A/N: Long time no see! Writing this was quite frustrating, as is everything where you mostly try to get as much original writing in as possible but have to keep a bunch of canon dialogue in. I put off writing a long time but oh well, quarantine shmarantine, bored to heck.

Ill probably have to bump up the predicted chapter count a bit, I figured by chapter 5 I'd already be much farther into the plot.


Well. I wrote that A/N in April 2020. Kind of didn't think it would take me three years to finish and post this, but oh well.

In the meantime, I've recently finished my long-running Harry Potter fic Denial and its Side-Effects; the last chapters are being posted this month, so if that tickles your fancy, feel free to check that out. I've also written a Avatar: The Last Airbender fanfic, House, Home, Heir Apparent, which I'd also like to recommend to you. (Unfortunately, FFN strips the links.)

Without further ado, here's a new chapter (finally)!


This chapter has a content warning for canon-typical violence.


So much for taking us somewhere safe. Until now, all this Percy Jackson had done was gotten himself captured, and now Dr Thorn was leading us away from the school, and towards the woods we weren't allowed to stray into during the term, at least not without a teacher. I guess Thorn counted as one, although I didn't think taking students hostage was something teachers were allowed to.

Ahead, Jackson groaned, which earned him a shove and some choice words from our captor.

'It's my shoulder', he complained. 'It burns.'

'Bah!' Thorn waved dismissively. 'My poison causes pain. It will not kill you. Walk!'

Whoa slow down there. Poison? The guy was a Maths teacher, not some sort of assassin, right?

'There's a clearing ahead. We will sumon your ride.'

'What ride?' asked Bianca. 'Where are you taking us.'

Thorn grinned and I imagined I could see a set of fangs in his mouth, but surely it was just my imagination.

'Silence, you insufferable girl!'

'Don't talk to my sister that way', I managed to complain, because nobody gets to insult my big sister, alright? But the way he growled at me, more animal-like than human, shut me up fast enough. I kept quiet and tried to keep my shaking limbs calm—December wind or fear, probably both—until we emerged from the forest atop a cliff. Further down, I could hear the sea, but I couldn't see anything. Thorn roughly shoved us away, and Percy almost fell down, if it hadn't been for Bianca catching him.

I shivered and stuff my hands into my pockets to keep them warm. My deck was still there, and most of my figurines, too. Bianca and Percy were whispering about something, but neither reacted to my mumbled 'I'm scared.'

'Face me!' Thorn interrupted us. He produced a radio from his coat. 'The package is ready to deliver.'

The reply was unintelligible, but in my mind, I imagined it sounded something like copy that, over and out. Despite my fear, I found the idea exciting. Maybe there would be secret agents with phones in their ears, with black jeeps, or a boat, or maybe even a submarine! Not as exciting as pirates or ancient warriors, of course, but a submarine was a ship, more or less, right?

Next to us, Percy turned to look at the cliff, and again, Thorn laughed.

'By all means, Son of Poseidon. Jump! There's the sea, save yourself!'

No, no, stop. He had it all wrong. Perseus had been the son of Zeus, for starters, and this Percy here couldn't exactly just jump a cliff? Famous namesake or not, he was just a boy, although one with a sword.

'I would kill you before you even reached the water', Dr Thorn threatened, and was it my imagination or had he grown a good bit since we had left the school. 'You do not realise who I am, do you?'

He sneered at us and some noise, like from a whip, sounded as someone or something behind him moved. 'Unfortunately, you are wanted alive, if possible. Otherwise, you would already be dead.'

'Who wants us?' Bianca interrupted, and I anxiously looked up at her. Thorn seemed fairly dangerous, and I wasn't sure she should provoke him.

'Because if you think you'll get a ransom, you're wrong. We don't have any family.'

Look, I was twelve, alright? Not really an expert on hostage situations. But somehow, I felt that maybe it might be a bad idea to tell the guy holding you that he wasn't going to get any money out of you. I didn't want to end up like the dead people in the detective films Bianca had forbidden me from watching.

