Chapter 29

We Visit a Bodybuilder at Midnight

The celebrations lasted all the way up the mountain into our base. As soon as we entered, though, we all stopped.

Someone had replaced the boards patching the ceiling with a perfectly-fitted skylight. A full-sized disco ball had been hung to sparkle with light from the moon. Streamers lined with bronze LEDs ran from corner to corner. Covering most of a previously-blank wall was a titanic 64 inch flatscreen tv, complete with gaming consoles, wireless speakers, and a state of the art karaoke system.

"Whoa…" said Emmitt.

"Who…" said Victoria.

"I think I know," I said.

A post-it note had been stuck to the disco ball with three words scribbled so messily I was probably the only one alive that could read them: Nice work. Enjoy.

"Go on!" I gave the others a soft push. "Have fun, they aren't a trap. Just watch out for extra features. And if the TV starts buzzing, duck and cover."

Pretty soon, everybody was partying harder than ever. Lucas had yanked one of the streamers down and was inspecting its edges, ranting to a distracted Alyssa about refining lights to such a size and its implications for making fake blood. I bounced around for a while, going from dancing the Macarena with Emmitt, to embarrassing myself with a terrible Final Countdown cover, to shoving my face with Goldfish crackers in an attempt to get back some of the calories I'd burned.

Sometime after most of the others had crashed, I found myself nursing a Capri Sun with my back to the room's only window. It was amazing how good fruit punch could taste after a long night of accidentally swallowing dust and flecks of mud.

"Join you?"

I turned to find Victoria, a juice of her own in each hand. She'd stripped out of her armor and let her hair down— literally as much as figuratively. I hadn't ever seen her without a ponytail, but now when she looked at anything, it was through a curtain of black hair.

I scooted over to make some room by the window.

"Thanks." For a minute we didn't say anything, watching the others with the dark courtyard at our backs. For all the ones that tapped out across the floor, a couple were still going. John was in front of the TV flicking joysticks with half-open eyes. He hadn't noticed yet that his Mario Kart opponent, Emmitt, had drifted off with the controller in his hands. John might not have stopped even if he did. The AI was getting pretty close to him.

Bianca had passed out against Alyssa's makeup station, and the girl was using that to slip some onto her while she slept. It seemed like it'd started as a prank drawing little stars under Bianca's eyes, but as she went on Alyssa got distracted trying to do it well, and was now touching up a second layer of eyeshadow.

"You know, I never actually apologized to you."

"Hm?" I turned back to Victoria, leaving people watching for later. "What for?"

"When we met. Blackmail isn't cool. I know that, but I was just so desperate."

Isn't cool wasn't a way I had heard a felony described before, but I shrugged and sipped my drink. "Don't worry about it. Everything ended well."

"No. I tried telling myself that, but I was just running away. After everything you did for me — for all of us — I can't accept that. So I'm saying it now. I'm sorry."

She bowed her head. I was really glad nobody else was watching, because I was already blushing. Cutting down a monster twice my size? Sure, why not. Weaponizing an entire creek? Give me a minute. Accepting gratitude? Way too much. What was I supposed to do with my hands?

"Erm, yeah. No problem. Really."

I chugged what was left in my Capri Sun before deciding to change topics.

"You know, I thought you'd be a bit more excited right now."

"I think I'm too excited," Victoria admitted. "Doesn't feel real yet. None of it does. Tomorrow morning I'll probably wake up screaming, but for now I'm still convincing myself it's not a dream."

"Well, if you do wake up screaming, I'm glad you sleep in the other room. Knowing you it would be at the crack of dawn."

"I think now is the crack of dawn." She leaned close to the window with her hand above her eyes. "It looks like there's a little light out there at least."

I saw what she meant. Right about the center of the window something was glittering, like a far off lamp or…

"That's a reflection!"

We spun and found a glittering two-dimensional shape hovering in the center of the room. A voice seemed to be coming from it, but it was soft and garbled, static buzzing over the words.

"Hello?—SHHHHHH—anybody—SHHH—there?"

Aelia was in my hand before I took a single step, but Victoria relaxed and pushed past me.

"It's an Arke Message," she said. "Somebody's trying to get a hold of us."

"Arke Message?"

"Like Iris Messaging, but through her sister, Arke. It's the titan's go-to for communication."

"Iris Messaging?"

"Ugh." Victoria rolled her eyes at me, like I was a grandpa asking what made some phones 'smart'. "You know. Make a rainbow, offer the Drachma, say a name, and bang! Instant video call. Were you raised under a rock?"

