First Person: Lucy
Once I'd finally explained Kaze being my little brother, a son of Hermes, who spoke only Japanese and had a knack for stealing things with incredible speed (as well as gotten him to give back Leo's tool belt), Frank stumbled into the mess hall.
"Take off! Take off!" All of us shot to our feet.
"Where's Percy?" Annabeth demanded. "And Audrey and the goat?" Frank grabbed his knees, trying to breathe. His clothes were stiff and damp like they'd been washed in pure starch.
"On deck. They're fine. We're being followed!" We hurried above deck, Frank trailing, still gasping for air.
Percy, Hedge, and Audrey lay on the deck, looking exhausted. Hedge was missing his shoes. He grinned at the sky muttering, "Awesome. Awesome." Percy and Audrey were covered in nicks and scratches like they'd jumped through a window. Audrey waved as she sat against a mast, trying to catch her breath, while Percy grasped Annabeth's hand weakly as if to say "Be right with you, as soon as the world stops spinning."
"What? What?" Leo cried, holding a half-eaten grilled cheese sandwich. "Can't a guy even take a lunch break? What's wrong?"
"Followed!" Frank yelled again.
"Followed by what?" Jason asked.
"I don't know!" Frank panted. "Whales? Sea monsters? Maybe Kate and Porky!"
"Tatakai?!" Kaze asked, with a little too much enthusiasm.
"That makes absolutely no sense," Annabeth said, looking ready to strangle the guy, though I wasn't sure her hands would fit around his thick neck. "Leo, you'd better get us out of here." Leo put his sandwich between his teeth pirate style and ran for the helm. Soon, the Argo II was rising into the sky. Annabeth manned the aft crossbow, and Kaze looked over the railing, moving back and forth across the deck looking for any signs of a fight. He seemed to have gathered a disturbing excitement for battle. He was disappointed when he reported no signs of pursuit by whales or otherwise, but Percy, Frank, and Hedge didn't start to recover until the Atlanta skyline was a hazy smudge in the distance.
"Charleston," Audrey said, having calmed a while ago. "Set a course for Charleston."
"Charleston?" Jason asked, saying the name as if it had brought back bad memories. "What exactly did you find in Atlanta?" Frank unzipped his backpack and started bringing out souvenirs.
"Some peach preserves. A couple of T-shirts. A snow globe. And, um, these not-really-Chinese handcuffs." Annabeth seemed to be visibly struggling to stay calm.
"How about you start from the top - of the story, not the backpack." We gathered on the quarterdeck so Leo could hear the conversation as he navigated. Percy, Frank and Audrey took turns relating what happened at the Georgia Aquarium, with Hedge interjecting from time to time with a "That was awesome!" or "Then I kicked her in the head!" At least the coach seemed to have forgotten about Percy and Annabeth falling asleep in the stable the night before, though judging from the story, we had worse problems to worry about than being grounded. When Percy and Audrey explained the captive sea creatures in the aquarium, I understood why they seemed so down.
"That's terrible," Emily said. "We need to help them."
"We will," Percy promised. "In time. But we have to figure out how. I wish…" He shook his head. "Nevermind. First, we have to deal with this bounty on our heads." Coach Hedge had lost interest in the conversation - probably because it was no longer about him - and wandered toward the bow of the ship, practicing his roundhouse kicks and complimenting himself on his technique. I repeated what Percy said in Japanese for Kaze, working as fast as I could to keep him up to date on the conversation, and he blinked.
"Bounty? Sure." He reached into his jacket and dug around in the infinite pockets for a moment. There was some clanking, and I wondered how much he'd already taken from the ship alone. After a moment, there was a crinkling sound and he pulled out a scroll of paper. It had kanji symbols on it, but I took it and recited it in English. It took me a moment of reading it because I hadn't read kanji in years.
