-Replies:

Ahhhhhh! Whhhhyyyyy! It was amazing and really sad at the same time! I can't wait for the next chapter! What happens?! Where did Percy go? You do know that if Annabeth finds you, she is going to kill you right? ;) –LizCraft

Thanks for the review, Liz! Your review made me so happy since it was the exact reaction I was hoping for. The next chapter is right here, and don't worry, we'll find out where Percy is eventually. This next chapter might help, since its written from his POV. As for Annabeth, I think her and Camp Half-Blood will be too occupied with finding Percy and dealing with the mysterious figure… *Grins*

-Part One: Pressed-

Chapter 4: Percy

This chapter might be a yellow flag to all those moderators out there, but don't worry. I don't plan to copy much work from Riordan. I've also changed a lot of things, so I should still be in the parameters.

Besides that, hope you guys enjoyed last chapter and it's cliffey! We're going to step away from Annabeth and come back to Percy this one, ENJOY! :P

Stepping through the brush, I set my eyes upon the set of boulders that had once resembled a fist.

I've had mix memories of the place. So much good and bad had happened.

Today, I was hoping to make a great one.

I approached the pile of boulders, seeking the picnic basket I had brought here earlier this morning.

There was a rustle in the trees.

I turned and came to face my accomplice in this evolving scheme.

"Hey Jackson," Jason shouted, landing with a breeze.

"I can never get over the fact that you're just like a blond superman," I replied, shaking my head at him.

Jason smirked.

"So you got your part of the plan checked?" He asked.

"Yep," I said, patting my pocket. My most prized possession laid inside. "Don't worry about me. I've got the easy part." I said, walking down the side of the ridge. I turned the corner of the boulders and found the romantic picnic that my mom had cooked for us.

Annabeth loved my mother's cooking, and I could risk making anything myself, so I had asked my mom to cook something up for us. The smell of fresh chocolate-chip cookies wafted in the breeze.

"You?" I asked back, not getting distracted by my stomach.

"North Shore. Distraction. Make it as wet as possible." Jason answered me.

I nodded, rummaging through the basket, making sure everything was still there.

"You got the prize Nyssa and Piper picked out for you?" he asked, starting to hover again.

I patted my pocket once more. My most prized possession.

"Luck with the ask, Percy? Not that you'll need it." I nodded. "Then I'll be expecting to get invited to the party?" Jason said jokingly.

"You better be there." I smiled.

Then there was the sound of the conch from the northern woods. The game was off.

Jason, taking his queue, made a flashy getaway as if the conch horn had been there to announce his epic escape.

Like a superhero from a film, he flew in towards the sunset.

I took out some notecards that I had written, making one last rehearse. I hadn't yet memorized it yet, but I prayed this last try would do wonders. My speech had to be perfect. Annabeth deserved no less.

Estimating that Piper wouldn't be here with Annabeth for another few minutes, I mumbled to myself, reading the scribbled blue ink off the crumpled lines of paper.

Then, there was a snap. A misstep. A sound sprung from behind.

Piper was supposed to come from ahead of me. No one else is supposed to be here.

The air around me seemed to change. A static that felt so familiar that I couldn't place it.

I tried to turn around, but time seemed to slow down.

All I could feel, was a sharp pain in the back of my pain, and I began to fall down.

My vision turned red, and the ground came in the forefront of my vision.

The last thing I saw was a dark form – enveloped with shadows, eyes bleeding into me. He gloomed and stood with expectance. And the glowing blue delta.

LINEBREAKALREADY?

There was a blinding flash, and a jaw-rattling boom!

In an instant of a second, I felt weightless, like I was being crushed, fried and hosed at the same time.

I peeled my forehead off of something before realizing it was the back of a car seat. Not the dirt?

"Percy!" the sounds of my mom's voice echoed in my ears.

"I'm okay…" I stuttered. My voice sounded weird.

