Ready for this chapter? I know I am!

Disclaimer: *speaking nonchalantly, pretending to be cool) You know. The ushe. (I have no idea how to spell the abbreviation of 'usual')

And guess what? HoH comes out in a month! We can officially start freaking out and prepare ourselves for an even worse cliffhanger! Yay! *quietly turns back and sobs into hands*

Piper

"How on earth did they do that?" Piper demanded. "Train the gryphons, I mean. They're monsters. They can't be tamed."

Hazel winced. "Actually..." she started, then stopped as if taking back what she said.

"And?" Annabeth prodded.

She sighed. "It's a new experiment we Romans have been trying out," Hazel admitted. "We breed some gryphons in the safety of camp and train them to be sort of like our replacement of flying horses. The first few tries didn't go so well, and I think someone lost a finger."

"Yeah, cool, whatever," Percy interrupted. "Our main problem are the mortals. We need to get them to safety."

"Where?" Leo asked. "We're three thousand feet in the air if you haven't noticed, and no square meter of this place is currently qualified as 'safe'."

"Not safety; just out of sight," Annabeth decided. "The Romans won't kill them." She turned to Hazel. "Will they?"

"We wouldn't," Frank replied for her. "But maybe the Mars campers would..."

There were five loud thumps on the plane roof as the gryphons landed. They heard the co-pilot in the controls room ask, "What was that?"

"We need a distraction," Hazel decided. "What do gryphons like?"

"Gold," Annabeth replied almost immediately. "Or anything that looks like gold. We can drive them away with that."

"We have some valuable things on the plane," Piper announced. "Gold? I'm not so sure, but I could double-check."

Annabeth nodded. "Anything shiny should be all right," she told her. "So here's the plan—"

She was interrupted by a knock on the plane door. "The Romans," she announced, glancing behind her shoulder. She turned back to their small group. "Piper needs to go get the valuables; someone else to stay with the mortals in the control room and defend them if something goes wrong."

"I can do that," Hazel and Frank volunteered at the same time.

"Percy and I, as the best fighters, should go and keep them busy while Piper gets ready. Sorry, Leo, you're coming with us."

"Shoot," he cursed.

"But they'll be coming inside, right?" Percy made sure. "We won't have to fight on the roof. Because if we do, I'll be fine with helping Piper gather shiny things and—"

A loud hissing sound interrupted him, and Annabeth yelled, "Grab on to something!" The airplane door opened if just for a second, and three Romans jumped in before the wind pulled it shut again.

"Whoa!" one of them exclaimed, looking around admirably. "Sweet ship!"

"Piper, go!" Annabeth shouted, drawing her blade. Without being told, Hazel and Frank ran over to the control room to the mortals. Percy unsheathed Riptide, pulling off the cap and holding it in his free hand. Leo looked around for some sort of weapon he could use, eventually deciding on a seat cushion. Piper scrambled over to the back room, the door shutting behind her.

The first Roman struck towards Percy, stabbing towards his center, but the Greek twisted and the blade struck his arm instead. Percy winced slightly but remained unscratched. He faked a move towards the left and instead swung to the right, hitting the Roman in the side and forcing him to his knees. Percy thrust the heel of his blade into the Roman's chin, knocking his head back against the plane wall and rendering him unconscious. Annabeth was fighting the other two at the same time, keeping them busy until her boyfriend could lend her a hand.

"You know what, Leo?" she told him, her breath a little more paced. "I think we're okay. Go help Piper."

Leo was more than happy to oblige.

He found her in the back room, bringing over some expensive silver cutlery on a gold-plated tray to the front. "Need help?" he asked.

"Wouldn't help," she replied casually. Leo walked over to a small blue felt box and opened it to find ring encrusted with three legit green emeralds.

"How rich are you guys?" he asked, closing the lid and tossing the box to Piper.

"I don't know," she replied, catching it and dropping it next to the tray. "Dad never really spoke about it. He gave up a lot of expensive stuff to charities and whatever."

"Don't you mean 'donate'?"

Piper frowned. "All right, don't get all spirity-do-good with me here, Leo," she retorted. "It'll be too weird coming from your mouth."

He pretended to be insulted. "I can be spirity-do-good you know," he told her.

Piper scoffed. "Sure," she replied sarcastically, making a point of rolling her eyes.

The door opened. "Oh, thanks for coming to help us—" she started, but stopped. It was not one of their friends at the doorway.

"Hello," said the Roman. Unlike the other four, she was a girl, maybe around nineteen. She only wore a breastplate and some armour to cover her shins, so she must have been feeling pretty confident about this battle. "I'm Gwen. What's up?"

Instead of replying, Leo snatched his seat cushion from the floor and set it on fire, hurling it at her. She obviously wasn't prepared for this attack, and her sword barely managed to slice it in half. The flames died.

"Whoa," she said, blinking a few times. "That was unexpected."

"Don't tell me we have to fight you now," Piper said.

Gwen spun the sword around in a circle. "Probably," she admitted, aiming it at their throats as if preparing to thrust the blade into their necks.

Hazel

Hazel and Frank weren't doing so good at keeping the mortals busy.

"Oh, look at that cloud!" Hazel exclaimed, pointing. "Doesn't it look like a…" She faltered for a second. "It totally resembles a… the cloud seriously reminds me of a…" She coughed lightly. "What does it look like, Frank?"

"Hmm... a duck," he decided.

"More like a platypus to me," the female onboard attendant decided. "But why aren't you over with your rich friend, chatting about teenager things? I would love to have a rich friend."

Hazel shrugged. "We got bored—"

Someone shouted at the back of the plane.

The pilot steered his eyes upwards to the review mirror to see Hazel's and Frank's faces. "What was that?" he asked them.

Hazel scoffed. "Oh, I don't know," she said, desperately trying to remember how not to look like she was acting. "Probably the girls back there, taking about guys or something. You know how dramatic they can be—"

Another shout, followed by the sound of metal clashing on metal.

"Something probably just fell," Hazel added quickly. "I'll go check on it. Frank, stay here."

What? he mouthed at her.

Stay, she mouthed back.

No.

Frank. Stay.

"Why do I have to stay with the mortals?" he asked quietly.

"Because someone needs to keep an eye on them," Hazel hissed back.

"No."

"Frank, I'm warning you—"

"I won't do it."

"Uh, what are you guys talking about back there?" the co-pilot asked.

"Nothing," Hazel replied at the same time Frank replied, "Clowns."

The attendant turned in her seat to face them. "That's interesting," she said. "I was sure you guys called us mortals."

Hazel laughed self-consciously. "What? Ha ha ha. You're hilarious. Frank, stay here."

Then before he could reply she darted behind the curtain to the other room.

Well, I hope Frazel wasn't so OOC. I'm pretty sure they were. Ah well.

Now please! There's this video on YouTube, and you aren't a true PJO/HoO fan unless you've seen it! (I watched it, and cried. After a while I got over it and watched it again. I cried again. I'm still crying.) It's called "PJO [let's see how far we've come]" by kelso895. And there's another one by the same artist but different YouTube account; "C'mon - Viria's tribute to Percy Jackson" by Sam theGreat. Watch both of them and mention them in your review so that I can fangirl/guy with you!