Chapter 5: Life of a Thief

Phoebe's POV

Ever since that first time Connor came to visit, he's come to see me everyday (about three days because I heal quickly). He's come and told me about everything I've been missing (which I don't get how he knows because he's been in here all day everyday until curfew), and bringing me things like a get well card, a book I've been wanting to read, and today he brought me a party hat. He said we should celebrate me getting out of the infirmary. The Huntresses come by, but they leave within a few minutes everyday, and they look at Connor funny. I got changed into my Huntress clothes and Connor suddenly came in.

"Sorry I'm late, I slept in!" Connor seemed nervous.

"It's okay, I needed time to change into my regular clothes." I giggled.

"Right. I guess so." He blushed.

"Chiron still thinks I should rest up after my release, so what do you want to do today?" I asked.

"Maybe I can teach you something about being a thief." He grinned.

"No! I'm not stealing things from people." I exclaimed.

"You can use thief skills for things other than stealing." He chuckled.

"Like what?" I narrowed my eyes.

"Like sneaking up on people in battle, you have to be able to sneak up on people as a thief, so why not your enemy?" He explained.

"Teach me then." I dared.

"Fine, but we'll have to practice by stealing things from people. We can give them back afterwards." He warned.

"Fine." I agreed.

So we did a bunch of things like pick-pocketing Will Solace. I think Connor just wanted revenge.

"Just carefully slide your fingers into his back pocket, get a grip on the wallet, and pull it out, then run silently. The key is silence." Connor instructed.

So I walked up behind Will silently, slid my fingers into his back pocket, gripped the wallet, pulled it out at just the right speed, and ran silently back to Connor.

"Good job, you'll make a thief yet." He grinned.

"He was wearing a loose pair of jeans, so I had the advantage." I sighed.

"So? Either way it's a good start. This is only the first course of the first day of training." He said.

Then we went to the Camp's kitchen (it's used when the don't use the plates that magically make the food you crave appear). Chiron was talking to Dionysus in the connected pavilion and we snuck in easily. I think Dionysus saw us, but he didn't say anything. We walked to the fridge and opened it. There was a ton of nectar and ambrosia in there.

"If we can get away with stealing this, we'll be amazingly successful thieves." Connor seemed excited.

He pulled off the backpack and started shoving in nectar, while I shoved ambrosia into mine. We cleared out the whole fridge. Then we walked over to the only window, which was big enough for me to fit through (I'm not huge, but I'm bigger than the average person) and slid through it. We heard Chiron and Dionysus' voices coming, so we ran away from the kitchen window. About a minute later, we heard Chiron yell "Where's the nectar and ambrosia?!" If Dionysus saw us, he didn't tell Chiron. Then we went to the Camp store and stole a couple of secret stashes of soda (namely Coke) and ran before the store attendees noticed. Then we took all the toilet paper out of the public bathrooms and left the bathrooms. And finally, we stole the paddles for the canoes. After all that, we ran to the woods and shoved everything down a hole that led to a cave that nobody but Connor and now me knew about. Then we laughed our asses off.

"I can't wait to see the looks on people's faces when they realize this stuff is gone!" Connor laughed.

"But we are bringing them back, right?" I questioned.

"Of course." Connor confirmed.

Then everything got quiet. He was staring at me sadly, and everything was suddenly more awkward.

"Can I ask you a question?" Connor asked.

"Sure." I said.

"Why are you so nice to me? And why am I your friend when you supposedly hate men almost as much as Zoë? If anything, I'm worse than most guys what with being a thief and all, not to mention my strange sense of humor..." He questioned me.

"You're better than most men. Men usually won't apologize in general, let alone for their brothers. Your sense of humor isn't strange, and you don't judge me based on my weight. I've never actually heard you mention my weight except for when you said I wasn't a beefcake." I explained somewhat.

"But is there another reason?" He pushed.

"Yes." I whispered.

"What is it?" Connor was getting anxious.

"If I admit it, I can't be a Huntress anymore." I gave a large hint.

At first, Connor seemed shocked. Then he grinned.

"What if I promised not to tell anyone, so then you can still technically be a Huntress?" He teased.

I blushed. He took that as an answer and walked closer. Then he leaned his head extremely close to mine, and kissed me. I let him. Then I kissed him back. And even though it was quick in my terms, we ended up using tongue. When he finally pulled away, I was out of breath, and so was he.

"You won't kill me, right?" He tried for a joke.

"No." I answered simply.

"Do you want to go see a movie with me tomorrow?" He asked.

"Yes." That was the only thing I could interpret out of my scattered brain.

He grinned, grabbed my hand, and walked back to Camp with me.

Katie's POV

I saw Connor kiss Phoebe and her agree to to go on a date with him, but I almost didn't believe it. I just hope they don't get caught, because the Hunters would try to kill him, Phoebe wouldn't be a Huntress anymore, and she's keeping him from stealing and pranking (except for today). And if Travis figures it out, God only knows what will happen. I walked back to Camp and looked for Travis. I saw an angry mob. There he is.

"What's going on?" I asked Travis as I pushed Clarisse out of the way.

"That evil bastard stole toilet paper from the public restrooms, our reserve nectar and ambrosia, and some Apollo jerk's wallet." Clarisse growled.

"Hey!" Will protested the nickname.

"Where's our stuff Travis?" Silena asked.

She didn't look very serious though. Does she know what really happened?

"I don't know!" Travis exclaimed.

"Punk..." Michael Yew started.

"Your too shrimpy to call anyone punk..." Chris coughed.

Clarisse twitched a smile and so did Chris.

"Did you steal their stuff?" Chris asked.

"No! And I'm not the only master thief in this Camp. Chris and Connor are pros!" Travis defended himself.

"I've been with Clarisse visiting her mom today, and Connor's been visiting Phoebe over the last three or four days." Chris gave alibis.

"She was released from the infirmary today." Will brought up.

"Either way, Phoebe's not a thief." Chloe (the Huntress) reminded us.

I stifled a giggle.

"What's so funny?" Fiona (the Huntress) narrowed her eyes.

"Nothing." I bit my lip.

"Katie..." Clarisse threatened.

"Fine. I saw Phoebe and Connor hide all the stuff you just mentioned, because I passed them as they did." I relented.

"What?!" All the Huntresses screamed.

"Are you saying I'm being blamed for something my brother and his crush did?" Travis was agitated.

"Shut up!" I elbowed him.

Chris face-palmed, and the Huntresses gasped.

"He's a professional liar, and it's not like they're dating anyway." I lied.

The mob immediately left to find Connor and Phoebe. I eventually found them, kissing again by the lake. I ran up to them and they pulled apart quickly.

"I already know you guys like each other, I just came to warn you that people are looking for you so they can get their stuff back. At first, they thought it was Travis, but then they figured out it was you." I warned.

"Thanks." They said and ran for the woods.

About an hour later, everything was back in place and they were in their respective cabins. Today's been interesting.