Some of you may have noticed redundant POVs...yeah, I'm just writing in whoever's POV I feel like at this point, and these are all Argo chapters until it's sleepey time for the Seven. Sorry about that. But it should be soon enough. Hopefully. A few chapters more. Then we get to action and another Calypso chapter and...stuff.

Enjoy! Oh, and you guys can expect an update on Tuesday or Wednesday...that's when I'll be shooting for. Love ya!

Chapter XCIV

Hazel

Hazel takes a lot longer to change then she usually would-although most of the time she spends in her room is actually taken up by staring in dismay at her reflection in the mirror.

The bikini looks good on her-the gold color brings out her eyes, and the cocoa complexion of her skin. But does it have to expose so much of her skin?

Before leaving her room, she debates throwing on a t-shirt over it, but then decides against it, knowing it'd just make her discomfort stand out more.

As soon as she opens the door, she wishes she could run back inside and hide under her bed-Frank's waiting just outside in swim trunks. Meaning he's shirtless. And, of course, she's wearing even less than he is, technically. She can feel her cheeks turning bright red, and she can't meet his eyes.

She's not entirely sure how she makes it up on deck without running away in embarassment, but she does, and finds herself standing at the railing looking down at the others-Piper and Jason are already in the water, splashing each other and wrestling while Annabeth, Percy, and Leo stand by and watch. Most likely, they're waiting for Hazel and Frank.

Hazel vaguely wishes that she and Frank could've stayed down in the stables-possibly forever. It'd been so peaceful, laying back on the hay, listening to the gentle hum of the ship and telling each other stories...

In any case, it'd been a lot less terrifying than the prospect she faces now: swimming.

The bikini is bad enough. It fits her perfectly, but having so much skin exposed makes her feel vulnerable, and she knows the nuns at 's would have a heart attack if they could see her.

Now, though, faced with the twenty foot drop into the water below, which is no doubt filled with all sorts of dangerous animals, the bikini doesn't feel like such a big deal.

"Come on, Hazel! I promise it's safe!" Percy calls reassuringly from below.

"Are you sure Neptune won't drown me for it?" She calls back nervously.

"Nah, my dad's cool! Besides, if he was going to do anything, he'd drown Jason, and Jason's fine!" He replies, grinning when Jason's smile disentegrates into a look of concerned alarm.

"He's kidding, Jason. You're perfectly safe." Annabeth assures him, shooting an irritated look at her boyfriend.

Hazel rubs her shoulders, shivering a little, mostly from the combination of nerves and having so much of her body uncovered. Beside her, Frank notices her disomfort and puts his hands gently on her shoulders, turning her towards him.

"Hey." He says. "It's okay." The feeling of his rough hands on the bare skin of her shoulders makes electricity arc through her, and she looks down, embarassed at the reminder that she's basically naked in front of the one person she cares about most. But Frank lifts her chin back up, until she has to look him in the eyes, and smiles warmly at her. "You look great. There's nothing to worry about."

Hazel can't help but smile back at her, and the comforting warmth of his presence spreads through her and helps her forget her embarassment and nerves. She cautiously pulls her arms away from her chest, and Frank grabs her hand.

"Together?" He asks, and she nods.

"Together." She replies, gripping his hand tighter.

Then they run to the railing and leap over it, high into the air, until gravity pulls them down again and towards the sea.

Normally, Hazel knows, the impact with the water from twenty feet up would probably feel more like concrete than water, but Percy must be doing something, because falling into the water is as easy as falling into bed.

She and Frank slip into the water, going several feet under before kicking their way back to the surface and taking big gasps of breath. Then Hazel laughs out loud in pure happiness, and Frank grins back at her.

"That's the most fun I've had in a while." She tells him, and he nods.

"We should do it again in a bit." He replies. "But swimming first."

"Swimming first." Hazel echoes, smiling faintly and kicking closer to him. He wraps an arm around her, and she lifts herself up to kiss him once on the lips.

"Hey, who wants to play chicken?" Percy calls, and Hazel breaks away from Frank with an exasperated roll of her eyes. Frank grins at her, and she smiles back, happy.

"Before we can play anything, someone needs to explain what that is." She says, turning to the others.

"Sorry, Hazel." Percy apologizes. "Chicken is a game where one person sits on another person's shoulders-there are usually two groups-and then the people on top try to push each other off and back into the water. The first one to fall loses."