"A whole lot of them," I said. "And a bunch of soil, some roots, and worms." I leaned forward, inspecting the shape. Now that she mentioned it, it did sort of look like a rainbow… a really gimpy one, like the dim beginnings you sometimes saw near a real, bright rainbow. "So why is this one from Arke? No offense, but it seems pretty crappy."

"Cut her some slack. She had her wings chopped off by Zeus for running to the titans during the last war. Never really recovered from it. Think of her like AT&T and her sister as Verizon, if AT&T had one bar everywhere because they made bad business decisions and got mutilated for it."

"Sounds like really bad business decisions then. So how do we answer it?"

"Oh, answering it." Victoria blinked like the idea was just coming back to her. "Right. That would be a good idea, wouldn't it."

She gave the disk a tap, careful not to put her finger through it, and said, "Victoria Champion accepts this message."

She nudged me. "Repeat that yourself. Arke's too weak right now to send automatic messages like her sister does. If you don't tell her you accept, she can't get it through."

I was beginning to wonder if there was anything she could do, like maybe she was a great chef or something, because this was starting to sound like a dating bio filled with only bad points. Weak, flightless, inferior copy of her sister with terrible decision making and a traumatic past. And Ready to mingle!

"I'm Percy Jackson, and I endorse—"

"Accept!"

"—and I accept this message."

The blurry light crackled, chirped, and began to crystallize. In a second what had been indecipherable had become a familiar blonde face, down to his scar. When Luke spoke, his voice came out almost as clear as the sound system on our newly-delivered tv.

"What were you guys doing? I've been trying to get through for minutes."

I decided answering was probably my job, considering Victoria had ducked the second she saw Luke, trying desperately to re-tie her ponytail.

"That's weird, it only just popped up. Maybe Arke is feeling extra wingless today?" The borders of the message flashed, like the rainbow wanted to wrap nonexistent hands around my throat and squeeze. "What'd you need, anyway?"

"You," Luke said. "Both of you, and one more. Bring Bianca to the Planning Room. It's important."

I was glad he dropped the whole leaving him hanging thing, but I didn't like how serious he sounded. "Now?"

But Luke had already karate chopped the display, cutting the call dead.

—-

I was glad to find Victoria knew what this "Planning Room" was, because I'd sure never heard of it.

"It's deep inside the main base," Victoria explained as we power walked across the freezing courtyard. She had finished her hair and even found time to touch up her makeup before she dragged Bianca and I down the stairs in record time. "Not many people see it, but all the Regiment leaders know how to get there. When something really important is going down, that's where it starts."

"Like now?" I said.

"It better be important." Bianca yawned, rubbing under her eye. She seemed puzzled when her hand came away smudged, and I realized she probably hadn't seen a mirror since Victoria shook her awake. Oh well. It was too late to do anything about Alyssa's work now.

The main hall wasn't crowded. The Dracaena working reception waved us through without looking up.

We took a succession of those home-mimicking hallways in a direction I'd never been before- heading down, like to the forges or Bianca's former cell, but in a different direction, right at the fortress's center.

While we jogged I caught Bianca staring at what was wallpaper and shag carpet for me, but for her must've been completely different.

"See something strange?" I asked.

She frowned. "I just expected different design sense from the titans. I mean, I know they decorated my hall with kitten paintings of all things, but hardwood floors and felt walls? Really?"

"It's based on your memories," I said, feeling smart for being on the other side of the conversation this time. "Whatever feels like home in your head is what it will show you."

"Can't be." Bianca shook her head. "I've never seen this stuff in my life."

"What? That doesn't make any—"

"Guys."

Victoria was gesturing for our attention, having stopped in front of a door that, now that I looked at it, was a lot more impressive than the others lining the hallway.

It looked like wood at a glance, but was actually metal painted brown and riddled with screws. It had no handle, but there was one of those rectangular slits, the kind you saw in movies that someone slides open asking for a password. What made this one different was that it wasn't on the door at all, instead built into the wall just beneath the ceiling… at least twelve feet off the ground.

Victoria knocked sharply three times, paused, then struck it twice more. For a minute nothing happened. Then I heard grunting and shuffling. The rectangle slid open.

"Hellooo? Is anybody thereee?"

A pupil the size of my head panned right and left, looking about four feet above where our heads stopped, before disappearing again.

"Hey!" Victoria repeated the knock. This time, when the eyes appeared, she shouted, "Tityos, look down!"

