Chapter 12:

AJ circled Clarisse, stalking her like a lion would its prey. Then he charged. He thrashed at her ruthlessly with his daggers as Clarisse blocked. Then he leapt away from her as she pulled out a spear from her belt.

Sadie noticed electricity flowing through the ends. Sadie wasn't sure if electrocuting a person counted as maiming, but Sadie was worried from the look Clarisse was giving AJ that she didn't care.

Clarisse charged AJ this time. All AJ could do was duck and try to avoid her attacks.

Clarisse still wasn't backing down, she kept attacking AJ. Eventually she managed to hit him with the electric end of the spear on his arm. Sadie could see him wincing in pain but he kept up his defenses.

AJ then attacked Clarisse again, this time he was aiming for her leg. Sadie saw him give Clarisse a dark grin before punching her very hard on the leg. Clarisse didn't look like she was one who normally showed pain, so it was surprising to see her fall to the ground on her bruised leg and grimace.

"You're going to pay for that pretty boy," Clarisse said in a menacing tone. Her teeth were gritted and her eyebrows were furrowed.

"This battle is already over," AJ said giving her a dark smile before charging again.

Clarisse tried to block his attacks but AJ kicked her hard on her injured leg making her drop her spear.

Sadie and the others were in shock at what they witnessed. Clarisse was sending deathly glares at AJ as she clutched her injured leg.

Then Sadie saw Carter running like a maniac as skeletons with swords chased after him. Sadie almost laughed at the sight. The whistle blew and Sadie knew that his team had managed to win.

Sadie smiled and quickly ran up to her brother giving him a pat on his head in approval, "Good job wise guy," she said to him.

Sadie then saw a scowling Nico exiting the forest. He approached Carter and gave his approval, "That was a good fight; you managed to outrun my soldiers."

Carter smiled at all the attention he was getting, "You put up a nice fight. It was terrifying seeing the earth open up and skeletons coming out."

Sadie went over to where AJ was standing. He and CJ were talking to Clarisse about their fight.

"I assumed you two were just all looks and no bite," Clarisse said, "However next time I'm going to completely destroy you."

AJ gave her a cocky smile, "Definitely. And then I hope you still won't be hurt. Your left leg is injured, am I right?"

Clarisse reddened and scowled, walking away with a few tough looking guys whom Sadie guessed were her brothers.

Sadie then realized why AJ had attacked her leg so much. He had taken advantage of the injury. She wasn't too happy about that, it seemed unnecessarily cruel. She was glad that Clarisse didn't seem permanently injured though.

Sadie didn't want to make too much of a fuss about things and congratulated both him and CJ on their win.

AJ, CJ and Carter got a lot more attention diverted to them the rest of the afternoon. A lot of campers would come up to them and ask them to show them their daggers or ask about Egyptian life.

Sadie stayed back and let them bask in the attention.

"How did you think I did?" Nico asked Sadie as he sat down next to her at the guest table in the dining pavilion.

Sadie didn't really know how he fought. She had only seen the skeletons he summoned. Though, Carter told her that Nico was pretty amazing at fighting, he had more than just the ability to summon skeletons. "I wish I could've seen more, Carter said you were amazing."

Nico smiled. "Well I don't know about amazing, but I guess I was pretty awesome. Well, I guess you can say I'm amazing," Nico said in a playful tone.

"Way to stay modest dirt boy," Sadie said playfully nudging him.

"Are you guys going to stay the night?" Nico asked still smiling at her.

Sadie had forgotten that they hadn't told Nico of the change of plans. She told him about Zia and CJ, Carter and Bast's plan to go to the Land of the Dead.

"Since you're spending the night you're going to need somewhere to sleep. You can sleep with me," He said before blushing. "I mean! Not like that!"

Sadie laughed at his embarrassment from his miswording.

"I meant do you want to stay in my cabin? There are a few beds in there so you don't have to share a bed with me. I mean you can't share a bed with me!" Nico was bright pink, making Sadie laugh even harder as he sat there in his usual black skull and crossbones t-shirt and black pants. She thought he looked funny and a cute when he let his guard down.

"I'll ask AJ where he wants to sleep," Sadie said after she finally stopped laughing.

Nico's face darkened and he nodded, "Oh okay, tell me what you decide later..." Then he got up and left Sadie sitting there.

