Hey everybody! So, this is chapter 14! No real action in this chap, we're mostly just getting our bearings here, lots of talking (sorry. We'll kick butt next chap) and setting up some conflict. The Hunters are here, by the way! Yay! More people to be mean to! And SuzieQluvsU, I promise, I will not kill Thalia. Also, I'm brainstorming for the next PJO fic I'm going to write. It's going to be a story or a series of oneshots in sequential order about Luke, Thalia, and Annabeth before they were found by Grover and taken to Camp Half-Blood. I'll write shots or include situations about anything and everything, angsty, Thuke (Slight! I don't do fluff), fights, randomness, etc. I'm not going to start it untill I'm done with Christine's story because I don't work on more than two fics at a time (the other one I'm working on right now is The Killing Queen, based on the Hunger Games books. If you read the Hunger Games, check it out!), but if you have any L/T/A moment you want me to include in my upcoming fic, drop me a line and I'll see if I can fit it in. Anyways, keep reading, and review!
Ch. 14
Percy Jackson wants me dead. That's all I know.
The demigods had totally cut me off from the outside world, trapping me in the basement of the Big House and posting guards at the door twenty-four-seven. I heard nothing, knew nothing, saw nothing that happened outside that door.
So, all I knew was that I was on Jackson's dirt list, and I could probably have come up with that by myself without being told by Chiron one day as he gave me my daily meal. They're feeding me down here, thank the Titans, so I must be needed for something before they let Jackson rip me up.
I don't really know how long I've been here, or what time of the day it is, since the basement has no windows and is usually plunged into darkness, the only light coming from the crack beneath the door. I'm suspecting about a week, since I've been fed four times since I regained consciousness and am incredibly stiff. I've tried to wheedle it out of Chiron, who is the only one who will feed me, but he keeps a tight lip. Apparently just because he can stand being in the same room with me doesn't mean he's willing to talk.
So I have nothing better to do than stew for hours at a time, and pace the dark room. I've explored every corner, crack, and crevasse of my little prison, and there's no way to escape unless I feel like dismantling a concrete wall and digging myself a tunnel to China, or breaking down the door only to be jumped, knocked out, and tossed back in. (I tried it too, and it didn't work. I've got the scar to prove it.) I guess the demigods finally figured out that dog crates aren't effective enough, and only make me mad.
I wonder if Hawkeye, Mokkan, and Kodiak make it back to the Rebel camp. I'm assuming they did—nobody can outrun Mokkan, Kodiak can fly, and Hawkeye had been let off the hook after I had been captured.
Hawkeye. I really was going to kill him if I got out of this alive. I mean he, he freaking left me! For all he knew, I could have been killed the moment he disappeared around the corner. And he still ditched me. I've had several days to contemplate why he would leave me to die, but quickly decided not to think about it too much until—and if—I see him again.
After all, I probably would have done the same thing to him. But that's off-subject.
I was going to kill him anyway.
Another thing I was worried about was how the demigods would react to us killing Chase, other than running me down. Would they attack the Rebel camp? What did they want me for anyway? Hopefully they were smarter than to try to use me as a hostage, since Zane wouldn't bother to give them anything just to save my skin. All that would do was earn me a public execution in front of both armies, probably. So what else would they want to keep me around for? Revenge for killing Chase? If that's what they wanted, they could just give me to Jackson. To keep me cooped up in here for years to rot away into dust? Well, that was shallow minded and completely pointless.
My questions were answered on what I guessed to be my seventh day in the basement. Lost in my own thoughts as I curl up in the corner of the dark room in wolf form, I don't notice the commotion outside the door until it is thrown wide open, blinding me with bright light.
Chiron steps into the room, his bow and arrows at the ready. "Don't you try anything," he tells me firmly, which I translate as "don't look at me the wrong way, or I'll send an arrow through your skull."
Okay.
Chiron steps to one side, and several others enter the room. Jackson and Nico Di Angelo scowl down at me, followed by a tall girl several years younger than them who I recognize, but can't put a name to. She has black hair cut in layers and chopped off at her shoulders and bright blue eyes, with a silver band perched on her brow. She wears a silver coat and jeans, and a sheath of arrows slung over her back.
In front of her however, stands a little girl. No, not a girl. A god.
I gasp at the sight of Artemis and press myself back against the wall, trying to put as much distance between myself and the Goddess of the Hunt. I hate all the gods, but have a grudge against this goddess and her brother in particular, for what they did to my mother and me.
My reaction does not go unnoticed by Chiron and the demigods. Jackson's eyes narrow, and the girl with the headband crosses her arms and cocks an eyebrow.
"What's this all about, Chiron?" she asks the centaur. "I've never seen that beast before."
Artemis holds up a hand to quiet the girl. "Silence, Thalia," she scolds. "Chiron, please explain how you came by this animal." Her sharp eyes sear into my skin as I stare at her. I can tell by the look on her face that she suspects who I am.