Hazel blushes a little at sitting on someone's shoulders, but she has to admit it does sound pretty fun. She's about to ask Frank to be her partner when she sees Leo standing at the edge of the group, smiling half-heartedly.

"Frank," she whispers, and he leans closer, "I think I'm going to be Leo's partner. Are you okay to sit this one out?"

Frank glances at Leo once and immediately understands. His expression softens and he nods, smiling warmly down at her-she'll always love him for that. "Go ahead, Hazel."

"Hey, Leo!" She calls, swimming towards him. "Wanna be my partner?"

His expression instantly brightens, although it fades a little when he looks over at Frank. "What about Frank?"

"He wants to sit this one out." She tells him. Okay, so she's not exactly telling the whole truth, but she's not lying, either.

Leo obviously knows that's not the real reason, but he seems to decide it's better not to say anything. "Fine with me. Who do you want to go against first?"

"Jason and Piper." Hazel answers, relieved he's not going to question it too much. "I don't think anyone really has a chance against Percy and Annabeth."

They glance over at Percy, who's making miniature whirlpools for his girlfriend's amusement. "No, not really."

Jason's already lifting Piper onto his shoulders, probably using his control over the wind to help a little. Hazel knows Leo isn't going to be able to do that, so she glances at him curiously, wondering how he's going to get her onto his shoulders.

"Come here-I've played chicken before, I know how normal people get onto each other's shoulders." He smirks a little when he says 'normal people,' and Hazel can't help but smile too. She swims closer to him, and he moves in front of her so his back is to her. "Okay, I'm going to go underwater; when I do, go ahead and climb onto my shoulders. Then I'll stand up."

Hazel feels a little doubtful about the whole thing, but she does as he says, blushing a little as she climbs onto his shoulders. She has to grab onto his hair to avoid falling off when he stands up suddenly, and he quickly holds up his hands for her to hold onto instead.

"Jason! Piper!" Leo yells, calling them over. "Ready to lose?"

"You wish, Valdez!" Piper shouts back, smiling, and Hazel grins at their easy-going friendship.

As soon as Piper's close enough to reach her, she starts trying to push Hazel back into the water, but Hazel manages to keep her balance and quickly pushes back, placing her hands on Piper's shoulders and shoving as hard as she can. Piper falls backwards, and Jason stumbles back in an attempt to keep his balance. They just barely manage to recover, and Leo gives Hazel a high five before they start the whole thing over again.

Hazel sees a flash out of the corner of her eye, and turns her head to see that Annabeth's holding Piper's camera, taking pictures of the four of them playing chicken. She shakes her head and goes back to beating Piper.

After a bit, Hazel decides to try something different from pushing Piper backward or pulling her forward, and grabs onto Piper's arms before pulling and pushing her sideways, so that her left leg slips off of Jason's shoulder and the two of them both end up tangled together in the water.

"Whooo!" Leo whoops, pumping his fist in the air. "We beat you; we win!" Then he lets himself fall backwards, dumping Hazel in the water. She comes up spluttering, but laughs despite herself, and spots Frank smiling at her from a few yards away.

"Okay, now who's going to play against us?" Percy asks. "Winners or losers?"

"No way." Leo says, shaking his head. "We're not playing against both you and Annabeth. That just gives your team an unfair advantage. I say you team up with Piper, and Annabeth teams up with Jason, and then we see who can win."

Percy and Annabeth exchange a glance and then shrug before turning back. "Okay, we'll do it. Jason, Piper, come over here! Time to team up!"

Piper doesn't look particularly thrilled with the idea of teaming up with Percy, but she swims over to him without complaint.

Hazel decides to go back over to Frank to watch-Leo follows her, but she's okay with that. He doesn't deserve to be alone right now. Or any time.

Percy and Jason both exchange some goodnatured insults, "You're going down, Grace." "In your dreams, Jackson." etcetera. It's really just amusing how much they can act like the stereotypical competitive jock friends. Both of them lift their partners onto their shoulders instead of doing it the 'normal way,' like Hazel and Leo did.

"You better not drop me, Percy." Piper tells him, a threatening tone in her voice.

"As if I would." Percy retorts, his eyes sparkling.

"I'm just saying, if you do, I'm going to tell the Stolls your middle name." She warns, and Percy wrinkles his nose.

"No fair." He complains.

"Who said anything about fair?" Piper replies, grinning a little. "Just don't drop me, Jackson."

"How much you wanna bet he drops her?" Leo whispers loudly to Frank, and Frank grins while Hazel shakes her head at them.

"He'll probably drop her on purpose just because she told him not to." Frank predicts.

"I don't know." Hazel says doubtfully. "Whoever the Stolls are, I don't think he wants them to know his middle name."

"The Stolls are twin brothers-head of the Hermes cabin. 'The prankster pair,' is Nyssa's name for them. And, no, you wouldn't want them to know something embarassing about you. For example: that your middle name is Odysseus." Leo explains.

Hazel glances at Frank. "They sound like Hailey and Hunter."

Hailey and Hunter are brother and sister-not twins, but they're also children of Hermes. And they absolutely love to prank people, which they constantly get in trouble for. Octavian loved to lecture them about how 'un-Roman' they were.

"Let's hope they never meet each other." Frank says. "I don't even want to think about what would happen."

"Remember when they painted Hannibal in rainbow colors?" Hazel asks, cracking a smile at the memory.

"How could I forget?" Frank replies. "I'm the one who had to give him a bath and wash the paint off."

Hazel notices Piper and Percy whispering conspiratorially with each other-a strange sight, since Piper has to lean forward to bring her lips close to his ear. But she can guess what they're talking about, since they both keep glancing at Annabeth and Jason, both of them with wicked grins on their faces. When Piper finally straightens up, she's obviously biting back laughter, and Percy's grinning his troublemaker smile-one that makes Hazel want to cross her arms and shake her head at him.

"I think Piper and Percy are going to win." Leo comments, squinting at the pair of them.

"What makes you say that?" Frank asks.

"Because both of them are going to cheat." Leo points out. "Piper will probably use her charmspeak, and Percy's no doubt going to use his water powers to trip Jason up. Annabeth and Jason don't have a chance."

Piper and Annabeth start to wrestle, with Annabeth obviously having the upper hand-she has better balance, and more experience with hand to hand techniques. But then, of course, Piper starts to throw out random charmspeak phrases-they don't trip Annabeth up in the least, but Jason gets a very confused look on his face and keeps shifting weirdly under Annabeth, throwing her off. That's only half of their problems though, because then Percy starts using his powers, creating little waves and whirlpools and finally doing something under the water that nearly pulls Jason under. Piper takes the opportunity to shove Annabeth as hard as she can, and Annabeth, as hard as she tries to stay on Jason's shoulders, falls backwards, her tight grip with her legs only pulling him down as well.

Piper and Percy do a complicated handshake that involves fist bumps, high fives, and then raising their hands in the air, going, "Ooooooohhhhhhh!"

Percy finishes off their new ritual when he gets a mischevious twinkle in his eyes that ends in his dumping Piper in the water. She shrieks in outrage as she falls, but that only causes her to get more water in her mouth. When she comes up, she's glaring at Percy, but since she's also laughing, it doesn't have the same affect. She shoves Percy's head under the water, wrestling with him until he just swims under her and pops up several feet away, laughing his head off.

"They're like long-lost siblings or something." Leo observes, grinning.

"So, that makes Percy the oldest, Piper the second, and you the youngest, right?" Hazel confirms, smiling.

Leo's forehead wrinkles. "So did not think of it like that. But since she's always telling me I'm like the little brother she never had, I guess so, yeah."

"It's nice, isn't it?" Hazel asks, watching them a little wistfully. "Having people you can think of as your brother and sister?"

"Yeah." Leo says, nodding. "But you have Nico, Hazel. And me, too, if you'd like." Hazel smiles at him, and then he grins, ruining the seriousness of the moment. "We can stay up all night and paint each other's nails and talk about Frank behind his back-"

"Hey!" Frank protests, and Hazel laughs with Leo this time, continuously set off by Frank's attempt at maintaining a disdainful expression.

This is nice, Hazel thinks, surprising herself a little, but she means it. It's nice having a family again. And she decides right then that she never wants to lose them. Any of them.

I love awkward chaste Hazel. She's so sweet. And I think she deserves the family she's found in the others...more than almost anyone. Except perhaps Leo.

I love you, don't forget the turtle doves, don't be falling off any glaciers, and LOVE THE WORLD (because right now, I don't like it very much, so you guys need to make up for that)!