Suddenly Sadie could smell a familiar perfume scent around her, Drew.

"What do you want this time Drew?" Sadie said without turning around.

Drew sat next to her and Sadie looked at her to see her with an almost maniacal grin on her face. "Oooooo! Does your boyfriend know that you have a crush on Nico?" She said enthusiastically.

Sadie blushed at the accusation. "I don't know what you're talking about," she lied.

"Sure you do," Drew said, her grin becoming bigger, "If I had a boyfriend like yours I wouldn't be two-timing with some loser. That's just me though, some girls can't help themselves."

Sadie glared at her, "I'm not two-timing with anyone, Nico and I are just friends."

"Just friends, right… You know if you keep telling yourself that it doesn't mean that it'll come true, love doesn't work that way," Drew said giggling before she got up and left leaving a miserable Sadie sitting on the bench taking in what Drew had just told her.

Sadie found AJ amongst a group of people. Sadie didn't want Drew's words to bug her as much as they did, but they had made her feel guilty. She wondered if she was being a good girlfriend. AJ never even flirted with other girls, and Sadie was doing it all the time with Nico.

She decided she was going to be there for him more. And to be a good girlfriend, she was also going to make an effort in trying to not get to comfortable with Nico. She still wanted them to be friends, but she couldn't allow nothing more to happen. It wasn't fair to AJ.

Carter, CJ and Bast left before dinner to make their flight.

Chiron told Sadie and AJ that they could sit at the big table with him and a girl named Rachel.

Sadie took a seat opposite of Rachel and next to AJ. Sadie thought Rachel seemed like a nice person. She had crazy red hair, freckles and green eyes. Sadie liked her eccentric look; she wore a large pink t-shirt with a hoodie that had ears on the hood, and jeans that were scribbled on.

"Hey," Sadie said to her as Rachel was absentmindedly drawing pictures into her food.

Rachel looked up at her and gave her a quizzical look, "You two are the Egyptian magicians."

It wasn't a question but Sadie nodded, "Why do you sit at this table? Don't you have a parent who's a god too?"

"I don't have one. I'm a normal mortal shockingly. But I have a special skill in divination so Lord Apollo made me the Oracle of Delphi."

"You're like my mother!" Sadie exclaimed. She knew that people who had the power of divination were rare, her mother being the only one for a while. It was exciting to find another person with the trait.

Rachel looked at her confused.

"She has the ability of divination. I wonder if it's different than yours though," Sadie pondered.

Rachel looked at her interested, "Does she make lots of prophecies?"

Sadie honestly didn't know. Besides what she learned about her mother predicting chaos would return and destroy the earth if the House of Life didn't accept the gods.

"I honestly don't remember," Sadie said sadly, "She died when I was 6-years old."

"I'm sorry, I didn't know," Rachel said giving her a sympathetic look.

Sadie didn't like the pity she always received when she told people this, people would always say they were sorry. She understood they meant well but there was nothing to be apologetic for. Her mother's death was tragic and if everything worked out, it would not be in vain.

"It's okay. What sort of prophecies have you made?" Sadie asked trying to change the subject.

"Well currently there's a prophecy that the world may end in fire or storm. That's why we sent 7 half bloods to fight the giants," Rachel explained, "I think it was a pretty good prophecy for my first few minutes on the job. I also knew that you were coming here."

Sadie wondered if somehow the two prophecies were connected.

"My mother saw that in the future chaos would consume the world if the House of Life, they're like the leaders of magicians, didn't accept the Egyptian gods," said Sadie, "If the world fell to chaos it would sort of be like the world ending in fire or storm right?"

Rachel shrugged, "I honestly only have feelings about some things that a prophesize. I can only see and help so much. In this case, I have a feeling that we are somehow connected. Like us being here is important somehow. But I'm not entirely sure."

Rachel drifted off as she spoke and went back to drawing pictures into her meal. Sadie peeked at her plate to see that she arranged her ketchup and mustard to look like fire surrounding a decapitated hot dog.

"Well that's creepy," Sadie whispered to AJ.

After dinner Chiron showed them to their rooms in the Big House. Sadie drifted off to sleep and dreamt of fire trying to consume a large hotdog as people screamed in the distance.

(Shifting to Nico!)

