Daedalus again! For those of you just tuning in, I'M NOT RICK RIORDAN. HE PROBABLY DOESN'T EVEN KNOW I EXIST. A BAD MOVE ON HIS PART, BUT IT'S NOT HIS FAULT. And, because of me not being him, I don't own any part of the Percy Jackson books. Yeah, sorry about the long update time, but work takes precedence over writing, seeing as one gets me money and the other doesn't. Sorry. But it's ok, because it's on here now! Ladies and gentlemen, I give you… The Second Story!

The Second Story

Or,

Running Away From a Drakon

I woke up to the sound of horns blowing and kids yelling. My first thought? How the hell am I still alive. My second? I didn't have one, because I fell asleep.

The next time I woke, several people were in the room with me there were two kids and a guy in a wheelchair. One kid held a stone bowl, and the other was discussing something with the wheelchair guy, using her hands a lot as she talked. The wheelchair guy looked pretty old, with a tweed jacket and a bushy white beard. As I looked around, I saw another lady standing in the corner. She was wearing a long white dress, and seemed to glow slightly in the early evening light leaking in through the window. She looked at me with such an intense gaze that I shuddered in the bed.

Heal well, my hero. The words resounded in my head. I forced myself to look away, and I saw that the others in the room were watching me now. The kid with the bowl was stirring something up, and his spoon was dripping with a yellow goo. When I looked back to the corner where the strange woman was, she was gone. The girl reached over to me and pulled out pieces of cotton from my ears.

"Welcome to Camp Half-Blood, son," Said the old man in the wheelchair.

"What's your name?" the girl asked insistently.

"Shut up, Stevenson," the boy chided. "He's nowhere near being ready to answer questions. I doubt he has the strength to talk." He was right, and my head was swimming just laying there, but I wasn't about to let them know that. So I drew back the sheets, and started moving my legs to the side, managing to drape them over the side. "Whoa, hey now, calm down!" the boy said, moving to push me back into bed. I pushed him aside with a wave of my arm, and sat on the edge of the bed, trying to gather enough strength to stand. Stevenson, the girl, took my arm to help me up. I stood, leaning on her heavily, and the boy took my other arm.

We moved to an outside porch, the old man wheeling himself after us. "Son, I know it's quite a sight, but please try to stay calm. This is Camp Half-Blood, where people like you can live and train in safety." Stevenson and the boy laid me down on a beach chair. "p-people like me?" I managed to croak out.

"Demigods, son. Half Human, half Greek god."

I blacked out again.

When I woke, I was back in the bed, and a different kid was standing over me. He was wearing a large apron, so I couldn't see his legs. The man in the wheelchair rolled in the room. "Ah, it's good to see you awake again! Last time you exhausted yourself so completely that you've been asleep for an entire day!" Stevenson and the other guy brought in a projector on a cart. Stevenson glanced at me, saying "Usually we show this in a theater, but seeing as Willie says you're not allowed to move…" Willie, the boy, shrugged. "Hey, last time you did you were asleep for a full day. You don't have to be the son of the god of medicine to understand that moving is bad for you!" he chuckled. Willie left the room, turning the lights off as he went. Stevenson stood on my right, and the wheelchair dude sat on my left. The projector started up.

A day later, I was lying on a beach chair on the porch, trying to understand and absorb what world I had just fallen into. I watched people with goat legs picking strawberries, kids swinging swords at each other and shooting dummies with bows. Every so often, an alarm would sound, and groups of kids would run out of whatever outpost was nearby, and kill whatever monster had popped up. There was a blacksmith's forge in the camp, but instead of black or grey smoke, green and yellow would sometimes billow up.

I heard someone approach from behind. Willie spoke. "You know, the ambrosia has probably taken full effect by now. You should be alright to get up and start training." I ignored him, continuing to stare out at the valley from the porch of a huge farmhouse.

He sighed and walked away, taking his bow off his back, casually shooting three arrows into a fiery bat that had popped out of the ground a few seconds before.

