Chapter 2

"Tragedy Strike when your friend almost died"

Percy

Instinctively, I grabbed Toby and shoved him behind me, widening my stance and reaching for Riptide. But I hesitated. The monsters made no advancing movement. I could hear their raspy breathing, the snarls of hunger and anger carrying across the half-mile of distance. They were on the far side of the beach, and I stood somewhere on the mid-point between the two ends. They had quite a distance to cross before they reached Toby and me, and they didn't seem to be thinking about breaching it. All I heard for a long time was the harmony of Toby's and my hearts beating rapidly, the hissing wind coming from the ocean, and the panting heaves of air from our motionless enemy.

Then they charged.

"Holy shit!" I screamed, stumbling backward in alarm.

For some reason I'd expected a bit more time before they went after us. Maybe a lead monster sending up the order, or a shout, or really anything except the immediate outpour of demons barreling toward us. Frankly, my swearing was anything but uncalled for.

Toby had already started kicking up dust by the time I started sprinting. I prided myself on good footwork and a skillful hand with a sword, but nobody could take on that many monsters without ensuring certain death. And although I personally had nothing against dying at that point in my life, I was not going to leave Toby without a guide or a helping hand.

I splashed through the surf deliberately, storing up as much strength and stamina as I could. With a breathless yell, I sent a wave of water into the center of the horde, but it barely made a dent. They were gaining on us.

Toby stumbled and I caught him before he face-planted. Together, we staggered into a level running speed and kept going.

"Come on!" I said while grapping his arm.

I had quite a lot stored, but Toby hadn't had half as much training or energy storage as I had. He was pale and sloppy in his running, whereas he was normally more like a galloping gazelle than fleeing baby elephant. I tried my best to help him, but he swayed and turned unhealthy shades of green, alternating back to his colorless cheeks.

I concentrated on Toby while I was running, and that slowed me down considerably. Before I met him, I'd dealt with situations not unlike this one and I had never had a problem surpassing it. I only had one person to look out for; me. But with Toby, I couldn't double my efforts to get away and leave him as the main course. Nor could I stumble back and send him ahead for fear that even my death wouldn't slow down the charging horde enough for him to escape. So I was greeted with a considerable dilemma. How were we going to get out of this?

"Trent" he said in a scared voice. "What do we do now?!"

"Toby, I told you when I'm attacked; you need to run and keeping running until I track you down. Right?" I said while holding the attack from one of the Cyclops.

Toby pushed off my side, crossing his arms with an open mouth. "What?" his blue eyes flashed angrily. "No, no, no, no, no. We agreed to that when you were yelling at me and I wanted you to shut up and let me sleep. I wasn't actually agreeing to anything."

"You just contradicted yourself," I pointed out, a nasty habit I picked up from a friend years back and hadn't ever lost. "And we're agreeing to it down. Toby you're ten. You need to get away before they kill you."

Battles strategies and plans ran through my mind, but before I could put anything into place, I was surrounded.

What the…?

The monsters had split into two separate groups and had closed in on me. This was unusual; most monsters were only smart enough to maybe set up a very basic ambush or split up groups of demigods. Even during the wars, monsters never had the intelligence to split up and make complicated plans on their own. These were smarter than what I was used to.

Thankfully, that was as far as their intelligence seemed to go. I sliced down hellhound after hellhound, monster after monster. I had drawn Riptide and quickly dispatched the small army, covered in monster dust in an empty clearing surrounded by trees.

I was breathing hard from adrenaline, and had relaxed. This was a mistake.

Years of training and demigod senses were what saved me then; there was something behind me!

I barely reacted in time, spinning to block the blow from the Omega-shaped axe. I was facing the Minotaur.

"Toby" I hissed. "Now."

The Minotaur roared, and I aimed for its big hairy neck.

Riptide connected, and the monster exploded into yellow sulfurous sand. The axe took a little longer, and I quickly realized that it wasn't going to dissolve in time. I rolled to the side, whacking my head against the wall

I cried out, feeling blood trickle down my neck. My back hit the ground hard, and that was when the burning started. The scar on my back burst open and I knew that it had turned black. My heart rate sped up, and my mouth grew dry.

My eyes flitted around, searching frantically for anything to use as an advantage against our advisories. Running was fine and good, but only if it was temporary; eventually, you ran out of steam.

I muttered a short, breathless prayer under my breath, even though I knew it was in vain. "Ares, help."

I could already hear his pompous voice from above: Yeah right, punk. Fight your own battles.