"There's a description of all of you, including my team, your names, your godly parent, powers, weaknesses, etc. The Argo II is mentioned as our vessel. They want my team alive, and if possible two other demigods, a boy, and a girl, but if they can only capture Veon and someone else from my team, they'll still be a reward from Gaea. As this paper's in Japanese, I'd assume this is worldwide, so not only in the U.S." Annabeth gripped the hilt of her dagger.
"A bounty on our heads…as if we didn't attract enough monsters already."
"Do we get personal WANTED posters?" Leo asked. "And do they have our bounties, like broken down on a price list?"
"Ototo, are there different versions of the poster? Possibly one for each person?" He shook his head.
"There's only that, as far as I know." Hazel crinkled her nose.
"What are you talking about?"
"Just curious how much I'm going for these days," Leo said. "I mean, I can understand not being as pricey as Percy or Jason, maybe…but am I worth, like two Franks, or three Franks?"
"Hey!" Frank complained.
"There are no separate prices on you guys," I said. "All of you would be equal in value one way or another. All of you possess skills required for this quest. At the least we know our next step is to go to Charleston, to find this map." Piper leaned against the control panel. She'd done her braid with white feathers today, which looked good with her dark brown hair. Where the heck did she find the time for that? I could barely find the time to brush my hair in the mornings.
"A map," Piper muttered. "But a map to what?"
"The Mark of Athena," Audrey suggested. "Whatever it is, we know it leads to something important in Rome, and Phorcys was saying that "even if we found the map, we'd never make it to Rome," suggesting said map leads to something in Rome. Of course, that's just a hypothesis, but it makes sense. Whatever this is, it might help us heal the rift between the Romans and Greeks."
"The giants' bane," Hazel added. Percy nodded.
"In my dream, the twin giants said something about a statue."
"Um…" Frank rolled his not-exactly-Chinese handcuffs between his fingers. "According to Phorcys, we'd have to be insane to try to find it. But what is it?"
"Kaze, any idea?" Veon asked, but Kaze shook his head.
"I've never been to Rome." Everyone looked to Annabeth, and she seemed to be pondering things, something she knew. Emily had informed me of what she'd learned from Annabeth about her dream, and I knew the pieces were coming together. Jason seemed to be studying her, as if he knew what she was thinking and didn't like it any more than she did.
"I…I'm close to an answer," She said. "I'll know more if we find this map. Jason, the way you reacted to the name Charleston…have you been there before?" He glanced uneasily at Piper.
"Yeah," He admitted. "Reyna and I did a quest there about a year ago. We were salvaging Imperial gold weapons from the C.S.S. Hunley."
"The what?" Piper asked.
"Whoa!" Leo exclaimed. "That's the first successful military submarine. From the Civil War. I always wanted to see that."
"It was designed by Roman demigods," Jason explained. "It held a secret stash of Imperial gold torpedoes - until we rescued them and brought them back to Camp Jupiter." Hazel crossed her arms.
"So the Romans fought on the Confederate side? As a girl whose grandmother was a slave, can I just say…not cool?" Jason put his hands in front of him, palms up.
"I personally was not alive then. And it wasn't all Greeks on one side and all Romans on the other. But yes, not cool. Sometimes demigods make bad choices." He looked sheepishly at Hazel and Veon. "Like sometimes we're too suspicious, and we speak without thinking." Hazel stared at him, and slowly it dawned on her that he was apologizing. Jason elbowed Leo.
"Ow!" Leo yelped. "I mean, yeah…bad choices. Like not trusting people's brothers who, you know, might need saving. Hypothetically speaking." Veon nodded in approval while Hazel just pursed her lips.
"Fine."
"Brother who needs saving?" Kaze asked, pointing at himself.
"No, Veon-san has a brother that needs saving," I told him. He looked to Veon before looking down. He passed over Veon's two rings.
"Gomen'nasai…"
"How the heck did you get these?" Veon asked. "When did you get these?"
