Sorry for not updating earlier. I did forget to mention that the characters may seem a little OOC but for everyone except Reyna, I'll try my best to keep them in character. You'll find out why Reyna was threatening and challenging Annabeth in the next/last chapter of this story.
2. Roman-like capture the flag
Percy
Percy sat in his praetor house, thinking about the events that happened earlier today. That girl…he'd seen that face before, but he can't quite remember who it belonged to. Those Greeks…all looked at him with respect…but that was understandable, he was praetor after all, but they were gone when he attacked that girl…
"C'mon Perce, it's time for dinner." said Reyna.
He nodded slowly as Reyna sat down next to him and pecked him on the cheeks. "What's wrong?" she asked.
"Those Greeks…I don't know, it's just…never mind, don't worry about it." he said. And with that, he got up and walked out the door.
Percy and Reyna ate at the praetor's table while the Greeks ate on a large table by themselves, the Romans didn't seem to talk much but the Greeks were laughing and talking like nothing's wrong. It was a mixture between English and ancient Greek. But if he concentrated, Percy would find himself understanding what they were talking about in ancient Greek.
"And-and-and…Leo was all like: 'Oh Romans, got sharp weapons? Well flame on!' and he like, totally shocked the Romans and I swear, they even peed their pants!" exclaimed a boy with light brown hair with a mischievous grin along with a person sitting next to him who looked exactly like him.
The Greeks laughed and a boy who looked seriously ADHD that also looked like a Latino-elf blushed. Percy raised an eyebrow at this but said nothing and continued to eat.
"Romans, Greeks, may I please have your attention." said Lupa allowed in everyone's brain as the dining hall fell silent.
"I understand that usually tonight, we have war games." she began.
The Romans cheered while the Greeks looked confused.
"But since the Greeks are here, and they don't know what it is, we will instead, have it tomorrow."
The Romans awed at this but didn't complain.
"The game will be determined tomorrow at breakfast, and it will be Greeks vs. Romans."
The Romans yet again cheered at this as the chatter began once again. Percy noticed an absence in the Greeks…the girl and Jason Grace, the former praetor who had turned to the Greek side.
After dinner, as the Greeks headed back towards their ship, Percy stopped a buff-looking girl with a red bandana wrapped around her light-brown hair.
"Hey, excuse me, where's the girl from earlier today and Jason?" he asked.
The girl glared at him, before her eyes widened.
"You remember?" she asked.
Percy frowned at her, in which she simply sighed and her glare returned.
"She's in the infirmary, when you cut her, you opened an old battle wound and she needs rest." said the girl before turning away.
"Wait, what's your name or the girl's?" asked Percy.
"The 'girl's name is Annabeth, and my name is Clarisse, you should know Jason." she said with a huff before turning her head and jogging off.
The Next day
Annabeth
"Alright, so Chiron and I have discussed, that today's war games will be a game that was inspired by the Greeks." stated Lupa.
All the Greeks including Jason cheered.
"The game will be Capture the flag and it is simple: you must capture the enemy's flag, but it will also be like our war games; there will be a fortress on each side of the border which will be the creek. The whole Field of Mars will be a forest and it will commence at 4:00pm today. The fortress will be incomplete, and the engineers and architects are allowed to work on their forts at 3:00pm, the field will be protected by a shield, and no camper or legionnaire are allowed in the field except for the engineers and architects who will be selected amongst your sides." after Chiron finished explaining the rules of Capture the Flag, the Greeks began to talk amongst themselves quietly.
"Okay, who's going to be the architects and engineers? We are only allowed 10 people working on it." began Annabeth.
She noticed that there were some Roman campers standing relatively close to their table and was trying to eavesdrop, Annabeth made sure Percy was not near, before switching to ancient Greek.
"I think, Annabeth, you should definitely go because you're our camp's best architect, as well as Malcom." stated Piper.
The Romans frowned and left, just like Annabeth had planned.