Toby and I had the added advantage of being a two person group. Although easily overpowered, we moved faster and more effectively than a massive mob like the monsters. Sure enough, when I risked a glance over my shoulder, the monsters were having a hell of a time breaking past the foliage and following us. We had slowed them down considerably, but they still weren't stopping. To get rid of them, I had only one choice. I would have to drown them.

I cast my mind out for a nearby source of water and felt the tug of the ocean on my gut. Letting out a triumphant shout, I altered my course and headed for it, the tiring Toby hot on my heels. I burst out past the trees and felt my legs and feet scream at me. I had been running at a constant sprint for longer than I had in a long, long time, and I was feeling the burn.

I couldn't help but commend Toby on his stamina and determination. He had less than half the experience that I did and yet he was keeping up pretty well. Or at least so I thought until he dove into the ground.

"Toby!" I screamed against my better judgment, alerting the horde to our whereabouts.

I skidded to a stop and doubled back, turning over my young companion and seeing that the right side of his face was scraped and bloody from his plowing through the hard ground like that. His eyes were closed and his breathing shallow. He was out cold.

I heard a crashing sound and decided that either a bulldozer was tearing through the forest or monsters had made some serious ground. I looked up and saw some faster telekhines already appearing in and amidst the trees. Left with no other option, I heaved Toby up and carried him Princess-style as I ran for the water I felt getting closer and closer. If he wasn't out cold, he could hit me right now, because maybe this is beyond embarrassing.

Carrying Toby made the running even harder with the condition of my scar The curse- for that was what the scar was- hadn't spread to this extent since the first time I had left Tartarus. The gods had saved me then, and given me the cure. Since then, I had always had my bag and cure on me whenever the poison activated, and had gotten the antidote before I had gotten too bad. But now, the backpack was carried by Toby and now it's on Toby's back while I'm carrying him. Not a great time to lay him down, get the med and carried him back.

"We're going to be okay" I said in a panic tone. "I'm promise you"

"T-Trent" he said. I knew in this time he's really out cold.

He was a little lighter than a hundred pounds, mostly because neither of us got much food, but the added weight still slowed me, down giving the leading telekhines time to catch up. I placed Toby on the ground and drew Riptide, disintegrating three in a single fluid slash. More were coming, forcing me to pick him back up, more sloppily this time, and pour on the speed. I was coughing up blood, and tears streamed out of my eyes. Pain began to black out my vision, and a hot liquid began flowing out of my nose.

Finally, I felt the call of the sea rip at my intestines. I stopped at the bottom of a hill and staggered under Toby's weight. I couldn't go any farther. Exhaustion wore me down to practically nothing and the pain because my scar even worse. I tried not to, but I dropped Toby onto the ground, falling on top of him in a poor shield.

The monsters were right there, breathing down my neck almost. I needed to rest and recuperate. I couldn't fight that many after running as hard and long as I just had. But I didn't have a choice. I drew Riptide again, hands and arms and legs trembling uncontrollably, and faced the army of monsters with as firm a look as I could. I picked one foot up over Toby's unconscious body and snarled, holding Riptide out two-handed. The monsters recoiled and looked from her to me. They got the message. If they got near him, I'd tear them apart so much not even Tartarus would be able to pick up the pieces.

Now it was the monster's turn to hesitate. Most of them, with the exception of maybe the dracaena, were dumb brutes. They didn't know who I was or what I was capable of, and they certainly didn't know I'm Percy Jackson. But they did know that I was somehow associated with the wave earlier, and that I was pissed. Even wild animals know enough to recognize a serious threat when they see one.

But monsters can sometimes be even dumber than wild animals. A wild animal, unless starved to the point of insanity, will not attack a human unless that human cannot stand up and carries no weapon. Monsters will ignore even the most obvious signs of a healthy demigod carrying a sharp sword and blunder on ahead stupidly. So when they got over their hesitations and came at me, I wasn't surprised.

I spent the entire fight standing over Toby, kicking and stabbing and slashing at the monsters to hold them back. And I put a pretty good decrease in their numbers. I took out somewhere around thirty before an axe-wielding Cyclops hooked Riptide and yanked it from my grasp. I stumbled backward and landed on my ass, hard. Then the Cyclops bowed down and lifted Toby up from the back of the collar.

"No!" I screamed desperately, fighting to stand.

Any moment now, Riptide would return to my pocket, but that wouldn't do either Toby or I any good if I couldn't carry. And my arm felt like it hadn't just been filled with lead, with had been filled with cement. Completely inanimate and useless as anything but a weight.

