Christina:
I reached the archery range, scanning it for my best friend. I found her at the other end of the range, near the forest. She had curly, jet black hair, high arching eyebrows and electric blue eyes. She looked intimidating and pretty powerful, which she was only if you ticked her off. But besides that, she was pretty chill and cool to hang with. Her name was Alethia Grace Aquila, the Daughter of Zeus.
When I reached her, we talked for some time and she informed me that the tree nymphs got into an incident with the Ares kids. The Ares kids had shot a couple of arrow into their tree trunks on purpose because they thought it would be funny to play a prank. And so the tree nymphs got revenge by using their woodland magic to grow vines and plants and wild stuff in the Ares cabin. So the Ares kids got longer hours of chores while the wood nymphs got to set up the courses. She said the nymph that led the little revenge party was Maple. When she finished explaining, Maple came walking up, glaring at me and Alethia.
"She looks smug," I acknowledged.
Alethia smirked.
"Well here you demigods go. Your stupid, idiotic archery targets. Good luck with trying to hit them," Maple grumbled.
"Oh don't worry. Its not like were going to shot some arrows into your trunk," retorted Alethia.
"Don't even mention that incident," growled Maple.
"Why shouldn't I? Everybody is talking about it. Besides, you wood nymphs and the Ares cabin deserve what they got," snapped Alethia.
"Shut up!" hissed Maple, her face turning a shade of a light brown, the color of maple.
"Go turn back into a maple tree, Maple," spat Alethia.
Maple looked at me angrily and snarled, "I guess your going to side with your friend, are you?"
"Yeah, I sure am. You guys deserve what you got," I said. Maple glared at me and with a small pop, she was gone leaving a sweet, hot maple scent behind that was blown away by the light wind.
"Well then. Let's just continue as if nothing happened."
We notched our arrows again and shot. They went flying through the air, planting themselves right flat in the middle of the target.
"Bulls-eye!" shouted a voice. Alethia and I spun around to see a boy walking toward us with his bow and his quiver full of arrows. I blushed and so did Alethia.
"Thanks Lynch," I beamed.
He grinnedand his straight teeth gleamed. Lynch Fuller was the son of Apollo and like a brother to me and Alethia. He had blonde hair that turned gold in the sunlight and he was built like a long distance runner. He was somewhat tan and had nice arm muscles.
"What brought you here?" Alethia asked.
"Well, I was thinking about practicing with you guys if you don't mind," he said.
"Oh, all right." I said.
"So I heard that there is a new camper here," Lynch said, taking aim. "Determined or undetermined."
"Undetermined. His name is Logan Moore. He is on the tour with my sister Lillian." I informed, watching him send the arrow into the blue area.
"Ah. Well I guess I'll see him tonight at dinner or at some point today," he chuckled.
About half-an-hour later, we were drenched in sweat. We had tried different moves and different attacks. I even told them about the fight that happened on the hill.
"Well duh Christina. Of course it would've been waaaay to easy for you. It's because of your parents and also being a-," said Alethia.
"I know already! Everybody tells me that all the time whenever I fight a monster in the woods or when I'm just battle training! Why can't people just see me as what they are?" I exclaimed frustratingly. No one answered.
After an uncomfortable silence, Alethia and Lynch went to go get a drink of water. I told them I would catch up to them.
"Maple, come here," I huffed once they were out of earshot. The was pop and then she was here.
"What do you want?" she grumbled.
"To talk to you about your duties that got assigned to you after the Ares incident."
"Oh please, I really, really, absolutely don't want to talk about it!" she said, raising her voice.
"Too bad because I'm going to anyways, whether you like it or not," I growled.
"Why would you want to talk to a wood nymph? All you did was make fun of me with you little friend. Besides what good would I do for you?" she argued.
"Well if you don't want to have your duties cut short than fine!" I shouted.
"Yeah, well, I don't wa-. Wait. Did you just say you could cut my duties short?" she asked, suddenly interested.
"Um, duh. Unless you want to be stuck doing them for the rest of the month." I said.
"Oh. So do I have to do them but my time gets cut in half?"