"This creature has been around for quite a while," Chiron says levelly, watching me carefully. "I first saw her several years ago, when she was hunting one of our satyrs. Then she joined the Titan's army a little while before the war began, and we believe that she worked undercover for Kronos himself, but that's never been proven. Then she was seen again at the Battle of the Labyrinth, fighting with the Titan army, and on board the Princess Andromeda when Percy so helpfully destroyed it. Nico, also, had a run-in with her during the final battle for Olympus. Now just recently, with the uprising of what's left of Kronos's army, she's been around a lot. We captured her a couple of weeks ago, but she escaped, taking the Golden Fleece with her. That's why our borders are so weak."
My mind is reeling. How did these creeps find out so much about me? Have they really been keeping tabs on me all these years? Do they know that Artemis did this to me, or is it just coincidence that she's here?
There are no such thing as coincidences, part of me whispers. Everything happens for a reason.
Artemis frowns at me. "How did you capture her?"
"We trapped her in an alley, a little over a week ago," Chiron says. "She and some accomplices were delivering the body of Miss Chase back to us, apparently under the orders of the captain of their organization."
At the mention of Annabeth Chase, the atmosphere of the room changes. The Hunter girl, Thalia, makes a small noise in the back of her throat and looks at me with a new hatred. Jackson's eyes darken. Chiron and Di Angelo wipe their faces pointedly clean of all emotion. I, of course, can't help but grin at the acknowledgment of my spectacular crime.
Thalia glares at me over Di Angelo's shoulder, her eyes burning with grief and hatred. "I say we kill it," she spits out. "If it's a prisoner, and it's allies don't care if they get it back or not, it's of no use to us."
"Thank you," Jackson mutters under his breath, obviously glad to finally find someone other than Clarisse the Drakon Slaughterer that agrees with him.
"We've considered that," Chiron says, "but I thought that Artemis would like to have a say in her fate, since she created the beast."
"What?" Thalia asks the goddess. "If you created it, why did it turn against you?"
Artemis continues to watch me as I cower against the wall. "I only created the monster, Thalia, not the girl that it has consumed. The beast's mother, Marie Jacobson, became one of my Hunters, many years ago when she was seeking refuge from my brother, who had taken a shine to her. After a decade or two, she betrayed me by falling in love with a mortal man," the goddess explains calmly. "So I cursed her unborn child, which is the beast you see before you today. I later heard that the child had indeed been born, and that my brother had killed off Marie and her lover. But I have not heard of Marie or her child again until today."
Thalia scowls. "And you never guessed that the kid would turn against you?" she asks as respectfully as possible, although it's obvious that she's scornful.
Artemis bows her head. "I admit, I made a mistake by cursing the child. I had trusted Marie completely and was deeply hurt by her betrayal, and it caused me to behave drastically. To be truthful, I had almost forgotten about the curse."
Chiron nods understandingly. "You wouldn't happen to know the name of the beast, would you my lady?"
Artemis shakes her head. "Marie's family name was Jacobson, and I do not know the name of the father. I assume it's mother would have named it before she died, but I do not know what that name is. Or if the beast took it's mother or father's last name."
I suppress a sigh of relief. These people know my past and my abilities, but at least they don't know my name.
Jackson speaks for the first time. "So what are we going to do with it?" he asks Chiron.
The centaur looks to Artemis. "With lady Artemis here, I do believe that we might be able to wheedle some information out of her. The least we could do is try to get her to tell us where the Golden Fleece has been hidden, before we risk lives organizing a quest to locate it, or another possible way to replenish the borders."
The goddess nods again. "Not today though," she says. "We have some other business we must attend to before dealing with the beast." She gives Chiron a significant look, and he gets the message.
"Nico," the centaur says, "go find the Clarisse and the others. We're calling a council of war to discuss how to parry the Rebel's latest move."
The group recognizes this as a dismissal, and they file out of my prison, heading back up to the floor level of the Big House. Chiron is the last to leave. He gives me an odd look that I can't interpret before he slams and locks the door, leaving me in the darkness once more.
After several minutes of silence, I pry myself off the wall, realizing that I haven't moved once, not even a twitch, since Artemis entered the room. The fact that she's here in Camp Half-Blood, fighting my friends in the Rebel camp, infuriates me. What business does she have around here? She needs to go disappear into the woods in Canada somewhere and just stay there, and take her stupid stuck up Hunters with her.
I leap to my feet and start pacing furiously back and forth in the darkness. What did Chiron mean, "the Rebel's latest move"? Had Zane done something else since I had been captured, or were they talking about us murdering Chase? Zane had referred to the murder as "our move," so that could be what they were discussing. But from what I had gathered from the conversation, I had been here for over a week. If they were going to get the Rebels back for Chase, wouldn't they have done it already?
Unless they were planning something huge. Maybe that's why Artemis had showed up with her Hunters. The demigods' plan may have caught her attention, or they had asked for her assistance.
So what would they need the goddess's help for? For backup, more people to fight the Rebels, or more power? Were they going to attack our camp? If they did attack the Rebel camp again, they would probably be a whole lot more successful than they had been on their mission to retrieve Chase, because they would know what they were up against and would be out to kill, rather than retrieve.