I tried to shake off the daze. I haven't had that much of a crash since….

That's when I saw where I was in.

Gabe's Camaro. The one that was destroyed years ago.

How?

Next to me in the backseat was a big motionless lump.

"Grover?!"

My best friend was slumped over, blood trickling from the side of his mouth. But the weird thing was, he looked exactly like how he looked years ago….. in the 6th grade.

It took me a few moments to start comprehending what was happening when suddenly, my friend groaned.

"Food!"

I sighed with relief. He was injured and bleeding, but alive.

He was alive.

I looked to the driver's seat, where my mother, who looked mostly unscathed and several years younger was struggling to get her seat belt off.

I remember this…

"Percy," my mother said. "We have to–"

Her voice faltered.

I looked back. In a flash of lightning, through the mud splattered rear windshield, I saw a shadow of a figure lumbering towards us on the shoulder of the road. The sight of it made my skin crawl.

This must be some dream.

But it felt far too real.

It was the minotaur. And somehow, I was experiencing something that had already happened years ago.

"Percy," my mother said, deadly serious. "Get out of the car."

I didn't hesitate. I tried busting my own door open, but it was jammed. Quickly, I smashed my way through the glass. In a hurry, I crawled out.

"Percy – you have to run! Do you see that big tree?" came from the car.

"No." I answered back. I didn't look towards where I knew camp was. I stared at the rumbling clouds. The falling rain around me. The minotaur half a hundred yards down the road, wailing.

Starring me, in anticipation for a meal.

"No! Percy! The other way! That's the property line," my mom tried to yell over the storm. "Get over that hill–" I could feel her pointing towards the trees. "– and you'll see a big farmhouse down–"

I walked steadily onto the lane of the road, splashing in the mud enough so the minotaur could hear me.

"Mom," I said. I had no idea what I was doing. I just knew, I had to do it right.

The minotaur grunted, making snorting noises.

"Run Percy! He wants you. He won't even look at us! Just get to the top of the hill," my mom tried to scream over the rain.

The minotaur, at that point must've have found our conversation boring, because that's when he finally lowered his head.

He charged, those razor sharp horns aimed at my chest.

I stood my ground, waiting patiently. I had done this before. I had no idea how I was here, because this felt more real than any dream I've ever experienced.

And I've never dreamed about myself. I've never had any control in any of my dreams, always before, I was a silent observer.

At the last moment, I jumped to the side.

The minotaur stormed past me like a freight train. He bellowed in frustration and turned. But not towards me. But towards the Camaro.

I spied my mother, who had managed to escape the car, was trying to help Grover out of the passenger door.

"No! Mom! Watch out!" I screamed. I sprinted as hard as I could, but the minotaur outpaced me. My mom turned and saw the incoming beast. She shoved Grover, like a doll out the way onto the grass before the minotaur made a grab at her.

She tried to sidestep, but the monster had learned his lesson. His hand shot out and grabbed her by the neck. He lifted her as she struggled, kicking and squirming.

No. Not again!

With an angry roar, the monster closed his fists around her neck, and she dissolved into a shimmering golden light.

I sighed in relief, as Hades had saved her from a gruesome end.

I should thank the god of the underworld; the next time I saw him. Without his intervention, my mom would have surely died.

The minotaur hollered at Gabe's Camaro, apparently offended. I didn't understand why, but the minotaur began fisting the windows, in obvious distain.

Maybe it smelled to much like Gabe and his moldy pizza.

That's when I remembered something Gabe had once told me, 'Not a scratch.'

Oops.

I stood back, expecting the minotaur to continue, but then the bull-man bore down on Grover who laid helpless in the muddy grass. The monster hunched over, snuffling my best friend as if he were about to lift Grover as well.

I couldn't let that happen.

I stripped of my red rain jacket, not minding getting a bit wet.

"Hey! I screamed, waving the jacket, running to one side of the monster. "Hey Idiot! Ground beef!"

