Rogue

Chapter 6- We Meet a Thief

Here it is… the moment you've all been waiting for! The thief's finally appear in this chapter! YAY!

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I do not own PJO, that honor belongs to the fabulous Rick Riordian!

Now ON WITH THE STORY!

ANNABETH'S POV:

What are we going to do? Now that we found a trap… ok, back up. Percy being stuck up in that trap was the funniest thing I have ever seen! Thalia, Nico, and I busted up laughing and didn't stop for over five minutes. It was just TOO funny. Nico pulled out his phone and said, laughing:

"This is soooo going on Olympusbook!" he took a picture.

"C'mon guys," Percy pleaded, "help me down, we need to find the thief remember?"

That snapped me back into reality. What if the thief heard us laughing and went to another position? We would never find him then!

"Alright guys, help me get Percy down."

"Aw Annabeth," complained Thalia, wiping a tear from her eye, "you are ruining the fun!"

"Listen guys, as much as this is funny, we need to get him down and start searching again," I stated, "the thief might have heard our laughter and be miles away from us now!"

"Wait Annabeth." Nico stopped me from cutting the rope at the last second. To keep his blood from rushing to his head, Percy reached up and grabbed the rope that ensnared his ankles and pulled himself up into a more comfortable position. Well, as comfortable as he could be hanging in a trap.

"What now?" I said, exasperated

"Remember how we wanted to catch an animal to trigger the traps? What is we use Percy as the animal?"

"Whoa. Wait, What?" Percy asked, confused, "I am NOT being bait. I'm the one who needs his sword back!"

I nodded, now that I thought about it, Nico was right. "Wait a minute Percy. You might not like being bait, but this might be a real time saver."

"What is that big brain thinking of now Anna?" wondered Thalia

"I was thinking, our original plan was to find a trap, catch an animal, make it trigger it and wait for the thief. Well we found a trap and it was triggered, maybe not by an animal, but triggered none the less. As long as the thief can't see what was caught, we have a chance to surprise him. We can finally confront him."

"As much as I hate this idea," Percy admitted, still upside down, "I think you are right, Annabeth."

"Alright then" I motioned to some nearby bushes, "Thales, Nico and I will hide in there, and we'll jump out when the thief shows his face. Ok?"

Percy sighed, "Alright. I just hope the thief shows up soon, before all the blood rushes to my head."

We giggled and ran over to the bushes, and Percy let his arms hang limp, heels over head again.

We waited.

PERCY'S POV

Wow. My life couldn't get any better than this. Not only was I humiliated in front of my friends by getting caught in this stupid trap and now I'm bait. Woohoo. Hello people… its SARCASM. This was officially the worst day ever. No telling how long I would have to hang here waiting for the thief to come. It could be 20 minutes or it could be the rest of the day. And all the blood was rushing to my head. YAY. As I hung there, I didn't hear a sound from where Thales, Nico and Annabeth were hiding. They were good. Not a single peep. Now only if I would do my part then Annabeth's plan would work!

Annabeth. Man, there is no other girl in the whole wide world who competes with her beauty. Not even Aphrodite was competition against her. Even though she wore no makeup, she still looked like royalty. And she's freakishly smart too, even with stupid things like ADHD and dyslexia weighing her down. And her kisses… I won't even go into that subject. All I'm going to say is that her kisses should be illegal. I sighed… lost in my thoughts when a rustle was heard in the bushes. My head shot up and waited for another sound. There it was again, on the opposite side of the clearing where my friends were. It wasn't them, it was the thief! I looked toward the bushes casually; hoping the thief wouldn't know what I was doing, but facing them.

Get ready. I mouthed

Annabeth nodded and mouthed back: We'll be on guard but we want to see what the thief will do first.

A panicked look crossed my face: What! That wasn't part of the plan!

She rolled her eyes and said: Just trust me. We have your back.

I grimaced but was forced to look away again so the thief wouldn't locate Annabeth. Just then I heard a noise, louder than the others. And a figure came into view. A wolf. It was beautiful to look at. It had muscles that rippled with every step and silvery-grey streaks on its coat, creating a collage of black and silver. Even though the wolf was breathtaking, I sighed, the thief wasn't here yet. Movement snapped myself back to reality. The wolf started coming toward me and looked up at me like some confused child. It started pacing around underneath me. I started getting a little nervous. What if the wolf attacked? I'll get a face full of wolf teeth. Hurray for me. I looked into the wolf's eyes. They weren't like any other wolf eyes that I have ever seen. The eyes were pure black with no pupils. That WASN'T normal. It had a strange look in its eyes, like it was guilty and at the same time, revengeful and a huge hatred. THAT wasn't normal either.

