Chapter 8: Let's never give up.

Percy looked over at Chris Rodriguez whose face was bright red and eyes were gleaming. Their eyes met and Percy felt a sense of renewed friendship. He'd forgotten those times with Chris, Castor, and Pollux. His heart ached even more at the sadness of not being around Castor more before he died. But at least he regained those moments, they were still precious to him.

Weeks passed, which felt like years. All the excitement from the past summer was basically gone. The choir met, but the enthusiasm was gone. Three other boys had a family member pass away on September 11th.

Travis and Connor tried to get everyone happy again, they'd set off stink bombs or eat all the food. But no one reacted.

Everyone was down in the dumps.

"Everyone, the Choir Olympics is in three days. You guys sound terrible. Awful. John, when I say sing with vibrato, I don't mean shaking your head quickly to get your voice to shake. Aaron when I say don't punch Castor and Pollux on their head, that doesn't mean it's okay slap them on their heads," Sir O groaned and then looked at Percy, "And Percy, it's obvious when you aren't singing because the soprano section sounds like a group of constipated cats."

"Well that's encouraging," Pollux said rolling his eyes as he was leaning back in his seat.

"Why don't we just cancel going this year," said Michael Yew. Michael had been older than Will, but because he was tiny (even tinier than Percy), he only recently after Will's departure became the leader of the group.

Sir O shook his head, "We can't, I forgot to mention this to you but the choir ends after this event."

Everyone jumped out of their seats in surprise.

"What? Why?" everyone asked at the same time.

Sir O slowly walked over to the large grand piano and sat on the bench, "I am no longer needed here by the higher ups, they're almost finished with what they're doing and so I'm returning to my home. My cold and depressing home."

"What higher ups! Why don't you tell them to come down here and have them talk to me!" Aaron shouted puffing his chest out as Travis and Connor patted him on his back in approval.

"Yeah, send them here and we'll take care of them," added Connor.

Sir O laughed and shook his head, "I'm afraid you're all a little out of their league. Anyways, that's why we have to compete. Don't you all want to finish knowing after everything that's happened you accomplished something. When I was a young man-"

A few people groaned but Sir O continued his speech, "When I was a young man I was madly in love with a woman. We married and lived happily together for many years."

"Woah you were married Sir O? What happened she left you?" Aaron asked grinning.

Sir O looked a little peeved, but mostly sad as he continued, "No, she died."

Aaron slumped back in his chair guiltily.

"She fell and was bitten by a venomous snake. I suffered years living in pain. I refused to sing after that. I refused to play music. For what was music when the light of my world was gone?"

Everyone shifted in their seats as they all for once felt genuinely bad for Sir O.

"I wondered around for years after that, contemplated taking my life. Well many long years passed and then I was visited by my father. He gave me his instrument and asked me to play. I declined at first but then later began to play.

I put my soul into the song it became my favorite song, it was a song for Eurydice."

"Like that woman who died in that story," whispered someone from behind Percy.

Sir O continued, "After that I realized all the years I had wasted sorrowfully wallowing in my own pity I was sent here, to help others who possibly are just wasting away not using their talents. Not growing but just waiting. I don't want any of you to become like me."

After he said that he got up and left the room leaving everyone to think about what he had just said.

After a few moments of silence Connor stood up and went to the front of the room, "You guys I think I know what we have to do."

Travis joined his brother, "Yeah! We can't let Sir O think everything was for nothing. I don' t know about the rest of you but me and Connor were headed for a terrible future. Our mom said we'd be in jail by the time we were 10. And well look at us now, I'm 10 and he's 11. We have only almost been in jail thanks to Sir O!"

Everyone laughed and energy started flowing through the room. Percy was also getting interested in what they were saying. He also didn't want everything to be for nothing, he wanted to prove not only to everyone but himself that he could do something incredible.

"We are going to practice all day and everyday until the event and we are going to win!" Connor screamed.

Everyone erupted into cheers. Travis and Connor started setting off party poppers (where they got them from nobody knew).

Sir O came down to see where the ruckus was coming from and to make sure everyone wasn't killing each other.

"Sir O, please teach us. We really want to win and we need your help," John said with everyone nodding and shouting out their agreement.

Sir O looked at us stunned. Then a smile broke out onto his face, "Well then, let's get to it!"

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For the days leading up to the competition everyone practiced their hardest. The boys decided to stay at Sir O's house with their parent's permission so that they could stay longer to practice.

Percy, Aaron and Michael were selected to be the main soloist for the song that originally also featured Will and Chris. Resulting in them having to practice much longer than everyone.

Percy was excited to compete. He felt he was singing his very best, even Sir O complimented him on his progress.

It was the two nights before the competition and Sir O was allowing a party to be held for all choristers. Even Cleepy came, though he was mainly sitting in the kitchen complaining about how loud everyone was.

"Let's play a game of tag," suggested a boy named Ryan.

Everyone groaned, over the past few days they had played at least 200 games of tag. Connor and Travis were even playing it in the sleep.

"We should ride bikes," suggested Castor, "And go to the lake a few blocks down," added Pollux.

"That sounds fun," Percy chimed in, he liked water. Some boys were pyrotechnics, he was a hydrotechnic.

Everyone else agreed, except Ryan who insisted on a game of tag.

They rode bikes, that were wither stolen by Travis and Connor or dropped off by their parents, to the creek. Along the way they were playing cowboys and horses as they tried to kick each other off from their bikes.

Once they reached the lake they all got off and started a game of skipping rocks.

"This is boring, let's have a little fun," Travis said grinning to his brother. Suddenly they both grabbed Pollux and threw him into the lake, laughing in amusement.

"POLLUX!" screamed Castor as he tried to reach down and grab his brother who was flailing, "He can't swim you dumb butts save him!"

Percy reacted without thinking, one minute he was on the ground the next he was in the cold water. The shock of his body in the cold lake consumed him for a moment and then he got his bearings. He quickly swam over to wear Castor was now starting to sink and grabbed him, which was very hard to do considering Castor was 3 times his size.

Percy focused on keeping Castor's head out of the water which was hard to do when Castor kept flailing. Finally with help from everyone on surface they were lifted onto the ground.

Castor ran to his brother to makes sure he was okay, and Michael went over to Connor and Travis and punched them both on the face, which was a site seeing as Michael being only 4'2" and Connor and Travis about 5'6".

"That wasn't cool at all guys," Michael said to the two brothers who were holding their cheeks in pain on the ground.

"We didn't know he couldn't swim," Travis said defensive.

"Yeah, we wouldn't have if we'd known, I thought everyone could swim."

Percy was still angry at the Stolls for being so reckless that he went over to wear Connor was sitting and pushed him into the lake.
Everyone laughed as Connor screamed from the coldness of the water.

"You're dead Jackson!" Connor screamed at Percy while trying to splash him with water. Travis then came behind Percy and pushed him in, Percy grabbed Travis's wrist as he was falling over making them both enter the water with a splash.

Other choir members began to jump in the lake and they had a splash battle, everyone laughing forgetting the earlier incident.

After a half an hour had passed they decided to head back to the house for food. Upon entering they were greeted by the shouts of an angry Sir O who was wondering why all of his party guests left before he was going to perform.

Later that night after all the partying was over, and they were forced to get some rest by Sir O, Percy smiled to himself in the darkness taking in the day. Then he drifted off into happy dreams.