Airplanes and Embarrassments
THALIA
I sat awkwardly in the Big House. Percy and Nico had gone to their cabins to pack, but I had all I needed in my nifty little Huntress pack. After a while of sitting on the beat up couch, I got jumpy and walked outside.
I stopped abruptly when I was met with the Stoll brothers right outside the door. They spoke in alternating sentences:
"Hey Thalia!"
"Whatcha doing?"
"You got called to the Big House, huh?"
"Why?"
"Did Chiron tell you something important?"
"Secret?"
"Wait, why are you at camp?"
I sighed. Classic Stolls. "Chiron called me here, smart ones," I said, slightly annoyed. "And no, I am not going to tell you what he told us about." The boys' faces fell. I strode away with a smirk.
I walked up to the top of the hill and sat with my back against my tree. I closed my eyes and drifted off to sleep, the steady breathing of Peleus and the glittering of the Golden Fleece lulling me into a daze.
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I woke up to the sound of Percy and Nico yelling at me. I opened my eyes to see a pinecone flying towards my face. It hit me square in the nose. I glared up at Percy, who had thrown it.
"Pinecone—face," he gasped, doubled over with laughter. I narrowed my eyes. It was on. While he and Nico were still incapacitated with laughter, I gathered up some pinecones and launched them rapid-fire at the boys. Each one hit their mark; one even hit Nico so hard he fell over.
I was immediately answered with what sounded like an Amazon warrior call. "EYEYEYEYEY!" I was pelted with pinecones, but I had a few more tricks up my sleeve. I grabbed a pinecone and lit it on fire with a small electrical shock, and threw it at Percy. His shirtsleeve caught fire, and he yelped and rolled around on the grass, yelling, "NOT COOL!"
I was too busy laughing to care. I looked over, and Nico was too. He reached his hand up for what looked like a high-five, but maybe he didn't realize he was facing the wrong way.
Our funtime was interrupted by a shadow passing over a section of the grass. I looked up, squinting at the sun behind the figure, and I realized it was Argus. His hundreds of eyes looked down on us disapprovingly, and he motioned for us to get up. Joy, I thought. Quest time. I heaved myself to my feet and Nico did the same. Percy took a little longer because he was still trying to snuff out the last of the fire on his sleeve.
"Aww, c'mon Thalia, you ruined my shirt," Percy whined.
I snorted. "Like you would care." Percy just shrugged and got to his feet. We followed Argus down Half-Blood Hill to the van and climbed in. I'll spare you the story of the van ride, because it was painfully boring. We finally got off at the airport. We checked in, and went through security, which involved a lot of sneaking and a lot of manipulating the Mist.
We sat at the gate for an hour, munching on snacks. Percy and I were embarrassing Nico to death when we decided to hang upside down from the chairs. Hey, a hyperactive kid's gotta do what a hyperactive kid's gotta do, right?
When we were boarding, Nico was sweating and Percy had gone pale. I just rolled my eyes at them a lot and kept walking. Thank the gods the rows were three across, so Percy, Nico and I could sit together. I refused to take the window, so I sat in the middle. Percy took the window seat and Nico sat on the aisle.
I found myself muttering reassuring words to the boys during takeoff. I blinked. Since when did I do that?
I konked out after the first hour or so, waking up after a while to see Nico had done the same. Percy's hands were clenched onto the armrests, and his muscles were shaking from being tight for so long.
I tapped Percy. He didn't move his hands, but he looked over at me. "Have you been like that the whole time?" I asked. Percy nodded and went back to looking scared. I checked the clock and almost choked. It was 5:30pm. Our flight had taken off at 11:00am. Percy had been like that for six and a half hours. I gasped and yanked at his arms. He didn't budge. I slapped his forearm. Nothing.
I finally grabbed his shoulders, shaking him and saying, "Perseus Jackson, snap the heck out of it!" I even gave him a tiny electric shock. He blinked and looked down at his arms. His expression became one of extreme concentration while slowly but surely, his fingers unclenched from the armrests. I saw prominent crescent moon shapes in the gray fabric where his fingernails had dug into it.
Percy was slowly moving his fingers, as if forcing them to obey. (A/N: The Last Olympian quote!) He looked over at the time, and gasped. He rubbed his arms some more and looked over at me gratefully. "Thanks Thalia."
I shrugged. "I try." Just then, one of those airplane ding, dongs sounded, jolting Nico awake.
"What?" He yelped rubbing sleep out of his eyes. "Who's dying…" he stopped as Percy and I started laughing at him. He just rolled his eyes and pointed out the window, and apprehensive expression on his face. "We're landing," he said, a small hint of fear in his voice.
Percy groaned. "Let's just get it over with," he sighed, shutting his eyes tight as the wheels bumped on the ground.
When we finally got off the plane, Percy and Nico looked ready to kiss the ground (with much eye-rolling on my part).
We walked through the London airport with nothing but our backpacks. We searched the crowd for a while, and finally saw a group of people that had a lot of flaming red hair, except for a girl and a boy. They held a sign that looked something like this:
ONIC
SPUREES
IALHTA
Those were the letters in our names, with Percy's full name. The three of us ambled over to them and asked what the signs said.
The tall, redheaded man holding the sign responded. "Nico, Perseus—" Percy flinched at the use of his real name, "and Thalia. Are you them." I nodded. "Come along then," he said, motioning with his hand. After a moment, he stopped abruptly, and I had to slam my heels into the floor to avoid smashing into him. "I'm Arthur, by the way," he said, sticking out his hand. "Arthur Weasley."
I shook his hand, as did Percy and Nico. Mr. Weasley motioned to a plump woman next to him. "This is my wife, Molly," Mrs. Weasley waved. "My sons Fred and George," two identical redheads with mischievous grins smiled at us. "My other son Ron," he motioned to a tall, gangling guy, also with red hair. "And Ron's friends Hermione—" a nice-looking girl with bushy brown hair, "and Harry." Mr. Weasley motioned to a kid that looked uncannily like Percy: green eyes, messy black hair, around the same height. But I also saw some differences: Percy was tanner than Harry, Harry's eyes were emerald green when Percy's were sea green, and Harry had a scar that looked like a bolt of lightning on his forehead.
Then I realized: Harry Potter. Our target (sort of). His friends, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger. We had our wizards. That was easy.
I stepped forward. "Thalia. Just Thalia," I told them.
Nico raised his hand in feeble greeting. "Nico di Angelo," he said simply.
Percy stepped up. "Just call me Percy," he said to them. "No Perseus please." I raised my eyebrows. Since when did Percy Jackson have manners? I shrugged it off and followed the Weasleys out of the airport and into a strangely spacious car, considering the small outside.
As we drove off, I found myself humming; We're off to see the Wizard, the Wonderful Wizard of Oz. We were definitely seeing some wizards, but we would have to wait and see just how wonderful they really were.