Chapter 13!
Hades should take cover, Poseidon will be out for ichor.
I don't own Percy Jackson!
Enjoy the story!
Last time: Zeus slammed the book shut. "That's the end of that chapter." He said relieved that he was done reading. Without even looking he tossed the book towards Hades.
Hades read the chapter title to himself, glanced at Poseidon and gulped.
Now:
13 I PLUNGE TO MY DEATH
As he read that, Hades noticed that Poseidon started to glare at the book, and Percy, had paled considerably.
We spent two days on the Amtrak train, heading west through hills, over rivers, past amber waves of grain.
Percy and Jason just shake their heads, like their shaking away bad memories. Piper meanwhile just rolled her eyes at the two.
We weren't attacked once, but I didn't relax. I felt that we were traveling around in a display case, being watched from above and maybe from below, that something was waiting for the right opportunity.
"Paranoia at it's finest!"
I tried to keep a low profile because my name and pic-ture were splattered over the front pages of several East Coast newspapers. The Trenton Register-News showed a photo taken by a tourist as I got off the Greyhound bus. I had a wild look in my eyes. My sword was a metallic blur in my hands. It might've been a baseball bat or a lacrosse stick.
The picture's caption read:
Twelve-year-old Percy Jackson, wanted for questioning in the Long Island disappearance of his mother two weeks ago, is shown here fleeing from the bus where he accosted several elderly female passengers. The bus exploded on an east New Jersey roadside shortly after Jackson fled the scene. Based on eyewitness accounts, police believe the boy may be traveling with two teenage accomplices. His stepfather, Gabe Ugliano, has offered a cash reward for information leading to his capture.
A wave of seawater nearly drowned said stepfather.
"Don't worry," Annabeth told me. "Mortal police could never find us." But she didn't sound so sure.
Apollo and Hermes had matching looks of astonishment, "A daughter of Athena reassuring a son of Poseidon!? Run everyone the world is ending!" Everyone, except for Poseidon and Athena who just rolled their eyes, started laughing.
The rest of the day I spent alternately pacing the length of the train (because I had a really hard time sitting still) or looking out the windows.
Once, I spotted a family of centaurs galloping across a wheat field, bows at the ready, as they hunted lunch. The little boy centaur, who was the size of a second-grader on a pony, caught my eye and waved. I looked around the pas-senger car, but nobody else had noticed. The adult riders all had their faces buried in laptop computers or magazines.
Piper almost let out and 'awe!' at the mention of a little centaur, but caught herself.
Another time, toward evening, I saw something huge moving through the woods. I could've sworn it was a lion, except that lions don't live wild in America, and this thing was the size of a Hummer. Its fur glinted gold in the evening light. Then it leaped through the trees and was gone.
Thalia's eyes went wide, "You saw the Nemean lion when you were 12!?" Percy rubbed his neck. "Funny thing…" Thalia just rolled her eyes.
Our reward money for returning Gladiola the poodle had only been enough to purchase tickets as far as Denver. We couldn't get berths in the sleeper car, so we dozed in our seats. My neck got stiff. I tried not to drool in my sleep, since Annabeth was sitting right next to me.
"You still did."
Grover kept snoring and bleating and waking me up. Once, he shuffled around and his fake foot fell off. Annabeth and I had to stick it back on before any of the other passengers noticed.
Grover blushed.
"So," Annabeth asked me, once we'd gotten Grover's sneaker readjusted. "Who wants your help?"
"What do you mean?"
"When you were asleep just now, you mumbled, 'I won't help you.' Who were you dreaming about?"
I was reluctant to say anything. It was the second time I'd dreamed about the evil voice from the pit. But it bothered me so much I finally told her.
"And now the same son of Poseidon is going to her for council!" Apollo shouted dramatically.
Annabeth was quiet for a long time. "That doesn't sound like Hades. He always appears on a black throne, and he never laughs."
Suddenly Hades chuckled, proving Annabeth wrong.
"He offered my mother in trade. Who else could do that?"
"I guess ... if he meant, 'Help me rise from the Underworld.' If he wants war with the Olympians. But why ask you to bring him the master bolt if he already has it?"
"Exactly! More proof that I'm innocent!"
I shook my head, wishing I knew the answer. I thought about what Grover had told me, that the Furies on the bus seemed to have been looking for something.
Where is it? Where?