She nodded at Piper's statement.
"Alright, Leo, Nyssa and Jake, you're coming too because you're the best at building and fixing things, Travis, Conner, I need you two with us to set up traps. Lou, I need you to put in magic wards as well as detecting out dangers and stuff…Okay, so that leaves us with…2 more people left…Jason, why don't you come with us since you can fly so you can fix the things on the roof and stuff?"
Jason nodded his head.
"Okay…We need one more…Katie, why don't you come? You can grow weeds and plants to stop the attackers." suggested Annabeth, Katie also nodded in response. "Alright, for the rest of you, you need to train, train, train. You've seen how to Romans fought yesterday and we know that they always fight offense, and not so much defence. Train on the Argo II so they don't see how you fight, meet Thalia, Jason and I in the meeting room on the Argo II at 2:00pm and we will draw up battle plans, clear?"commanded Annabeth.
Nobody disagreed as the rest except for Thalia, Jason and Annabeth went their separate ways to check out Camp Jupiter. Annabeth let out a loud sigh as she turned, only to be face-to-face with a pair of sea-green eyes that she's been dreaded to see.
"Hey, um… you're Annabeth right? That girl Clarisse told me. Uh… I'm sorry about yesterday, I just got defensive that's all, how's your arm?" asked Percy.
Annabeth glared at him, her eyes were going misty and she took a step back from him. She clenched onto her bandaged left arm as Thalia and Jason stepped in front of her protectively. Percy narrowed his eyes slight at Jason, feeling a pang of what…jealousy? No, he had a girlfriend. Annabeth didn't answer but only looked at him with sad eyes.
"No she is not fine, and because of you Romans, she will be slightly disadvantaged today during Capture the Flag, but not to worry, we'll pone your asses anyways." said Thalia with a lot of venom in her voice before she led Annabeth away.
Jason stayed behind for a little bit and faced a sorry-looking Percy.
"Look here praetor," began Jason, he said praetor as if it was a disease, "you may think you were being 'defensive' but yesterday, everyone could see that she didn't want to fight you, but you attacked anyways just because your girlfriend challenged her to a duel and Annabeth won, now I suggest you back off and just don't talk to her for a while, because you've done enough damage already."
And with that, Jason stalked off towards the direction Thalia and Annabeth went in, leaving Percy feeling as bad as ever.
1:00pm
Percy[1p]
Who was she? I'm trying very hard to remember an Annabeth Chase in my memory but I just can't. I knew Jason because I heard that He-Juno had taken him away to the Greek camp and wiped his memories. But what about them? Did Juno take the leader from the Greek camp? Annabeth is the leader, and she's never been to this camp before, so I'm assuming that Juno didn't do anything to the Greeks. And why did I feel jealous when I saw Jason and Annabeth together? I mean sure, Annabeth is breath-takingly beautiful (don't tell Reyna I said that), I bet she's just a daughter of Aph-I mean Venus, but why would I feel jealous? I sighed as I stood up and went to my bedside table. I pulled open the drawer and studied the pictures on the inside; they were pictures of Jason and Reyna, but I didn't feel jealous even if it's my girlfriend and the former praetor. I wondered why…did I really like Reyna? We've only been together for about 3 days really…I was happy and liked Reyna, but I didn't love her. I looked at one of the photos; it was Jason with his arm around Reyna's shoulders and was standing on Mt. Tam. They looked worn out and tired, but Reyna had the smile on her face that was bigger than any of the ones I'd seen. I sat down on my bed and concentrated, thinking of my past. I remember stumbling into Camp Jupiter, worn out and tired...running from…something. I don't quite remember, it seemed like ages ago when in reality, it was only a few months ago. I was immediately recognised as the son of Neptune and got accepted into the fifth cohort, until we discovered Ga-Terra's waking and went on a quest with Frank and Hazel to save death. After we came back, we fought the army of Polybotes, the giant opposing my father and afterwards, I was made praetor and got together with Reyna.
