Author's Note: Next chapter is here, and I hope you enjoy it. We're getting closer and closer to the serious business, and lets just say, I've got plans for this story. MUAHAHAHAHAHAH *COUGH* Muahaha

Disclaimer: I don't own PJO, or evil laughs.

Chapter 5

The Wrath of Bacon

The group had arrived at the outskirts of a small ski town in the mountains. The sign said 'WELCOME TO CLOUDCROFT, NEW MEXICO.' It seemed night had passed, and the morning had arrived, with the tall pine trees casting taller shadows. All the cabin roofs were heaped with snow, and mounds of it piled up on the street sides.

Percy still had the lion pelt, and he felt it would've made him warmer, but he didn't know how you even put on something that resembles a rug more than a coat.

Just as they went off to head towards the town, Percy remembered the message Fred the god had given him.

He ran to catch up. "Hey guys! Wait a sec!"

The all turned around. Ye-Olde-Hunter-Girl sighed, "What is it now?"

"Well on the train ride over, I kinda… had a talk with a god. He gave me some advice about the quest."

"Wait, who was it, which god?"

"Don't know, they said their name was Fred-"

"Apollo! Argh, he can never stay out of others business."

Percy blinked. Okay, apparently he has history with the Hunters.

"Anyway, he said you were also looking for this powerful monster something? Well, he said that we shouldn't bother. Some guys called the Titans already have it or something like that."

"WHAT! Are thou joking? It cannot be!"

Percy recoiled at the sudden outburst. "Uh, no. That's what Fre- Apollo told me."

Ye-Olde-Hunter-Girl sighed. "Well, though it is bad news, it does make the rest of journey less complicated, though the destination will be as deadly as ever."

"Wait, Destination? You know where we're-"

"Come, let's go." She completely ignored him.

Percy huffed, but followed anyway.

They stopped in the middle of town, and you could pretty much see everything the town had to offer from that point: a school, a couple of tourist shops and cafés, some ski cabins and a grocery store.

"Great," the Punk-Girl said, "No bus station. No taxis. No car rental. No way out."

"There's a coffee shop!" Grover exclaimed

"Yes," Ye-Olde-Hunter-Girl said. "Coffee is good."

"And pastries… and wax paper."

Percy was slowly getting used to how weird this Grover guy was, but… eating wax paper? That's a whole new level.

Punk-Girl sighed, "Fine. You two get us some food, and the rest of us will check the grocery store. Maybe they can give us directions. We'll meet in front of the store in fifteen minutes."

In the store the clerk told them there was no easy way in or out of the town unless you had your own car.

"You could call a taxi from Alamogordo," he said doubtfully. "That's down at the bottom of the mountains, but it would take at least an hour to get here. Cost several hundred dollars too."

They left the store dejected, staying by its porch waiting for the others.

"Wonderful," the Punk-Girl grumped. "I'm going to check at the other shops. See if they have any suggestions."

Percy didn't think they'd say anything different from the clerk they'd just talked to, but he didn't object.

As she left down the street, Percy realised this was the first time he'd been alone with the younger Hunter-Girl. He also realised that he only knew Grover's name so far. No one else's.

"Look, I don't really know much of you guys. I mean, I know Grover, a little." He held out his hand. "I'm Perseus… Percy for short."

She seemed a little nervous, but she shook his hand anyway. "I'm, Bianca… Di Angelo. Nice to meet you, I guess."

"So apparently your part of this, Hunter group or something? Who are they exactly?"

"Well, we travel with Lady Artemis. Hunting monsters, and stuff like that. We're immortal too."

Percy's eyes bulged. "I-Immortal? Seriously? You can't die? How old are you?"

She seemed a little unsure answering. "Yeah, but we can die. We don't get sick or age, but weapons can kill us. And I only joined recently."

"Wow. That's pretty cool. So can anyone-" Percy cut himself short when he saw Grover and Ye-Olde-Hunter-Girl approaching. Percy accepted the hot chocolate and blueberry muffin, but it made him think of when he was talking to Jack, back at the café he worked at. It made Percy homesick.

Can a homeless person be homesick? I suppose its New York that I'm missing.

"We should do the tracking spell," Ye-Olde-Hunter-Girl said. "Grover, do you have any acorns left?"

I'm pretty sure that just made no sense.

"Umm, I think so. I just need to-"

He froze.

And half a second later, a warm breeze rustled past. It was strange, but it made Percy think of Springtime, and smelled of wildflowers and felt like sunshine. He could've sworn he heard a voice in the breeze, but it was too indistinct to make out what it was saying.

