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Chapter 6: Under the Sea
My eyes fluttered open. For about three seconds, I didn't know where I was. Light came and filtered into the room weird, and for some reason my hair was floating around my face.
I sat up, a kelp blanket floating away. My mind pulled up mental images of everything that had happened the previous day; my escape from my school, the drive to Percy, discovering his friend, the drive to the city, and…
Olympus.
I sat back down, hair streaming in front of my eyes, taking in just how crazy my life had become.
The gods… were real. My father was Poseidon, god of the seas. And Percy and I… were never supposed to exist.
A real comforting thought.
I laid there for who knows how long, until a shark drifted into the room, eyed me, then just swam back out the open window, cool as you please.
That's when I decided I had enough and floated out of the bed.
The room was plain, a brilliant, shimmering white. Every piece of furniture was coral: the bed, the chairs, the bedside table, everything.
The curtains floated in the current like gossamer in a light breeze.
It was very pretty, but the looming threat of a giant lightning bolt to the head kind of dampened the mood.
Apparently the thought of an imminent and painful death will distract you from enjoying yourself.
Who would've thought?
I grabbed the blanket from where it was floating and tried to make the bed.
Have you ever tried to make a bed? The blankets are hard enough. They say one end is longer than the other, but then they make everything look square. And don't even get me started on fitted sheets. Those flappy pieces of fabric are my nemesis. I abhor them and wish them a fiery demise in the pits of Mordor.
It sucks is what I'm saying.
Now, take all that difficulty, pain, sweat, blood, tears, frustration and various curse words, and attempt to do it underwater.
Where everything floats.
Including you.
Sound fun?
Well it wasn't fun at all.
I won't subject you to my frustrated cursing, because at one point, I turned around to grab a chair to hit the blanket with, and found a much traumatized merman staring at me. He slowly closed the door, never breaking eye contact with me.
I'm pretty sure he retired the next day.
But, after much struggling, I availed over my enemy, conquering the challenge of… making a bed.
That was the highest point in my life. I was so proud. I honestly deserved a trophy.
Oi! Percy!
What?
Where's my trophy?
What?
WHERE'S MY TTROPHY?
You're crazier than Hera sis!
Go to hell Percy!
Already did, now shut up and let me study!
Unfortunately, I never did receive a trophy. It was a grave injustice, and yes. I will be taking it up with the manager.
Now, where was I?
Ah, yes, I had just finished bravely conquesting the cesspool that was beds, and I left the room to swim aimlessly through the castle halls.
I did come across many more merpeople, but some reason, no-one stopped me. Maybe because I looked like I knew where I was going. Which I didn't.
WHY DID NO-ONE STOP ME?!
Luckily, I was eventually stopped.
By literally crashing into my stepmother.
You think you've had bad first impressions?
Try mine.
I literally burst in on family time, dropped a bombshell on her head, then peaced out to a guest bedroom.
And now, here I was, slamming right into her side, spilling her drink (how do you have drinks underwater? I really can't understand it, even today.), messing up her very pretty hair, and startling away the fish that were swimming with her.
Top that.
I dare you.
The look she was giving me…
I smiled nervously, clearing my throat, "Your majesty! Hi! Hello! How are you this fine morning? I'm… really sorry about running into you like that."
She glared at me for a full minute while I nervously sweated, then huffed and looked away, "It is fine. Where were you? My lord sent a servant to fetch you 15 minutes ago."
I swam slowly by her side, "Well, I was having a struggle with the bed, and since then, I've been lost. Your home is quite… immense… and stunningly beautiful."
She eyed me, "Yes. My husband designed and built this palace."
I cleared my throat again, "you love him very much."
She glared at me for a second, then looked away, "I do love him. But a marriage lasting thousands of years can have certain… strains on it."
"As in me and all the other children he's had with mortals or otherwise."
She looked me full in the face and didn't turn away from me, "well, to be quite frank, yes. Your sudden appearance was… startling, and didn't give us a chance to discuss it."
I looked down as we swam, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to cause problems in your marriage. I didn't think first, which is honestly a big problem with me."
Our eyes met for about three seconds before I slammed into a column, halting my progress in the water.
At least she laughed.
I'm the queen of ice breaking.
And nose breaking.
Luckily, I did NOT break my nose at this time. All that happened was an extremely loud crack of face to marble. I should be counting myself lucky that the column wasn't spiky.
Or unlucky, because a sudden death would have solved A LOT of problems for me.
Ah, well.
Can't miss what never was.
What I do miss however is not being in constant PAIN.
Every day is pain.
Why.
Why must you hurt me like this, life?
I'm getting off topic again. Get back on track Jackson.
I rubbed my nose gently while Amphitrite chuckled softly.
"I see you have all the gracefulness of a drunken dolphin."
"In my defense, I've never been down this deep, and you are quite distractingly gorgeous."
She laughed again, a clear, flowing sound, like a forest brook, bubbling out of her.
"I must ask though, what species of fish are swimming at your ankles? They look quite interesting."
She looked down at the twin brown mottled fish swimming at her heels and smiled, "they're sea bass. My favorite fish. I've loved them since I was a child. They're just so cute, don't you agree?"
I nodded, "yes, very cute, especially when compared to a creature like the blob fish, Humboldt squid, goblin shark, or angler fish. But I must ask, have you ever seen a sea bunny slug? Or an axolotl?"
