Nico:

Returning to Camp Half-Blood and my first Council meeting in a while

That's right baby! I arrived with some heavy-duty cannons dating back to the Civil War as well as some undead soldiers to wield them. We arrived just in time as it seemed to me like Thalia was going to be killed by the demigod son of Kronos. I couldn't let that happen so I ordered the first rounds to go off and destroy him.

But quicker than the cannonballs, he dodged them and they just whistled harmlessly by. Since they were fired by undead soldiers and were the equipment of the Underworld, they were absorbed into the ground and did no damage to the surrounding environment. Then I ordered the Gatling guns brought in and I made sure that every last bullet the soldiers had in their present supply was fired. To my eternal amazement, they all missed; thousands if not millions of bullets failing to hit one obvious target.

"He's too quick for guns, I should know I tried to fight him with twenty-five Hunters just before you came in," Thalia said to me. "Then I will have to bring in a weapon that specializes in both range and in seldom missing it's target. Bring in a turret from the WWII carrier we have back in Hades. "Even if it doesn't miss, how do you know he won't just shake of the blast?" Thalia asked.

"There's no living thing besides the gods that could shake of the blast of this turret. It's range is too great and the explosion is too wide to be easily avoided without prior desertion of the area in question," I answered, confident in my father's powers. "Funny, two of my Hunters shot at him with arrows made of celestial bronze and they simply bounced off his armor," Thalia replied, feistier than was normal. Still, I ordered the turret to fire its round once it was brought in and I smiled in the knowledge that we had smoked that son of a gun.

The explosion came and went in an instant, leaving me to gloat about my victory. I ordered soldiers to make sure nothing remained but to my shock, the demigod was still alive! That and besides a chunk of his helmet as well as more than half his cape, the demigod was completely unharmed. He cut down my soldiers like they were grass and he was a lawnmower, even going as far as to destroy the cannon with single pulse of telekinetic energy.

"That's not even possible, nothing survives that cannon at that range!" I shouted, desperate. "If you really wanted to try and destroy me, have the Enola Gay and her crew come back long enough to drop another atom bomb on me. I doubt that would change anything save the fact that several innocent mortals would die in the blast and you would look like an idiot in front of your dad," the demigod replied. "I will destroy you if it's the last thing I do, I swear it!" I hissed as I unsheathed my sword.

"Stygian ice, no doubt you honestly believe that you by yourself (with a blade made of ice) could do what a daughter of Zeus with twenty-five Hunters of Artemis couldn't do?" the demigod asked. I hesitated and he took that brief moment of hesitation to grab the sword, yank it from my hands without even cutting himself, then give me a solid punch to the nose. My nose bled like crazy and Thalia took me to go to the Apollo kids I brought with me for medical attention. We were soon on the road after the last of the Hunters had been gathered up and were in the cars we had been given by Chiron.

I ordered for a pursuit to be mounted against that demigod but was told that if we did that the Artemis Hunters would likely die from the wounds. Reluctantly, I had to give up any hopes for a chase that I could have had and let the Apollo kids proceed with driving the wounded home. At the same time, I attended to my bloody nose and made sure that the bleeding was stopped before blood leaked everywhere. But a question came to my mind when I had healed my nose and placed myself next to Thalia.

"How did that demigod know who I was?" I asked. "His name is Gabriel from what I can gather and he knew you most likely because of your sword," Thalia answered. "But how would he know the difference between celestial bronze and Stygian ice?" I asked, inquisitive and a bit of a pouter. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you," Thalia said calmly.

I told her to try me but I was unprepared for what she had to say. "That demigod does not serve the Titans. In fact, he was on a diplomatic mission on behalf of Olympian gods that he calls his 'Special Five'. Keep in mind that a rogue demigod in the service of Olympus is not unheard of so he may have seen Stygian ice before," Thalia explained. I was at a complete loss for words because I had not thought of it.