"Here's your choice. If you can do six good deeds, try not to make Mr. D or the campers mad for a whole week, then I will cut your duties short. But until then, you'll be doing full time duties." I said. "Only if you take this deal." I added.
Maple thought for a second and then finally agreed. "So I have to do six good deeds, try not to make Mr. D mad or the campers mad for a whole week to get my duties get cut short. But while I'm doing this, I'll be doing full time duties." she repeated. "Yep."
"What if I don't do it in a whole week?"
"Then you start over. Today's Thursday. Therefore, if you did six good deeds and don't make Mr. D mad, you'll be fine. But if you do fail, you'll have to wait until the next Thursday, before you start again."
"Ok. Well thanks."
"Yeah, no problem. Just remember this bargain. And don't go blabbing your mouth either or else," I warned.
"Fine," And without a proper goodbye, she disapppeared with a poof of green smoke.
I began walking out of the archery range feeling a little nervous. What if I couldn't be able to cut her duty time short? I thought. Maybe I was so sure when I was telling her that I could. Stop it, I told myself. You can cut her duty time short if you talk to the right person.
As I trudged across the lawn, I thought about Friday night and who I would want on my team because Friday night was Capture the Flag like Alethia had said. Finally I made to where Alethia and Lynch were drinking some water and were talking with some other campers that were also drenched in sweat. We began to talk for a little bit about what had been happening at camp while I was gone, and what had been going on with me when I was at the school with Logan. There was a pause for a few seconds and then we started talking about Logan.
"So, is he determined or undetermined," asked Liam stupidly. I looked at him as if he were really that stupid not to know the answer already. He smiled.
"Undetermined idiot or else everybody would be talking about it."
"True. Very true," he said, stroking his chin as if he had a beard.
"So…what activity do you have next?" Alethia asked.
"I think tree-jumping class. Why should I go to it even though I made up the technique myself?"
"Because you might lose skill in it," she reasoned. I looked at her like that was impossible for that to happen.
"How can I, if I made the technique up?" I said. Alethia shrugged.
"I guess its because you get out of practice. Kind of like when you train with a bow and an arrow and then you don't use it for a while so that when you go to practice or fight, you miss aim or it doesn't feel right because your out of practice."
The conch horn sounded in a distance, signaling us to move to the next activity. Lynch asked where I was going.
"Well, I'm planning on going to the sword arena and practicing. Also I was going to visit the armory to get Logan a balanced sword because I've got a feeling that when I go to the sword arena, I'll end up seeing him there," I replied. They nodded and saying goodbye, they left.
I arrived at the sword arena, a big circular place with walls, and found that I was either up for a challenge or the campers in there were. On one side of the arena, there was at least a dozen of big, strong, ruff looking campers. On the other side of the arena were a bunch of honey blond hair, stormy gray eyes, athletic looking campers. The ruff looking kids are the children of Ares, the war god. The others campers were the children of Athena, goddesses of wisdom and battle strategy.
"What is going on here," I said. One of the Ares kids looked at me and sneered.
"Well look who it is. The one who always interferes in fights."
"Nice to see you too, Sophia." I grumbled.
"And isn't the hero of the day too? The one who brought a new camper to camp"
"Yeah, so. Got a problem with that? Or are you just jealous that I went out into the real world for nine months and came back with a new camper; something that you couldn't do?" I taunted. Sophia's look turned to rage. She tried to make a desperate attacking lunge at me but her brothers and sisters pulled her back.
"Let go of me!" she screeched at them. "She's the one who's asking for a fight! Not me!"
"Actually you're the one who's asking for a fight because you are the one who tried to attack me just right now," I said.
"You little-," she started.
"Uh uh uhh. No profanity," I replied. Before she could react, one of Sophia's sisters leaned down in whispered something in her ear.
"Fine then," Sophia told her. She looked at me with hatred. "My sister just told me that you can be on Athena's team because we are planning on doing a practice battle." she snorted.
"You don't think I know that already? Besides why would I want to be on your team?"
"I didn't say that I wanted you on my team," she growled.
"Basically you did," I said.
"Prove it."
