Disclaimer: I do not own Rick Riordan, the Percy Jackson books, characters, series, movies, or anything else you may recognize.
Chapter Five
Everyone Has A Vision, Except For Me
Everything is f'ed up, straight from the heart
Tell me what do you do when it all falls apart
Gotta pick myself up where do I start
Cause I can't turn to you when it all falls apart
"When It All Falls Apart" by The Veronicas
Sign-in duty. SIGN-IN DUTY.
This was not okay. Not okay at all. Why should I be worried about signing in amperes when Percy was missing? Chiron had decided it would be best to wait for a few days, to see if he showed up. He gave me a list of reasons why he could have disappeared, most involving monsters attacks or even surprises for me, but none of them made any actual sense.
Somewhere deep inside my heart, I knew Percy had been taken and that we needed to do something.
So Chiron said that as a senior counselor, I needed to set a good example for the other campers, which meant sign-in duty. We needed to keep things under control so that there was no panic. The other senior counselors were working tours, taking groups of five – preferably from the same cabin – and showing them around the camp. And I was stuck at a table, filling out forms for every new kid and finding all the previous campers on a huge ass list and checking off their name.
"Name?"
"Lou Ellen Brooks." I'd never seen the girl before. She was probably only around thirteen with dark hair and pale green eyes that were kind of hypnotizing.
"Alright," I said, shaking my head a little to break the trance as I pulled out a new form. "Have you been claimed yet?"
She nodded. "My mother is Hecate."
"Ah," I said. "That explains the yes." Hecate was the goddess of magic, and I'd met her briefly on a few occasions. She looked like an older version of the girl in front of me, but the whole eye thing was because she liked to captivate people. She did it quite well.
I asked Lou Ellen more questions off the questionnaire, like where she currently lived, what school she went to, if she planned on staying at camp year-round or just for the summers, and other basic information. I was just finishing up Lou Ellen's paperwork when I heard someone running toward me.
"Excuse me, excuse me!" Annabeth shouted, pushing people out of her way. "People, move!"
"Annie?" I asked, whipping around. Her eyes were bright with excitement. She'd found something.
That was the good thing about having a partner-in-crime. While you were stuck on desk duty, they could go out and do some digging.
"Phoibe, can you cover registration?" I asked.
She nodded and wished me luck, scooching her chair over so she was in the middle of the table now.
"We have to get Chiron," Annabeth said. "Now."
I nodded and followed her to the Big House, where Chiron seemed to be spending most of his time lately. He turned when we entered the room, rearranging the blanket on his Mist-concealed legs.
"I had a dream," Annabeth announced. I looked at her strangely – I hadn't had any demigod dreams since last summer, so how was she getting any? Let's face it – I was the most likely to get them, my dad being Apollo and all. "The dream told me that I needed to go to the Grand Canyon skywalk and look for a guy with one shoe. He'll lead us to Percy."
It probably sounded crazy, but at this point, I was desperate. "Then what are we waiting for?" I asked. "Let's go!"
I started out the door but Chiron rolled over and latched onto my wrist, holding me back. "Andee, I cannot let you go on this quest. You are too emotionally invested in this."
"Too emotionally invested, my ass," I said. It was because of last summer. No one trusted me to do anything anymore, like I might explode at any second. I wasn't going to. Chiron gave me a stern look. "What, and Annabeth isn't? She's known Percy a lot longer than I have. This is the love of my life we're talking about. I deserve to go looking for him!"
"This is why you can't come, Dee," Annabeth said soothingly. "You're too emotional about this and without knowing what level your abilities are at, it could be really dangerous for you."
I glared at her. I knew she had good intentions and that she was trying to do what was best for me while also trying to find Percy, but the best thing for me right now was to have Percy. If I couldn't him, I wanted to be one of the people trying to find him. I had to be.
"You will stay here, Andromeda, and continue with your duties as senior counselor of the Zeus cabin. That means registration, tours, cabin inspections, hand-to-hand combat instruction and leading the campfire sing-alongs," Chiron said.