The eye blinked, then slid down the wall to look at us. "Oh," said a voice from the other side. "'Bodies is there."

I heard the sounds of locks unbolting, followed by metal scraping on metal. The door opened slowly, screaming the whole way, until it was open just wide enough for us to slip through. Victoria darted in, turnings sideways when she needed to, and Bianca and I followed right after.

I don't know what I expected to find, but after ten minutes of walking through hallways to get there, a cavernous space with a glass ceiling higher than an air hanger's wasn't it.

We were on a cobblestone path winding through a garden. No, that doesn't do it justice. This was the garden.

Full grown Eucalyptus trees lined every wall. Grass up to my waist swayed in nonexistent wind. Flowers in dozens of colors poked through the sea of green, little dots of color. And on the far side, right next to a grand set of pillared steps, was the most beautiful tree I had ever seen laden with juicy golden apples.

Then Victoria caught me looking and said, "It's a nice replica, isn't it?"

I coughed. "Replica!?"

"Of course. The real garden's lower on the mountain, by the entrance. I'll show you sometime. They don't let just anybody close, but being a regiment leader comes with its perks."

"If the real one's so close," Bianca said, "why bother making a fake?"

"To keep him from feeling homesick."

Bianca and I shared a look. "Who?"

Before Victoria could answer, the giant that opened the door for us clapped.

"Friends here," he boomed. "Why here, friends?"

He'd closed the door immediately after opening it, quickly lumbering to what looked like a cat's dream: the largest cardboard box I had ever seen. The thing was bigger than a tank, and the giant — Tityos, Victoria had called him — had crawled straight in through a giant-sized hole that he was now peeking out from.

"We were summoned, Tityos," Victoria said. "Is everyone in the meeting room?"

"Yes," said Tityos. "Liver Buddy looking angry."

"Liver buddy?" I mumbled as Victoria thanked him and led us down the cobblestone path.

"He means Prometheus," she said. "Both of them spent a couple centuries getting their livers pecked out by vultures. They really bonded over the experience. Prometheus even got him a job here as a guard, although he spends most of the time hiding in that box. The sky gives him flashbacks."

I picked a purple bud off one of the passing plants. "Prometheus angry, huh? That's hard to picture. Wonder if it's got anything to do with how he ditched his commentary gig."

Right after Bianca's stunt with the shadows went unsaid, but I could tell all of us were thinking it. That she'd been specifically asked for, right afterwards in the middle of the night, didn't bode well either.

"I don't know, Percy." Victoria set her eyes on the Greek-style pagoda ahead of us. "But I know where we can find out."

Walking up those stairs and passing between the pillars, it was hard not to feel that you were stepping into somewhere important. A pressure hit you, like someone was pressing on where your jaw met your skull with two fingers.

Luke and Prometheus were opposite each other, leaning over a table that was built into the floor with fused, spindly legs. Like the outside of the base, the shelter's architecture was clearly Greek. It looked like a meeting spot philosophers might've gathered at a thousand years ago in Athens, except the marble was as dark as the night sky above us.

Speaking of the sky, not far away, just behind the marble structure, even the glass disappeared from the ceiling. There was nothing keeping the night air out, and it was taking full advantage as it seemed to bend inside through the open gap. It was difficult to describe, a funnel of stars swirling down to rest on a pair of extremely burly shoulders.

"Hey kids," boomed a kneeling man with dark skin and a military cut. "Switch with me a second? I've really got to go number two."

"Ignore him." Luke didn't spare the man a glance, apparently used to the presence of a squatting bodybuilder at crucial meetings.

"Don't be like that." Suddenly the bodybuilder began to morph, until it was an ancient but somehow equally jacked grandpa in his place. His t-shirt read: Help an old man hold up the sky?

Opposite Luke, leaning over the other side of a table decked in maps and open books, Prometheus sighed. "I'm afraid my brother is always like this. Centuries of bearing the sky would do it to anyone you understand, but that doesn't make the begging pleasant to be around."

"Begging?" All of the sudden the old man morphed back to a traditional bodybuilder, his dark muscles rippling. "I'll show you begging, Prometheus. Just come here and take the sky a second while I get some hits in."

"Yes, yes," Prometheus demurred. "The strength all went to you, Atlas, and clearly not a drop of the intellect."

"Enough."

Luke pushed himself up from the table, crossing his arms authoritatively. I could've sworn I saw Prometheus' eye twitch.

"We aren't here to talk about Atlas, much as he may wish we were."

