Leo's vacation was starting to turn a little sour.
"Um, what?" Leo sputtered, absolutely confused. "W-what's the matter guys?"
Jason's eyebrows managed to go further down his face. "Hey, man. It's not you—"
"It's him." Piper accused, pointing a finger in Jason's direction.
"No, you're just being unfair! You were on the other team—"
"And I'm your girlfriend! You're not supposed to freaking slash me with your dumb sword!"
"Reyna never minded. She was a great leader, never letting her fellow Romans confuse her during battle."
"Oh, so Reyna's a better girlfriend than me?"
"I never said that! Jeesh!"
Leo put his arm between the couple. "Hold on, hold on. What in Olympus is going on? You guys are supposed to be tight."
Hazel sighed. "Well, it began with the war game…"
Leo's eyes widened. "Oh man, this doesn't sound good."
Piper growled again. "No. Let me explain it."
"Nuh-uh. You'll tell it the wrong way, just like a girl." Jason protested.
Piper snarled, and this time Hazel looked angry too. "What do you mean by that?" They demanded.
Frank shrugged. "Well… you girls do stretch the truth a little…" He stopped when he saw the look on the two girl's faces.
"Excuse me?" Piper snapped. She shook her head and turned to more important matters. "Leo, come with me. Let me talk to you."
Her charmspeak flooded his mind and Leo nodded. "Yeah, sure."
"Not fair. Cheater!" Jason spat.
Piper shrugged off the comment. She grabbed Leo's hand, pulling him away. "Come," she insisted.
Leo obliged. He followed her to someplace in CampJupiter, not paying any attention to where he was going. Jason, Frank, and Hazel (and Calypso) stormed behind. They weren't going to let Piper do all the talking, especially when things were this big.
By the time the charmspeak wore off, Leo found himself in the middle of a field, most likely the Field of Mars.
Piper turned around and faced him. "Okay now, listen."
She told the story with some interjections from the others. Basically, there was a war game in camp and Jason and Piper joined in. Jason was on one team and Piper the other. Jason was in enemy territory, almost to the flag. Piper was standing guard someplace and Jason, being the rule follower he was, went through Piper with his golden sword to get to the flag.
Piper was mad because Jason had injured her, and Jason was mad because he just followed the rules and didn't let who his enemy was stop him from trying to achieve victory for him team.
The two wanted to know on who's side Leo was. But being both their best friend, he couldn't do this to them. If he chose one, the other would hate him for who knows how long.
He tried to explain why both were right. "Well, Jason, she is your chick and she is a girl which means she's a little more delicate than we are."
"Delicate?" Piper snapped.
"Um, no no, not at all." Leo said quickly. "But Piper, Jason is on the other team, and being a good team member, he shouldn't care who his enemy is. Plus, it's just a game guys, chill!"
"It's not just a game! I got sliced by my boyfriend!"
"And you got taken care of by the infirmary!"
Piper lifted her shirt up to a little over her bellybutton. "Do you see this scar?!" But there wasn't one.
"UGH!" she groaned. "Mom! You are so not helping! AND AREN'T YOU THE GODDESS OF FREAKING LOVE LIVES?!"
Hazel looked at Piper with worried eyes. "Piper, please. Calm down."
Piper took a deep breath. "Okay. What in all of Hades—no offense, do you want me to do?"
Hazel groaned and whispered something in her ear.
Piper opened her eyes wide and exclaimed, "I am not!" In a quieter voice she muttered, "Maybe it is. So what?"
Hazel and even Calypso sighed. "It means you need to calm down!"
"B-but!" Piper sputtered. "Arg! Fine!" She stormed off toward New Rome probably to where she was staying and disappeared from Leo's sight.
"Wow." He said. "What did you ask her?"
The two remaining girls looked down and blushed. "Um, nothing."
He looked at Frank and Jason who both shrugged. At least Jason looked calmed down.