"I will. You said, 'My sister just told me that you can be on Athena's team' which means that I could choose either to be on your team or on Athena's team. But if I did have a choice, I would've picked Athena anyways because why would I want to be on the team of Ares?" I replied back. Sophia glared at me and made a deep growling sound in the back of her throat.
"You want to mess with Ares, Christina? Then fight us. One against my cabin if you think your so tuff."
"Fine. I don't care. I'll whip your butt easily."
"Yeah right. We'll see how tuff you are after I've won."
"I highly doubt that, Sophia." I turned around facing the Athena cabin.
"Don't help me in this battle. You know full well that I'll whip their butts." The Athena cabin nodded and backed out until they were at the rim of the arena.
"Now time to get down to business. Let's see what you've learned," snarled Sophia, unsheathing her sword. I chuckled.
"Oh, I've learned a lot. But you guys haven't learned anything because you think you can win a fight against me."
"Whatever. We'll see who's laughing in the end," was her only reply before she yelled, "Attack!" Her front line of six people came charging at me. As the first one approached, I saw something out of the corner of my eye. It was Logan and Lillian coming up to the arena. They froze next to the Athena campers and stared in shock as six Ares warriors charged me.
As the first Ares warrior swung his sword to my head, I ducked and hit him in the head with the butt of my sword. Thank the gods that he had a helmet on or his head would've become more thick-headed or brain jelly. Number 2 and Number 3 attack viciously. Number 2 bent down and swung his sword so that the flat side of his blade would knock me off balance. But I jumped and instead of tripping me, he tripped his teammate who I slashed with my sword. As the last three out of the six warriors from the first row came towards me, Sophia yelled for her line to attack. The three that had been running at me had slowed down so they could combine with the last line. Soon nine warriors were charging me with Sophia leading them.
This should be easy, I thought.
Then Sophia barked an order and four Ares kids came forward but not at the same time. They would give one another a few seconds head start before coming at me. As soon as the first one came, our swords clashed together. She tried to take a swing but I was behind her I elbowed her right below her neck about in between her shoulder blades, so that she fell in pain. Number 2 came at me quick as lightning. He swung and our swords clashed together too but this time he was too slow. Obviously his sword was not his balance because he tried to pick it up quickly but I used my elbow again and hit him between his left shoulder and neck then using my knee, kneed him in his gut. Number 3 was either really stupid or was just brave because she came at me with no problem. But when she came, she tripped over her gear, so I just left her. Number 4 paused for a second until Sophia told him to attack me and not to stand there like a idiot. His sword hit mine and for a second he held me in a pose. Finally, without a warning, I yanked downward and swept him rapidly off his feet. By this time, Sophia was outraged by the fact that I had already had injured half her cabin.
"You're so dead, Christina. You're so dead," she yelled.
"I'd like to see that happen!" I retorted.
"It will!" she answered.
"Yeah, right. Because I'm about to die of laughter because you're just wasting time."
Sophia's face turned the color of pepperoni, and charged me with her five remaining warriors.
"Christina! What are you doing? You're going to lose against them! There is no way that you can fight them all?" yelled someone that I realized was Logan. Oh we'll see about that, I thought. I let my instincts take over and I went autopilot. I knew that fighting more than five at once on ground was hard enough.
"Come and get me if you can!" I shouted. I turned heel and began running. I heard footsteps pounding on the marble floor behind me and I knew I was being pursued by all of them just as I wanted them to. I began to slow down as I got closer to one of the pillars letting the Ares kids get in striking distance but when one came forward, I leaped up the pillar, pushed off and flipped once, twice, three times before landing on my feet behind Sophia and her warriors. I looked ahead in time to see the one warrior trying to slow down before slamming face-first into the pillar I had flipped off of.
"Ahhhh!" she screeched. "Look what you did! You just injured my best warrior!"
"Wow. That's saying a lot about you and your warriors," I retorted sarcastically.
"What do you mean?" she growled.
I glanced back real quick and saw that Logan had his jaw hanging open with a stunned look on his face. I had probably stunned him with my flips but he had just only saw the a beginners move because he didn't know what else I had up my sleeve and he still didn't know how long I had been training here and how good I was. I looked back at Sophia and said, "Well you just said, 'you just injured my best warrior' which means you're not as good as a fighter as she was and that she was very unintelligent and blind because she just ran into a STUPID PILLAR!"