Maybe Grover sensed my emotions. He snorted in his sleep, muttered something about vegetables, and turned his head.
Annabeth readjusted his cap so it covered his horns. "Percy, you can't barter with Hades. You know that, right? He's deceitful, heartless, and greedy. I don't care if his Kindly Ones weren't as aggressive this time- "
Hazel, Hazel, Nico, Nico, and Bianca all raised their hands as if to say, 'We would like to disagree.'
"This time?" I asked. "You mean you've run into them before?"
Her hand crept up to her necklace. She fingered a glazed white bead painted with the image of a pine tree, one of her clay end-of-summer tokens. "Let's just say I've got no love for the Lord of the Dead. You can't be tempted to make a deal for your mom."
"What would you do if it was your dad?"
"That's easy," she said. "I'd leave him to rot."
Percy changed tactics, "Okay what if it was Nico?" Annabeth looked at Percy like he was crazy, "Percy you do know that Nico is Hades's son right?"
"Yes, but answer the question."
"I would try and get him back."
Percy smirked.
"You're not serious?"
Annabeth's gray eyes fixed on me. She wore the same expression she'd worn in the woods at camp, the moment she drew her sword against the hellhound. "My dad's resented me since the day I was born, Percy," she said. "He never wanted a baby. When he got me, he asked Athena to take me back and raise me on Olympus because he was too busy with his work. She wasn't happy about that. She told him heroes had to be raised by their mortal parent."
At that the people from the future and Luke all glared at Zeus. Who ignored them.
"But how ... I mean, I guess you weren't born in a hospital..."
Ares looked like he was about to answer that question, when all of the other gods shouted, "DON'T YOU DARE!" Ares wisely decided not to answer how children of Athena were born.
"I appeared on my father's doorstep, in a golden cradle, carried down from Olympus by Zephyr the West Wind. You'd think my dad would remember that as a miracle, right? Like, maybe he'd take some digital photos or some-thing. But he always talked about my arrival as if it were the most inconvenient thing that had ever happened to him. When I was five he got married and totally forgot about Athena. He got a 'regular' mortal wife, and had two 'regular' mortal kids, and tried to pretend I didn't exist."
Percy looked over to Annabeth and silently decided that even if their parents hated each other, he would become her friend.
I stared out the train window. The lights of a sleeping town were drifting by. I wanted to make Annabeth feel better, but I didn't know how.
"Awe!" Aphrodite cooed, young love was always so cute.
"My mom married a really awful guy," I told her. "Grover said she did it to protect me, to hide me in the scent of a human family. Maybe that's what your dad was thinking."
Annabeth kept worrying at her necklace. She was pinching the gold college ring that hung with the beads. It occurred to me that the ring must be her father's. I wondered why she wore it if she hated him so much.
Annabeth was mimicking her book self as she answered, "I don't hate him. I wish I could, it would be so much easier if I could, but I don't." She quietly told Percy. Who nodded in somewhat understanding.
"He doesn't care about me," she said. "His wife-my stepmom-treated me like a freak. She wouldn't let me play with her children. My dad went along with her. Whenever something dangerous happened-you know, something with monsters-they would both look at me resentfully, like, 'How dare you put our family at risk.' Finally, I took the hint. I wasn't wanted. I ran away."
The other demigods that were there, looked at Annabeth sadly. Finally Annabeth took matters into her own hands. She got up and walked over to her younger self. "I know it seems like he hates you, but I promise it will get better." Annabeth looks at Annabeth and sees the truth in her words.
"How old were you?"
"Same age as when I started camp. Seven."
"But ... you couldn't have gotten all the way to Half-Blood Hill by yourself."
"Percy! Haven't you learned anything yet! Annabeth can do anything!" Leo said while holding back a laugh.
That's when Athena spoke up. "You know for a chapter titled 'I Plunge To My Death' you aren't falling much."
Poseidon, who had somehow managed to forget the fact that Percy was supposed to die this chapter, paled. Athena smirked.
"Not alone, no. Athena watched over me, guided me toward help. I made a couple of unexpected friends who took care of me, for a short time, anyway."
Thalia, and Luke chorused, "Awe!"
I wanted to ask what happened, but Annabeth seemed lost in sad memories. So I listened to the sound of Grover snoring and gazed out the train windows as the dark fields of Ohio raced by.