"Don't you dare use that name and don't treat me like a child," I spat at Chiron. "I can literally leave whenever I want – you can't make me stay here." I stormed past him and out of the Big House.
How dare he? He had no right to tell me what I could and couldn't do! Percy was one of the only people in this world who still believed in me. He trusted me and loved me as I was. And now that he was gone, no one trusted me to go look for him.
I screamed in frustration, wanting to beat the crap out of something. I looked around and saw that I had made it to the training arena. Perfect.
I went into the weapons supply closet and pulled out a few of the practice dummies. I started fighting as hard as I could, using all sorts of combinations of punches, kicks, and full body blows. Sometime in the middle of this, I broke down and started crying. I fell in a heap on the ground and just cried. Cried because everyone seemed to be against me. Cried because something horrible was happening and my say wasn't being taken into account. Cried because I might never see Percy again. Cried because I was useless.
"Andee?" Lee asked, cautiously approaching me.
I didn't bother to turn to look at him. "I just want to find him. That's all I want."
Lee sat on the ground with me, hugging me tightly and wiping my tears. "I know, Dee, but you have to trust that Chiron knows what he's doing. We can't have you risking your life when we don't even know what your powers are like. That would be dumb. We don't want Percy to come back to find you dead."
"I can't die, stupid," I said, hitting him on the shoulder.
"Just let Annabeth find him. Then you'll be back together and you'll have nothing to worry about anymore," Lee said.
"Yes I will. No one trust me. No one wants me to do anything. I went from coming to camp and being this bad ass superwoman to being this helpless child who can do nothing. Percy was one of the only people who didn't treat me differently after everything," I said frustratedly. "If anything, I'm even more powerful than before."
"Did you ever stop to think that's why Chiron doesn't want you going out on quests yet?" Lee asked. "A lot of the people at this camp experienced just how powerful you are firsthand last summer during the Battle, whether you were on Kronos' side or ours. Your power is undeniable, and that scares some people."
Maybe that wouldn't be a problem if the gods had given me the control I needed instead of playing their stupid games. I didn't say it out loud because as far as everyone else was concerned, I was okay with the punishment I was given. I wasn't. I was happy with the gift, though, because I got to live my life the way I chose to. Although right now, that wasn't really happening.
Lee gave me another hug. "Everything's going to work out, somehow. But for now, let's go back to registration, as boring as it is.
I sat at the registration table shuffling through the papers in boredom. Most of the campers had already signed in and were on their tours or being shown to their cabin. Chiron decided that because so many more demigods were coming to camp this year, the first few days should act as a sort of orientation, and tomorrow we'd start the training with some of the senior counselors (myself included).
I leaned back in my chair and tried to see into Annabeth's mind to see whatever she was seeing on the quest, but she blocked me. Seriously, my best friend in the world, one of the only people who truly understood how much this was hurting me, blocked me from her mind. Obviously something important was happening if she wasn't letting me see.
"Andee!" two voices screamed, interrupting my attempts to break through the barriers in Annabeth's mind. Two girls stood in front of me. One was average height with olive skin, long, curly dark brown eyes and eyes the color of dark honey. The other girl was around the same height with a short blonde bob and eyes that changed colors from the blue of the sky to the green of the grass.
I screamed, almost knocking over the table as I ran over to them, wrapping my arms around them in a big group hug. "You're here! You actually came!"
"We're here!" Mel said, laughing as she squeezed back.
My friends from Vancouver were finally here at camp! Mel was born in New York and moved to Vancouver when she was three, and she was a daughter of Hecate. Delia was a daughter of Hebe and was born in Southern Ontario, almost in Michigan. Her family moved to Vancouver when she was five.
My heart was bursting with love and excitement. Percy had told me they were part of the reason for him asking the gods to claim their children and for the minor gods to be acknowledged and honored the same as the major. And now I got to be surrounded be with all my loved ones in one place.