"He's got the stealing skills of Hermes himself, along with the speed," I explained. "He makes the Stoll brothers look dull and Luke Castellan look like an amateur sword fighter. Overall, my brother is the scariest demigod you will ever meet. The only thing that he didn't get from his dad was the ability to teleport like a god can. I'll try and keep him in line. Anyway, back to Charleston. Are you saying we should check the submarine again?" Jason shrugged.
"Well…I can think of two places in Charleston we might search. The museum where they keep the Hunley - that's one of them. It has a lot of relics from the Civil War. A map could be hidden in one. I know the layout. I could lead a team inside."
"I'll go," Leo said. "That sounds cool." Jason nodded. He turned to Frank, who was trying to pull his fingers out of the Chinese handcuffs.
"You should come too, Frank. We might need you." Frank looked surprised.
"Why? Not like I was much good at that aquarium."
"You did fine," Percy assured him. "It took all of us to break that glass."
"Besides, you're a child of Mars," Jason said. "The ghosts of defeated causes are bound to serve you. And the museum in Charleston has plenty of Confederate ghosts. We'll need you to keep them in line." Frank gulped.
"Okay," He relented. "Sure."
"Then I guess Veon would be the best addition from my team," I said. "Ghosts are his best friends. Plus, an all boys team seems safer considering a boy and a girl are what Gaea is looking for." Frank frowned at his fingers, trying to pull them out of the trap.
"Uh, how do you…?" Leo chuckled.
"Man, you've never seen those before? There's a simple trick to getting out." Frank tugged again with no luck. Even Hazel was trying not to laugh. Frank grimaced with concentration, and then suddenly he disappeared. On the deck where he'd been standing, a green iguana crouched next to an empty set of Chinese handcuffs.
"Whelp, that's one way to escape," Audrey commented.
"Well done, Frank Zhang," Leo said dryly, doing his impression of Chiron the centaur. "That is exactly how people beat Chinese handcuffs. They turn into iguanas." Everybody burst out laughing. Frank turned back to human, picked up the handcuffs, and shoved them in his backpack. He managed an embarrassed smile.
"Anyway," Frank said, clearly anxious to change the subject. "The museum is one place to search. But, uh, Jason, you said there were two?" Jason's smile faded.
"Yeah," He said. "The other place is called the Battery - it's a park right by the harbor. The last time I was there…with Reyna…" He glanced at Piper and then rushed on. "We saw something in the park. A ghost or some sort of spirit, like a Southern belle from the Civil War, glowing and floating along. We tried to approach it, but it disappeared whenever we got close. Then Reyna had this feeling - she said she should try it alone. Like maybe it would only talk to a girl. She went up to the spirit by herself, and sure enough, it spoke to her." Everyone waited.
"What did it say?" Annabeth asked.
"Reyna wouldn't tell me. But it must have been important. She seemed…shaken up. Maybe she got a prophecy or some bad news. Reyna never acted the same around me after that."
"A girl's adventure then," Annabeth said. "Piper and Hazel can come with me. Zy, you can choose your member."
"Emily," I said. "Audrey went the last couple times and Veon's no longer an option, so why not? I'll stay with Percy, Audrey, Coach and my brother."
"So that's settled." She turned to Leo, who was studying his console, listening to Festus creak and click over the intercom. "Leo, how long until we reach Charleston?"
"Good question," He muttered. "Festus just detected a large group of eagles behind us - long-range radar, still not in sight." Piper leaned over the console.
"Are you sure they're Roman?" Leo rolled his eyes.
"No, Pipes. It could be a random group of giant eagles flying in perfect formation. Of course they're Roman! I suppose we could turn the ship around and fight-"
"Which would be a very bad idea," Jason said. "And remove any doubt that we're enemies of Rome."