"Yes, they are cute, but that slug is toxic. But you're right, they are certainly more beautiful than an angler fish. However, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and the lenses it is viewed through."
"Yeah. Have you ever seen that deep sea eel without the eyes but those giant light pink splotches on its cheeks and black skin? It looks like something out of an anime."
"I don't believe I've ever seen it. I'll have to look out for it on my next sojourn outside."
I looked around at the coral wall mosaics of a thousand different colors you wouldn't find in New York, and smiled, "you're really lucky to live here, or in the oceans in general. It's beautiful down here, and theres always something new to discover and learn."
She smiled at me, "that's the fun part of growing up. You get to learn new things about our world."
"And the others."
She glanced at me, then looked forward again, "yes. And the others."
"I always wanted to know about the world, but I never thought I'd be able to learn all I wanted to… and now I have to deal with gods and nature spirits and monsters and ghosts."
"In my experience, the worst one to deal with is the gods. You might want to look out for that."
"Whelp, guess I'm screwed no matter where I go."
"Depends on your definition of screwed."
"Yes. That is exactly what I want to be thinking about this morning."
We laughed together as we turned a corner.
One guess what happened.
Yes.
I ran into someone else.
Luckily, they didn't have any drink to spill, but running into him was still bad.
The man of the house. God of the seas. Father of horses. The Earth-Shaker. My father.
Poseidon.
NEXT UP IN THE RUNNING INTO LIST: everyone. Literally everyone in the universe.
Poseidon looked confusedly between me, rubbing my nose for not the first, but hopefully the last time that day, and his normally composed wife bent over in giggles, her sea bass swirling around her in a crazed whirlwind.
He cleared his throat, "right… I'm… glad you two are getting along. Amphitrite, love, would you mind if I showed the girl around the grounds?"
"I could live with it."
He smiled, "S 'agapó alithiná agapité mou. Lypámai gia ólo aftó to cháos. Tha tin deíxo kai tha tin steílo."
She kept a neutral face as she met his eyes, "Apodéchomai ti syngnómi sas. Tóra párte to korítsi éxo."
Rough translation from Greek to English for all you non-Greeks and non-demigods: 'I love you truly my dear. I'm sorry for all this mess. I'll show her around and send her off.', 'I accept your apology. Now take the girl outside.'
He waved at me to follow him and we swam through positively enormous doors. Well, I swam. He just floated, the currents naturally helping him.
We passed over armories and coral gardens. Poseidon pointed out all the different sea creatures and mer-men, the coral and different building, explaining each one.
Eventually, we reached an underwater mountain. We floated at the peak, overlooking the empty and dark abyss. We stayed like that in silence for several minutes.
Finally, he cleared his throat, "so, why did you come here?"
"Well, for one, Hermes said I needed to get out of Zeus's domain stat. second, I just wanted meet if, if only for one time."
"Mhmm…" he looked at me from the corner of his eye, "and your brother?"
"Doesn't know a thing about any of this. He's suspected at times, but usually, everyone involved forgets, and he puts it down to overactive imagination. I have had to step in at times though."
"It can't be easy on you, knowing you're different, and being alone. Why did you never involve him?"
"I wanted to protect him. Like you wanted to protect us, by leaving before we knew you. The way our mother wants to protect us. She knew who you actually were somehow."
"It was painful for you, wasn't it?"
"Yeah, but I managed. I just wish-"
I cut myself off short. Something was wrong. Something about the pressure or temperature had changed, alerting me that something wasn't right. Poseidon sensed it too.
We floated in wary silence for what seemed like an hour.
Poseidon turned to swim back down the hill, just as a blob emerged from the darkness.
It had a harpoon in its hand-arm-fin-thing, and it yelled "MIR ARTIKIR BIMIR!" as it raced for Poseidon.
Recent studies of mine have concluded that this is a form of Kurdish, roughly translating to 'Die Earth-Shaker.' Fun.
Poseidon barely had time to turn around before it was on him. I moved without thinking, natural instincts taking over. The next thing I knew, I had drawn my knife and was shooting forward, the water aiding me.
I stabbed the creature in its side and it started to disintegrate into black-green slime, gurgling out two final words in its strange language before death.
"Bijî Cthulhu"
'Long Live Cthulhu' in Kurdish. That is not good news for anyone, except the mentioned party.
Poseidon was frozen for thirty seconds, then turned to me, "how?"
"Like i said, i managed." I shrugged.
He looked at the disappearing slime, "it's a bad thing they are returning. I need to deal with this. I'm sending you back to your school. Go home, pack your things and head for Long Island Sound. You'll find refuge there. Zeus won't be able to harm you there. Go to Chiron and tell him who you are. You'll be safe."
I opened my mouth to argue, to question, to even say goodbye, but he waved his hand and suddenly I was sitting on my dorm bed, right back where I had started.
I looked around in dismay, wishing I had more time. I had set out for answers and ended up with more questions.
My eyes fell on a pile or curriculum books. A smirk crept across my face. My hand crept to my pocket, pulling out a little rectangle of paper with a phone number on it.
I grabbed my phone and dialed.
It rang for thirty seconds before he picked up.
"Hello, who is this?"
"Hermes, its Lana. I need your help. Want to pull a com?"