"I think I like the black better," Ate told Percy as he sighed. He was currently busy giving the goddess a pedicure, scraping her heals, filing her nails, and painting them.

"Why am I doing this again?" he asked.

She sighed in frustration and rolled her eyes. "I have a date tonight with a harpy, and my nails haven't been done in at least a century. And your little girlfriend's busy making me a dress, so that leaves the nails to you, my tiny little demigod."

"Why the Hades would you go on a date with a harpy?"

She groaned. "Haven't I already told you my evil plan?"

"Well yeah, but don't all evil villains tell their hostages or whatever what their evil plans are at least a million times?"

"I guess."

"Plus I kinda forgot."

Ate rolled her eyes before saying, "Well it all started when I was a youngin', about 450 or so, when Zeus took a liking in the whole 'bad girl' thing."

"Do you mean. . ."

"Yeah. We got it on like the prawn who yawns at dawn."

"Oh gods."

"Yeah, and Zeus? Such a nice ass."

Percy crinkled his face in disgust. "Just go on with the story."

"So, a few days later, Hera found out, and then she got all pissy at me, and then I ended up with a mole the shape of a sad clown on my-"

"I don't wanna know!" Percy shouted loudly, cutting her off.

"Fine, fine," she said. "So after that, I kinda ruined the life of most of the Olympians."

"Whatdja do?"

"Oh, you know, the usual. Trapped Zeus in a net, cut the strings off all of the Muses' instruments, made Artemis horny so she slept with Apollo,-"

"Wait," Percy interrupted her once again. "Aren't Apollo and Artemis twins? And isn't Artemis a maiden goddess?"

"Yeah, and that's what makes it hilarious!"

He sat in thought for a little while before a smile broke out on his face. "That is pretty funny."

"Right?" Ate asked. "Anyways, I was a naughty little goddess. So at the next Summer Solstice, where I was rudely not invited, they decided to kick me off Mount Olympus. And not the harmless-Hephaestus-throw-off-Olympus-where-you-come-back-a-while-later-with-a-broken-nose-and-an-ugly-face throw off Olympus. This was the your-thrown-off-Olympus-forever-and-ever kind of throw off Olympus."

"What did you do then?"

"The norm. I started slavery and the Great Depression. I broke up the Beatles and started that whole thing where people put the names of couples together, like Bradgelina, or whatever, cause you know that nobody likes that even though they all do it. Oh! And of course I did what all great gods and goddesses do in their spare time. Mate with mortals. There was this one in particular." She swooned. "You should have seen his criminal record." She seemed to be out of breath a bit, and she was gazing out into space.

Percy cleared his throat to get her back to reality.

"As I was saying," Ate stated, "I eventually heard about this whole Kronos re-rising thing, and I couldn't help but be interested, so I joined them."

Percy had just finished a not so good painting of black nail polish and was just about to start a clear coat.

"Eventually I got kicked out of there too."

Percy laughed a bit, but once he noticed the glare coming his way, he covered it up with a cough. "How?"

"I don't know, really. I mean, I knew Kronos had a bad temper, but gods, one time you paint his sarcophagus with rainbows and bunnies, and write 'Kronos is a faggot' across the top, and you're out."

Percy chuckled once more. Did I say chuckle? I meant cough. He must be getting sick.

"So now I hate them both. The gods. The Titans. Both of them can just suck it!" she yelled, causing Percy to jump and cover most of her big toe with clear polish. Luckily, she was too caught up in her story to notice. "That's what I'm here to do. Take revenge on the gods and the Titans. The whole thing with trying to kidnap you two and keep you hostage doesn't seem to be working all that well, seeing as nobody's here, so I have a different plan. I'm going to gather an army."

"Isn't that just what Kronos did?"

"Shut your mouth! No, this is absolutely not what Kronos did. I already have a body of my own, and I'm perfectly happy with it, thank you very much."

"Sor-ry."

She glared at him a bit more before continuing. "I'm starting with the harpies, those strange, ugly, little creatures. That's why I'm going on a date with one tonight. If I need to flirt a little to get them on my side, then I'll flirt. If I need to sleep with them, then I will. I will get them on my side. I will get everyone on my side."

Annabeth woke up in the tiny captain's bed with a gasp. They needed to hurry up if they wanted to stop Ate's plan. She knew how desperate harpies were. She will admit to flirting a bit on occasions so she could stay out a bit after curfew without getting eaten.

"You alright?" Pez asked, right at her side. He had insisted on taking the first watch once he saw her yawn. He had also insisted on staying in the captain's quarters to make sure Annabeth was alright, no matter how much she teased by calling him a stalker.

"Yeah," she said. "Just another dream."

"Of Percy?"

"And Ate."

". . . So?"

"She's planning on taking over the world one harpy at a time."

"Oh, that's kinda weird."

She nodded her head. They sat in silence for a while. "Pez," Annabeth said out of nowhere, "how are we going to do it?"