The next day, I stood, stretching. Across the plain, Willie saw me, and grinned. I searched out the wheelchair dude, Chiron. Except he wasn't in his wheelchair anymore— he was over with Willie, standing in all his glory as a… half horse. The centaur looked at me and raised his bow over his head as a kind of salute, I guess. He left the field and came trotting over to me. "Nick!" he cried, "It's good to see you up and about! I was worried you'd never move again!" he chuckled. I shrugged and said "well, I'm not gonna sit around for the rest of my life. Especially not when I could be learning how to sword fight, shoot a bow and arrow, and make weapons! This is a freaking awesome place!" I grinned, and Chiron gave me the tour.

After seeing the stables, the arena, the archery range, Chiron handed me over to Stevenson. She led me toward the forge, and after my first attempt to talk to her, she corrected me. "You don't have to call me Stevenson," she laughed, "Willie does that because he's an idiot. My first name is Eloi." I apologized, saying "Oh, my mistake madam. I can imagine why you would want to be known as Eloi. Because, as I'm sure you're aware, Eloi is a much more normal name than Stevenson." She grinned and shoved me, heading down towards a small shack.

As she opened it, I was hit by the sight of bronze, gold, and iron. Armor and shields were stacked on the side, and weapons covered the rest. She gestured for me to enter, and so I ran in, eyes wide. "Alright Nick. Pick out anything you want. But choose wisely, because whatever you pick is going to be what you train with the most." I nodded, scanning the collection. I picked up a long bronze tipped spear, feeling it. "Hmm… maybe. It doesn't really seem you, though." Eloi said. I agreed, laying it back down. I hefted a huge ax, and turned to pose for Eloi. She cracked up. "Nick, that is the most ridiculous match up I have ever seen! Put it down before you hurt yourself!" I pouted, but dropped it back on its hooks. The next weapon I picked was a golden dagger. "That's a trophy from a long time ago. During a clash with the Romans." I nodded, but put it back. Then a shortened spear caught my eye. The shaft was about five feet tall, a little shorter than myself, and the tip was a piece of black iron, fashioned into a blade about four inches long. The blade came to a sharp point at the tip.

I gripped the short glaive with both hands, holding it across my chest. I turned to face Eloi, who nodded. She was very excited, and quickly fitted me with a big thick piece of chest armor made of bronze, and a kilt of bronze strips for my legs. A small helmet covered my face. Eloi stepped back and nodded. "You look every bit the hero you're going to become, Nick." I was glad my face was hidden, or she would've seen me blush.

Alright, fine, I admit it, Eloi is extremely attractive. Long curly brown hair, deep green eyes, a gorgeous tall, curvy body… She's very dangerous, very athletic, and because of all this, she was also VERY out of my league. I'm about five foot four, with short brown hair, and a heavy body. I'm not really fat, but I'm definitely not skinny. I'm just heavy. My eyes are pure grey, and my skin is not the shade it should be to match my Cherokee heritage.

But back to the story.

We walked out of the shed, and back up to the archery range, me carrying my helmet under my arm, and my glaive across my back, and my knife strapped to my waist. As we arrived, Willie was trying to nock six arrows, showing off for some girls in fancy clothes. When he released, disaster struck. One went sideways, one strait up, two went directly for the girls, and the remaining two flew directly at Eloi and I. She shot one out of the air with her short bow, while I sliced the other in half in one move. The girls, now hiding behind a rock, were shrieking with laughter, and Willie looked embarrassed.

Nobody had noticed me cut an arrow out of the air, and I was glad. If they had seen me cut an arrow out of the air, they'd think I was the son of Ares or something. I didn't want to know who my parent was. I didn't want to know which one of my human parents had cheated on the other to get me.

So Willie was trying to slink away from the archery range, the Aphrodite girls were laughing at him, and Eloi was making fun of him. I just kind of stood around with them, not wanting to make an enemy of Willie, but still finding it funny that his attempt to show off for the ladies failed so spectacularly. Eventually, Eloi led me towards the Hermes cabin, who took in everybody who hadn't been claimed."It's actually kind of weird that you haven't been claimed yet, Nick. It's supposed to happen by the time that you're thirteen. How old are you again?"

