Erm, I don't own Percy, Harry Potter, or Sigmund Freud.
Chapter 3
My Accomplice Is A Hairnet Thief
We both collapsed on the bench of the nearest bus stop, which wasn't too far away considering it was a school we'd just escaped from. It was the first opportunity I'd had to speak to Rachael since we left the building. I needed to give her instructions urgently, but I waited for her to catch her breath first. She had yet to say anything since our near demise, and I'd anticipated the moment when she would drop to her knees, shocked and frightened and refusing to go on, but it'd never happened. She'd followed my every direction and instruction, despite the fact that she'd seemed like a stubborn individual when we'd first met. I hoped that obedience would hold out as I guided her for the last time.
"Okay," I said, turning to her. She looked up, eyes wide and unblinking. "First of all: you're not crazy. Yes, that was a monster, and yes, you might see more in your lifetime, but you probably won't have to deal them."
She nodded, gaping, and I took that as a sign to continue.
"Second of all: not everyone can see them. You are special in that aspect, but that doesn't make you weird," I added, thinking of my mom. If Sally Jackson was weird for seeing things the way that they were, then the rest of the world be damned. Rachael nodded again, so again, I continued.
"And, lastly, there is a bus coming in approximately five minutes to this stop." I had already checked the schedule posted above the bench. "I will stay here to see you safely on, and then you'll probably never see me again, or those monsters. They were after me, not you." I finished, taking a deep breath so that she could digest the info. She didn't nod; instead, she stared off into space, concentrating deeply on a dilemma in her head. I recognized the intelligent, cognitive expression she wore as the same one my mom had every time I bought her Evil level Sudoku puzzles.
Rachael spoke for the first time since we'd started running, and whatever it was I'd been expecting, it wasn't what she said.
"Take me with you."
I blinked at her. "Wha…"
"Take me with you," she repeated. It was my turn to gape.
"But, if you come with me, those monsters will be on your tail for miles! You can still escape, so why would you want to come with me, a complete stranger? For all you know, I could be a lunatic." At least, that's what the papers tended to say every time I made the news.
"The thing is that I think those… things might be after me," she said, shivering in the hot mid-day sun.
"No, they were-" I shook my head, but she interrupted me.
"Just hear me out for a second. I'm about ninety-nine percent sure I've seen that girl-thing before at least a dozen times this week, following me around. Not just that, but the shadows, everywhere I went, seemed to… move. And, I have horrible nightmares of un-seeable things, screeching and hissing at me like that monster did." She paused, paling as she seemed to remember the nightmares that sounded very similar to the ones I had. "Why else would she have attacked me the way that she did?" she concluded.
I was shocked. Could this girl be a demigod? I asked myself. All I knew is that, if she was indeed something special, I needed to get her to Chiron. Arriving at camp alone would determine if she was completely mortal, for, if that was the case, she wouldn't even be able to get beyond the border barriers.
"Before you throw yourself into something as dangerous as following me to a place I haven't even told you about yet, you need to seriously ask yourself whether or not there's a good reason monsters would be after you," I said, trying to be Annabeth-reasonable. I was skeptical: all the reasons she had given me thus far could be linked to an over-active imagination, which I felt there was a good chance this girl had. If I was going to take her across the county, I wanted to be sure I wasn't endangering her life, and mine, for nothing.
She swallowed. "There's a good reason," she said guardedly, as if unwilling to share it with me. I waited for her to explain when she suddenly lifted up her left forearm. She pulled down the worn, lumpy sleeve to expose her bare arm.
Clamped tightly to her skin was sparkling, silver, net-like object. It looked a bit like a hairnet, wrapped so tightly around her arm that it was cutting in slightly, and embedded into its threads were gems that glittered with an ethereal luminosity far exceeding that of mortal diamonds. I reached out cautiously to touch it with my index finger and felt a familiar feeling of overwhelming power, almost to point that I thought I might be reduced to ashes if I lingered too long in contact with it. I also felt a familiar feeling of dread, for I knew then three things:
One, this object belonged to a God.
Two, Gods do not take lightly to their possessions being misplaced, even if it's their own fault (trust me; I've had personal experience).
And three, I was in far more danger being with this girl than she was being with me.