Alright, I know I was ridiculous to take over two months to post this and I'm truly sorry for that. It's been awhile since the last chapter but still try to enjoy this, even though I'm not sure whether I'm good at describing fights or not.

Chapter 6

I stifled my irritation: of all the things we Romans could always manage to waste our time doing, it had to be cheering on the suffering of others. It was just in our DNA to love gladiator fights, chariot races, and, of course, men fighting wild beasts. It had been that way since Rome first came to be; a huge crowd watching two enslaved warriors beat each other to death. Only this time, I had the rotten luck of being one of the fighters.

At that moment, I was observing the two groups of demigods from a safe distance. The Romans were happily goofing around and making fools of themselves, while the Greeks were simply trying to remain calm. How they managed it 'knowing that one of those savage demigods would soon be dueling their new leader to the death' was beyond me.

For me though, riled up Romans were the least of my worries.

Jason had to be out of practice by now, while I'd been training with an 'Achilles,' or whatever it is Jackson said he was, every day for the past six months. All I could hope for was that Jason would be able to manage a couple of battle maneuvers and that maybe, just maybe, his dad would help him out or something. Problem was, this wasn't one of those battles where I could just go easy on my opponent. The Army had seen us fight so many times that if anything was amiss, they'd catch on fast. I groaned: I just wanted to fast-forward to after I got pounded by my best friend in a fake fight.

Percy, on the other hand, was preparing to do his favorite thing: 'accidently' break every rule possible before anyone had time to realize what he was up to. He was sneaking through the Greeks' ranks without a care in the world. Apparently, the temptation of going to see Annabeth had become overpowering for my mischievous half-brother.

With his helmet concealing his face, Percy appeared to be just another Roman soldier, so the Greeks decided it was best to stay out of the way. Annabeth, who was deep in thought behind the crowd, didn't even notice that her missing boyfriend was even there.

"This is going to stink," she thought aloud.

"Probably, but you never know what'll happen in these kinds of fights."

The blonde jumped, "what are one of you demigods doing here?"

Jackson pretended to be insulted, "that's a pretty bad greeting for your missing best friend, wise girl." Percy slid his helmet out of the way, revealing the huge grin on his face.

"Percy?" she said and was soon hugging him tightly. "Thank the gods! Are you alright?"

He blushed, 'y-yeah. It wasn't like I was in the Underworld or something."

"You're about as close as it gets outside of Hollywood," she glanced toward the crowd of Romans, frowning.

"Oh come on Annabeth, they're not thatbad. They're just more into discipline and military stuff than us."

"And being incredible obnoxious. But enough about the Romans, do you think Jason will be okay?"

"If he's as good a fighter as Reyna says."

Before the two could continue their unauthorized conversation, the match began. I walked over to one side of the field and tossed a small metal box to Jason. He caught it, pressed the button on it, and it transformed into his armor. In the sun it had a slight gold tint so any Roman could immediately know he was a son of Jupiter. Jason and I moved to opposite sides of the field, drawing our swords.

Then the sky began to thunder. I breathed in the salty sea air, trying to stay calm. The usual group of Apollo's children sounded their trumpets to signal us to begin. Jason glanced at a Greek brunette before recklessly charging directly towards me. That was one of the many things Lupa told us to never ever do in a duel. I blocked and dodged each strike he attempted unusually easily. I couldn't believe that this was the best he could do then. After all, he was swinging his sword just as effortlessly as I was ducking out of the way of it. It must be a trick.

Then he inhaled deeply the same way I had seen numerous times before; a bolt of lightning crashed down immediately after. I managed to jump out of the way and loosened up a little. He wasn't any weaker than he had been when he disappeared. I only had to make sure he didn't go too far in our little match.

I dropped my silver blade, it needlessly attracted electricity and I needed as little weaknesses as possible. We both clashed, he with his sword charged with lightning and me, pulling water out of the nearby sea and hitting him with everything I could.

The heat from Jason combined with the force of the seawater veiled the area in a thick mist. Both Jason and I were relieved by the temporary peace.

"So you're not going to kill me then?"

I sighed, "not today…but we still have to do something to satisfy everyone else." Jason nodded and we began our battle again. Only this time, neither of us were at all reluctant to, as long as our attacks looked like they hurt. Mostly, during that time, we only hit each other with the flats of our swords and dodged each others' swings as we listened to the cheers of the audience. Perhaps someone else would have felt exhilarated, but I knew well enough that something bad was coming soon enough.

We parried each others' thrusts and struck the other if we could. We were soon fighting harder than any time we'd ever dueled before. I eventually saw that his skin was glowing purple. And let's just say I was positive that Juno's hatred for Percy had spread out to include me somehow. Jupiter would just give the kid strength, but Juno would actually put some effort into making sure her favorite demigod stayed among the living.

I sent a wave crashing on top of him, sending him into a tree. For a moment, I hoped that if he was unconscious then maybe the Army would just allow him to live. I shook off the idea just as quickly though. Jason was charging right at me again, starting to summon another zap of lightning. I channeled another wave over me, slowing down Jason's blast and giving me just enough time to dive out of the way. I spotted Jason trying to hit me again and blocked, luckily. Just the force of it drove me onto the ground. I had to roll out of the way, and then trip him with my leg just to give myself enough time to get up again.

We clashed repeatedly, trying to find each other's openings. Juno seemed to be the only way that Jason could be so determined to kill me. Eventually, he knocked my sword out of my hand. I dodged his next swing and punched him in the eye before grabbing the small divine brass dagger off of my belt. I had an excellent chance to stab him then, but for once, Jason was faster than me. He flipped a switch on his belt and it spit out a shield. He grabbed it before I could do any more damage, spotted me with his good eye, and rammed it into me. I was smashed into the grass and he almost managed to hit me again, but a blast of water stopped him.

He started up again and was soon forcing me farther and farther back. I lost any hope of getting either of my swords back. I barely managed to block him with my puny six-inch dagger; an ordinary sword would just slow me down at this point. I still kept trying to knock him down, but any sliver of hope I had had of getting out of this painlessly had long since fled to the sea. Finally, his sword rammed into my chest and sent me flying across the field and headfirst into a tree. I fell to the grass and that was the end of that fight.

Later on, after Captain Kou of Hall Aesculapius had made sure that I was well enough to do a little paperwork, Jason paid me a visit. He was holding ice to his eye.

"That was a good fight Reyna, but did you really have to give me a black eye?"

"It needed to be realistic. Did you really have to break three of my ribs and give me a minor concussion?"

Jason winced, "that bad?" I shrugged and went back to work.

Juno-Hera

Jupiter-Zues

Aesculapius - Asclepius (the god of healing and medicine, I put him in because Apollo seemed to have too many duties)

Thank you for your incredible patience and please continue to read and review this.