Chapter 8

Disclaimer" I do not own Percy Jackson. All rights go to Author Rick Riordan

Jason's POV

Ugh! School is so boring. All these classes that make us do things that I know I'll never use. Half the things at school are boring in general. Piper is also starting to become like Annabeth. Girls have been coming up to me non-stop asking me out or walking with them or giving me their number. Now I know how Percy felt.

Piper is not taking these girls lightly. Every time one of my "fans" as we now call them comes up to me, Piper glares daggers at them and curses in Greek.

This happened to occur right before lunch time.

"Jason! How's it going?" a brunette girl asks me.

"Um... it's lunch time so I'm going to eat?" I say nervously while Piper glares at the girl.

"Haha, you're so funny!" she exclaims. "Why don't you sit with me and my friends today?"

"Actually we are sitting with our friends today, and everyday," Piper says.

The brunette curls her lip at Piper with a look of disgust.

"Well, Jason, a person with your looks could do so much better than her," she says gesturing to Piper. "I mean why do you hang our with people like her anyways?"

"Maybe because I like to be with friends," I say. I didn't like the way she was talking to my girlfriend.

"Well if you ever want to hang out with beautiful people, call me!" she says walking off, but not after putting a slip of paper with her number on it in my shirt pocket.

Piper immediately took the paper out and crumbled it up.

"The nerve of those girls," she grumbles.

"Hey, your mom is a goddess, not to mention she is the goddess of beauty," I whisper to her.

She blushes at that comment.

"Let's just go to lunch."

Castor's POV (after school at football)

"All right team listen up!" coach exclaims as we gather around him. "We got a new member to our squad, meet Justin West!"

In comes a very athletic looking guy. He has sandy colored hair, cut short, similar to a buzz cut. He looks a little bigger than me and walked in with a look of authority.

"West just moved here from Texas, now I want you to meet our new captain!" coach says.

My jaw dropped.

"Um... coach? I'm captain though," I say.

"Not anymore, Castor. You keep getting into trouble, I need someone that will behave himself to represent our team. Also, Justin was captain for his team in Texas, so he knows what he is doing."

I scowled. I knew I shouldn't have picked a fight with those kids from Percy's "gang". Now it cost me my captain-ship.

"All right guys! We're going to do some laps around the field to warm up! Move! Move!" new captain Justin says.

I fall in line with him to talk while we do our laps.

"So... you played football in Texas?" I asked.

He nods.

"Been playing since I was in elementary school. I can't wait to go to school here. A lot of pretty girls walk around. 'Specially a girl named Annabeth. Know her?" he asks.

"Yeah I know her, she don't like me though. She has a boyfriend," I grumble.

"Never been a problem for me! Who is this boyfriend, I'll put 'em in his place!"

"Guy named Percy Jackson. He's a swimmer."

"Shoot this'll be too easy. Swimmers have no muscle!"

"I will warn you, though. He has some pretty strong friends. They all look like they could go a few rounds with Chuck Norris, without breaking a sweat."

"I think this will be fun," he says, grinning. "Just wait 'till tomorrow. I may just surprise you."

Percy's POV

I guess Skylar thinks that because we did one project together, she is my "best friend" or something like that. Of course she got more annoying. Great. Just great.

We didn't even go to my house for the project! We just talked to Paul after school and he told her what she needed to know. That and I don't live with anyone other than my demigod friends.

That day at lunch, for example, was a bad one to be me.

"Ohh Percy!" Skylar said. I knew it was her from the moment she opened her mouth.

"What?" I groaned.

Everyone else developed a sudden interest in their shoes. Well except Thalia, Annabeth, and Piper.

"How's my best friend doing today?" she asked.

"Why don;t you go find him or her and ask?" Annabeth suggested.

"But I already found him, it's Percy!"

I could hear Annabeth trying to control her anger. So I kissed her to calm her down.

"Skylar for the thousandth time! I am not your best friend, we did one project together, and I already have a best friend," I say.

"That's too bad, maybe next time," she says then walks away.

I blinked. "What? No more than that?"

"You should be glad, Seaweed Brain," Annabeth said.

"I know, but why would she just give up like that?"
"We're about to find out," Thalia says looking at something behind me.

I turn to see a kid I have never seen before. He was tall six and a half feet, with close-cropped blondish color hair. He was wearing a Varsity Football jacket so I assumed he was a jock. With his build, even without the jacket I would be able to tell he was a jock.

"So Jackson!" he says loudly. "I hear you and Skylar have a thing going on. Care to explain?"

"What are you talking about and who are you?" I ask.

He stretches out his hand. "Justin West, Football team captain! Now about my question?"

I didn't shake his hand. "I don't have a thing with Skylar. We were forced to do a project together that's it."

"Well I heard that when you were at her house, you kissed her. Is that true?"

Annabeth was growling, but I wasn't sure who she was growling at.