"Just set me free! Get the sky off of me and I'll win the war for you all on my own! The greatest General, the—"

"I'll tell Kronos you were whining again." Luke eyed Atlas from the corner of his eye. "Good. Much better. Now, you three."

He turned our way, and the nerves must've shown on mine and Bianca's faces. Victoria wasn't included because she was a statue, just like she always was in front of Luke. Somehow, she had completely mastered the art of hiding emotion in front of her crush.

"Don't look so scared!" Luke said. "You're here for an opportunity, not a punishment."

"In my experience, opportunities don't mean getting called away in the middle of the night," I said.

"HAH! That is because you're young!" barked Atlas, earning himself twin glares.

"Think of this as a first then," Luke told me. "You've been selected for a Feat."

That got a variety of reactions. I remembered Emmitt talking about those, super important missions that only a couple people had ever completed. Bianca, who never got the M-O, looked lost. But the biggest reaction went to Victoria, who's mouth dropped open.

"A second one?" she asked excitedly.

But Luke only shook his head.

"Not for you. For these two."

Right away, she was back to withdrawn. "Ah, makes sense."

"Before we go any further," Luke said, "Bianca, there's somebody that wants to meet you."

Bianca's forehead creased. "Can I ask who?"

"Let me guess," I said. "He likes scythes and plays around with time."

Atlas chuckled like artillery as Luke winced. "Slightly risky tone there, Perce. But it is who you're thinking of."

"Ms. Champion, if you would be so kind as to guide Ms Di Angelo to the waiting room?" Prometheus prompted.

Victoria snapped off a salute. "Right away, sir."

She led Bianca around back down the path we'd arrived from. Before they got out of sight, Prometheus called, "Ms. Di Angelo!"

They stopped, and Bianca looked curiously over her shoulder.

"Trying out a new look takes courage. It looks quite good on you."

Bianca looked puzzled, but Victoria was stifling a laugh as she led her away.

"Now," Luke said. "Back to business."

"There is a mission," Prometheus told me. "An extremely difficult one, fraught with danger and risk. But overstating its importance would be impossible. Truly, success here could move our victory closer by years."

I was beginning to suspect I wouldn't like the answer, but I asked, "What task are we talking about here?"

"A trip," Luke said.

"But first, a bit of history," Prometheus added.

The titan snapped his fingers and the largest map strewn across the table fluttered into the air, suspended in energy the same color as The Competition barrier. A pen floated up too, straight into Prometheus' hand where it was promptly uncapped.

"Western Culture is far reaching," he said. "Across most of North America and near all of Europe, we titans wield significant power." To demonstrate, he drew a little stick figure Prometheus, even pausing to scribble on the scars. The stick figure was smiling somewhere over Utah, with little lightning bolts above its head. "However, this is not true everywhere in the world. Some lands we want nothing to do with. Others are already occupied, by neighbors we'd rather not be drawn into yet another spat with. And some regions? Well, they are too remote for us to have much say in at all."

This time, he drew a new Prometheus above Greenland. This Prometheus was frowning, and instead of lightning bolts it had sad little squiggles.

"That's interesting and all, but what does it have to do with a Feat?"

"Patience, Percy. So it is these regions lie beyond our power, but that does not mean they are empty. Many creatures make their homes in the far north. Monsters, spirits, and, occasionally, more."

He drew a big circle over southern Alaska, and Luke took over.

"There's a tribe of giants you may have heard of. People call them the Hyperboreans. When Western Culture moved overseas, they landed in Alaska. What we need is to recruit them to our side."

The name rang a bell, something I was sure Daedalus had quizzed me on once upon a time.

"Weren't there only three of them?" I asked. "Doesn't exactly seem like war winning reinforcements."

"There were," Prometheus said. "Long ago, at least. But the people that lived among them were large in size themselves, and in time the giants fathered children. Today their descendants live among them as a new, varied race. Less powerful than the originals, but far more numerous. A lesson in war, if you will: fifty competent swords kill more surely than a single strong one."

"Keep talking about war," Atlas called. "It makes me chuckle to watch you act like you know something, as if you ever stepped out of your libraries long enough to even watch."

Prometheus ignored him. "There is a problem however. I must go personally to ensure we win them over. Usually, that would mean doing this."

He made a fist in front of his drawing, and the stick figure over Utah disappeared. He brought the fist across the map to Florida and opened his palm. The figure reappeared in Miami.