"Raaaarrrrrr!" The monster turned towards me, shaking his meaty fists.

I backed up, lining my exposed back upon Thalia's tree and waved my jacket in front of the beast.

The Minotaur charged, and I readied my legs.

Time slowed down.

I let go of the coat, and leaped straight up, kicking of the creature's head, using it as a springboard, turning midair, and landing on his disgusting neck.

I may have been really distracted last time, trying to survive for my life, but now that I knew what I was doing, I began to wonder when was the last time this guy took a bath.

Do monsters bathe? I've never thought about that before.

The minotaur staggered around trying to shake me, but it was no use. I wasn't going anywhere. I locked my arms around his horns to keep from being thrown. Thunder and lightning were still going strong. Rain splattered into my eyes.

That, gave me an idea.

I relaxed. Using the rain around me, trying to draw in strength.

Right on cue, Grover started groaning in the grass, forcing me out of my concentration. I wanted to yell at him to shut up, but the way I was getting tossed around, if I opened my mouth I'd bite my own tongue off.

"Food!" Grover moaned. What was with him and food?

The minotaur wheeled towards him, pawing the ground ready to charge at the dazed satyr.

With as my effort as I could muster, I put both my hands on one horn and pulled backward with all my might.

Snap!

The minotaur screamed and flung me through the air. I twisted midair, and rolled onto the ground. Safe.

The monster turned and charged at me at double speed, obviously enraged and in pain.

Instinctively, I rolled to one side and came up kneeling. As the monster barreled past, I drove the broken horn straight into his side, right up under his furry rib cage.

He roared in agony. I landed on my back in surprise, as he flailed his arms around, desperate for one more grasp.

Then, he disintegrated into a barrage of golden dust, which was quickly blown away by the winds of the storm.

The monster was gone.

The rain began to stop. The storm still rumbled, but only in the distance.

My mom was gone, but I knew where she was. Grover groveled, moaning for food behind me.

I dropped the horn, and stared at my own hands. There were covered in blood, scratched up by the broken glass.

But that's not what worried me.

They were tiny. My hands looked so small.

I ran past Grover's form, to stare at the last intact window of Gabe's beat-up Camaro. I stared at myself.

I looked twelve years old.

I was in pain. This wasn't a dream. I looked around me to see if I could see anything wrong with the scene.

Thunder clouds rumbled.

The air was drying.

The winds battered my face.

I looked down at my unconscious friend, who laid there moaning for enchiladas.

I tried slapping myself, yelling myself to wake up.

All I could feel was the skin on my cheeks sting from each impact.

The pain.

It began to become overwhelming.

Need to get help…

I wanted to lie down there, waiting until I woke up from whatever this was. The only other option was….. time travel. And I highly doubted it was that.

But then there was Grover, needing my help. So I managed to haul him up and stagger up the hill, to take in the site of camp. The illusion quickly gave way, since I knew what to expect.

The Big house laid hundreds of yards down, and after that, the dining hall and amphitheater.

Steadily, I made my way.

The last thing I remember is finally giving way, collapsing on the front porch, looking at the ceiling fan circling above me, moths flying around the yellow light, and Chiron and Annabeth's stern faces. Annabeth's princess curled hair fluttered in the soft breeze.

"He's the one. He must be," she said, expectantly.

"Silence, Annabeth," Chiron soothed. "He's still conscious. Bring him inside."

Then, there was black.

End of Chapter.

Did you expect that? Probably, especially if you read Josh the Pleb's Shattered. Time's going to be important, (you should've expected nothing less, it's called the Time Locked Prophecy for a reason) but I swear this is completely different from how Josh has been using it. (And for the record, me and my friend had this idea, like three years ago.)

See ya guys later! :)

Best Wishes, from a Junior Scribe of Camp Half-Blood,

~VCRx

(This chapter has not been betaed)

[Last Edited: 4.18.2017]