"I'm sixteen. So about three years late? And, this armor is cool and all, but can I take it off and put it somewhere? I know I make it look easy to carry, but it's really heavy and hot." She laughed, throwing her head back and picking up her pace. "Oh, sorry, I forgot you were wearing that! Yeah, I can take you over to the Hermes cabin now, or you can just hold on to it and wait for your parent to claim you. It shouldn't be too much longer, now that you know who you are." I nodded, distracted again by which of my parents had cheated on the other. I decided to just hold on to it, because I should be claimed at any moment.

Of course, I wasn't. I carried all my gear with me for a full week.

On Friday, we played capture the flag.

"Alright Nick, here we go. We're the red team, and we're allied with Ares, so we don't really need to worry about fighting as much as getting the flag. Erica and the Athena cabin are pretty smart, so this is gonna be REALLY hard." Garrett, the Hermes cabin leader, was explaining my part in the game. I wasn't allowed to use my knife because of its poison, so I was wandering around in the armor and my glaive. I had really taken a shine to the arts and crafts training, and I had built a new weapon to use, but I hadn't told anyone about it yet. As such, I was getting a lot of weird looks. I had a quiver strapped to my thigh, but it was too short to hold any arrows. That's why I had a crossbow slung across my back. Garrett was still talking "… So that's why we have to be fast. Got it?" I nodded, but kept staring at Eloi. "Yeah, Garrett. Fast. Got it. Who is the Apollo cabin with?" He shook his head, following my gaze. "Huh? Apollo? They're on the blue team. The enemy. Be mean, Nick. Be a jerk to 'em!" I gave a convincing chuckle, and started marching off towards the forest. "Hey Nick!" I turned. Garrett gave me a rare serious look. "Give 'em hell, man." I grinned, thinking on the plan and how much confidence he had in me, the newest guy there.

I went to my assigned position and waited for the game to begin. I wasn't waiting long, and a horn blew in the distance, signaling the start. I climbed to the top of Zeus' Fist, one of two twin boulder piles. This one supposedly had an entrance to the Labyrinth a long time ago, while the other was supposed to be covering up Kampe, a huge dragoness that was bad news. I took my crossbow off my back, and loaded in a bolt.

I wasn't really sure how I was supposed to not kill, but still shoot people, but Chiron had promised it's be ok.

So I stood atop the boulder pile, waiting for anyone to show up. It took nearly thirty minutes for anyone to show up, and when they did, it was a mix of both teams, screaming their heads off and running towards me. I was extremely confused until Garrett shouted at me. "DRAKON! NICK, SHOOT IT!" and lo and behold, there was a huge silvery wingless dragon running through the woods after the rest of the campers. I took careful aim, remembering what Chiron and Eloi had taught me in archery practice that past week. I said a quick prayer to Apollo, and squeezed the trigger. The crossbow jumped in my hands, and the bolt sped out, like a bronze bullet. the bolt bounced off his side. I reloaded and aimed again, slowly squeezing the trigger. This time it hit his mouth, knocking out a tooth. The campers had assembled into a phalanx in front of Zeus' Fist, and were advancing slowly. The Drakon had taken notice of me, the little pest that had knocked out his tooth and injured his pride. He bellowed, and rushed straight at me. I stood my ground like an idiot, and fired again, this time hitting him square in the eye.

Now, even though I had never met a Drakon before, I hadn't known they were screamers. Learn something new every day.

The Drakon shrieked its head off, staggering slightly and swerving to the left, where its good eye could still see. I loaded another bolt, but I didn't need it. The phalanx of campers had reached him, and was tearing into his side with celestial bronze weapons. He was a pile of silvery scales in no time. The camp was chanting my name, and were offering me the Drakon scales, but I hardly noticed. Something better was happening.

Eloi was staring at me with respect, and pride, and maybe just a glimmer of something more.

Well, there's chapter two! Hope you enjoyed it, and I apologize again for the long delay in the update. Hope you don't hate me… REVIEW PLEASE. I honestly would love to know what you all are thinking when you read this, and it'll help make the story better for everyone.

Always,

Daedalus