Finally I just flop down on the cold floor with a sigh. Why did I care? I was stuck here in a basement, with nobody trying to get me out, just like the first time I had been captured. Except this time, I couldn't save myself. It was possible to bust down the door again, but I would just be knocked out once more and thrown back into the basement. It was like going in circles, like being stuck on one of those hamster wheels. No matter how many times I tried to move forward, I ended up right where I began, like I didn't move at all. And eventually Artemis would come back from her business, and they'd try to get information out of me, and then they'd give me to Jackson or that Hunter girl, who I remembered had been close to Chase.
I close my eyes, absorbing the comforting coolness of the concrete floor, and drift into sleep.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________
"Chrissy!"
Something sharp prods me in the shoulder, making me stir.
"Christine Savage, wake the Hades up! Ya sleep like a rock, dearie."
My eyes flicker open, but all I see is the darkness. "What. . .?"
Someone sighs exasperatedly. "Be'ind ya, Chrissy. Gud lordy, what did these 'ere demigods do to ya?"
I crank my head around, and meet a pair of big golden eyes with no pupils, seemingly floating in the air, not attached to anything. "Charlie!"
Charlie X the mutant runner holds a long black finger to his lips. "Shush up, Chrissy. There's guards outside the door still, ya know."
I sit up stiffly, looking happily at the mutant. Charlie appears almost invisible in the darkness, nothing but a pair of eerily floating golden eyes and the occasional flash of pristine white teeth as he grins at me. "How did you get in here?" I whisper.
He sits back on his haunches and wraps his tail around is back paws, scratching his nose with a long finger. "Tricks o' the trade, ya know, Chrissy," he says quietly, winking slyly at me. "My only prob'lm was that there magikal border, but seein' how you got rid o' that fer me last time you was 'ere, I got in nice 'n' easy. Takes more than concrete to keep me out of somethin'."
I can't help but grin at him. "So what's going on at camp?" I ask eagerly.
Charlie shakes his head. "Lot's o' stuff, Chrissy. Yer 'Awkeye made it back to camp with Mokkan and the creepy kid with them wings. Zane 'ad a fit when they told 'im you was captured again; never seen 'im so off in me life. He's getting attached to ya, Chrissy. Jus' bout killed 'im to wait so long to send me, but ya know, didn't want to get caught and all. We didn't even know where they was keepin' ya for a long time. When we couldn't locate ya out in the open, we started wonderin' if they'd gone on and killed ya and we'd jus' missed it."
"Okay, but what are you planning? Have the demigods attacked you yet?"
Charlie cocks his head to one side, flicking his ears. "Nah, not yet, anyways. Zane thinks they may be plannin' somethin' like that, though. 'Ave you 'eard anything down 'ere?"
I sigh. "No. I didn't have anybody around here except the centaur until today. Artemis and her Hunters are in town now, did you know that?"
"No, I didn't," Charlie frowns. "When did they get 'ere?"
"I don't know. I just saw Artemis for the first time a little while ago."
"Zane won't like this," Charlie mutters. "That means they prob'ly are plannin' an attack o' some sorts."
"Probably. Anything else new?"
Charlie gives me a wry grin. "We're tryin' to find a way to get you outta 'ere, Chrissy. We 'ad to leave ya to yerself the first time ya got caught, but we can't do that this time. Apparently we's learnin' some loyalty these days. . . kinda fright'nin, eh?"
I nod agreement. "So how are you going to bust me out?"
Charlie frowns. "Haven't gotten that far yet, Chrissy. We jus' figured out ya was in the basement last night. We're getting' there though. Don't--"
He freezes. "'Eads up," he hisses at me. "I'll be back sometime, Chrissy. 'Ang in there." With that, he closes his eyes, disappearing completely, blending into the darkness. After several seconds without seeing him moving, I hesitantly poke a paw out where he had been. But there's nothing there. Charlie had disappeared.
Just then the door bursts open, and Chiron and a boy demigod appear in the doorway. The boy narrows his eyes. "She was talking to someone Chiron, I swear I heard her," he insists.
Before Chiron can reply, I snarl at them. "What, can't I talk to myself?" I ask. "It's not my fault I've been cooped up in here for a week."
Chiron frowns, not buying it, but decides there's no use arguing. He grabs the arm of the demigod without a word and drags him back out the door, locking it behind him.
I stay still for several seconds to make sure he won't suddenly burst back in, but he doesn't, so I resume pacing. I was heartened by Charlies visit. The Rebel camp hadn't forgotten about me yet. Artemis threw a wrench in the plan of course, whatever the plan was. I really didn't know what Zane and the others were going to do to get back at Camp Half-Blood. Our original intentions had been to weaken and possibly destroy the godling camp, but what were we up to now? Wipe out the demigods? Kill Jackson? I didn't know.
But whatever it was, it wouldn't be pretty. Fun maybe, but not pretty.