"Oh." He seemed surprised by what she said. "Well, there's many different ways, actually. You can be on the bottom, or the top if you like, but I'm usually on the top, and -"

"Gods, Pez, shut up!" she cut him off. "I meant, how are we going to stop Ate?"

"Oh! . . . I don't know."

She couldn't help but laugh a bit at his idiocy. "Well then we're just going to have to think about that a bit." She was too tired to be annoyed.

"Guess so," he said with a yawn.

They ended up not thinking about a plan at all, seeing as both had fallen asleep, cuddled up on the captain's bed.

"Land ho, milady!"

Annabeth woke up to Pez's loud yelling and sunlight streaming down on her face. She groaned, and turned over, covering her head with a pillow.

"Wakey, wakey!" He grabbed the pillow from her hands and threw it across the room. She looked up at him with groggy eyes.

"What?"

"I see an island up ahead."

"Really?" she asked, a smidge bit too excited for Pez's liking. She got out of bed quickly and ran out of the room to the deck. Pez followed behind.

"We're so close, and we never even thought of a plan of how to stop Ate."

"How do you even know if this is Calypso's island?"

She hesitated. "I don't." This time it was Pez's turn to roll his eyes. "But we can hope."

"Yeah," he mumbled. "We can hope."

It ended up not being Calypso's island. Not at all.

"What the hell is that?" Pez whispered to Annabeth. They were currently hiding behind a giant rock from some strange creature standing on the beach. She had a serpent's head, but a lumpy body that he guessed was a human's. You couldn't really tell though, seeing as it was completely covered in different colors of freckles and stripes. It also had something on it's head. Wait! Is that fire?

"It's Hades."

"What? I thought you said the gods looked normal."

"I meant that it's not hell, it's Hades."

"Whatever! Just tell me what the Hades that is!"

"It's Lamia." She was acting way too calm for this.

"Who's that?"

"She's a monster. Daughter of Libya and Belus. She had an affair with Zeus and Hera found out so she made her into a monster, and made her eat her own kids."

"Yucky."

"She then got a liking for all kids, not just her own."

"So she's a monster that just eats kids?"

"Yep."

"Well it's a good thing I'm a man," he said with a sly smile.

"Are you eighteen?"

". . . Maybe."

"Then you're bait for her."

"What about you? How come you seem so confident?"

"Cause I can fight."

"Well it's a good thing I can fight too." She looked at him with raised eyebrows. "Kind of."

She smiled while she unsheathed her knife. "This isn't play time, Pez, or just another practice in the sword arena. This is real. Just stay here, don't touch your sword, and keep quiet and everything should be okay." She started to walk out from behind the rock and towards Lamia, but Pez pulled her back before she could go.

"Wait just a minute, missy," he said as she shook her arm out of his grasp. "You can't just go out there by yourself. "

"Watch me." She started backing up once again, but he grabbed her before she could go.

"Let me come with you."

"No!"

"Why not?"

"You'd kill us, that's why!"

"No I wouldn't! I'd protect you!"

"You'd protect me? Now I'm too helpless to protect myself?"

"No, I never said that!"

"That's what I'm hearing!" she started, but stopped before continuing and smelt the air with a disgusted face. "Gods, what is that smell? Is that you?"

"No. I took a shower this morning."

"Are you sure?"

They stood their in silence for a bit, before it finally clicked in both their minds. But before either one of them could voice their thoughts, a giant, colorful figure crushed their rock of protection into dust.

"Run!"

They ran and ran, as fast as their legs could go. One thing that Annabeth didn't know about Pez was that he was a terrible athlete. Yeah, she knew he was a sucky sword fighter, and it didn't take much to make him get out of breath, but she just thought that he had to be good at some sport seeing how thin he was. Guess not. She could've just left him behind, and ran ahead to safety all by herself, but what kind of girlfriend would do that? Instead she slowed down a bit, grabbed Pez's hand, and practically dragged him.

She should've just ran ahead.

Lamia had caught up with them, and was only a foot or two away. She opened her mouth wide, and chomped down quickly.

Oh Gods.

"Did we seriously just get swallowed by some child-eating monster and are now sitting in its stomach?"

"Yep."

"Oh goody."

Oh my god, she updated faster than a month!

Yeah, it's true. And guess what? This chapter's actually good! Yeah, I know your amazed. You can thank Winter Break. Yippee!

I forgot a disclaimer on the last chapter so just know that I don't own anything. Same with this one.

Reviews are love. Ugh! I hate when people say that. It's just so annoying! So, in my world, reviews are packets of ketchup, and one day those ketchup packages will be our currency, so next time you go to McDonalds and want some ketchup and you say just 'One or two' and they give you like 32, you keep those 30 extra ketchup packets.

. . . Yeah, I don't even know where that came from. Ha ha!

:) Jordan