"A boy who is considerate? How rare." Artemis commented, while glaring daggers at her brother, who pretended to look offended.
Toward the end of our second day on the train, June 13, eight days before the summer solstice, we passed through some golden hills and over the Mississippi River into St. Louis. Annabeth craned her neck to see the Gateway Arch, which looked to me like a huge shopping bag handle stuck on the city.
Leo and Leo's eyes widened, "I should totally build a giant shopping bag!" they chorused, before looking at each other and high-fiving.
"I want to do that," she sighed.
"No Annabeth! The giant shopping bag was our idea! You can't steal it!" the Leo's shouted.
Annabeth slapped her forehead, "I don't mean a giant shopping bag."
"What?" I asked.
"Build something like that. You ever see the Parthenon, Percy?"
"Yes and it still haunts my nightmares."
"Wrong Parthenon Seaweed Brain."
"Only in pictures."
"Someday, I'm going to see it in person. I'm going to build the greatest monument to the gods, ever. Something that'll last a thousand years."
I laughed. "You? An architect?"
"Ow! Annabeth!"
I don't know why, but I found it funny. Just the idea of Annabeth trying to sit quietly and draw all day.
"Ow! Stop hitting me!"
"Then stop being ridiculous!"
Hades stopped reading, as he and the other gods along with the mortals laughed at the fight between Annabeth and Percy. Though even they could see that neither of them was really putting any heat into the fight.
After a few more minutes everyone got settled once again and Hades reluctantly began to read again.
Her cheeks flushed. "Yes, an architect. Athena expects her children to create things, not just tear them down, like a certain god of earthquakes I could mention."
"Annabeth 1 Percy 0!" Leo shouted making everyone laugh again.
I watched the churning brown water of the Mississippi below.
"Planning to take a swim Peter?" Dionysus mocked, Percy smirked and replied, "Maybe."
"Sorry," Annabeth said. "That was mean."
Now Hermes and Apollo actually looked like they were going to freak out, Athena looked slightly outraged, and Poseidon didn't know whether to be smug or terrified.
"Can't we work together a little?" I pleaded. "I mean, didn't Athena and Poseidon ever cooperate?"
"Yea, a few times. You know before the whole Medusa incident." Apollo replied, thinking of a new haiku.
Grey vs green eyes.
Snakes and spiders will fight now.
I am so awesome.
Apollo smirked, he would have to write that down after this was over.
Annabeth had to think about it. "I guess ... the chariot," she said tentatively. "My mom invented it, but Poseidon created horses out of the crests of waves. So they had to work together to make it complete."
"Then we can cooperate, too. Right?"
"Percy they didn't willingly work together." Piper told Percy, looking at him like he was crazy. "So they still worked together." He replied, thought for a second and then said, "Though now I kind of wish they hadn't invented the chariot."
With that strange statement Hades resumed reading.
"I suppose," she said at last.
We pulled into the Amtrak station downtown. The intercom told us we'd have a three-hour layover before departing for Denver.
Grover stretched. Before he was even fully awake, he said, "Food."
"Come on, goat boy," Annabeth said. "Sightseeing."
Percy stood up and shouted, "For the record, the rest of what happens after this is because she wanted to go sightseeing!" This would've sounded bad except for the fact that he was slightly smirking.
"Sightseeing?"
"The Gateway Arch," she said. "This may be my only chance to ride to the top. Are you coming or not?"
Grover and I exchanged looks.
I wanted to say no, but I figured that if Annabeth was going, we couldn't very well let her go alone.
Aphrodite and Piper (She'll later deny it) awed at how protective Percy already was of Annabeth.
Grover shrugged. "As long as there's a snack bar with-out monsters."
Percy looked at Grover and deadpanned, "Whatever happens is because you jinxed it. I just know it." Grover just rolled his eyes and everyone else laughed.
The Arch was about a mile from the train station. Late in the day the lines to get in weren't that long. We threaded our way through the underground museum, looking at covered wagons and other junk from the 1800s. It wasn't all that thrilling, but Annabeth kept telling us interesting facts about how the Arch was built, and Grover kept passing me jelly beans, so I was okay.
In sync, both Annabeth's punched their respective Percy's in the arm for not paying attention.
I kept looking around, though, at the other people in line. "You smell anything?" I murmured to Grover.
Clarisse laughed, "The real paranoia!" Ares smirked at his daughter.