"Oh my gods, I'm so happy right now," I said as I pulled away from them, hardly able to believe they were really here. "Were your guys' flights okay? Did you run into any monsters or anything?"
"The flight was fine, but there are a lot more monsters here than there are in Vancouver," Delia commented.
"I know," I said. "It's the higher demigod population and the proximity of Mount Olympus." I smiled, just looking at them and taking them in. I hadn't seen them in person since last summer. Just over Skype. "Let me take you on the tour and show you your cabins!"
I showed them around the whole camp, showing them the strawberry fields, the amphitheater, the lake, the beach, the combat arena, the armory and forge, the stables, the archery range and came up to the cabins last.
"As you can see, we had to do some rearranging to make room, but Annabeth did a fantastic job designing and putting it all together," I said. "I'm in the Zeus cabin at the very end, which you both are always more than welcome in. Sleepovers are going to be a must." I pointed out the rest of the cabins, telling them who each one was in honor of and some of the people staying in them. "So Delia, you're in Cabin Eighteen here and Mel, you're in Cabin Twenty. The cabins for the minor gods and goddesses are really cool. So they are four modules that are all back-to-back so you can enter any way you want. Inside there's the main sitting room with couches that turn into beds, and all the furniture is programmable so that everything can be changed and moved with a snap of your fingers. Also, you guys get you own private bathrooms with showers, which none of the bigger cabins get. And then there's also a loft with more beds and storage. Basically, you can make it whatever you want."
Cabin Eighteen was a beautiful sky blue with pretty little white window panes – it looked like something you'd see in a movie. And Cabin Twenty – Hecate's cabin – was made to look like it was built from stone, with each stone inscribed with magic symbols. Apparently if you dropped any of the blocks, they could explode or turn people into trees or other fun things like that.
"Annabeth outdid herself," Delia said, opening the door and peeking inside. She would be the second Hebe demigod to arrive this summer, and with her age and experience, she would automatically become the senior counselor, as would Mel for the Hecate cabin.
"And yet she still did not give me my own private bathroom," I said and they laughed. "But you guys can go in, check out your new homes away from home and get comfortable before dinner."
"Sounds good," Mel said, before stopping and asking, "Where's Percy? I would've expected him to be attached to your side."
"Oh," I said, having been able to momentarily forget about the problem in the midst of my joy at seeing my friends. "Percy is missing."
"Andee, I'm so sorry," Delia said, hugging me. "Do you know what happened?"
I shook my head. "There's people out looking for him as we speak, but I just – I feel so useless. I'm so worried and I can't do anything about it."
"He'll be okay," Mel said, her hand on my shoulder. "He's a tough guy and he's got the Curse, right? So he can't die."
"That's what Val said."
"Val is smart," Mel said. "That's why we all listen to Val."
There was a huge splash and I knew in an instant that Annabeth had returned, and all that Will would kill her for wrecking the chariot.
"I have to go, this could be it," I ran out of the ring of cabins and watched as the nymphs threw the chariot out of the lake, Will immediately going to its aid. That chariot was like his baby. Annabeth and Butch were the first people out of the lake, Annabeth immediately looking around and spotting me.
I'm sorry, Andee. He wasn't there.
My heart sank. I continued to watch and saw three more people come out of the lake after Annabeth and Butch.
One was a girl that was definitely First Nations with tan skin, choppy, unevenly cut hair with a few braids throughout, and blue eyes that were shifting to green as she looked around in confusion. Definitely a daughter of Aphrodite. I wondered if she'd been claimed yet.
The second guy looked like he was Spanish with tan skin, curly black hair, dark brown – almost black – eyes, and pointy ears that reminded me of an elf. He had a super babyish face and was average in height, not nearly as tall as Percy, but not nearly as short as me. His godly parent wasn't as easy to guess.