"Okay bro," Leo said to the son of Zeus—Jupiter, whatever. "Are you alright?"
Jason shrugged again. "Yeah. Just a little stressed about things, being the ambassador for both camps. I don't feel like I belong in either. I'm Roman, but in some ways I like the Greek style better. Definitely not very Roman…"
Frank put his hand on Jason's shoulder. "It's okay, dude. I think you're a pretty great Roman. You were made Praetor here too. That counts for a lot."
Jason sighed. "Yeah, you're right. We're just over-reacting."
Leo grinned. "Yeah, you two were. No go kiss her and make up."
So Jason followed Piper's path back to the main area, leaving the four behind.
Calypso snorted. "That was fun." She said sarcastically. "Nice start to a vacation."
Hazel gasped. "Oh no, you're right! I'm so sorry! If only we had dealt with them earlier-!"
Leo shoved Hazel playfully on the shoulder. "Hey, don't worry about it. I'm sure Sammy would have turned this into something hilarious."
An awkward silence followed at the sound of Leo's great-grandfather's name. He was also Hazel's almost-boyfriend when she was alive the first time.
"Um, I'm sorry."
"No, it's alright." Hazel straightened herself up. "Let's show you to our place." She took Frank by the hand and walked off to New Rome, Calypso and Leo tagging behind.
Frank and Hazel shared a small place in New Rome, near the collage. It had three bedrooms, one for each and a guest.
"You can take the room." Leo told Calypso.
"No, it's okay. You can have it. I'm small enough to fit on the couch just fine." Calypso insisted.
Leo shook his head. "You need your privacy, and I'm tough," He pretended to puff up his chest. "I can manage one stinky little couch.
"Hey," Frank sniffed. "I picked out that couch!"
"Not what I mean, Frank."
"Oh, right."
Calypso giggled. "Oh, fine. I'll take the bedroom. But don't complain when you can't fit on the couch."
"I thought I was too scrawny."
"Well, maybe you aren't."
Leo grinned and slung his arm across her shoulder. "Since when wasn't I?"
Calypso blushed furiously. "I don't know. And that matters why?"
"Oh, nothing. Maybe it was the day you started crushin' on the Leo?"
She turned ever redder. "I am not 'crushing' on you. Whatever you decide to call it is Minotaur bull."
"Come on, I know you want me! Team Leo for the win! I'm the hot stuff!" Leo joked.
Hazel snorted. "You sound the sane as when you were trying to get those crazy nymphs to like you. And do you remember Echo? She was nice."
Leo froze. He could feel Calypso tensing up underneath his arm.
"Oh?" She asked in a hard voice. "That sounds like an interesting tale. A whole crowd of pretty Team Leo nymphs."
"Um, did I... say something wrong?" Hazel squeaked.
That was the wrong thing to blurt out. Nothing like a bad-move than to tell a girl the guy she may or may not like that he was trying to get other girls to like him.
"Um," Hazel stammered. Frank was sitting on the couch, awkwardly watching the little scene. "Actually, they were all still on Narcissus's side. We just needed them to like Leo better so Narcissus wouldn't look at himself. He was there and Echo was trying to help him not die again."
"Mm-hm." Leo winced. Not really going so well, he thought. And right when I was almost there too. "They were all in his favor. Team Leo consisted of just me and Hazel. We just were there to get the celestial bronze away from Narcissus."
"Yeah. Sounds like a fun story. You should tell me the juicer detail sometime later." Calypso forced a smile and walked to the guest bedroom. "I'll put my stuff away. If you need me to cook or something, just ask."
Leo's vacation trip with Calypso was off to a pretty bad start.
A/N: and I am sooo sorry about the very late update. Tuesday and Wednesday my dad cut off the internet again and so I could not post. Things in school are getting pretty heavy which means more homework so I probably won't update as often. Maybe once a week or something. I don't have a chapter ready for tomorrow, but I'll post again as soon as possible.
Again, super sorry,
Melanie