Then the wolf did something I would have never expected. It stood on its hind legs and began to change its form. The bent legs of the wolf straightened and formed into dark blue jeans and converse, the muscular torso molded into the form of a hoodie sweatshirt and its front legs and paws bent into a human's arms and hands. Finally, the wolf face shrunk, molded and smoothed into a human face covered by a hood. It was the thief. We had found him.

ANNABETH'S POV

Wow. I have never seen anyone be able to do that! Turning into a wolf is just huge! No wonder the Oracle said that the thief can't be taken down without some of us, he's really powerful! The thief finished its transformation and looked up at Percy.

"YOU! GIVE MY BACK RIPTIDE! NOW!" Percy screamed.

He really wasn't in the position to yell right about now. But I kept my hand on my dagger, just in case the thief attacked him. The thief looked up and sighed. He went over to Percy and cut the rope with his swords, freeing Percy. Percy scrambled up and grabbed Bronzeheart.

"Give…me…Riptide…NOW!" he said through gritted teeth.

The thief said nothing but pulled back his hood. I gasped. The removal of the hood revealed a girls face, with dark brown eyes and straight black hair that went down past her shoulders. She looked about 16, but what was the strangest thing about her was her skin. It was as white as the snow, no blemishes in sight, just pale, white skin. She had a scar that ran from the top of her forehead, went down and off the bridge of her nose, continued down her cheekbone and ended on the top of her neck.

Percy, getting over his state of shock, then said "I don't want to fight you, all I want is to get Riptide back and why you stole it, thief!"

The girl said nothing, but calmly put her swords down on the ground, clearly not wanting to fight.

We waited in the bushes, making sure that if Percy needed backup, he would get it. Everything was quiet, the two demigods staring each other down when all of a sudden, Nico shot up from his sitting position.

"Percy, stop! She doesn't want to fight you!" he yelled

"What? What makes you think that?" Percy questioned, not taking his eyes off of the girl.

"She just said it!" Nico replied

"She didn't say anything," Percy said, "at least not that I heard!"

"Well she spoke and she said that she doesn't want to fight, she wants to talk!" Nico said desperately.

"Talk, my foot. She just wants to trick me into getting this sword too!"

Percy struck. He hurled himself at the girl, slicing Bronzeheart down in a deadly arc, wanting to slice the girls shoulder. Quick as lightning, the girl grabbed her swords, ducked underneath Percy's blow, and then her form wavered, disappeared and reappeared on the other side of the clearing. Percy whirled around, but the same thing occurred, the girl giving him a small cut and then disappearing, until she became visible at another part of the clearing. This went on for minutes.

"That's it." I said, and jumped out and joined the fight, Thalia joining me. Nico just stood there yelling at us to stop. I didn't want to listen. This girl is mocking Percy and we need answers. I joined the fight.

The girl didn't flinch when Thalia and I came out of the bushes; she just gave us the same treatment that Percy got. It went like this: we attack, she avoids, she disappears, and she reappears. I don't know how long this went on for but all we got was being out of breath. This was going nowhere. Suddenly, water began to flow around the thief, encasing her in a ball of water. She pounded her fists on the bubble's wall, but to no avail.

"Great job Percy!" congratulated Thalia

"No, Percy STOP!" Nico came over to us

"Why would I do that?" Percy retorted

"Because she doesn't want to hurt us, she just wants to talk!" Nico pleaded

"Are you defending her," I asked, "she's a thief!"

Nico was silent for a moment, as if he was listening to something and then said: "because she said so, and if you haven't noticed; she's about to drown in your water bubble!"

It was true, the girl's pounding had stopped and she started drooping down onto the bottom of the bubble, slowly running out of air and dying. Percy gasped and hollowed out the bubble, leaving the strong walls up, but giving the thief air to breath. It seemed too late, the girl was slumped up against the bottom of the bubble.

"Pop the bubble Percy, she needs help!" I said

"Wait Percy, what if it's a trick?" Thalia suddenly said

"Yea. I agree," Percy nodded, "We should take her to the Big House, we can care for her there, and when she comes to… she's got a lot of answering to do."

We started walking back to camp, the thief's bubble floating behind us. I walked along Percy for a while, but then dropped back to Nico.

"Nico, how did you know that the thief just wanted to talk?" I asked

"She said it." He responded

"But Percy, Thalia and I were right next to her in the battle and she didn't say a word the entire time! Are you sure that she was talking to you. It might just be in your head."

"No, I heard the same voice that spoke to us on the day that Riptide was stolen. It was her, Annabeth, I just know it."

I pondered this for a moment and then asked: "How come only you heard it?"

"I don't know. I assumed that you all heard her until she said stop and you didn't."

"Nico, no one heard her except you."

Well there you have it! The thief is finally caught!

More powers and the thief's name will be in the next one!

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