"That never happened!" I say.

That is when Skylar pops her head from behind Justin.

"Yes it did! When we were talking about our love lives, I asked if I could kiss you and you said yes!" she says.

"WHAT!" Annabeth screams. "AND YOU DIDN:T TELL ME ABOUT THIS!"

"Annabeth, that never happened!" I plead.

"tsk-tsk, Percy. You should be more loyal to your girlfriend," Justin says.

I looked into his eyes and realized something. He wanted this to happen. He wanted me and Annabeth to fight and for me to fight him.

I tried to calm myself down. I looked at my friends and they were looking at me with all different looks. Pity, anger, sadness, betrayal (that was from Annabeth). I couldn't let this guy win.

"I'll say this once! I never kissed Skylar, nor do I want to ever kiss her!"

"Well, you probably don't want anyone to know you kissed her, so I understand why you're so tense, but it helps to admit to these things."

"What do you really want?"

"Like I'll tell you anything, you're just some weak little Fish-Boy that thinks he can stand up to me! Looks like you have your hands full, especially without your retarded friends. Who were they again? Oh yeah that's right, the baseball wannabe, the disappointment football player, the caffeinated Mexican, and the twin twerps!"

"I'll warn you one time, and one time only," I say angry. "Leave me and my friends alone, I don't want to hurt you."

"Like you could ever hurt me! Don't make me laugh!"

That's when I went for it. I punched him right in the stomach and he jerked back a few feet, but it didn't look like it fazed him.

"Nice try, Jackson. I'm not gonna fight you, I'll just bide my time."

When everything finally settled down, I explained to Annabeth about the whole "kissing" thing.

"So you didn't kiss her?" she said finally calm.

"Yes, that guy probably made it up so you would be mad at me. Probably thought we would break up and he could make a move."

"I hate mortal boys..." Thalia mumbled in Greek,

"Same Thalia, I don't even know why I went here," Nico said in Greek as well.

"Well at least we all have a common enemy," I say.

"That's an understatement, Percy," Jason said.

"He's right, Percy we need to make a plan, in case something like that happens again," Annabeth says.

"I want in on this," Halle says. "Anything to get back at the people who made Eric get suspended."

"How about we meet this weekend at our place?" I say.

They all nod.

"Perfect, now we can kill two birds with one stone. Get rid of Skylar and scare the daylights out of Justin," I say.

"Oh, by the way I've been having some problems with girls throwing themselves at me, too," Jason tells us.

"Join the club," I say.

"Has my wittle bwother been having some girl problems?" Thalia jokes causing Jason to pout.

"They don't seem to get that I have a beautiful girlfriend. It's even worse when Piper is there and they hit on me!" he says.

"Tell me about it, anytime I'm with Annabeth, girls throw themselves at me! I don't want that." I agree.

"Well, we could make you two ugly?" Thalia suggested.

"How about, No?" Jason and I answer.

"I'm happy people leave me alone," Nico said. "I probably would have killed a girl by now."

"Let's just get back to the "planning Skylar and Justin's downfall" thing," I say anxious to change the subject.

"Okay so our place this Saturday, at around noon?" Annabeth says in her strategy voice.

I kissed her on the cheek, "Sounds like a plan, Wise Girl. You guys good for then?"

Halle nods.

"I can tell Eric and Noah to meet us there," Halle says.

"What about Danny and Sofia?" Piper says.

"They got transferred to a new school. Their parents were close and they changed them to a private school," Halle says.

Ding Ding Ding Ding

"See ya on Saturday, guys!" I call as I head to class with a grin.

As I made my way to class, alone because I had to go to the restroom, I run into who else but Justin and two of his friends, one of them is Castor.

"'Sup, Jackson?" he calls.

"Going to class," I answer trying to get by him.

"Leaving us so soon? I thought you were nicer than that."

"I'm going to be late if you don't let me pass," I warn.

He shrugged.

"That's cool, just wanted to give you a little present," he says as he punches me right in the mouth.

When I wiped my mouth, blood was on my hands. Great.

"That's just a warning, Jackson! Next time will hurt even more!" he calls as he heads to his class.

I quickly got up to go to the bathroom and clean it off, but I realized I wont be able to do that. There was too much blood to wipe up and there was a mark on my mouth. Oh gods! How would Annabeth react?

Annabeth's POV

I had just sat down in class when I noticed Percy wasn't here. He told me he would be late, but class started a few minutes ago. What could have happened.

It didn't take long for me to figure out something bad happened. About a minute after my thoughts, Percy walked in trying to hide some part of his face from me. Then I noticed what he was hiding.

"Percy," I hissed. "What happened!?"

"Nothing, just... nothing."

"You're lying!"

"Can we talk about it later? I don't want to talk here or now."

"Fine! But as soon as we get home you're telling me every detail."

"Okay, Wise Girl."