Toby's head fell forward; his eyes still closed and face so pale I would've thought he was already dead if I didn't see the steady rising and falling of his chest. The Cyclops, topping at about eleven feet, lifted her up to eye level and chuckled throatily.

Even for his race, he was huge. My brother, Tyson, who was also a Cyclops, although a good one was only half his height. And Toby was dangling seven or more feet off the ground, helpless.

I struggled to stand, but my limbs wouldn't work. Gravity seemed more real than ever before, holding me there while the situation spiraled out of control. Tears were rolling down my face when I started pleading with the Cyclops.

"Please," I begged weakly. "Take me instead, but leave him alone."

The brute just laughed and drew a sword from his belt, which for him was really just a dagger. He raised it above his head and prepared to thrust down, straight into Toby's heart.

"No!"

The sword shattered in a thousand pieces, making me incredibly shock and I saw Toby glow a little bit in his chest like someone or something making a shield for him. Something or someone had saved him, but the mystery is, how can that even possible, Toby's not a Demi-God or maybe he's a legacy, but that's not even make any sense, Gold is the color of Zeus but he swear he won't have any kids and maybe Kronos but Luke's already killed Kronos by sacrificing himself.

But then something whistled through the air and the Cyclops tensed like he'd been struck. He looked down at the stick protruding from his sternum. The wooden shaft of an arrow. He burst apart into golden dust, covering Toby as he fell back down to earth. Suddenly finding myself again, I leapt into the air and caught him. All I could do was lessen the fall and stop his head from impacting. I heard several crunches and snaps indicating broken bones.

Panicked, I probed his neck for life. His breathing was too shallow to tell for sure. Several moments passed while I groped around, petrified that the arrow had come too late. I said a silent thank you to Apollo for following up on his old favor last minute. He promised me after the Titan War that a well-timed arrow would show up when I most needed it. I ignore the pain on the back of my neck again, I don't even care, and all I care about now is Toby.

Toby's neck didn't pound or thud or do anything but stay still.

"Toby," I said breathlessly, poking his neck and trying to find the pulse. Where was it? He couldn't be dead. He was too damn young to be dead. "Toby, wake up, damn you! You are not going to die on me! Do you understand? You are not going to die!"

I started CPR, which I didn't know very well except for the brief lesson given at camp during the days preceding the war. I pressed down on the center of his chest with the heels of my hands, working quickly and as hard as I dared without breaking a rib.

Tears spilled past my eyelashes I gulped, tapping his cheek frantically. "Toby? Wake up, kiddo. You hear that? I called you kiddo. Yell at me."

Moments passed and nothing happened. I kept trying to revive him, but he didn't stir. I adjusted his head, angling it and opening his mouth before puffing air into it, plugging his nose with my fingers. I waited for a sign of life or dramatic gasp for air as the movie always showed, but he didn't stir. I pressed my ear against his chest, listening for life, but I heard nothing.

His lips did not move.

"Toby?" I gasped. "Come on, Tobias Howard Carter, fight. I'm older than you. I'm the stupid, selfless hero. I'm supposed to die first. Wake up!"

Silence pervaded the hillside.

"Help!" I screamed, although I knew it was stupid and useless to do so.

There wasn't anyone for miles. I brushed his blonde hair from his face and starting CPR again. I still received no response. I started to panic, more than I was before. "Toby!" I cried, shaking him. I didn't have any ambrosia on me. Then I remembered the backpack.

I dug through it also I found my med, drinking it quickly and discard it; I emptied it out completely, digging around for ambrosia or nectar. I found our canteen, which barely had a few drops left. I needed it too, but at that moment I didn't care. I dribbled it into Toby's open mouth, nearly hysterical, and tried my best to wake him up. The nectar dripped down the side of his mouth and wasn't swallowed. I got out the energy bar from my pocket and tore open the wrapping, breaking off a piece and shoving it into his mouth. I worked his jaw up and down, making him chew it, but it hardly worked.

It had already been at least five minutes. Toby was dead. I couldn't believe it, though, and refused to let him die. I would have knelt there forever, trying to wake him back up, if I hadn't felt a hand on my shoulder. I turned, for a moment thinking Toby's ghost was saying goodbye.

What I saw were sneakers. I followed up the pant leg to the sympathetic gray eyes staring down at me. My wise girl, my girlfriend, Annabeth Chase.

"We've got him now"

My blood felt as if it was fire, and I was glad when the sweet relief of unconsciousness hit me, and I fell into a world of darkness and forgotten memories.

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