"You know what? That's it. You just pulled my last straw. You're going down," she responded.
"Go ahead. Take one step forward and I will make you wish you had never asked or challenged me into this fight," was my answer. She blinked once and then her eyes reduced to slits which meant either she was thinking this through (which would be a first) and was about to be smart and give up or she was going to play brave and be stupid by charging me for the finishing fight. Of course, I knew deep down that she wasn't going to give up and was going to pick the choice of playing brave and being stupid. And she did. She screamed at her warriors to attack me and they did. Now at this point, I thought they couldn't get anymore stupider. However, they did. Sophia let herself drop behind all the others so that she could fight me last if all her first warriors fell first against me.
Good thinking, but I'll still defeat you in the end, I considered. There were still five warriors because the one warrior who had tripped and fell because her gear was too big, had finally gotten up and was with her fellow warriors.
"Use Lightning Strike!" Sophia screeched at her warriors.
We rarely used Lightning Strike during battle training. No one really considered it useful unless you had a bunch of people. Also I realized the real reason why Sophia had dropped back because she was going to make her team use Lightning Strike on me and she was thinking it was going to make me surrender. Lightning Strike works fine with groups like I said. Lightning Strike is where they surround the other group and attack, but leave and then attack again and so on until the group being attacked surrenders or is defeated. It makes it seem like there is more of them. I guessed Sophia was using it because I was making her lose warriors. The warriors were now like six feet away and I noticed that they had used some of there energy running. I knew automatically that they were going to be slow making the move not that efficient. Boy, I was right.
Soon they had surrounded me and were getting ready to attack. I forced myself to wait until the last moment.
One Olympian, two Olympians, three Olympians, and that's when I used my attack.
As they came inward, I leaped straight up so that some of the warriors would run into one another. As I came down, I saw one warrior right below me and I had a sudden idea. Time to change the plan, I thought wickedly. I twisted so that instead of seeing the arena wall in front of me, I was seeing the Ares kids in front of me. I came down and landed square flat on the back of the warrior that had been straight below me. When I landed, I grabbed the straps of his armor and flipped. As I flipped, I brought the Ares warrior, who was surprisingly light, flipping with me. I let go at the last moment as we came for the ground, and landed on my feet as the Ares kid went sprawling behind me. One down, four to go. I didn't have much time to finish off the rest of Ares kids because they were beginning to get over there surprise and daze. As quick as lightning, I grabbed the nearest Ares kid and tripped her. Three left. Two Ares kids spun around and lunged at me. Warrior 1 had managed to leap a little to high and I crouched down quickly into squatting position, small enough for the warrior to go flying over me and onto the one I had tripped. Warrior 2 had regained his balance and lunged forward again, sticking his sword under my arm. I crouched down again and jabbed at his legs causing him to collapse.
"Nice try," I told him, "But not efficient or fast enough." His only reply was a loud groan. That left the one warrior who had tripped over her gear the first time, and who didn't look anxious to fight me, and Sophia that stupid idiot who was bidding her time.
"What you going to do now? Fight me or surrender to me since I just beat your whole cabin?" I asked Sophia grudgingly.
"I'll never give up!" she growled. "Trina!" she yelled at the girl who had tripped. "Use the Two-people Macedonia plan!" Idiot, I thought. If I just beat your whole cabin plus the warriors who were using Lightning Strike, do you think the Two-people Macedonia plan will work against me? The Two-people Macedonia plan is where you have one move on either side and attack. But seeing how I just beat her cabin, this was going to be easier and she was going to be stupider.
As Sophia and Trina moved onto to either side of me, I flipped my sword back into a golden key, slipped it in my pocket and brought out two wicked, gleaming, silver long daggers about the size of my arms. I saw that Sophia and Trina had paused, wary of my daggers. Trina took one look at them, and backed up a step or two. Sophia was watching them. She didn't know how bad these could hurt even if they weren't Celestial bronze (a type of metal that make monsters disintegrate and freak out at the sight of it. Also hurts demigods too and we use it all the time in battle training or for real battling). Sophia glanced at Trina and nodded. Then they attacked.