A demigod son of Kronos under the service of Olympus in spite of having no membership in Camp Half-Blood? Now I knew that I was definitely in for some trouble with my father and stepmother when I realized that. "But that doesn't answer my question of how he might have heard of Stygian ice before," I said. "Perhaps he saw it used by the Titan Army when we were waging war against them three weeks ago," she replied.

That solved my questions for the moment but there would undoubtedly be more along soon. At the back of each of the cars, Apollo medics began working on the repairs that the Hunters would need before they could even stand let alone fight the demigod again. "Hey Nico, compared to my hunters, he let you off the hook so be grateful you never got more than that bloody nose," Thalia stated. "What about you?" I asked rudely.

"My left arm is broken from hand to shoulder and my spinal cord is in great pain. Now don't laugh at me, you get kicked in the abdomen hard enough to fly right into a dumpster with the equivalent impact of a meteor then tell me how it feels. By the way, my abdomen and the whole area around it hurts from that as well," she answered. "Well at least you weren't expecting when you received the injuries," I said, completely off the top of my head.

She slapped me in reply and told me to be ashamed of myself for saying that. "What, the impact would likely have killed the baby and you would have needed to get it out of your womb, right?" I asked. "That's not the kind of thing you talk to a girl about much less a Lieutenant of Artemis who also happens to be Zeus' daughter," Thalia answered. I shrugged and we did not speak anymore after that in the knowledge that if we did, we would likely be at each other's necks before long.

We were soon back at Camp Half-Blood after we took the cars for a little flight in the air and landed near the camp. The Apollo kids quickly brought the Hunters of Artemis into the Asclepius Cabin where the real medics began their work on Thalia's warriors. For Thalia, it was just a quick cast on her arm and she was soon back in action but not of the other Hunters were so lucky. Phoebe and about seven others were bound to wheelchairs, ten more could not even be moved from the bed without risk of dying from the effort, six had two broken legs and walked on crutches, and two had to wear neck casts just to stand safely.

Most had to be bandaged to prevent bleeding from the slashes that had been given by the swords of the son of Kronos. That did not include Thalia and Phoebe but it did include at least a dozen of the Hunters. Only one thing was really mutual about more than ten of the Hunters: every single Hunter except Thalia had been knocked unconscious during the fight. Chiron looked over the Hunters of Artemis and saw that their situation was very grim.

He even looked grim when he saw how everything was with the Hunters of Artemis. "I'm calling a Council meeting, the leaders of each Cabin will need to see me at the Big Cabin in six hours. That should be enough time for all the Cabin leaders to come in and listen to Thalia's prognosis on the situation with the son of Kronos," he declared. I agreed and decided to stay in the Hades cabin until it was time for the meeting.

After all, I needed some time alone to ponder what had happened and why it happened. Not only that but there was the fact that it happened in almost the blink of an eye. First, it looked as though I was going to destroy the demigod then he turned the tables on me and destroyed all of my artillery and my soldiers. Apparently my father was thinking similar thoughts since he came to visit me shortly after I had settled down in my bed in the Hades Cabin.

"I see you survived your encounter with my half-brother. Tell me, how is it fighting someone whose only flaw is that he is mortal?" he asked. I tried to explain that I did the best I could to destroy that demigod but he stopped me. "Your sister would have been better than that because hey, she would not have attacked the son of Kronos if she knew she could do nothing," Dad said.

"I had to at least buy time for Thalia and the others to be loaded on to the cars and escape. Even if I didn't make it myself, I would seen to it that Thalia and her Hunters lived to fight another day," I replied. "What difference does it make? Zeus is furious at me for your actions against a servant of Olympus!" Dad shouted.

I had nothing to say so he asked me how I intended to explain what I had done. "Maybe I will wait until the meeting and then explain what I did and why," I said. "Oh that will be a sight to behold, Zeus will surely be watching you explain yourself at the Camp," my dad mocked. "So he is indeed a servant of Olympus and not of the Titans?" I asked.

