Disclaimer: I know, I own nothing. It's just sad.
Percy and Annabeth were the first ones to arrive back at the truth or dare 'meeting point.' Travis and Connor were not too far behind, but seemed to be running from something. When Percy asked them what was up, Connor replied, having recovered from laughing and running faster than his brother.
"Poured poison… on Katie's plants… on accident. It was funny, though. Something called Round-Up that she uses for the weeds in the strawberry fields. I think it's a mortal thing. Not sure how she got it in here."
As if on cue, Percy and Annabeth whipped their heads around as an irritated scream ripped through the air, obviously from Katie Gardner of the Demeter cabin. "STOLLS!" The brothers turned to each other and high-fived, grinning like Halloween pumpkins.
A rustling in the trees startled all of them, causing them to whip out their weapons. A very manly scream cut through the air as a black something fell through the air from about forty feet up. The black something landed directly on top of Percy, who flung his arms out to the side in a fruitless effort to keep himself standing. One arm took Travis out and the other smacked Connor in the face, sending him flying into a tree.
Off of a groaning Percy stepped an irritated, scratched-up but otherwise unharmed Nico who started muttering to himself about that 'darn, lousy, unreliable shadow travel.'
Annabeth chuckled to herself before hauling her flattened boyfriend to his feet, leaving the Stolls to fend for themselves.
"Clarisse isn't coming." Nico muttered quietly, as though to himself. "Yelled something about not wanting to waste valuable training time acting like a kindergartener with in a group full of wimps." Connor started laughing, but quickly realized he was the only one. Pause. "Wait, was she talking about us?" Travis, ignoring his brother, realized something. "Wait, was that girly, high-pitched squeal I heard coming from you? The mighty Nico DiAngelo squealing like a little girl? HAHAAA!" He was bent over laughing, following the example of his brother, who had started halfway through his speech.
Nico clenched his fists. "Not if you want to live," he replied creepily. The Stolls stopped laughing.
Annabeth suddenly seemed to have a lightbulb moment. Travis and Connor hoped it was something to diffuse the tension. Annabeth turned to Percy, who seemed to be doing better now that he had recovered from being a human pillow. "Percy, aren't you going to find the arrow? I think it's that way." She pointed vaguely in the direction the thought the arrow had flown the night before. Percy nodded and walked off in the direction she had indicated.
Annabeth turned to the other three, who had apparently been watching their interaction. "we'll wait for him to come back," she decided. Nico nodded and sat down in some shade by the tree he was leaning against the day before. Annabeth wondered if she should go with Percy or watch the Stolls.
Pathetic, really. The Stolls acted as though they were five years old. If they were left alone in New York, a bank in Florida could find all their cash taken within two days, factoring in the amount of time it would take to fly there and back on a few Pegasi. Nico, however, acted his age. That is, about eighty. He could probably take over his father's kingdom for a day and be totally fine. He looked like the kind of guy who would love the opportunity to torture bad people. She shivered momentarily, then looked around to make sure nobody noticed.
Before she could make her decision, however, she heard Percy calling them from the forest. "HEY! Guys, come check this out!"
With Percy
Percy walked in the direction that Annabeth pointed to for a while. Everywhere he looked was a mirror image of itself. Everything was brown and… full of sticks? …sticky? Ha! That would make a good joke. Oh, wait, that was already invented. Darn.
Finally. after wandering around in the eternity that was probably only two minutes in reality, Percy remembered that the arrow had a red feather thingy on the end. It was a… fledgling? No, that's a baby bird. Something like that… a … fletching! Anyway, Percy decided to climb a tree to get a better look. He climbed to about twenty feet before looking for anything red.
There! The arrow was at the base of a tree not too far from their truth or dare meeting place. The tree also seemed to hold something red, and sort of looked like apples. However, it was not an apple tree. He didn't get a good look though because the tree decided that his time standing on one of its many arms was up. The branch fell, forcing Percy to copy Nico's earlier move. He fell to the ground without much noise because he was low enough not to have time to yell.
He groaned and rolled over, mentally deciding that he did not need any more high-speed impacts today. Percy pushed himself up and walked over to where he had seen the arrow. He was sure he had seen that tree somewhere, maybe the Stolls could identify it. They did spend quite a bit of time around Katie. They seemed to split their time halfway between spying on Katie and pranking her. Especially Travis. Huh, wonder why?
Finally, he came to the spot where the arrow rested. It had buried itself in between the roots of the strange tree. Percy took out Riptide and cut away the stem of one of the fruits. Maybe he could identify the fruit by what was on the inside. He sliced it open. Inside were sections of small red seeds connected to a weird whitish stuff.
He pulled the arrow out absent-mindedly while he thought about where he could possibly have heard of this fruit before. "HEY! Guys, come check this out!" he yelled. He poked at the red seeds. They seemed alright to him.
He turned, just as Travis and Connor jogged up beside him, looking at the fruit in his hands.
"Where are Annabeth and Nico?" he asked the two. Connor answered. "Annabeth went to look for Nico. She'll be here in a few minutes…" "If she can't find him," Travis finished.
Connor looked back to the fruit. "Are we still playing truth or dare?"
Percy shrugged, unsure of how he should answer. "Um, sure?" he replied, but it sounded more like a question. Travis matched his brother's evil grin. "I dare you to eat one."
Percy may not have the best memory, but he knew from having to cross the country before that you should NOT eat fruit you randomly find unless you know what it is. He asked the brothers if they knew.
"Oh, it's a pomegranate. Don't worry, it won't eat you." Connor snickered quietly as if he had told a hilarious joke. Percy scanned their faces, and shrugged deciding to eat it. However, the conch horn that signaled lunch had other plans.
The Stolls sighed unhappily, but Percy just popped one quickly into his mouth, showing them that he was not afraid to eat the fruit. He tossed the rest of the fruit into the woods. None of the things that lived in the woods ate plants anyway. Quickly, Travis, Connor and Percy ran in the direction the conch horn sound came from. On the way, they met up with Annabeth, who told them that she had given up on trying to find Nico. He would be found when he wanted to be. Nothing really unusual happened at lunch, and the day seemed to promise an uneventful night.