"Or I've got another idea," Leo said. "If we went straight to Charleston, we could be there in a few hours. But the eagles would overtake us, and things would get complicated. Instead, we could send out a decoy to trick the eagles. We take the ship on a detour, go the long way to Charleston, and get there tomorrow morning-" Hazel started to protest, but Leo raised his hand. "I know, I know. Nico's in trouble and we have to hurry."
"It's June 27th," Hazel said. "After today, four more days. Then he dies."
"I know! But this might throw the Romans off our trail. We still should have enough time to reach Rome." Hazel scowled.
"When you say should have enough…?" Leo shrugged.
"How do you feel about barely enough?" Hazel put her face in her hands for a count of three.
"Sounds typical for us."
"Okay, Leo," Emily said. "What kind of distraction are we talking about?"
"I'm so glad you asked!" He punched a few buttons on the console, rotated the turntable, and repeatedly pressed the A button on his Wii controller really, really fast. He called into the intercom, "Buford? Report for duty, please." Frank took a step back.
"There's somebody else on the ship? Who is Buford?" A puff of steam shot from the stairwell, and Leo's automatic table climbed on deck. Buford mostly stayed in the engine room, since Leo insisted that Buford had a secret crush on the engine. He was a three-legged table with a mahogany top. His bronze base had several drawers, spinning gears, and a set of steam vents. Buford was toting a bag like a mail sack tied to one of his legs. He clattered to the helm and made a sound like a train whistle.
"This is Buford," Leo announced.
"You name your furniture?" Frank asked. Leo snorted.
"Man, you just wish you had furniture this cool. Buford, are you ready for Operation End Table?" Buford spewed steam. He stepped to the railing. His mahogany top split into four pie slices, which elongated into wooden blades. The blades spun, and Buford took off.
"A helicopter table," Percy muttered. "Gotta admit, that's cool. What's in the bag?"
"Dirty demigod laundry," Leo said. "I hope you don't mind, Frank." Frank choked.
"What?"
"It'll throw the eagles off our scent."
"Those were my only extra pants!" Leo shrugged.
"I asked Buford to get them laundered and folded while he's out. Hopefully he will." He rubbed his hands and grinned. "Well! I call that a good day's work. I'm gonna calculate our detour route now. See you all at dinner!"
First Person: Emily
"So I've gathered this," I reported to Audrey. "Based on your last dream, I've gathered that there's someone, an enemy of Athena, waiting in Rome. If Annabeth follows the Mark of Athena, then she'll come across this statue, which is the giants' bane and the key to mending the rift between the Greeks and the Romans. After a Google search, I've gathered that Athena had three main enemies, at least according to this Yahoo post. It's repeated many times throughout the internet that Poseidon was her worst enemy because of their dispute in Athens, and the name Athens may or may not reveal who won that dispute. Arachne was another one of Athena's enemies because she bragged that she could weave better than Athena, so she challenged Arachne to a contest, which Athena won. Athena then changed Arachne into a spider, which is why it's called an arachnid. This is who I assume we're talking about. The prophecy says that this statue, the giants' bane, is won from pain from a woven jail, and since Arachne was a weaver, this makes the most logical sense."
"Who was the third one?"
"Oh, just Medusa. She has tons of other enemies, of course, from the Trojan War, for example. But anyway, I figure that what we can gather from the prophecy is that Annabeth must win this statue from some kind of woven jail. Whether that means she's going to have to make a woven jail for Arachne, or she has to escape a woven jail made by Arachne, the point stands. Both are logical challenges she'll have to face."
"Annabeth's going to go to Rome and face a giant spider woman?"
"If my guess is correct, yes."
"Any idea where the twins and Nico could be?"
"No. I'm still clueless as to what we can get Bacchus to help us too."
"We'll figure out something. The Diet Pepsi option is still on the table." The dinner bell rang.
"We're not allowed to tell Annabeth, are we?"
"I guess not. Rules are, we don't mention anything Zy doesn't want us to. Let her make the first move and then we'll know it's safe to talk about things. Besides, what are the odds Annabeth has pieced together most of this as well?"
