Hellooo folks! Now we'll finally find out about Annabeth's nightmare. Hold on to your invisibilty caps! Here we go!

Thalia took my hand. I guess I looked that upset to her. On the other thought, I was upset.

"Take your time, Annabeth. You look awful. You can tell me when you're ready to deal with it, okay?" Thalia promised. I was grateful having a friend like that. She was one of a kind. I was so overwhelmed by gratefulness, exhaustion and fright that I didn't even notice I'd started sobbing before Thalia wrapped her arms around me. She didn't say anything, just held me there until I'd calmed down a bit. Then she looked at me.

"Are you ready to tell me now, Annabeth?" she asked carefully. I nodded. I gathered my strength to speak.

"I was running in a forest", I started to tell.

"It was dark and I couldn't see a thing. I was followed. I had to run for my life. After a while I reached this strange place. There were these weird rocks piled upon another. I heard a rumbling sound coming beneath my feet. Then I saw a weird mummy sitting on one of the rocks..."

"The Oracle?" Thalia interrupted. "Did she say something? A prophecy?"

"Shut up! I'm trying to explain here!" I snapped at her and continued:

"Her mouth opened and a wisp of green smoke poured out of it. Then I heard a raspy voice saying:

'I am the spirit of Delphi, speaker of the prophecies of Phoebus Apollo. I have a message for you, young hero.'

I was terrified. I couldn't speak, I wanted to run, but my legs didn't obey me. The same voice spoke again. It said:

'Five will take the chariot on rails

And run into one of the ancient tails.

Gods and titans shall be combined

When in the garden the words the heroes will find.

One of the group will be betrayed by a friend

And one in concern will meet his end.

Listen, hero, to the words of caution:

Always remember the temper of the ocean.'"

Thalia looked thunderstruck. But that wasn't all.

"The dream changed. Everything faded around me and I was left alone in the darkness. I heard the noise of battle around me, though I couldn't see where it was coming from. Then a single spotlight lit in the darkness and..." My voice broke. I couldn't tell any more. It was too horrible.

"Oh, Annabeth. Tell me. What was there?" Thalia asked. "It's important that I know."

"Percy", I sobbed.

"What about him, honey?" asked Thalia.

"He was d..." I couldn't finish my sentence, I just broke into much bigger sobs. Thalia seemed to understand though.

"Shh, Annabeth. Don't cry. It's gonna be okay. It was only a dream", she tried to calm me down.

"I know", I managed to whisper between my sobs. "But it was so... real."

After a while, I had calmed down that much, that we could wake the boys up. It was almost time to change the train. I was just about to start the waking-up process, but Thalia stopped me.

"No, don't wake them up just yet!" she told me. "I think we should tell Chiron about your dream."

She was probably right. Chiron would want to know about it. And if it was a real prophecy and was about this trip, we had to be extra careful. Maybe Chiron could help us a bit.

"The question is, though, how are we going to tell him..." Thalia pondered. I already had the answer:

"By Iris message of course!" I said, a bit smug about coming up with an idea in this mental condition.

"Where are you going to get a place with sprayable water, oh wise daughter of Athena?" Thalia asked, her voice challenging and a bit playful at the same time. I dragged her out of our compartment and towards the lavatory.

I opened the tap.

"Put your finger under the tap so that the water sprays off it", I ordered and she obeyed me. As I had thought, the water started spraying off Thalia's finger. It sprayed all over us too, but we didn't care as long as we could send a message to Chiron. I threw a drachma into the spray and prayed:

"O, goddess! Accept my offering."

Chiron's figure floated in the air. He was teaching intermediate archery.

"Chiron!" I called at him. He seemed confused, not seeing where my voice was coming from, until he spotted me.

"Oh, Annabeth! Good afternoon, my girl. Is everything okay?" he said.

I told him everything about my dream and he listened carefully, nodding occasionally. After my story he was quiet for a while. Then he said:

"I have to say, I haven't heard the oracle appearing into one's dream in a hundred years, but I'm quite sure, that the prophecy she gave you was real."

I was horrified again. It was true. Someone was going to die...

"But don't worry, Annabeth. It will turn out alright", Chiron reassured me.

"I'll try to do some research here and I'll get in touch with you if I find something, that would help you on this quest. That's the best I can do right now", he promised.

All I could do was just nod.

"Thank you, Chiron", I said and the connection broke.

"We have to hurry, Annabeth", Thalia said. "It's almost three o'clock! We're going to miss the bus to the next station!"

We darted out of the lavatory and into our compartment, where the guys were still fast asleep.

"Errrmmmph..." Nico said when we tried to shake him up. We tried the same maneuver on Grover and Percy too, but none of the boys woke up. It was time to take it to a higher level. Thalia grabbed both Percy's and Grover's ankles and pulled them off the bench. I did the same to Nico. They instantly woke up, shaking their heads. Thalia and I grinned at them.

"Come on, boys. Make yourselves useful", Thalia ordered. "It's time to change the train."

From the Staunton station we took a bus to the Clifton Forge station, from where the next train would depart. It would take us to Crawfordsville Indiana via Charleston, Cincinnati and Indianapolis.

