Woo-hoo! Eleven reviews in the last chapter only! Which means we're NOW AT THREE HUNDRED REVIEWS OH MY GODS OH MY GODS!
When I first started my story I thought I'd get fifty reviews, total, but now this is my most popular story because I've never, ever, hit the three hundred review mark before. (Some have yet to reach five. hinthint)
Disclaimer: Not Rick. If I was I'd probably be working on the fifth book in the HoO series, as apparently HoH is finished and all there is left to do is edit it and print all the copies. (Which will take a while, considering the size of this fandom.)
Special dedication to Donavin, the three hundredth reviewer! And The Minun as well because of his/her idea!
Leo
"Sabotage Team One arrived at Warship 001, I repeat, Sabotage Team One arrived at—"
"Just short-circuit the wires," Frank told him, feeling quite annoyed with Leo. The first boy just grinned and knelt down next to the controls, picking out a wire-cutter from his Hephaestus-kid belt and snapping off the correct lines. To completely disable everything in the ship it took him around twelve minutes. Frank stood behind him with his bow loaded and ready to shoot in case they met someone, but nobody showed up. Nico patrolled outside, waiting for them.
"Done," Leo announced, standing and dusting his hands against one another. The two boys began towards the door. "Now let's just get to the second ship—"
He and Frank froze just as they were about to leave to find themselves facing half a dozen spearheads pointed at their heads.
"Maybe we can wait," Leo adjusted.
Percy
Annabeth was knelt next to the control panel, cutting what seemed to be random wires in Percy's perspective with her dagger. Percy stood watch, but Annabeth was taking too long and he was beginning to get bored.
"Which ones do you know to cut?" he asked, in reality just wanting to hear the sound of another person speaking.
"I find the ones that connect to the circuits, then follow the commands of what they do. If I lose track of one then I have to start all over again," she replied.
"Why don't you just cut them all?"
She turned and gave him a glare. "If I could do that, don't you think I would have done that by now?"
Chime twittered.
"Whatever," Percy said, running a hand through his hair. He turned back to face the door to find two Romans standing there heaving very deadly looking swords.
"I have no idea how those guys got there," said Annabeth.
Percy pulled the cap off of Riptide and snapped the flat of his blade against the helmet of the first Roman. He crumpled and was unconscious in under five seconds after the fight started. The second guy hesitated, then charged.
Percy dodged the blade then countered the swipe with his own. He struck again, adding a slight flick to his wrist and sending the Roman's sword flying. Percy allowed a small grin to unnerve the other and slapped his blade against the side of his head as well. He fell forward, knocked out cold. Chime landed on his helmet and began to peck the back of his head angrily.
"Are they outside?" Annabeth asked, still cutting wires with her dagger.
Percy was way ahead of her. He ran outside and leaned off of the warship railing outside to find about twenty other Romans, led by Octavian himself.
"Surrender in the name of Rome!" he yelled, brandishing his sword.
"Yeah, sure, in a sec," Annabeth called out, furiously working on the ship's controls.
Octavian frowned, then understood what she was doing. He raised his sword even higher and yelled, "SENETUS ROMANUASSS MAXIUSS!" (Percy had no idea what that meant; probably something like "Rome FTW!") He took a step forward, tripped on a pile of Pegasus poop, and landed face-first on the ground.
"I'm just going to wait," Percy decided.
Piper
Piper yelled out as she was thrown in the cell. As far as she could tell, Hazel, Frank and Leo had been caught as well. Somehow Annabeth and Percy and Nico had evaded capture, or maybe they were on their way of coming. The cell door slammed behind her and she heard the pitter-patter of feet walking away.
She closed her eyes and tried to think back of where things went wrong. Jason and Reyna had introduced Hazel, calling her a hero, and then Hazel gave them a three-minute insight of the Greeks. Then she called Piper up, and when Piper tried charmspeaking… what had happened?
Octavian. That creep ruined the plan. Somehow he could tell it was bewitchment and ordered her imprisonment along with Hazel's. Jason and Reyna were forced to claim they didn't know of their plans if they wanted to stay out of the mess. Piper didn't really blame them.
Afterwards Octavian figured out the rest of the plan and sent a bunch of groups to search the warships. They found Leo and Frank and easily overpowered them, but had no clue what had happened to Nico. Had he sided with the Romans or the Greeks in the end? No way of knowing. Percy and Annabeth had fought, as Piper heard it, and managed to get away with Chime.
Now, because of this, Octavian had fast-forwarded the flight to that very day, meaning CHB would be attacked the following morning. Jason and Reyna were on one of the four ships that now worked, flying over to NYC. A small group of a dozen campers had remained at Camp Jupiter to keep everything organized, guard the four prisoners, and to be there if Percy and Annabeth (and maybe Nico?) returned.
One day before the Romans reached Camp Half-Blood. One day. Piper looked around the cell she shared with Hazel to find that she was the same pale colour.
Piper couldn't shake off the feeling that this failure was all her fault. If she had been a bit more distraction-worthy for ten more minutes maybe the others would have been able to disable the remaining four ships. Or at least two of them.
Hazel crawled up to her and patted her shoulder. "It's alright," she reassured her. "We'll be fine."
They heard a door opening from the outside of their cell. It sounded as if there were two people talking to each other.
"So you're new?" one was saying.
"Yep," replied the other. "Got here two weeks ago."
"So how was your trip with Lupa?"
"…Lupa? It was, uh, okay, I guess."
There was a pause, as if the other didn't really believe him.
"That's cool. What cohort are you in?"
"I'm in the, uh… two. Second co-thingy."
"I'm in the second cohort, and I've never seen you around. Are you sure you belong here?"
"…Of course I belong here! Why wouldn't I be here if I didn't belong here?" There was nervous laughter.
Then the sound of a blade being pulled from its sheath and being swung. A yelp and then metal on metal. The fight endured around half a minute, and by the sounds of it it wasn't played nice. Eventually there was a loud crash and a groan, and the girls' cell door opened to reveal Percy, wearing Roman armour and easily re-capping Riptide. He was completely unscathed, as if it were magic.
"That was fun," he decided.
Annabeth showed up with Leo and Frank, Chime fluttering above her head. "We have to leave," she decided, running for the door at the end of the hallway.
"And Nico?" Hazel asked, concerned for her half-brother.
"He went with the Romans," replied Annabeth. "We have to figure out how to follow them."
"They already all left," Percy informed the others as they pushed open the double-doors to reveal the fading sunlight. "So we'll have to find our own method of transport. Any way other than plane would take too long, and six unruly teenagers travelling without adults would bring up a lot of questions in customs."
Piper suddenly remembered something. "We're in California?" she asked.
"Yeah," Leo said. "Why?"
Piper grinned. "Oh, I can get us a ride."
SNAP CLIFFHANGER!
Even though you guys all now what's Piper thinking of!
Review, please. Pretty pretty pretty please.
Also, I'm going on a camping trip pretty soon and I won't be able to update then, and afterwards we're taking a family/friends trip to the States (woo hoo!) for another long while, so I honestly don't know when I'll update. I'll try to post the next chapter in between the camping trip and the United States of America trip, and I'll let you know for how long I'll be away for the second one.
Peace!