He took his nose out of the jelly-bean bag long enough to sniff. "Underground," he said distastefully. "Under-ground air always smells like monsters. Probably doesn't mean anything."
As one all of the gods and demigods face palmed.
But something felt wrong to me. I had a feeling we shouldn't be here.
"Guys," I said. "You know the gods' symbols of power?"
Percy looked at his older self, "Yeah what about them?"
Annabeth had been in the middle of reading about the construction equipment used to build the Arch, but she looked over. "Yeah?"
"Well, Hade-"
Grover cleared his throat. "We're in a public place... You mean, our friend downstairs?"
Hades actually stopped reading and gave Percy and Annabeth a 'really' look. His children just quietly laughed at the way Grover phrased it.
"Um, right," I said. "Our friend way downstairs. Doesn't he have a hat like Annabeth's?"
Both Annabeth's face palmed, and Hades seriously considered killing the older Percy.
"You mean the Helm of Darkness," Annabeth said. "Yeah, that's his symbol of power. I saw it next to his seat during the winter solstice council meeting."
"He was there?" I asked.
"Don't act so surprised Jackson."
She nodded. "It's the only time he's allowed to visit Olympus-the darkest day of the year. But his helm is a lot more powerful than my invisibility hat, if what I've heard is true..."
"And you wonder why he's always angry with you guys." Percy mumbled. Hades was surprised to hear that from his brother's son's mouth.
"It allows him to become darkness," Grover confirmed. "He can melt into shadow or pass through walls. He can't be touched, or seen, or heard. And he can radiate fear so intense it can drive you insane or stop your heart. Why do you think all rational creatures fear the dark?"
"And how do you know this exactly?" Thalia asked Grover who blushed and didn't answer.
"But then ... how do we know he's not here right now, watching us?" I asked.
Hades actually looked offended. "I do have other things to do besides watch a group of demigods kill themselves."
Annabeth and Grover exchanged looks.
"We don't," Grover said.
"Thanks, that makes me feel a lot better," I said. "Got any blue jelly beans left?"
All of the campers burst out laughing at how Percy obviously changed the subject.
I'd almost mastered my jumpy nerves when I saw the tiny little elevator car we were going to ride to the top of the Arch, and I knew I was in trouble. I hate confined places. They make me nuts.
"You can thank your father for that one." Athena said snidely.
"Thanks Dad!" Athena just shook her head slowly. Leave it to a sea spawn to take her seriously.
We got shoehorned into the car with this big fat lady and her dog, a Chihuahua with a rhinestone collar. I figured maybe the dog was a seeing-eye Chihuahua, because none of the guards said a word about it.
For some reason everyone in the room got nervous. Something about that just didn't sit well with them.
We started going up, inside the Arch. I'd never been in an elevator that went in a curve, and my stomach wasn't too happy about it.
Percy took on a thoughtful look, "You know I'm curious. How high would I have to be to considered in your territory?" He asked Zeus, but it was Percy that answered him. "Zeus decides that, on how angry he is with us at the time."
"No parents?" the fat lady asked us.
She had beady eyes; pointy, coffee-stained teeth; a floppy denim hat, and a denim dress that bulged so much, she looked like a blue-jean blimp.
Something about that description resonated with Hades, he just couldn't figure out why.
"They're below," Annabeth told her. "Scared of heights."
Both Percy's looked at Annabeth and said, "Staying below was an option!?" Annabeth just laughed.
"Oh, the poor darlings."
The Chihuahua growled. The woman said, "Now, now, sonny. Behave." The dog had beady eyes like its owner, intelligent and vicious.
Apollo jumped up and shouted, "I don't know who she is but that lady's a monster!" Everyone rolled their eyes and Artemis told him to sit down and shut up.
I said, "Sonny. Is that his name?"
"No," the lady told me.
She smiled, as if that cleared everything up.
"It really doesn't though." Nico replied.
At the top of the Arch, the observation deck reminded me of a tin can with carpeting. Rows of tiny windows looked out over the city on one side and the river on the other. The view was okay, but if there's anything I like less than a confined space, it's a confined space six hundred feet in the air. I was ready to go pretty quick.
Percy nodded his head in agreement, just hearing about it made him jumpy.
