Chapter 7: A whole lot of advice
Long time no see, right? I've got there eventually. It was a nightmare writing this chapter because of how I wrote the last one. I didn't want to go back and change it, so I had to struggle getting something that worked with it, with no contradictions anywhere. But here we are for you. Enjoy!
Chiron faced the remaining campers around me, knowing that he was probably about to face further probing about the meeting that had just taken place. Annabeth was the one to speak first.
"I take it that you know exactly what's going on out there, just like you knew about the Romans and the Egyptians" Chiron surprisingly shook his head,
"My dear Annabeth, I may seem to be wise and powerful, but even someone as old as me has their limits. You are right when you say that I knew about things that you did not, I still do, but I cannot help you now."
Annabeth looked stunned by Chiron's news, I could tell, but she eventually nodded and looked down at her feet. Percy wrapped his arm around her to comfort her as best he could.
"What I don't understand" began Piper "is what he's got to do with this."
She meant me. I was going to retort back but Will beat me to it.
"Hey Piper, be fair, Haxolo might have nothing to do with it at all. There isn't anything to say otherwise."
"No, I guess not, but I think that it's freaky coincidence that he loses all memory of his past life, comes back to camp, picks up a sword of the underworld and another Great Prophecy is spoken, hurting Rachel in the process."
Chiron held up his hands to calm everyone down, then he spoke to her softly.
"As I have previously states to Annabeth, I simply do not know whether this is coincidence or not. I am sorry that I cannot help you any further, perhaps you should go organise your cabin, tell them about the quest and everything else that was discussed."
"Yes Chiron." and Piper promptly left the Big House, leaving the rest of us here to ask Chiron like, a thousand questions that he probably wouldn't answer. Leo hadn't spoken for a while so when he did it kinda surprised me.
"So err...what exactly would we do on this quest? It's not like we have a specific task or anything."
"That, is a very good question. The best option would be to try and gather information relating to the contents of the prophecy. As you mentioned, we don't have an official quest so the rules may have to be bent for a while."
Leo's childish grin crept across his face.
"Now that's something I can do! Thanks Chiron!" Leo got up and ran out of the door so fast I was tempted to shout "arriba! Ándale, ándale!" but I held my tongue. I guess that was going to be Will's question too, because he got up to go, closely followed by Nico.
I decided to go next, because nobody else seemed to bother.
"I would like to ask you about me. What does the sword mean? Why is everyone against the underworld?"
"Not a lot of nice things come from the underworld; it is a place where the dead gather after all, and many monsters dwell down there. That being said, good things happen there too. You must try to accept that, if you are a child from the underworld, people will be scared of you because people fear death. As for the sword..."Chiron merely gave a shrug, offering no more advice.
That made some sense, and yet I got a feeling that it was totally unfair to judge someone based on their background. Then again Chiron was trying to be nice so I said thanks and got up, leaving the rest of them to ask whatever they felt like.
I'm not sure what I expected from that meeting to be honest but the more it went on the more restless I became. When I left the Big House the tension between campers became more obvious as I looked around, but I just kept walking down to the ocean that I had spotted on the tour around. If you ask me, the ocean is a pretty standard place, but nevertheless, I walked to the ocean regardless. As I got there I just stood there, occasionally lobbing pebbles across the surface.
"Hey! You made your way down to my spot I see?" It was Percy, the teen from the meeting earlier. From the looks of things he was at least eighteen, if not twenty, definitely old enough for uni. I didn't know what to make of him at the time, but I can say from later experience that he's pretty decent now.
"Oh hiya. I just had to get out and away for a bit, and there wasn't many other places that looked nice so I came here"
Percy shrugged.
"Well I find the sea to be pretty sweet. I'm glad you like it."
I looked at him and noticed that his arm had a tattoo of some kind.
"So uh, what's up with the markings?"
"You mean the arm" He rolled up his sleeve more to get a better look "I got that well over two years back, when us guys here found out about the Roman camp I got switched with my old buddy Jason. Of course it wasn't good enough for us to be swapped. Noo, we had to lose our memories too."
What was that? I stared at him in disbelief.
"So it's happening again? That can't be right!"
"Nah, our memories were stolen, you just got wiped clean like a whiteboard."
I tried to take that in. After I had understood I decided to change the subject.
"Some people seem to be worried by what's up at the moment, especially Annabeth."
"Yeah, well she is Athena's daughter, so if she doesn't know about it, she gets pretty angsty. Then again that's what I'm for, calming her down, giving her something to focus her attention on, let her call me names, y'know, the works. But the point is, if you'd seen a lot of weird stuff happen in about two weeks, with a new great prophecy and all, I'm sure that you'd be freakin' out too"
Percy had a good point and I knew I'd feel the same.
"Yeah, I guess so. You know what? You should become some kind of psychoanalyst or something."
"Pfft! Like Hades am I doing that! Anyway, I came down here for a swim, wanna come?"
"Say what!? No way, I'm alright really, don't let me stop you."
And with that, Percy immersed himself in the water and swam out, leaving me alone once again on the shore. I made my way back up to where the cabins were, and although I thought my day couldn't get any more complicated, I found myself face to face with a girl in the fire.