"True."
At dinner, Kaze was bouncing around and singing what sounded like a Japanese version of Ring-Around-The-Rosie. When we finally got him to sit down (and by "we" I mean "Zy" since she seems to be the only one able to control him) he was tapping his foot and his finger impatiently, having wolfed down a couple sandwiches with his speed. The laws of physics said that he wasn't going to be aging with the rate that he went into what he called "speed-mode." Since the last meeting was more based on the aquarium story, our plans and where we were going (and because Kaze was a bit on edge) we decided to use dinner time to learn more about him. Kaze was more than happy to talk about himself, but since Japanese worked in Yoda-talk where verbs, nouns, etc. were switched around, Zy had to listen to everything Kaze said before translating.
"He says: 'I'm not sure how I got these powers. I didn't have them before back when I was with Onesan. I spent some time in the Underworld, but it's all pretty blurry. Like a dream. I remember that I was able to think clearly once I woke up, alive once more.'"
"What other powers do you have besides speed?" Annabeth asked, and Zy went to work translating. Kaze put his arms in his thinking position, tilting his head slightly to the right. He began talking and listing off some things.
"He says: 'I'm strong and athletic, good with a sword, I can sense curses and traps on locks and disarm them, I can mess with money and stocks, along with win a lot at casinos, I'm smart and persuasive, I like to make things, I'm an adept alchemist, I steal, I can open locks with my mind, and I can throw these to predict the future.'" Kaze pulled out four small, rectangular, brown runes with a Japanese symbol on each that were a bit smaller than dominos, but larger than those Pez candies. "'Well actually it's more like I can get an answer, yes or no. They usually tell me the right things, but you have to be very careful in your wording when you use them, and the only answers are yes, no, maybe, probably, or unlikely. For example, is Onesan older than me?'" Before Zy had finished translating, Kaze had tossed the four runes up into the air before catching them in his hands. He said something that I assumed was "See?" based on the context of the situation, while he held them out to reveal they were all facing symbol-up.
"That's cool," Leo said. "Can you ask it whether I'll ever get a girlfriend?" Zy translated and Kaze shrugged before tossing the runes once more. When he caught them, only two of them were face-up, and the other two were face down.
"Maybe," Zy translated. "50% chance. Kaze says that's what the runes always say with it comes to questions like that. I take that to mean he's probably asked that question about himself." She asked something to Kaze and he shrugged. "He woke up with the runes in his pocket. He's not sure where he got them, but he figured out that they answer his questions. Of course, they're limited. He says they turn white when they run out of power, and they turn black when they're at full power." I did notice that they were now a light chocolate brown, a definite shade lighter than the dark brown from before.
"Think they could give us some information for the quest?" Annabeth asked.
"It depends on the questions you ask. Kaze says we have maybe two more charges out of the runes. Three if we're lucky."
"That's simple," Leo said. "We've just gotta ask if the map is in location one, yes or no, and then if it's in location two."
"But if it's in neither, we can't ask for a location since these are yes or no questions only," Jason pointed out. Kaze said something before tossing his runes. When he caught them, all of them were face-up.
"Well, we know the map is definitely in Charleston," Zy translated. "He asked if we're looking in the right places." Kaze said something else and then threw his runes, that once again, said yes. "We're going to find the map." He said something and threw the runes once more. They came up three positives and one negative, before the runes turned completely white and the symbols faded. Kaze said something to Zy and she turned her head in thought. "He says those three runes mean "sort of," as in, yes, but there's some kind of catch. He asked if we'd escape the Romans."
"That doesn't sound good," Frank said. "A catch can end up ruining everything."
"There's always a catch," Audrey muttered. "If there wasn't some kind of catch, I'd question everything I've ever known about life."
"But it does mean that we're going to escape the Romans," I said, looking on the bright side. "It was worded that way, right?" Zy nodded.