"Hey Percy, want to spar?" asked Reyna from the doorway.
I slowly nodded and got up, taking my unbalanced Imperial Gold sword with me.
2:30pm
Percy[1p]
I walked towards the Argo II. I had to admit, it was an impressive ship that was built by only less than 20 Greek campers. I was only a few metres from the ladder that led to the deck of the ship, should I do this? The Roman praetor going on a Greek warship? Then again, they came to join us in defeating Terra, mother Earth. But I had to see her, Annabeth. I needed to ask her some questions; did she know me before I got to this camp? I got to the deck of the ship and received some glares and weird looks from the Greeks.
"Um… hi, do you know which room Annabeth Chase is in?" I asked a girl with choppy-brown hair in a braid who was talking to that Leo guy from dinner last night, she seemed less intimidating then the rest.
"Erm… sure, she should be just down the hall to your left, the door next to the sea-green one." she said.
I nodded ad she returned to her conversation. I walked down the corridor and admired the mixture of wood and bronze floor and walls, I finally reached the door that was painted sea-green and found a door next to it with a grey owl painted on it. But before I knocked on the grey door, I studied the door next to it. On it, were black letters in ancient Greek, I squinted at them and found myself understanding it; Perseus. I frowned at this, what was my name doing on the door? Then again, it may be just another Greek camper named Perseus; it was a Greek name after all. I opened the door and looked inside, there was a horn and a shield stuck on the wall along with many pictures. I walked closer to the pictures and saw that it was Annabeth…and me. I looked at the first one to my right, it was of a younger version of Annabeth, with a person who looked exactly like me except younger, with my arm around her shoulders. We were both wearing orange shirts just like the ones the Greeks wore. I looked at the other pictures and the last one shocked me. It was with Annabeth and I again…the person looked exactly like me anyway, in an orange shirt and she did too, but we were kissing. What? This has to be a mistake… I've never met Annabeth before in my life until yesterday, this was getting creepy. But before I could study the horn and the shield, the door creaked open and I heard footsteps entering the room. I spun around and was face-to-face with a pair of beautiful grey eyes.
"What are you doing here?" asked Annabeth as she stared at me, I noticed that her left arm was still bandaged and she hid it behind her back.
"Um…why is my name painted on the door?" I asked. "And is that…who is that?"
Her eyes averted towards the photos on the wall and she sighed heavily.
"That was my boyfriend." she said.
I raised my eyebrows at her as she sat down on the bed with blue covers.
"Your boyfriend looks a lot like me." I commented as I sat down next to her.
"Yeah he does, he looks a lot like you, but he's gone." she said sadly, a tear escaped her eye.
"Gone?" I asked.
"Yeah, he's gone, lost, I don't know where he is." she said, her eyes had a faraway look in her eyes.
"I'm sorry." I said, patting her back.
"Don't be, it's not your fault, its Hera's fault." she said.
"How does Juno have anything to do with that?" I asked, confused.
"It's Hera. Anyway, she took him away, and because she hates me, I don't think she'll give him back anytime soon." said Annabeth before she got up.
"Are you looking for someone or…?" she began, looking me in the eye.
"Yeah actually, um… why exactly did you come?" I inquired.
"Oh we came here looking for someone as well as uniting the two camps to fight Gaia, but he's not here and the two camps aren't exactly hitting it off yet, but we'll get there." she said with a sigh, before standing up and headed towards the door.
"Look, I've got to go work on my fort now, I'd suggest you leave before Clarisse and her siblings skewer you into a kebab for being on the ship this early." stated Annabeth before heading out the door.
I took one last look at Annabeth's boyfriend's room, before going back on deck and climbing down the ladder.
3:00pm
Annabeth
"Leo, you got the fire bombs?" asked the daughter of Athena as the 10 half-bloods dumped the rest of their equipment onto the centre of the un-finished fort.