Annabeth kept talking about structural supports, and how she would've made the windows bigger, and designed a see-through floor. She probably could've stayed up there for hours, but luckily for me the park ranger announced that the observation deck would be closing in a few minutes.
Hephaestus nodded his head like he was planning to redesign the arch.
I steered Grover and Annabeth toward the exit, loaded them into the elevator, and I was about to get in myself when I realized there were already two other tourists inside. No room for me.
Dread pooled in the pit of Poseidon's stomach.
The park ranger said, "Next car, sir."
"We'll get out," Annabeth said. "We'll wait with you."
But that was going to mess everybody up and take even more time, so I said, "Naw, it's okay. I'll see you guys at the bottom."
"Of course the way I saw you at the bottom was a little different than I thought it would be." Percy said, slightly laughing, and making everyone else nervous.
Grover and Annabeth both looked nervous, but they let the elevator door slide shut. Their car disappeared down the ramp.
Now the only people left on the observation deck were me, a little boy with his parents, the park ranger, and the fat lady with her Chihuahua.
I smiled uneasily at the fat lady. She smiled back, her forked tongue flickering between her teeth.
Everyone did a double take, did the book just say 'forked tongue'? But Hades reread the paragraph and sure enough it said forked tongue.
Wait a minute.
Forked tongue?
Before I could decide if I'd really seen that, her Chihuahua jumped down and started yapping at me.
"Now, now, sonny," the lady said. "Does this look like a good time? We have all these nice people here."
"You know this was the first monster I had ever met that was just a little considerate of mortals in the area." Percy said, doing nothing to ease the growing tension in the room.
"Doggie!" said the little boy. "Look, a doggie!"
His parents pulled him back.
"Smart parents." Hera said.
The Chihuahua bared his teeth at me, foam dripping from his black lips.
"Well, son," the fat lady sighed. "If you insist."
Ice started forming in my stomach. "Urn, did you just call that Chihuahua your son?"
"Chimera, dear," the fat lady corrected. "Not a Chihuahua. It's an easy mistake to make."
Poseidon looked ready to kill Hades but Percy somehow managed to calm him down, not by much, but enough that Hades would go on living.
Percy looked at Percy curiously, "Out of curiosity, what monster are we facing this time." Everyone looked almost sad when they realised that just by reading this book Percy had become way too used to hearing about himself dealing with monsters.
Percy laughed and said, "She's about to tell us? Me? You?" He shook his head and said, "The Percy in the book."
She rolled up her denim sleeves, revealing that the skin of her arms was scaly and green. When she smiled, I saw that her teeth were fangs. The pupils of her eyes were side-ways slits, like a reptile's.
The Chihuahua barked louder, and with each bark, it grew. First to the size of a Doberman, then to a lion. The bark became a roar.
Leo smiled crazily and said, "I wonder if I could make Festus do that? It would be so cool!"
All of the campers shuddered at the thought of a full grown metal dragon being able to grow with each roar.
Athena also looked slightly disturbed and turned to Hephaestus, hoping he would talk his son out of it, but found him seriously thinking about the mechanics that would have to go into it. That's when all of the gods became truly terrified.
The little boy screamed. His parents pulled him back toward the exit, straight into the park ranger, who stood, paralyzed, gaping at the monster.
Ares snorted, "Wimps."
The Chimera was now so tall its back rubbed against the roof. It had the head of a lion with a blood caked mane, the body and hooves of a giant goat, and a serpent for a tail, a ten-foot-long diamondback growing right out of its shaggy behind. The rhinestone dog collar still hung around its neck, and the plate-sized dog tag was now easy to read: CHIMERA-RABID, FIRE-BREATHING, POISONOUS-IF FOUND, PLEASE CALL TARTARUS-EXT. 954.
Nico looked curious, "Do you think that would actually work?" Percy and Thalia looked at their cousin and chorused, "Only one way to find out!" The gods shuddered before looking at the older versions of the three currently planning on how they would call. Thalia was calming Percy, Annabeth, and Nico down.
When the younger three were done planning the prank and the older three were calm, Hades continued.
I realized I hadn't even uncapped my sword. My hands were numb. I was ten feet away from the Chimera's bloody maw, and I knew that as soon as I moved, the creature would lunge.
The snake lady made a hissing noise that might've been laughter. "Be honored, Percy Jackson. Lord Zeus rarely allows me to test a hero with one of my brood. For I am the Mother of Monsters, the terrible Echidna!"