Trina came at me faster than I thought she would. As she charged me, Sophia started her attack too. As soon as Trina got to me, she swung her sword which I caught on the hilt of my dagger. She yelped in surprise because that was probably the fastest move she ever saw with a dagger. Sophia finally reached me and tried to make a head cut. I parried the swing and took a swung at her. She blocked mine. Sophia backed up about three steps and came back at me. She tried to make a slash at my arm but I used my foot and caught her in her chest, making her stumble backwards. She winced, trying to catch her breath since I probably had just knocked all the air out of her. As she clutched her chest trying to get her breath back, I realized I had pushed Trina with my dagger so that it was about five inches from her chest. She yanked down and backed up real quick. The look on her face showed wariness and fear of my daggers. Very un-Ares like, I thought. Sophia, was now crouching down, still trying to catch her breath but was watching to see what Trina would do.
"Scared," I taunted Trina.
"No," she growled.
"You wish."
"I don't wish, I know."
"You're to dumb witted to know anything," I retorted.
She gave me a pure look of hatred which replaced her fear. She charged me and swung her sword downward which was suppose to come on top of my head but fell short. It would've been a few inches away from my undefended chest (since she had a breastplate on) but I used both my daggers and brought them up into a X so that her sword got caught in the middle.
"What the?" she said surprised. I forced one of my daggers down (using my other dagger to hold her sword in place) and cut a nice size gash across her arm. She howled in pain and collapsed. I turned on Sophia and saw that she had finally gained her breath but had also gotten her strength back.
"You…idiot. You…just…took…out…my…whole cabin," she managed to say since she was trying to control her fury. "You'll pay Christina," was her last reply before she struck.
She came at me fast and I swung one of my daggers at her which she deflected so hard that it clattered out of my hand about five feet away from me. No time to retrieve it because I knew it would return but not soon enough. Thank the gods I had an extra dagger. However, Sophia knocked me off my feet. She slashed downwards and I rolled. She slashed on one side then the other and I would have to keep rolling back and forth. Typical. I rolled backwards in a backward somersault and leaped up. She charged again and I got inside her strike and swung my dagger from side to side making her back up. She snarled in frustration and finally she jumped back far enough from my dagger. But I wasn't going to let her get her strength back so I came at her quick. She saw me coming, took a strike but as soon as my dagger and her sword collided, my dagger hit the base of hers and I put all weight on it forcing it down until it clatter out of her hand. She tried to retrieve but I kicked it away and stuck my dagger an inch from her chest. She froze. I had won because if she moved anywhere else, all it took was one swing to knock her down hard. Sophia was breathing heavily and had broken a lot of sweat. I had broken a little but I wasn't drenched in sweat like she was.
"I guess I win," I told her. "I told you I would win."
"Fine then," she snarled. "You win but if you think the Ares cabin is going to be nice to you just because you won this little battle, you're wrong."
"Oh I didn't say anything about you guys being nice to me or me expecting that. I'm just saying, I always win," I said. By now, the Ares kids were getting up and backing away and out of the arena. Sophia shot a look of hatred at me and left. As soon as she was out the arena, the Athena cabin broke into a roar of triumph. They began to congratulate me and start practicing in dueling pairs while I walked over to where Logan and Lillian were standing.
"Whoa! You just like beat…whipped…I mean…like wow! Where'd you learn to fight like that?" asked Logan exasperated.
"Here at camp and away from camp fighting monsters," I replied.
"Haven't seen you fight like that in a while," said Lillian.
"Yeah. Its been awhile since I've fought like that. Feels great," I answered. "Lets leave and finish your tour Logan."
"Okay."
"Are you going to come with us Lillian?" I asked.
"No, sorry. I was planning on doing sword practice."
"Ok then. Bye Lillian," I said.
"Bye Christina. Bye Logan. I'll see you at dinner or at some point."
"Ok." And with that we left.
A/N: All right, I'm going to try to make the chapters shorter because I know they're long. Sorry. Review and subscribe! :)