Chapter 5

What's up, chillins! Ok, so today I am like dying. I can't believe I have 23 REVIEWS! You guys are awesome! Well, actually, there are two of you reviewers who I had to tell them personally to review. You know who you are! :D haha ok. So, here's just a little shout-out to

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You guys give me the encouragement to continue writing. So thank you so much.

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the PJO characters, who haven't even bothered to make an appearance yet… but you just wait.

I decided to throw it. The knife bounced harmlessly off the monster's chest, hitting handle first. He looked up and grunted. Good, I had gotten his attention. Actually, that's not so good. Shut up subconscious!

The giant lumbered towards me, much faster than I had anticipated. He raised his arms, going for my neck. I knew that if I let the monster catch me, he would snap my neck like a twig, and that would be that. I would be done for. I had seen enough horror movies to know what to do. I raised my knife arm, but then realized I had thrown it at the monster. I had discovered that I was screwed.

The monster was just across the kitchen, I remember, and he was running quickly. I was frozen, but when he got five feet away, I remembered my sword.

I had never used a sword before. I had always thought that you just swing it, but this sword had a flat edge. It was meant for stabbing. So, I grabbed my weapon out of my belt and thrust it clumsily at the monster. He looked down at the dull point entering his body, grunted, and burst into brown dust.

"Ugh, what the heck?!" I yelled. I ran over to my father, who was passed out underneath the shattered door pieces. I heaved the chunks off his body, and splashed sink water onto his face.

"Dad! Wake up," Now at the time, I didn't realize how stupid my actions were. I was twelve then, but now I'm fifteen. As a "mature" teen, I would've acted differently under the same circumstances. I think.

Anyway, I remember that my father had jumped up quickly after that. But then he looked at his shoulder and groaned loudly. It must have been dislocated since it was… misshaped to say the least. His shoulder probably became dislocated when the giant thing slammed the door against Dad's shoulder so many times.

"Dad? Am I hallucinating? What WAS that thing?" I cascaded him with questions.

He groaned in pain again. "You will learn when you need to know. Where is your mother?"

I was confused. Not the first time, either. When I need to know? I was pretty sure I needed to know NOW. But I answered him nonetheless. "Mom's in the attic with Nicko and Jackson."

Dad had widened his eyes and murmured, "Right. Okay, let's go." I knew better than to ask. He grabbed my arm and practically dragged me up the stairs to the attic.

"Honey? Are you up here?" Dad called into the musty top floor room when we had arrived. We heard a far call saying, "We are in the back, dear!"

Dad went to a shelf with drawers on it. I watched as he had taken out a shelf and put something really small into his mouth. How could he eat something up here? Who knows how old that food was!

Dad then had gone to a box on a shelf that was far left, and near the wall. The box was a light gray color, with a label that said "Lysander's." He opened it and smiled, despite himself. I could see the memories that he was remembering relative to whatever was in the box. He pulled out a long white sword and said, "Let's go kick some a- I mean butt."

I shook my head and grinned. "Hey, how's your shoulder?" I said, pointing at his arm. He turned to me and I could see that his shoulder was in place.

"Oh, I'm good. Thanks, though, buddy." He answered, ruffling my hair. That was weird. Well, he must have fixed it when I wasn't watching…

We both went to the back of the attic and saw the twins and Mom. She was strapping a pack to one of my brothers' backs.

"What's in the pack?" I said to no one in particular.

Mom answered me, "Vital materials."

"Like what?"

She stood up and looked at me. "Jacob, really. I need to concentrate. You have no idea what's going on, and I understand that. But stop asking questions for the time being. You'll find out all the answers eventually. You just have to trust me."

I frowned. Ok, this was getting really weird. What was happening?! Dad sat down heavily on a wide ornamented chest. He put his hand to his head and sighed deeply.

"Dad, you okay?" I asked. He had it his head pretty hard… He didn't answer. Dad?" I asked again, uncertain. "Dad!" I grabbed his shoulder. He looked up at me with pain in his eyes and took his hand away from his head. It was red, and covered with blood.

I cursed and stumbled backwards over something on the floor. Holy crap, there was blood all over now, on his hand, and coming from the back of his head.

My mom turned around to yell at me for cursing aloud. But then she saw me on the floor and followed my gaze to my dad. "Xander! Ohmigods, Xander, what happened?" She was kneeling next to my dad, but quickly got up again and retrieved some cloth from a bag. She pressed it hard against my dad's head, trying to stop the slow but thick flow.

I quickly got up, too, and went to my dad. The twins had been out talking on the flat roof, and they were beginning to come in when they heard my mom yell. I went to them and smiled. "Hey, guys, come here." I brought them to the side of the roof and sat down.

"Jacob, why did Mommy yell?" Jackson asked. Nicko was sitting to the side, staring out at the sky.

"Oh, umm…" I had to come up with a reasonable answer. "Umm… she, uh… pricked herself on.. a nail..?"

"Oh," Jackson said.

"Yep, that's.. what definitely happened."

Ok, that's it for now! Feel free to leave a review! And that means you, Mia and Teresa! Yep, I used your names. Deal with it. Tell me what you think. And try to guess what happened to Mr. Racer. :D I tried to make it a bit longer. Hope ya liked it..!

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