"Yep." replied Leo, popping the 'p'.
Annabeth nodded and turned to Lou.
"Alright, first of all, Lou, are there any water pipes or anything that connects to the broken water cannons in front? Because Percy, being a Seaweed Brain will probably use it to flood the place."
Lou closed her eyes and muttered something under her breath, seconds later, she opened her eyes and looked around the room.
"There are two water pipes on each wall; they connect to the water-cannons in the front as well as a large water tank up the back." she said.
"Alright, Leo, can you crack open the tank and Travis or Conner, either one of you, I need you to pour in your slime mix to make the water slime instead, so Percy can't control it."
Travis and Conner grinned before taking off towards the back of the fort with Leo right behind them.
"Alright, Nyssa, can you and Jake install a high platform with no ladders on the sides, Jason, when we get the flag, I need you to fly up there and put the flag there." said Annabeth.
Just then, Conner, Travis and Leo came rushing back.
"Oh good, you're back, I got Nyssa and Jake to install a high platform so the Romans will have a hard time to grab the flag, but the rules say that it mustn't be impossible to get it, so it is allowed to be difficult. I want you to install chains hanging from the ceiling, so they'll have to swing on the chains like Tarzan to reach the platform and swing back down with the flag. But also, make triggers so when you pull on a chain, it triggers a switch that activates nets or buckets of chocolate pudding dumped on them."
Leo grinned like a madman at this as he began to work.
"Travis, Conner, do you guys still have the invisible trip wires from Camp?" questioned Annabeth to the twins.
They nodded,
"Alright, so I need you to put them at the entrances, Lou, I want you to put in a ward on the platform around the flag area that will raise an alarm that would be heard from all of the Field of Mars, Katie, I need you to grow weeds and thorns on the roof in case anyone lands their Pegasus or anything that flies on the roof, Jason can help you. And Malcom, I need you with me to finalize our battle plan and when Nyssa, Jake and Leo are done with their job, you can help me with thickening the walls to protect any incoming attacks. Are there anyone that doesn't have anything to do or has any more questions?"
Nobody said a word.
"Alright, now let's get into it."
4:00pm
Annabeth[1p]
I was actually very excited for this game. Our fortress was done and the walls could take on the impact of a giant. We met the Romans along with Chiron and Lupa at the creek that separates out sides.
"Alright, rule 1- no maiming or killing." began Chiron, the Romans looked disappointed while we stared at them, looking a little horrified.
"All magical items are allowed as well as all weapons, you are allowed an animal to help you out, but no bigger than Hannibal the elephant over there, the game will start as soon as the second conch horn is heard, only 2 guards per flag and no bounding the prisoners."
And with that, Chiron and Lupa left the field. I took out my magical Yankee's cap and Thalia took out her bracelet, aka, the Aegis. The romans laughed at us.
"Oi blondie, what are you doing with a hat? Is the sun too bright?" said one.
"Oh! And a bracelet? Are you going to be all pretty and fight us with a bracelet?" said another.
All of our weapons were in disguise, so the romans won't know what we're using. Butch had an unbreakable torch that looked more like a fairy-wand, but it shot out rainbows that could blind you for 5 solid minutes.
The Romans laughed at all of our weapons in which we simply smirked at them. We huddled into a group and began to talk strategy, in ancient Greek again of course. "Alright, I know we've given you vaguely of our battle plan for this game, but it has been changed. We're allowed an animal but we've got none-"
But Annabeth was rudely interrupted by Percy and a girl with coffee coloured skin and curly brown hair.
"Um… hi…I don't think you guys have any animals, and it would be unfair to you guys if we have an elephant and you guys don't have one, so we have this unicorn we'd like to lend you." began Percy, behind him was the girl tugging along a large unicorn with an Imperial Gold horn.
I was about to consider it when Leo spoke up.
"No thanks, we've got animals of our own…wait, are mechanical animals allowed?" he asked.