Suddenly Poseidon went from glaring at Hades to lunging at Zeus. It took Ares, Apollo, Hephaestus, Hades, Percy, Nico, Thalia, Jason, and Frank to get Poseidon to sit back down on his throne and not attack his brother.
By the time they achieved that, they were all exhausted, and looked like they had just fought a ten year war in five minutes. And lost.
I stared at her. All I could think to say was: "Isn't that a kind of anteater?"
If this were an anime everyone would've sweatdropped. "You're kidding me right!? That can't be what he actually said!" Thalia said grabbing the book from Hades and reading for herself.
She then proceeded to slap Percy upside the head while muttering, "Idiot."
Hades himself was trying not to laugh so hard that he didn't even notice the book being taken from him and then returned.
She howled, her reptilian face turning brown and green with rage. "I hate it when people say that! I hate Australia! Naming that ridiculous animal after me. For that, Percy Jackson, my son shall destroy you!"
"Wait-" Clarisse began. "Are you saying that if you hadn't called her an anteater she wouldn't have tried to kill you." She then began to laugh, making everyone agree that it was the stupidest thing they had ever heard.
Then Percy answered her, "Eh. She probably wouldn't have tried to kill me as hard."
The Chimera charged, its lion teeth gnashing.
The gods tensed simultaneously, this was most likely the most dangerous fight Percy had been in so far.
I managed to leap aside and dodge the bite.
I ended up next to the family and the park ranger, who were all screaming now, trying to pry open the emergency exit doors.
Now the demigods were tensing up. This was going south very quickly.
With a strained voice, Hades continued.
I couldn't let them get hurt. I uncapped my sword, ran to the other side of the deck, and yelled, "Hey, Chihuahua!" The Chimera turned faster than I would've thought possible.
Annabeth was glaring straight at Percy. She had never heard the full story of what had happened in the arch.
Before I could swing my sword, it opened its mouth, emitting a stench like the world's largest barbecue pit, and shot a column of flame straight at me.
Suddenly before anyone could move to stop him, Poseidon had wrapped a giant water bubble around Percy and Percy had them floating about fifteen feet above where they had been sitting.
Besides being slightly confused both Percy's appeared to be fine. Poseidon sat back down. Daring anyone to protest. No one did.
I dove through the explosion. The carpet burst into flames; the heat was so intense, it nearly seared off my eyebrows.
The tension in the room doubled.
Where I had been standing a moment before was a ragged hole in the side of the Arch, with melted metal steaming around the edges.
Leo looked both horrified and excited, eyes wide and messing with stray bits and bobbles he said, "Percy, do you think after this is done we could go find a Chimera and tame it?"
As he was talking Leo somehow managed to create a mini-chimera. That apparently also had fire power, as Leo so found out when he got too close.
After seeing that Percy shook his head 'no'.
Meanwhile Aphrodite was considering getting some kind of restraints on her husband because he looked like he was going to jump up and go search for one himself.
Great, I thought. We just blowtorched a national monument.
Annabeth and Grover looked at Percy and in unison said, "'We?' You are the one up there."
Riptide was now a shining bronze blade in my hands, and as the Chimera turned, I slashed at its neck.
That was my fatal mistake. The blade sparked harmlessly off the dog collar. I tried to regain my balance, but I was so worried about defending myself against the fiery lion's mouth, I completely forgot about the serpent tail until it whipped around and sank its fangs into my calf.
The so far calm exterior of the Olympus throne room was suddenly shattered as storm clouds began to brew. Rain pelted the steps and lightning crashed. Everyone looked between the now standing brothers as they glared at each other. They were also beginning to glow faintly, to the demigods in the room they began to get nervous, it was never a good sign when gods started glowing. It looked like they were going to come to blows when Hades stood up and the entire throne room darkened.
"ARE YOU TWO QUITE FINISHED! WE ARE HERE FOR AS LONG AS IT TAKES TO READ THESE BOOKS, AND I FOR ONE WOULD LIKE TO GO HOME SOON! ARGUING ABOUT THINGS THAT HAVE YET TO HAPPEN SHALL ONLY EVER CAUSE HARM! HAVE YOU NOT YET FIGURED THIS OUT!" While his words were loud his voice was deadly calm.
Poseidon and Zeus glared once more at each other and sat back down. Even they had forgotten what their oldest brother sounded like when he was truly angry.