As suddenly as the breeze, the pictures of birds on Grover's coffee cup peeled off it and flew into the air. That made Percy spit up the mouthful of hot chocolate he'd been in the middle of.

Grover collapsed in the snow and everyone gathered around him, trying to wake him up. Punk-Girl jumped into the circle out of nowhere.

"Hey! What's wrong with Grover?"

"Don't know. He just collapsed. Though there was this… breeze." Percy replied.

"Details later. Get him up! We have to leave, now." He only just noticed she was carrying her spear. She'd seen something, and Percy wasn't keen on finding out what.

They'd almost made it to the edge of town. Then the skeletons appeared.

Percy wasn't expecting that. A weapon-proof lion? Fair enough, but these guys were just weird. Their eye sockets glowed yellow, and they were wearing New Mexico State police uniforms, making them look like a new mythological type of SWAT team or something.

Percy would've preferred an actual police force over these guys.

Turns out there wasn't much of a difference, considering that was the moment they drew their handguns and took aim.

The Punk-Girl immediately tapped her bracelet, which somehow turned into the shield she'd been using earlier and Ye Olde Hunter-Girl and Bianca had drawn their bows.

Though Grover kept on leaning against Bianca, making it difficult for her to keep a steady aim.

"Back up," Punk-Girl said.

The group started to, but when Percy turned around, there were another two skeleton-police duo behind them.

They were surrounded.

One the skeleton-police ahead of them raised a cell phone, and spoke.

Except the noise they made was more like a dry clicking than actual words. But, more importantly, Percy realised they were calling for backup. There would be even more of them.

Grover suddenly groaned, "It's near."

Percy looked at the skeleton-police surrounding them.

Yep. They are exceptionally near.

Punk-Girl spoke. "We'll have to go one-on-one. Maybe they'll ignore Grover that way."

"I don't have a weapon." Percy reminded them.

Ye-Olde-Hunter-Girl drew one of her hunting knives and threw it to Percy, the same one that he'd used to impale the Nemean Lion's brain.

The warm wind swept through the canyon again. Percy felt something strange about the breeze. Something… godly.

Percy wrapped the lion pelt around him like an invulnerable poncho, and gripped the silver dagger in one hand.

They all charged.

Apparently the skeleton police didn't think much of Percy, considering none of them even glanced his way.

As the target he was rushing raised a gun at one of the others, Percy raised the knife and cut its arm off. Then, carrying the momentum from his first swing full circle he cut off its skull.

It clattered to the ground, and its entire bone structure followed immediately after. Percy stared stupidly, at the pile of bones.

Well, that was surprisingly easy.

Then, the bones began to move and shift on the ground. Within seconds there were two skeletal feet standing there in the snow.

Ah, damn it.

Then, he felt a dull push from behind, and he forced onto one knee. He glanced back and saw the smoking barrel of a gun pointed his way. Apparently his lion fur poncho was bullet-proof too.

The Punk-Girl was taking on a skeleton one-on-one, while the Hunter duo fired arrows at the other two. Grover was facing the trees, arms out like they were going rush and hug him.

Percy looked back just in time to see skeleton he'd decapitated fix its jaw bone into place, making it fully reformed again.

There was a sound like a construction site coming from trees, the ground was shaking and the trees swayed.

Probably more of the skeleton police.

Out of the corner of his eye, Percy saw one lunge at Bianca. She drew her knife and stabbed it in the chest as it rushed. After a brief moment, the skeleton burst into flames, leaving nothing but a pile of ash.

"How did you do that!?" Ye Olde Hunter-Girl yelled.

"I-I don't know." Bianca said nervously.

Percy would've said she should try again, but the skeletons were now wary of her, keeping the group away at batons length.

Just as they seemed done for, Grover yelled, "A gift!" Then, a giant pig crash out from the trees.

A giant pig.

Are kidding me right now!?

It was ten meters tall, with tusks the size of row boats and technically a boar, but the details seemed irrelevant in the shadow of this giant, angry piece of bacon.

It let loose a squeal that matched the wild look in its eyes, and swept its tusks into the skeletons with enough force to shatter them on impact, bone fragments and assorted pieces of the skeletons practically exploding in all directions.

Percy was cautiously optimistic that even they wouldn't survive that.

Then, because he had the audacity to be hopeful for once, the giant boar turned its attention to the demigods and one mortal standing before it.

Punk-Girl raised her spear, but Grover yelled, "Don't kill it!"

Not entirely sure if we can kill it.