"Why would I say it if it was not true? A god seldom says things that are not true unless there is a very good reason for it," my father answered. "But dad, surely there is a good reason that you and the other gods never revealed this servant to us before," I said. "Now you're thinking, now you're really thinking about things correctly," my dad said sarcastically.

"Well why wasn't revealed to us before the fight with Kronos?" I pressed. "We didn't reveal him because we felt that it was not yet time for him to be revealed. You see, we wanted him more for cleanup work after the war with the Titans since he was good at that. Besides, he could have single-handedly fought the war for you so what glory would any of you have had?" my dad explained.

Now I understood why my father was mad: I had attacked a servant of Olympus that the gods had intended to keep secret until the time was right. Because of this, I now understood that I had to apologize to the gods for the damage that I had done. Six hours passed and it was time for the Council meeting with all the leaders of the Cabins of Camp Half-Blood including the new ones like Hades, Nemesis, and Morpheus. Once we all arrived at the new meeting chamber that Chiron had built to accommodate us all, the meeting began with Thalia delivering her report first.

"From what I gathered before the fight, this demigod's name is Gabriel Johnson and he is a secret servant of the Olympians. He even has a group he serves called the 'Special Five' by his decree. As to which five gods he serves, I do not know yet and I am not sure that we will be finding out for a long while if we are to find out at all. He also mentions that he harbors a grudge against the Titans for some deeds they did to him long ago and thus, he is in the service of the gods until he can get revenge.

"This is all the information I have from before the fight but let me ask the Council this question. No doubt we have met powerful entities before but when was the last time that one demigod stood to the full might of one god or goddess' cabin and held his own? Not only hold his own but also has given twenty-five people injuries that could have been permanent in ways that would have killed at least four mortal people. Considering that he normally only attacks servants of the Titans and the Titans themselves, such power should not be allowed to fall into their hold," she explained.

"I agree, this Gabriel Johnson could change the entire tide of any war we may fight later on," Annabeth said. "If the Council does not mind I would like to make a public apology that the 'Special Five' and Zeus are probably watching. After all, I took drastic action to make sure that the Hunters of Artemis and the children of Apollo made it back to Camp," I said. When Chiron nodded, I confessed to having tried to destroy the demigod and apologized for my actions because they were too extreme.

"May the gods look on your apology and accept it," Chiron said. "No, may Gabriel Johnson here this apology and accept it," I replied. "A wise reply for someone normally so brash," Thalia agreed. I did not even look at her as I knew the way she was probably patronizing me for my actions.

Since she was a daughter of Zeus but was a Lieutenant of Artemis, we asked Phoebe to represent Artemis while Thalia stepped up to represent her father. That's besides the point but when I sat back down to represent Hades, Percy suggested a move that I thought was intriguing. "May I suggest, with Chiron's permission, that we create a diplomatic search party to find the servant of Kronos and invite him to join us. We can even given him a written apology from Nico if it means having him join us," he suggested.

"I'm terrible at writing, last time I checked. Could we perhaps type it in some manner or have someone write it for me?" I asked. Chiron chuckled and decided that maybe that would work if nothing else would. "Tell me something Thalia," Drew of the Aphrodite cabin said.

"Yes Drew, what is it that you want me to tell you?" Thalia asked. "Was he a handsome fellow?" Drew answered. "I didn't get a good look at him because he was mostly hidden by his armor but what I saw of him hinted that to me. That's about as much of an answer as I can give you at the moment," Thalia said.

"Why is it that you're always asking whether or not that a possible arrival may be handsome?" Clarisse of the Ares cabin asked. "Until I find my perfect man, I will never know who he is. That's why I ask about all the new male arrivals, is there a problem with that?" Drew replied. No one had a reply to that one and Chiron decided to close the meeting before it turned into just a bunch of bickering kids.