"Yes, I guess." replied Percy with confusion writing all over his face.
"Cool." grinned Leo as we all gave him questioning looks.
"You'll see the animal when we cause the distraction." said Leo.
I nodded and continued my battle plan.
"Alright, Lou and Jake, I want you two to guard the fort/flag. Jake, you know how to activate the traps and things, Lou; I want you to hex whoever gets past our defences. Clarisse and your siblings with Alice (head of Tyche cabin), I want you to guard the north borders with Piper. Piper, make the Romans stop and go back, use your charmspeak. Butch, take Clovis, Sam (head of Nike cabin) and Harry (head of Hebe cabin) with you and guard the west borders. Malcom, take Alex (another son of Athena who's 10 years old), Katie, Will and Lucas (head of Nemesis cabin) and guard the east woods. Meanwhile, Travis, Conner, Leo and Nyssa will pretend to go for the flag and distract the guards of their fort. Jason, Thalia and I will be the main search team and we'll go get the flag as soon as you guys leave. Clear?"
I looked everyone in the eye, they all seemed pretty excited and they nodded. Suddenly, a conch horn could be heard throughout the field, signalling to get ready. "Positions!" I yelled and everyone parted off in different directions.
I hurried back to the fort to ask Leo about the animal.
"Where is it?" I asked him as our majestic fort came into view.
"You'll see, it'll knock the Romans right off their ass!" he smirked before disappearing into the forest with Travis, Conner and Nyssa behind him.
The second conch horn was sounded and the loud clangs of swords were immediately heard.
"C'mon, we have to be quiet." whispered Thalia as we crept over the border and into enemy territory. We were only half-way to the Roman's fort, when we were ambushed by 5-6 Roman legionnaires, one of whom was Reyna.
"Well, well, well, look who we got here. Jason, nice to see you again." she smiled from under her helm.
Jason gave her a small smile, I knew he missed her and it hurt him just as much to see the person he loved with someone else.
"So, you finally going to flash your bracelet at us?" smirked a Roman as some laughed with him.
Thalia smirked at them.
"Yeah actually, I'd like you to meet Aegis."
She tapped her bracelet and it began to expand into the terrifying face of Medusa. The Romans screamed at ran away, all except Reyna we stood her guard, but she looked pretty shaken up.
"Don't worry guys, I'll take her, you guys go." said Thalia. But as Jason and I tried to bypass Reyna, she snapped out of it and stopped us.
"Not so fast, daughter of Minerva." she snarled.
Jason suddenly wrapped his arms around my waist and I felt myself being lifted into the air.
"Come down and fight, or are you a coward like your mother?" she sneered.
I glared at her with pure hatred.
"I will when you win against the daughter of Zeus, and plus, I'm a daughter of Athena, not Minerva."
And with that, Jason flew me away from the now duelling girls.
"I see the fort and Leo." I whispered to him as we landed right behind a large tree only a few metres from the Roman's fort.
Leo and his crew appeared into the clearing and two guards advanced him. When they got within 2 metres of them, Leo took out what looked like a remote-control and pressed the red button. Immediately, the secured doors of the fort combusted into Greek fire.
"Meet Leroy!." yelled Leo as he took out a celestial bronze tube out of his tool belt and threw it on the ground.
He lit his whole body on fire and ran away; Nyssa, Conner and Travis ran the other way, throwing stink-bombs and smoke dispensers behind them. A guard picked up the tube and studied it.
"Ha! That all you got?" he taunted.
But as soon as he said that, the tube made a clicking sound, the whir of gears turning and machinery clicking and the guard dropped it and stared at it in shock. The tube grew arms, legs and a tail, until it was a 5 metre long Goanna with bullet-proof skin, razor-sharp claws and also breathed Greek fire. The guards screamed as the mechanical animal chased them away. I slipped on my hat just in case and Jason and I sneaked into the fort. The flag was right in the middle, but as Jason, being in front of me, was only a metre in front of the flag, he was suddenly drowsed with water and a rope pulled him upside-down, leaving hanging in mid-air.