"It's gift," he yelled, "a blessing from the wild."

It swept its tusks at the group and everyone dived to the ground.

"How is this, a blessing!? It's trying to kill us!" Punk-Girl yelled.

"Of course! It's wild!"

The boar charged at Bianca but she dived out of the way, and it ploughed straight through the WELCOME TO CLOUDCROFT sign.

"Keep moving!" Ye Olde Hunter-Girl yelled.

The Hunter duo ran in opposite directions while Grover was playing his reed pipes, constantly almost getting eviscerated. But, as luck would have it, the boar turned towards Percy and the Punk-Girl.

She raised her shield, but for some reason that seemed to aggravate it even more.

Everything keeps reacting to it. What is on the shields face?

The boar charged.

The two ran uphill from the beast, running between the trees while it battered them down.

You'd think a 'blessing from the wild' would actually care more about nature.

While on the run from the boar, Percy saw an old stretch of train tracks. He dragged the Punk-Girl along with him. "This way!"

Ahead, there was tunnel and on the other side was a small bridge spanning a gorge.

Percy suddenly had an incredibly stupid, suicidal idea.

"Come on, I've got a plan."

The Punk-Girl seemed to slow down, as if she was catching onto the plan. She looked back at the mega-sized boar stampeding their way, and reluctantly picked up the pace.

They came out of the other side of the tunnel, and at the end of bridge. There was a snow filled gorge about twenty or so meters below them, the mountains in every direction. Percy would've thought it was a beautiful site, were it not for the monster-pig on their tail.

The Punk-Girl didn't seem to share Percy's thoughts on the view, as she screamed "NO!" and turned white as the mountains.

The boar was still charging.

Percy looked her straight in the eyes. "Look, either we definitely die and become pig chow, or we jump and possibly survive. Your choice."

She steadied her breathing, and seemed resigned to one decision.

They jumped.

Together they slid down the mountain side on her shield like a snowboard, somehow managing to avoid the larger rocks and keep to where the snow was thick.

Percy looked back just in time to see the mad boar falling off the bridge, blocking out the sun for just a moment, before it thumped into a snow drift behind them with a massive squeal. Snow rose into the air like a cloud of mist on impact.

Percy and the Punk-Girl skidded to a stop not far from the beast. She had pine needles stuck in her hair, and Percy felt a stinging on his arm.

Percy pulled back the sleeve on his left arm, and immediately saw fresh blood trickling from the bandage covering the wound he'd received from the Nemean Lion.

Damn. Must have aggravated the wound.

He left the bandage on for now, but he'd have to get Grover to patch him up again.

But for now, there was something else on his mind. He turned to the Punk-Girl.

"You're afraid of heights?"

She glared at him. "What? You're being ridiculous-"

"Hey, don't worry. We're all afraid of something. It's fine."

She started picking the pine needles out of her hair. "If you tell anyone…"

"Don't worry. My lips are sealed."

Just then, Grover's voice rang out from above, "Hellooo?"

"Down here!" Percy called back.

A few minutes later, the rest of the group were standing down in the gorge with them, all relatively unharmed.

The boar was buried in the snow up to its back, and they could just here its furious, muffled squeals.

"It's a blessing from the wild." Grover said.

"Hold up," Punk-Girl said. "How come you're all so sure this is a good thing? Good things don't try to kill you."

"Good things don't need anger management." Percy added.

"It's our ride west," Grover replied. "and this is the Erymanthian Boar. Do you know how fast this thing can go?"

"Wait, if this is a blessing, who's it from?" Percy asked.

Ye Olde Hunter Girl replied, "I'm not surprised you didn't feel it. In the wind, there was the presence of Pan."

Percy struggled to remember. He'd never knew much about Greek mythology to begin with (or was it Greek history now?), but he was sure Pan was some kind of nature god. He had something to do with goats.

He gave up thinking about for now.

So, before the boar could break out of the snow drift, everyone jumped on its back, Grover up the front. He tossed an apple in front of the boar and started playing his reed pipes, and the apple floated there, right in front of its nose.

The boar pretty much went spastic at that and broke out of the snow twice as fast as it would have.

Then it charged forward, and Percy readied himself for a long ride.

I don't usually place ANs at the end of the chapter, but I preferred to have this part here. I didn't change as much as I could have in this chapter because I didn't really need to. Anyway, leave a review, tell what you think.

Oh, and quick question. What exactly is it that's kept you interested up to this point? For that matter, why did you click on the story in the first place? Let me know.

Peace.