"Divine travel, a nearly instant trip. Except, when one tries to go North…"

He repeated the action, heading toward Alaska. Soon after passing the Canadian border his hand stopped, as if rebounding off an invisible wall.

"As you can see, travel is not possible. And that is not the only thing that's limited. Were I to be attacked in such a place I would be vulnerable. Seeing as we are at war, that is an incredible risk to take."

"For you maybe!" Atlas snorted. "Maybe if you were to get killed they'd finally free me. Now that would be an upgrade."

"Quiet you!" Prometheus snapped. "Anyway, Percy, you can see our conundrum. If I am to make this trip, it will need to be with protection."

I did feel like I was starting to see, and I had a sneaking suspicion that 'protection' in this case walked on two legs.

"Say I went with you…" I let it hang in the air, seeing if they would laugh it off and correct me. Nobody did. "If I went with you, wouldn't I end up useless too? My powers come from my… dad. Shouldn't they be going haywire as much as yours?"

"Mortality is a double-edged sword," Prometheus explained. "You can die at any time, but you are also less bound than us immortals. Freedom to die, freedom to travel, freedom to choose your fate. All of it is linked. I assure you, your powers will be just as potent in Anchorage as they would be in Atlanta."

I gulped. I felt the walls closing in, squeezing me toward a crazy trip playing bodyguard for one smooth talking immortal diplomat.

"Why us?" I asked. "You asked for me and Bianca specifically. In the middle of the night, too. Obviously you think it's important that we're the ones to do this, and you want it as soon as possible."

"Told you he was sharp," Luke mumbled to Prometheus, who only smiled.

"You ask why the two of you," the titan said. "I ask in return, who else would you entrust your protection to in my shoes? The Competition is surely proof enough of that."

I wasn't willing to let it go just yet. "Me I get. I've had personal training and I know my way around a fight. But Bianca? She just got free last week!"

"Then maybe seeing a bit of the world would be best for her," Prometheus suggested.

"Prometheus and I nominated one each," Luke said, "and you two are who we came up with. She might be inexperienced, but there's only one way to change that. Besides, who you bring as a third is up to you. And you'll be there to look out for her, won't you? What better way for her to learn to use all that power she has."

Abruptly, Atlas started laughing.

"What's all this bootlicking?" He chortled. "Oh, little demigods, you're so amazing and beautiful and powerful! BAH! Why don't you repeat some of what you were going on about before they got here, or are you too scared to be honest even to your own soldiers?"

He smiled a mouthful of square white teeth as Luke and Prometheus tried to decapitate him via glares. Eventually, after a solid twenty seconds of the staring match, Prometheus cleared his throat.

"There is one more thing," he admitted. "Bianca and yourself are both tremendously powerful among your kind. It's no exaggeration to say the day may come when one of you decides our rebellion's success or failure."

"And we hardly know Bianca," Luke finished.

"Hardly know either of you," Prometheus corrected, shooting me an apologetic look. "Luke vouches for you, but your presence in our ranks is still untested, much as I may like you."

I felt a headache coming on. "So this whole thing is a test. Great, I just love those." Then another thought popped into my head. "Wait, what happens if we fail?"

"Depends on how," Luke said. "There are two ways you can. The first is if you fall during the journey."

"Meaning we die." I shook my head. "Great. And what about the other?"

"The other," Luke said, "would be showing signs of disloyalty. A soft spot for the gods, lack of dedication to the cause, general incompetence… Basically anything which implies you're a risk to Kronos."

"And if that happens?"

Atlas laughed, booming over Luke's attempt to answer. "That is an easy one. You get thrown into Tartarus or tossed to the monsters, whichever is quickest!"

It wasn't Altas' cackles or the wind from his burden that chilled my bones. It was that Luke and Prometheus weren't correcting him.

(-)

Merry Christmas, ya filthy monsters.

Told you I was writing fast. To be honest, I have another chapter waiting on final edits and about 25% of the chapter after it written, which leads me to a question I've got:

Would you guys prefer it if I uploaded two chapters a week for the next 2.5 weeks or so, or if I uploaded once a week and got ahead on chapters before next semester?

The second one would make it much more likely that I could stick to weekly updates even after life gets busy. The first, obviously, means more content up front. It doesn't matter to me one way or the other— each are equally convenient. If people show a preference one way or another, I'll go with that.

P.S. Reading reviews from last chapter (which, by the way, warmed my cold heart with their compliments) I thought I should put a disclaimer here that there won't be too many characters from canon in this arc. Annabeth, for example, isn't really a player. The arc after this one on the other hand… ;)