It had been two days since Carter, CJ and Bast had left. AJ and Sadie had managed to contact all of their recruits who would arrive later in the day. Though the need for the recruits had decreased; after the magicians had arrived no monsters had attacked the camp.

Nico woke up depressed. He had the worst luck in the world, his mother was killed when he was 11-years old, which was over 70 years ago, his sister was also dead, his dad was unapproachable, he was stuck eating cereal every day, and the girl he liked was already dating someone else.

He woke up early and headed to the showers so he wouldn't run into anyone. After he was finished he set off to the dining hall, hoping it would be empty. Of course because he had the worst luck in the world he just had to run into the one person who he was angry at, AJ.

"Hey," AJ said smiling politely at him. Nico hated how AJ treated him nicely, as if they couldn't just hate each other and be done with it. Nico also wondered if it was just an act, he had a feeling AJ was only being nice to him because of Sadie.

Nico nodded at him politely and grabbed a plate of food and then he went over to the fire and picked out sausage and eggs as an offering to his father. He ate quickly so that he could go somewhere private.

After finishing his meal Nico walked through the forest, embracing the darkness and mysterious sounds that would've scared anyone but him. He sat down next to a tree, deciding to skip the classes at camp and another day at school.

As he was drifting off to sleep he heard sudden noise and someone was screaming his name. Nico opened his eyes to see Percy, Jason and Annabeth in front of him. They weren't really in front of him though, they were using Iris messaging.

"Nico? Is that you?" Annabeth asked him frantically.

"Annabeth! And yeah, it's me Nic. You did call me right?" said Nico.

Nico saw Annabeth smack Percy's arm, "See I told you to specify who you wanted to talk to, you can't just say "Camp Half-Blood!"" Annabeth said screaming at him, "That was our last drachma Seaweed Brain!"

Nico noticed the panic and worry on their faces, something was terribly wrong, "What's up you guys? You all seem like you're in trouble."

"That's because we are Nico. We needed to talk to Chiron but I guess you'll have to do. You know the Egyptian monsters that were attacking us at camp? Well there are a ton of them here. It's almost like they're teaming up with the giants, we're not going to make it if this keeps up," Annabeth said to Nico, panic evident in her voice.

"We need backup," Jason said from the back as he looked over his shoulder nervously.

"Wait,what about the prophecy? It only called for 7, that's why the rest of us couldn't go. I don't think we can go against the prophecy, can we?" Nico asked.

"We will die here if we don't get help, and the giants and Gaia will destroy the earth. At this point we have to go against the prophecy," Annabeth said desperately. Nico heard a ding and the three of them groaned, "We don't have much time, tell Chiron to send help Nico, you guys are our only hope."

Then the Iris message dissolved. Panicked, Nico got up from the ground and ran as fast as he could to the Big House. His friends were in danger; it was probably only days before they would become too overwhelmed with monsters.

Running inside he shouted for Chiron. Sadie entered the hallway looking at him confused, "Chiron's not here. He said he had to leave for Olympus all day."

"We have to go find him! It's an emergency," Nico said grabbing Sadie's wrist and ran out the house dragging her with him.

Sadie managed to knock him off of her by the time they reached the top of Half-Blood Hill.

"What's your problem?" Sadie asked angrily as she rubbed her wrist where he had grabbed her roughly.

Nico scolded himself; he had gotten ahead of himself. "My friends are in trouble. They messaged me just before and told me that Egyptian monsters are starting to team up with the giants. They're not going to survive if we don't help them and the earth might not either. I have to tell Chiron that we have to go help them, and if he's at Olympus that's where we have to go."

Nico was relieved when Sadie said she understood and would go with him.

AN:/ Sorry this took longer than usual to post.

At iHATEfangirls: Well we still don't know who would really win because of Clarisse's injuries. I'd say they're almost even, but with Clarisse being stronger and AJ being more tactful. I want to write another fighting scene in the future though, so maybe we'll see! I think the Egyptians would be a bit more strategic in battle due to them using magic along with fighting. Thanks for reviewing! :)

At ILuvZarter: It'll kind of be a few chapters before Annabeth and Percy come. And I was thinking about having the hunters come to camp to also have a battle but I'm not sure exactly where to put them because of the order of events. But I'm definitely going to have the hunters appear, just not sure when.

Thanks for favoriting/alerting/reviewing! ^_^