The third and last person to walk out of the lake made my jaw drop in shock. He was probably around the same height as Percy and his features looked like they had been carved into stone, like a Greek statue or something. He had light blonde hair in a military-style cut, and electric blue eyes that I had seen before. He wore a bright, orchid purple shirt that I thought would look a lot better with my coloring than the camp's orange ones. There was no mistaking who he was, no matter how impossible it seemed.
"How…?" I asked myself, not sure where my words had gone.
"I don't know," Chiron said, suddenly appearing next to me. He was visibly shaken. "Go to the Big House, I'll be there in a few moments."
I nodded but my mind was racing. He shouldn't be here. He wasn't even supposed to be alive from what I understood.
I sat stiffly at the table, my hands folded in front of me. To stop myself from further over-thinking it, I poured myself a glass of lemonade from the pitcher on the table and gulped it down.
Well that occupied five seconds.
It was a few minutes before I heard the squeak of the wheels on Chiron's wheelchair coming inside, and he was followed by the blonde boy. Seymour, the leopard head mounted on the wall, snarled at the boy when he walked inside.
"Shush, Seymour," I snapped at him, grabbing a couple of Snausages from the bag on the table and threw them into his mouth with perfect aim.
"Good aim," the boy commented, completely unfazed by the fact that the leopard on the wall moved. I mean, that would be my first question.
"Kind of my thing," I said as the boy sat down at the table, directly across from Chiron but beside me.
"I'm Jason," he introduced, holding his hand out. I stared at his hand before looking at Chiron. I knew him. Well, I'd never met him in person before but I knew of him. Jason gave me a strange look before Chiron started to speak.
"Jason, do you mind telling us what exactly brought you here?"
Jason started his story, explaining that he woke up on a bus with no clue as to who he was other than his name. Then he explained what happened at the Grand Canyon – the wind spirits attacking and then Annabeth and Butch finding him, mentioning that they had to find someone with one shoe. I glanced down and saw that he was definitely missing a shoe.
I also noticed the strange markings on his arm: SPQR, an eagle and twelve straight lines. There had to be some sort of meaning behind them. The eagle obviously symbolized his godly parents – Zeus, in this case, but I didn't know what the rest meant and that bothered me as much as it would have bothered a child of Athena.
"Hmm," Chiron said. "And do you have any questions for me?"
"Why did you say I should be dead?" Jason asked.
Chiron was looking at Jason as if he expected him to spontaneously combust. "My boy, do you know what the color of your shirt and your tattoo mean? Do you remember anything?"
Jason shook his head and Chiron started questioning him on what he knew about the gods, which was more than most new demigods did, including that they move from country to country as the center of power moves, like from Greece to Rome.
Chiron started speaking in a different language and Jason replied with ease. It wasn't one of the four languages I spoke fluently – English, French, Ancient Greek and modern Greek – but I knew enough to know they were speaking Latin. I only knew the few phrases most demigods knew.
"You are not like any pupil I've ever taught before," Chiron said to Jason. "It breaks my heart every time one of my former students dies, and your presence here could mean disaster. I'd hoped that after Percy's success –"
"Percy Jackson, you mean. The missing camper."
"My boyfriend," I added. Jason gave me another odd look.
"After the Titan War, I had been hoping for some peace. We all deserve it, especially you, the demigods," Chiron said, then sighed. "It seems the last chapter is approaching once again."
Apparently he'd been getting some of the signs I had been too, not that I'd discussed any of them with him. I was still pissed off at him for not letting me go on the quest to find Percy.
All of a sudden, Jason was standing with his sword out and pointed at Seymour, going off about some lady in the mist saying he needed to free her before four days were up.
"Something's happened!" Annabeth said, panting as she and Rachel brought in the unconscious First Nations girl.
Jason rushed over to her, forgetting what had happened to him. "What's wrong with Piper?"
"She was in Hera's cabin," Annabeth gasped. "Vision. Bad."
Oh, so everyone was getting visions now except for me. Just great.
