrollable. Much like his control over water it did not want to be tamed.
When he arrived at the beach he found that Xavier had had a similarly rough night.
In the area where he had laid down to sleep in, huge shards of glass radiated outwards in random spikes. Some of them completely clear and cool, and others still hot and molten, forming and running like lava.
Xavier himself was nowhere to be found. Any footprints or markings that he had been there at all being swept away by the wind and surf a long time ago.
It didn't surprise him that Xavier was already gone, the sun was rather high in the sky, as it was somewhere around 8 in the morning, and he often rose as the sun did. Something he shared with the Apollo campers.
He felt tired and rundown, and his scars ached as if dreaming about them had made them reopen again.
Tartarus was trying to get to him. And it was working.
When he reached the dining pavilion for breakfast he hit the ground a little bit harder than he intended to, drawing everybody's attention from the loud sound that was made when his feet hit the ground.
The dark and the cold seemed to radiate off of him in waves, and as he walked through the dining pavilion everybody parted around him.
He found Xavier sitting at a table with a couple of Apollo kids from last night.
"Come on. We're talking to Chiron", Percy said, interrupting what looked like a fascinating conversation about the sun.
"Well good morning to you too, sunshine", he said, turning around and smiling.
His smile disappeared when he turned around and saw Percy.
"Hey, you okay? You look terrible".
Percy's eyes flashed dark. "Nightmares. Haven't had ones these bad in a long time".
He rubbed the large burn mark on his left arm, and Xavier's gaze flitted to it for a second before coming back up to meet Percy's eyes.
"Do you want to talk about-".
"No", Percy's voice was cold and hard, and he took his hand away from the scar on his arm.
"Come on. Let's go".
Xavier looked at him curiously for a moment before nodding his head slowly and following.
Percy had already begun to walk out of the dining pavilion, his cloak billowed out behind him and spread a cold wind that made shivers run down people's back.
The further he walked the colder the area around him became until his boots started to crunch on ice that had formed on the floor.
"Reign it in Scarface!", Xavier called to the boy ahead of him.
Percy stopped and the entire pavilion seemed to hold its breath.
Finally he took a deep breath and waved his hand, causing all the ice to melt away.
"Sorry. My bad".
There was another beat of silence where he seemed to compose himself before he walked out, the sound of his boots echoing around the silent room.
Once he had gone conversation started up again, and Xavier hurried to catch up.
"Hey! Wait up!", he opened his wings and glided down the hill until he was next to Percy.
He landed in front, and forced him to look him in the eye.
"What the hell was that?"
"It's nothing. I'm fine".
Xavier wasn't convinced, but they had already reached the Big House.
Inside, they found Mr. D and Chiron in his wheelchair form playing Pinochle.
Mr. D looked up from his cards and gave a dramatic sigh before saying "What do you brats want?".
Xavier winced as Mr. D's Diet Coke froze over.
Mr. D's eyes widened slightly but before he could say anything Percy was talking to Chiron.
"Chiron, you have your prophecy. We need to start on this quest as soon as possible. We need you
Mr. D's eyes widened slightly but before he could comment Percy turned to Chiron.
"Chiron, you have your prophecy. We need to leave, now".
"I understand your desperation, Percy. But I just don't know. I just need more proof before I can let some of the campers be put in danger". Chiron showed his cards up on the table and Mr. D groaned.
"Tartarus himself appearing and telling you he would burn the camp to the ground wasn't proof enough for you?".
Chiron tensed at his cold tone of voice, and Xavier stepped in.
"Chiron, sir. I understand that you're more reluctant to let more of the campers go since you thought you lost some of them in the Giant War. But time is of the essence here, and whether we like it or not we must act".
Xavier's approach at comfort seemed to be more effective with Chiron, and finally he gave in.
"Fine. I will approve this quest. The meeting with the cabin leaders will be held shortly".
"Good. Thank you, Chiron", Percy's voice was clipped and curt, and Xavier looked over at him confused.
From what Percy had told him, the centaur, Chiron was like a second father to him. He couldn't imagine why he would be so formal.
But then Xavier looked at his eyes as Percy was staring at the old centaur, and he was almost startled. They looked haunted, sad almost, like he was reliving memories of his life before.
They made eye contact and Xavier raised an eyebrow, but Percy just shook his head and turned on his heel and left.
"I'm so sorry, Chiron. He had some bad nightmares last night and-".
"No, no. It's fine", Xavier looked back at the old centaur and was surprised to find him staring at the door with a sad look in his eyes.
"The pain that he has gone through is unspeakable, and it is something that he needs to work through and heal from on his own".
Xavier knew that he was right. Percy had made progress. He smiled as he thought back to the time when he had first met Percy back in Chaos' Palace.
Flashback:
I groaned as I was woken up from my sleep.
I heard yelling and screaming and I shot out of bed and was already reaching for my sword before I realised where I was.
My heart beating unnaturally fast, I focused on the sound and tried to tell where it was coming from.
The boy down the hall. He was at it again. Every night since I had come here a few days ago the boy in the room down the hall from me had woken me up with his screaming.
Nightmares.
Another blood curdling scream came from his room and I had to remind myself again and again that he was just dreaming and he wasn't actually being hurt.
The problem was it sounded so real.
Especially tonight. He seemed to be louder than usual tonight, and another sound accompanied his screaming.
I listened, it was a strange sort of groaning. Not like a sound that would come from a person but rather resembling the sound of bending metal.
It was coming from my bathroom.
I got out of bed and walked inside, my barefoot felt cold on the marble floor.
I focused in on the sound and realised that it was coming from my toilet.
My toilet?
Reaching over, I lifted the lid and peered inside. Nothing out of the usual here—
Suddenly a large stream of water burst from inside of the toilet and blasted me straight in the face. It was so powerful that I was knocked onto my rear in a steadily growing puddle of water on the bathroom floor.
The yelling from down the hall seemed to get louder, and I realised that he must be the cause of my toilet exploding on me.
I was soaked, and mad. So I marched down the hall, leaving wet footprints behind me and pushed into his room.
Lady Chaos had warned me never to come in here. She said that the boy had been badly injured before he was rescued, and had many scars that were still healing that he was embarrassed about.
But I didn't care, scars didn't scare me. I had a few of my own and I knew that someone's scars just showed how strong they were.
The more pain that somebody can stand the more you should be scared of them.
My father had always told me that.
My father.
I scowled as thoughts of him came flooding back into my mind.
My hand suddenly caught fire.
Damn. I can't let myself get out of control like that. Not again.
My thoughts saddened, but what I saw when I pushed through the door to the boy's room saddened me even more.
He was pale and his raven black hair was plastered to his forehead with sweat. He was yelling, and tears ran down his face. He was holding his back as if it was hurt, but as far as I could see there was nothing there.
Water was trickling into the room from the bathroom, telling me that his toilet had exploded as well.
He looked like he was in pain, and his entire body seemed to be covered in scars. Some white an faded as though they were old, and others still pink and heeling, like they had just been inflicted.
I rushed over to where he lay, twisting his body this way and that.
I shook his shoulders hard and firm, and his eyes popped open.
I could tell that they used to be a beautiful shade of green, but now they were clouded and dark, and tears streamed out of them in pure pain and misery.
"Wake up! It's just a dream. Wake up!".
His vision seemed to clear and he seemed to notice me for the first time.
"Who are you? What are you doing here?". He seemed suspicious, looking around the room as if an army were about to charge in any second.
"I'm Xavier. I was sleeping in a room down the hall until you exploded a toilet in my face!".
I scowled at him, and he glared right back. But then he did something I never expected him to do.
He smiled.
End of Flashback: