So!
Although some "Jillico" (haha, I love that) fans have stuck together, I've gotten a few reviews about Nico and Hailey as a couple, which was really surprising and totally unexpected. That didn't even strike me as I introduced her. But whatever. I'm sure none of you care about this rambling.
One more thing: Your reviews are all hilarious. I seriously crack up at most of them (I'm very easy to amuse :P ). But seriously. I love you guys(: They totally make my day. Leave me some more funny ones and I'll love you forever!
ON WITH THE CHAPTER!
Disclaimer: I don't own anything, except some Halloween candy! Yayy!
Only 20 minutes afterwards, a large group of campers, still in their pajamas, were piled into Big House.
Some had dozed off in their chairs, while some were wide awake and chatting with their friends. Most of them just seemed infuriated that they were woken up at four in the morning just to sit on plastic chairs and wait for a centaur to talk to them.
We were discussing the topic everyone was interested in: who would go on the quest.
"I think I should go." said a familiar girl with bright green hair. I noticed quite a few campers roll their eyes, but she ignored them. "After all, I have more than a few tricks up my sleeve!" To prove her point, she flicked out her wrist and small flames burst out, flying towards the window.
"Zap! Zap!" she shouted, and the curtains promptly went on fire.
Without missing a beat, Percy had exterminated the flames and doused the fabric in a coat of cold water. He turned around and stared at her like Are you insane? (which I think she was)
I didn't know if she meant to set the curtains on fire or not, but either way she looked quite satisfied with her work.
"Lime!" exclaimed some campers, but she happily threw her head back and cackled like a real witch. I scooted my seat farther away from her, worried that the flames would come in my direction next.
While Chiron reprimanded the ambitious girl on when it's inappropriate to use her powers, kids continued to talk excitedly about who was going to go on the quest. If they succeeded and saved all those campers, they would be heroes when they came back. And everybody here wanted a little taste of fame.
"It has to be someone smart, like me, so they can figure out what the cure really is." said an older son of Athena.
"No," remarked a daughter of Apollo, "no matter how smart you are, I have a natural way of finding medicines. Healing simply runs in my blood. That's why I should go." She smiled victoriously, and the boy glared at her.
Meanwhile, the Stoll brothers were taking advantage on a sleepy camper. The poor kid had fallen asleep, and now Conner stood over him with a sharpie and decorated his face with a mustache, a unibrow, and various other interesting things.
"Someone really strong has to go, so they can kill all of the monsters!" said a son of Ares. His brother nodded in agreement, and they head bumped each other and laughed. Kiara, from the Aphrodite cabin, stared at them in disgust, and then continued complaining about how her loss of beauty sleep was going to cause bags under her eyes.
"Bags should be cute and helpful accessories, not ugly dark blemishes!" she said to her sister.
It took me a while to notice another familiar face sitting in the corner, playing with the beads on her necklace. Brown hair was piled up into a bun on the top of her head, and loose strands fell at random spots.
Bored and annoyed, I decided to walk over to her.
"Hi Hailey."
She looked up, and I noticed how puffy and red her eyes were. Dried tears made trails down her face, and she sniffed loudly.
"Oh, hi Nico." She looked back down, and I considered sneaking away before she started crying again, but I found myself sitting down beside her.
I guess she heard me take a seat, because right afterwards she looked over and smiled. "I bet you're going to make fun of me for crying, but it's just that Jill was my absolute best friend and when I heard she got sick I was devastated, but Jill's tough, ya know? So I thought to myself 'Hey, she'll get over it! She's Jill! She has to get over it!' You know, one time she got a concussion and told Annabeth it was just a bad headache. Of course, when she started passing out they realized something was wrong, but still. She didn't even cry when I accidentally hit her in the head with my surf board! But she did punch me." She kept going on, and I decided it was better for her to babble than it would be for her to burst out crying. Plus, she was talking so fast I could barely understand what she was saying.
"So I went through the day, and I figured by tonight my siblings would've whipped up some magical remedy that could cure her and all the other kids. But then, bam!" She made an explosion with her hands, "Gone! She just disappeared! What if someone kidnapped her? What if she magically teleported into New York City and some really nice but totally freaky family found her and is gonna adopt her? What if she forgets about all of us? What if she forgets her name, and has to go around by something horrendous like… like… Uglajanice?" She looked at me, as if I knew all of the answers.
"Um… I'm sure she won't name herself Uglajanice." Unsure of what else to say, I just stayed quiet. Hailey sighed loudly, and leaned her head against the wall behind her.
She looked as if she was about to start rambling on again, but was interrupted by Chiron's entrance into the room. Lime followed him in, and sat at a chair with her arms crossed tightly against her chest and a pout on her face
"Campers," started Chiron, "I'm not in charge of this quest. It's you that will be the ones out there, not me. So, who here would be interested in going on this quest?"
A dozen Me!'s filled the room, and Chiron quickly had to quiet them.
"Alright, let me rephrase this." He said. Scratching his head, he looked deep in thought. "What kind of factors do you think are needed on this quest, to find the missing campers and the cure?"
"Strength!" shouted the sons of Ares.
"Beauty!" said a daughter of (guess who?) Aphrodite.
"Intelligence!" put in the son of Athena.
"Healing powers!" exclaimed the daughter of Apollo.
Chiron shushed everybody, and then began talking. "Alright, all of those could come in handy during this quest, but only three campers will go. First of all, we have to determine who will lead the quest."
At least twenty hands shot up eagerly. He looked over the campers, analyzing each one of us. "I can tell you right now, this is going to be a very difficult quest, and a lot pressure is going to be on your shoulders. There are twelve ill campers here, and if you don't find the cure, who knows what will happen to them?" A few hands lowered.
Chiron continued, "You will have to be fast with what you do, but also extremely careful. You will most-likely battle numerous monsters. The quest members and you may get injured. If someone does, it will be your responsibility to manage them. Will you need to send them back to camp? How much ambrosia and nectar should you give them? Or maybe you will need to take them to a mortal hospital? All these choices will be up to you." More hands were lowered.
"I'm not trying to scare you," He said, "but I have to make sure whoever accepts this quest is ready for it and everything that comes along with it." A few more hands were lowered.
Chiron smiled, happy that he was finally getting his message across; but it quickly returned to his worried frown.
He looked at the hands that were raised. The two sons of Ares, the son of Athena, Lime, and surprisingly, a daughter of Aphrodite.
"Well, Lime, your previous little performance has shown me that you are most defiantly not ready to lead a quest of your own." She glared at him, but put her hand down.
"Now, the rest of you would all be excellent leaders on this quest, and you each have something that you would be able to put in." the campers smiled, "But, there can only be one leader. So I'm going to send you all in one at a time, until Rachel speaks to one of you. Whoever she tells a prophecy to will obviously become the leader." He smiled, "Now, who wants to go first?"
The same hands stayed up.
"Alright, how about Anthony?" he suggested. A tall son of Ares stood up and rushed upstairs to where Rachel would be, probably horribly cranky that we woke her up at 4 o'clock in the morning.
And so we waited.
And waited.
And waited, and waited, and waited.
Finally, he stomped down the stairs with a scowl on his face and sat down.
"Well, I guess the Oracle didn't like him very much…" joked one camper. He turned and glared at him.
"No prophecy?" asked Chiron. The boy shook his head slowly, as if it was a personal insult that he didn't receive the prophecy.
Chiron seemed upset too. "Alright, let's send in the next camper." He was about to pick on someone, but Anthony interrupted him.
"No use, she won't talk to any of them." He said. Campers looked at him, confused at his statement. She had to talk to one of them, or else there wouldn't be a quest leader at all.
"What do you mean?" asked Chiron. He looked just as confused as the rest of us. I assumed there was never before a case where the Oracle wouldn't give a prophecy to anyone.
"She talked to me, but she just kept repeating the same name. She said she would only talk to them."
"Who was it?" asked campers excitedly, hoping fate would be on their side and the Oracle was reserving a prophecy for them specially.
He looked at Chiron and glared.
"Nico di Angelo."
(line-line-line)
Since it was obvious Rachel didn't like hanging out in a creepy old attic, her and Annabeth had redesigned it to fit her personal needs. Considering she lived there, there was a bed, a bathroom, furniture, and even a mini-fridge.
Bright colors filled the room, and I stood out horribly in my black clothes.
Rachel sat on her bed, crossed legged in her splatter paint pajamas. Her orange hair was tightly pulled back into a ponytail, and she slouched lazily.
"It's such a shame that those poor girls had to go missing." I nodded, agreeing with her. "But after all, I knew it was coming." She stated.
"Really?" I asked, "Are you like, psychic or something?" I only realized how stupid it sounded after I said it, but she disregarded it.
"Nope. But I had a dream about Johnny Depp the other night." While she twisted a loose strand of her hair, I waited for her to continue.
When she didn't, I asked her how that was significant in any way, shape, or form.
"Oh! Silly me, I forgot to tell you. Every time I have a dream about Johnny Depp, something horrible happens." I looked at her like she was crazy, which I was starting to believe he was.
"You see, when I was five, I had a dream that Johnny Depp and I filmed a movie together. The next day, my poor pet hamster died. And then, when I was thirteen, I had a dream that he bought me an ice cream at Central Park. The week after that my best friend told me she was moving. To Utah!" She sighed, like the pain of visiting old memories was just overbearing.
"I'm sorry?"
She ignored me, and kept going. "When I was 15 I had a dream I went to the Willy Wonka chocolate factory. Of course, I pictured Johnny Depp as Willy Wonka, because who doesn't? So I go downstairs to breakfast, where my housekeeper tells me she found my stash of candy in the china cabinet. And guess what she did to it? She threw it away! All that good candy, wasted!
"So anyways, the other night I had a dream I was going bowling with Jack Sparrow, and ta-da! Johnny Depp never fails to bring disappointing news to my life. Or maybe it's the other way around! Maybe life knows that something bad is going to happen, so to make up for it, I have a dream about the glorious and totally attractive movie star?"
Afraid she was going to go on, I had to stop her. "Uh, Rachel? I think you're supposed to be giving me a prophecy right about now." She opened her mouth, so I quickly blurted out "What is my prophecy?"
"Hey!" she said, mad that I purposely made sure she couldn't ramble on anymore. But seconds later her eyes turned an eerie green and she began to speak,
"Wisdom shall be found in the Wolverine State,
Since a mother saved her daughters' fates.
The heroes will find the missing and the cure,
But only death can open the door."
She shook her head, clearing her thoughts and the green smoke that surrounded it.
"Alrighty then!" she said cheerfully. "My work here is done." And with that, she collapsed on her bed and gave me instructions to turn off the light on my way out.
When I got downstairs, everyone was eagerly waiting for me to repeat the prophecy. I knew there were still some important steps to take until we could leave, but knowing we would be heading off at breakfast, I just wanted to get back to my bed and get some rest.
I quickly repeated the short prophecy to the rest of the group, and waited for Chiron to give further instructions on what to do.
Time rushed by, and people discussed what the prophecy could mean.
"Wisdom could be an owl!" remarked one horribly stupid kid. "And maybe the wolverine could eat it!"
"No, you idiot!" said the son of Athena, "The Wolverine State is Michigan!"
"Wolverines are very strong and powerful, so maybe you'll find strength and power on the quest!"
"I think somebody's going to die! It says only death can open the door!"
"Death obviously refers to Nico, duh."
"Well I think the mother is Hera. Maybe she'll help them!"
They continued to argue and shout out ideas and questions for quite some time, while Chiron told me to think about who I would want to go on the quest with me.
I decided to take Hailey, considering she's close with Jill, she has healing powers (a major plus), and, well, I don't have many friends.
She, of course, accepted and ran off excitedly to go pack her bags.
But there was still one more person to go with, and I really had no clue who to pick. Percy and Annabeth were out of the question, considering they were going to college in 2 months and didn't want to spend their last summer on some life threatening quest. The Ares kids were the most obnoxious people I've ever met, and I refused to go with them. I didn't need two children of Apollo, and I defiantly didn't need a daughter of Aphrodite. I wasn't taking that weirdo Lime with me, nor would I take any of her sisters. Children of Athena were generally irritating know-it-alls, and a child of Hephaestus wouldn't do me any good to help find two missing girls and some medicine.
Stupid boy…
I turned around, wondering who had said that. But nobody was there besides Chiron, and the voice was distinctly female.
Don't you know what most medicines are made out of?
I looked to my left and then to my right, searching for any freaky girls talking to me, but there was no one.
"Who's there?" I asked, but it came out quiet and nervous. I cleared my throat, and tried again. "Why are you asking me that?"
A few people looked over, confused as to whom I was talking to, but I waved them off and they turned back around.
Don't you know what medicines are made of?
"No?"
What an idiot… What does that girl of mine see in him?
"What girl?" I asked.
Do you know what ginger is?
"Uh, of course I do."
Don't be fresh! Now, do you know what ginger does?
"Helps your stomachache…?" I asked. I had no clue where all these random questions were coming from. Maybe it was just a figment of my imagination, asking me pointless questions because I was tired. Next thing I know, maybe there'll be a giraffe in the corner playing the accordion.
Exactly. It's a medicine. And you could call ginger a…
"…Plant?"
There was no response. A plant? What does a plant have to do with any of this?
It took me a minute to realize just how stupid I was.
Plants, medicine, cures; it was all starting to make sense.
"I need a daughter of Demeter!" I blurted out before I could stop myself.
The campers stared back at me, most likely horribly confused by my sudden outburst.
Dozens of eyes caused heat to flood up in my face, and I could feel the blush forming.
Finally, just as I was about to die of embarrassment, a kid about my age stood up.
"Well, I'm technically not a girl," he said, "but if you're still interested, count me in!"
And so it was settled.
A son of Hades, a son of Demeter, and a daughter of Apollo.
Oh, joyous.