"There's a trip wire, you need to step over it and then run before anyone catches you." he called.
I heard a few Romans coming my way, so I stepped over the wire and grabbed the flag before dashing out the door.
I felt a few arrows whiz past my ears from behind as the footsteps behind me got more and more rapid. I made a mistake for turning around, the Roman warrior jabbed at me with his sword, luckily, I jumped to the side just in time and he stumbled forwards. I was still invisible, but the flag must've been still visible as he turned to where I was and made another jab. I used my knife and disarmed him, flicking his sword away and gave him a karate-kick, right in the stomach. He fell backwards and I continued to run, I was only several metres from the creek, when someone jumped in front of me. Him. Percy Jackson. What joy. He looked at me, straight in the eye before he started jabbing and swinging his sword wildly at me. I ducked and dodged all of them and sidestepped one of them. The twigs and dried-leaves cracked beneath my feet and he spun around, looking at the floating flag and I again. He pointed his Imperial Gold sword at me and lunged, I jumped to the side and his back was to me. Perfect. I used the butt of my knife and poked him in the small of his back- his Achilles heel. He yelped like a little girl and put his hand on his back, looking around fearfully. I realised if I moved again, I would make too much noise so I stopped and noticed a large tree beside me; I placed the flag behind the tree.
"Where are you?" called Percy, looking around.
"Who are you?" he asked again, his eyes darting all over the place.
I remembered something back when we fought Polyphemus in the Sea of Monsters.
"Nobody!" I said, half-yelling.
Instead of turning to my direction, Percy staggered backwards, he clenched his forehead with his hands ad his eyes seemed to have a faraway look in them. "Nobody…Grover…golden fleece…" he muttered.
I stared at him. Was he remembering? Clarisse's shrill yell snapped me out of my thoughts.
"Hurry Annabeth! You can stare at Prissy later, come on!"
I was only a couple of metres from the creek, so I ran. But as soon as my foot stepped into the water, the creek exploded. I flipped backwards and was now floating in mid-air with a hand made of water grabbing onto my leg, I turned and found Percy standing there, waving his arms wildly in the air as made a fist gesture with his hand.
"Clarisse!" I yelled.
Thank the gods, the daughter of Ares heard me and turned towards me, unfortunately, she was fending off 2 Romans…if I could just…throw it to her…
"Annabeth!" came a yell from behind me.
I spun my head around and so did Percy, he must've lost focus of what he was doing because I dropped a few metres. In the distance, I saw a guy in the air with blond hair; plummeting towards me, a chain was wrapped around his leg with a loose end.
"Jason!" I called.
He flipped his coin and it turned into a spear. He pointed it at Percy and Percy immediately dropped me and began to fight Jason. I screamed as I free-fell 7 metres and was about to crack my head open on a rock below me, when I was yanked upwards.
"Jason!" I sighed in relief as he flew me to our side of the field and a conch horn blew in the distance, signalling the ending of the game.
The Romans groaned and huffed as I raised the flag up high in the air and the fabric shimmered from a purple banner with SPQR printed on it, to an orange banner with a black Pegasus and 'Camp half-blood' in ancient Greek on it.
"Jason, I owe you one. You saved me from cracking my head open." I exclaimed as I grinned one of the biggest smile I'd had since Percy went missing.
Jason blushed slightly before shrugging.
"Anytime for a friend." he stated.
I kept my smile as we began to head back towards the Argo II, when Reyna stopped everyone.
"Romans, Greeks, I figured we haven't exactly introduced ourselves yet, but…we will have a senate meeting in the senate house after dinner tonight. All Greeks are welcome, and I'm sure Jason will show you where it is."
And with that, everyone headed back towards the mess hall for dinner.
A/N Thanks for reading! :)