"Thank you." Hades huffed quietly and began from where he left off in the book.
My whole leg was on fire. I tried to jab Riptide into the Chimera's mouth, but the serpent tail wrapped around my ankles and pulled me off balance, and my blade flew out of my hand, spinning out of the hole in the Arch and down toward the Mississippi River.
Poseidon tensed, but with a warning glare from Hades he quietly sat glaring at his younger brother.
I managed to get to my feet, but I knew I had lost. I was weaponless. I could feel deadly poison racing up to my chest. I remembered Chiron saying that Anaklusmos would always return to me, but there was no pen in my pocket. Maybe it had fallen too far away. Maybe it only returned when it was in pen form. I didn't know, and I wasn't going to live long enough to figure it out.
Clarisse laughed awkwardly, "That's Prissy's infamous pessimism for you." The other demigods who knew Percy nodded in slightly hoping to relieve some of the pressure. It didn't really work.
I backed into the hole in the wall. The Chimera advanced, growling, smoke curling from its lips. The snake lady, Echidna, cackled. "They don't make heroes like they used to, eh, son?"
Poseidon glared at the book silently swearing to visit Echidna before any of this ended up happening.
The monster growled. It seemed in no hurry to finish me off now that I was beaten.
I glanced at the park ranger and the family. The little boy was hiding behind his father's legs. I had to protect these people. I couldn't just ... die. I tried to think, but my whole body was on fire. My head felt dizzy. I had no sword. I was facing a massive, fire-breathing monster and its mother. And I was scared.
"Ah yes most of that is the symptoms of Chimera poisoning. But it makes deliciou-" Apollo trailed off as everyone else in the room turned to glare at him.
There was no place else to go, so I stepped to the edge of the hole. Far, far below, the river glittered.
For the first time since the chapter began, Poseidon nodded in agreement with what he hoped Percy was planning.
If I died, would the monsters go away? Would they leave the humans alone?
Dionysus looked at the young heroes sadly, being one of the few gods who noticed how all of them looked away from the book and avoided everyone else's eyes. He actually did notice the subtle tells. This was something every hero, no every demi-god, asked themselves. He wasn't a camp director for nothing.
"If you are the son of Poseidon," Echidna hissed, "you would not fear water. Jump, Percy Jackson. Show me that water will not harm you. Jump and retrieve your sword. Prove your bloodline."
Yeah, right, I thought. I'd read somewhere that jumping into water from a couple of stories up was like jumping onto solid asphalt. From here, I'd splatter on impact.
Athena groaned. The one time one of his spawn bothered to read something and it stopped him from saving himself!
The Chimera's mouth glowed red, heating up for another blast.
Everyone tensed up again.
"You have no faith," Echidna told me. "You do not trust the gods. I cannot blame you, little coward. Better you die now. The gods are faithless. The poison is in your heart."
Poseidon growled, Echidna was most definitely going to be getting a visit.
She was right: I was dying. I could feel my breath slowing down. Nobody could save me, not even the gods.
Annabeth seemed to be having a mini-panic attack, at the image of Percy dying.
I backed up and looked down at the water. I remembered the warm glow of my father's smile when I was a baby. He must have seen me. He must have visited me when I was in my cradle.
All of the gods smiled briefly, a small remembrance of a simpler time. Back at chapter 3.
I remembered the swirling green trident that had appeared above my head the night of capture the flag, when Poseidon had claimed me as his son.
But this wasn't the sea. This was the Mississippi, dead center of the USA. There was no Sea God here.
Hermes made a 50-50 motion with his hand. "It wouldn't be as powerful than if it was sea water, but you could probably heal the flesh wounds if you jumped now. Not much for the poison though." Percy smiled softly and Percy was kind of freaking out about having the god of death, read about him dying.
"Die, faithless one," Echidna rasped, and the Chimera sent a column of flame toward my face.
"Father, help me," I prayed.
I turned and jumped. My clothes on fire, poison coursing through my veins, I plummeted toward the river.
Suddenly the book snapped shut and flew out of Hades hands. They all looked up to see Destiny. With a bright smile she said, "Well! That was an exciting chapter wasn't it?"
I'm alive!
I am so sorry for not doing anything for over two months!
But I'm gonna try and update these in bulk so please bear with me.
See ya next time!