The bus ride was quiet. The boys drifted back to sleep as soon as their asses hit the seats. I thought about my dream. Thalia tried to distract me with more questions about me and Percy, but soon remembered the second part of my dream and shut up. I was left alone with my thoughts.

I was shattered. The oracle had said that one of us would die on this trip and if my dream was to believe, it would be Percy... My Percy... My dear Seaweed Brain. I couldn't let it happen. I couldn't lose him. Not now. I had to prevent it from happening.

The ride didn't take long, just about fifteen minutes. Then we just jumped onto another train. This train wasn't as empty as the last one had been, but we managed to find us an empty compartment. I suppose Thalia and I had seemed a bit silent, because as soon as the train started moving, Percy asked:

"What's up with you, girls? You seem so... quiet?" He looked a bit concerned.

When he'd asked us what's wrong, Nico and Grover started to look at us with concern in their eyes.

"Yeah, you've been like the dead for the past hour!" Grover said. "No offense, Nico", he added quickly.

"None taken", Nico smiled.

I glanced at Thalia. She nodded.

"Well... I had this dream", I started to tell them.

"Uh-oh, this doesn't sound good", Grover squeaked.

I told them the whole story. I saw their expressions change from concern into anxiety and eventually into pure terror. After I'd finished the story, I was feeling just as awful as I had when I'd told Thalia. I tried not to show it. I didn't want them to pity me. I was strong. It might've not worked, because as soon as I stopped talking, Percy, who sat next to me wrapped his arms around me in comfort. I felt like crying right there and right then, but I fought against it.

"Don't worry, Wise Girl", he said. "It'll be okay. Nothing will happen."

I smiled and pulled back from Percy. He'd called me Wise Girl again. It used to irritate me, but now I found it relaxing. We were such close friends, that we could use such names and wouldn't have to worry about someone getting offended.

"Is that a promise, Seaweed Brain?" I asked.

"Yes. Come what may, none of us will get hurt", he swore, his hand placed on his heart.

Our trip continued in a much happier atmosphere. Again we passed some amazing views. We played poker, chatted and laughed. There were times, when I didn't even remember the prophecy. It was like I'd never seen the dream. While passing Montgomery, Grover pulled out his reed pipes and started playing. We recognized the tune immediately – Angel from Montgomery. We started to sing along from the chorus.

"Wow, you've really improved your playing, Goat Boy!" Thalia commented with a smile after Grover had played the last notes of the song. Grover blushed.

"Thanks, Thalia", he smiled back at her. I could see Thalia's face go a bit pink too.

Our sleeping rhythm was completely messed up, thanks to us leaving early. When we arrived at the Crawfordsville station, it was almost 7 am and we hadn't slept at all after changing the train. We changed the train again and started the last ride to Chicago. Then the real camping would start. I was looking forward to it. It would be awesome! Apart from the possible danger and the obvious spiders nothing could spoil our camping out.

In the last train we all tried to get some sleep. Percy had almost insisted me to rest my head on his shoulder. Thalia had grinned at me when Percy had made his offer. I had grinned back at her and gladly leaned against Percy. The closeness of him had done its soothing magic and I got a good two hours of sleep.

Percy's POV

We got out of the train in Chicago and walked into the nearby bus station. It was hot outside again and the coolness of the station felt welcome. Thalia went to get us tickets from the ticket machine. I was so, so tired. I hadn't slept a wink. My mind was packed with thoughts. Thoughts of one person in particular – Annabeth. She'd looked so fragile while telling us about her nightmare. I just wished my promise that none of us would get hurt had made her feel better.

I'd had a thing for her since she'd saved me and Tyson, my cyclops half-brother, from the Laistrygonian dodgeball players. It was a secret. No one knew about my feelings for her, not even Grover. I wasn't sure if Annabeth's feelings matched mine though. We were just friends.

Suddenly I needed to use the bathroom. I told the others I'd be right back and went on search for the toilets. Soon enough I found them.

While washing my hands I heard someone call me.

"Percy! Perseus Jackson!" It sounded like Chiron.

I glanced around me, looking for him. And then I saw him, his face floating next to me.

"Chiron!" I was quite happy to see him. So much had happened and I could've used some good advice.

"Percy, my boy. I'm glad I reached you", he said, an urgent tone in his voice. "I need you to listen very carefully."

"Okay, Chiron. What's wrong?" As if I didn't know already. There was a lot wrong.

"I suppose Annabeth has told you all about her dream, right?" Chiron asked.

"Yeah. Anything new about it?" I asked, starting to get a bit scared.

"Yes, I suppose. I talked to Zeus. He said there's been something going on at Olympus. He wouldn't say anything more, because the gods aren't really supposed to help you with your quests, but you have to prepare for something godly", he explained. He was totally right. If there was something going on at Olympus, so bad that Zeus had mentioned it, we'd better brace ourselves.

"Okay, Chiron. But I have to go now, our bus is about to leave", I said.

"Oh, I see. Take care, Perseus. May the gods bless you all." And his face faded away.

I walked out of the toilets, back to the others, who were already getting ready for getting on the bus. I eyed everyone and then said:

"I need to talk to you."

So this was the second chapter of my fic. I hope you enjoyed it. I'll soon be back with more!

Luv,

AC