"He asked if we would all escape the Romans, those exact words."
"Still, we should be prepared for trouble," Piper said.
"That's a given anyway," Veon said. "In our lifestyles, you can't go anywhere without something attacking you, whether you're on a quest or not."
"We'll be alert for any attackers," Audrey promised.
"And I'll try to keep my brother from stealing half the ship," Zy said. Right on cue, Riptide suddenly popped up in front of Kaze, nearly impaling him in the face if he didn't have such fast reflexes. He examined it with an "Ooo," and tossed it from each hand, testing its weight. Percy slipped his hand in his pocket.
"How the heck-?!"
"Onesan," Kaze said before looking at her with a begging face and probably asking if he could keep it. Zy shook her head and pointed to Percy, telling him to give it back. After a moment of argument and Zy being firm, he sulked and passed it back to Percy. Zy reached into his jacket pockets despite his protests and threw Annabeth's New York Yankees cap, which had the ability to make her invisible, to her, and tossed my Dove of Aphrodite pin to me. She pulled out Audrey's necklace/dagger, Hazel's cavalry sword, Piper's dagger, Jason's gladius, Frank's bow and his quiver, and a phone, which she then returned to him since it actually belonged to him.
"That's everything from the ship," Zy reported. "Apparently he likes weapons. And shiny things in general. I'll get him his own sword and hope it sates his appetite. Do you think Hedge would mind if he stays in my room? Personally, I don't trust him anywhere else."
"You are technically brother and sister," Ve said. "It's not like with Annabeth and Percy, and such. I'm sure it'll be fine. Besides, it's not like we have a guest room, and your place is the largest one. No one else has the ability to control the kid. My vote is he stays with you 24/7." She clapped her hands together and stood.
"Right, then it's settled. Kaze-kun, kuru." She walked off and Kaze jumped to his feet.
"Hai!" He said happily before rushing after her. He stopped at the exit of the mess hall to wave. "Sayonara!" He rushed after his sister enthusiastically.
"He's energetic," Audrey commented.
"And pretty dangerous if he went rogue," Annabeth said.
"He's a kid," I said. "He's been dead for five years and he's just been reunited with his sister. He's not gonna do anything that makes his sister unhappy with him. I get this feeling that she's had to mother him ever since they met, so she should know how to rein him in. He doesn't mean any harm, that's just how he is as a son of Hermes."
"But he has had way too much caffeine," Leo said.
"I've never known a child of Hermes to have speed like that without Hermes's winged shoes," Percy said. "That combined with ADHD is a deadly combination."
"Any demigod power combined with ADHD is a deadly combination," Veon said. "I like the kid. He's the same as the other kids of Hermes back as Camp Half-Blood. They're troublesome, but amusing. If Zy keeps him from stealing our things and makes sure he focuses his effort more on annoying our enemies rather than us, we're Imperial golden."
"Even the Mercury kids at Camp Jupiter are known for being tricksters," Jason said. "But they're kept in line most of the time."
"Based on all the Roman punishments, I assume," Audrey guessed. "Discipline is good, but sometimes just letting the Hermes kids loose on your enemies is kinda fun. During capture the flag, you'd be surprised what tricks those kids have up their sleeves sometimes. I think they have things from all of the other cabins stored in theirs, including some deadly weapons from the Hephaestus cabin."
"Hermes is an inventor only second to Hephaestus," Veon said. "He invented the lyre for Apollo as compensation for stealing Apollo's cattle when he was a toddler. If this kid has so much power from his dad, he might be a useful addition to the team."
"I do wonder if his finding us was really some coincidence," Annabeth said. "It feels a little too perfect."
"If we keep Zy with him at all times, she should be able to watch over him."
"We'll all watch over him," I said. "For now we just see where this leads. I sense he's a nice kid who loves his big sister and would do anything for her. He's got a good heart."
"Well, I don't know about you, but I'm turning in," Ve said. "Night."