I had to have missed some of the conversation, because next thing I knew, Percy was talking, and the cold wind seemed to get even colder when he spoke.

'Luke. You work for Luke.'

I didn't know who that was, but apparently, he wasn't very nice, and neither Percy nor Thorn seemed to like him. If the vice-principal had been arrogant before, he now looked outright insulted.

'You have no idea what is happening, Perseus Jackson', he mocked. 'I will let the General enlighten you. He is looking forward to meeting you.'

A general? So, secret agents after all? As scary as it was, I couldn't help the excitement.

Mostly scary, though.

The sound of a helicopter interrupted my thoughts, and when I saw it in the distance, approaching from the fog-covered ocean, everything suddenly seemed a lot less exciting and a lot more real. It was indeed black, and a lot different than I remembered helicopters looking, more sleek and larger.

'Ah, here we are!' announced Thorn. 'Your transportation.'

'Where are you taking us?'

He snorted. 'You should be honoured, my boy! You will have the opportunity to join a great army, just like that silly game you play with cards and dolls—'

Ok, look. Kidnapper or not? Nobody gets to insult Mythomagic just like that. I felt the anger grow in me, cold and determined, and clutched my fingers around the cards in my pocket.

'They're not dolls! They're figurines! And you can take your great army and—'

'Now, now', Thorn cut me off, and just like that, the rest of my courage vanished into thin air. 'You will change your mind about joining us. And if not… we have many monsters to feed. The Great Stirring is underway.'

Percy seemed to be just as confused as I was. What monsters was the guy talking about? Thorn's grin as Percy asked didn't seem very reassuring.

'The stirring of monsters!' he proclaimed. 'The worst of them, the most powerful, are now waking. Monsters that have not been seen in thousands of years. They will cause death and destruction the likes of which mortals have never known.'

I frowned. He sounded more like he was reciting from a book. I was fairly sure half of that had been in the adverts for the last Mythomagic expansion pack.

'And soon we shall have the most important monster of all—the one that shall bring about the downfall of Olympus!' Thorn finished his speech.

Bianca turned to Percy and whispered what we all were thinking. 'He's completely nuts.'

'We have to jump off the cliff', Percy replied, 'into the sea.'

'Oh, super idea! You're nuts, too.'

Definitely nuts. That had to be, what, at least a kilometre? Okay, looking back, considerably less, but at twelve, it looked like a kilometre to me.

For a moment, I thought Bianca nad Percy were going to argue, but suddenly, something knocked us to the ground. Right after, a salvo of projectiles passed just over our heads, and then, Grover-the-weirdo-from-school and a girl with a shield jumped out from behind Thorn and padre nostro che sei nei cieli, that shield scared the hell out of me. I curled up and probably screamed like a baby, although I would never admit that to anyone.

But yeah. The girl—who looked just like a pirate, except for the shield and spear, wild black hair and all—and Grover started attacking Dr Thorn, and the question of 'what is my sister's classmate doing here' had to make room for the new question of 'why does my sister's classmate have hooves ?', followed by ' mamma mia why does Dr Thorn have claws?!' and when I startled out of my shock, I pinched myself to make sure I wasn't dreaming. Sadly, I was not.

Another missile volley missed my head by what had to be less than a millimetre (okay: not really, but a centimetre at most!), and holy heavens, that guy had a tail. Like, a big… thing, like a scorpion or something, and that was where the spikey things were coming from.

'A manticore!', someone yelled, and wait where did that other girl come from?

'Who are you people?', Bianca asked at the some moment as I sputtered, 'a manticore?'

Look, deadly monster or not, you can't just throw names out there that I know. It was really more out of habit, but I had only gotten to 'he's got three thousand attack power plus five to saving throws' when the new girl shoved Bianca and me into the snow. Rude. She got up and grabbed a baseball cap off the ground (where had that come from, either?) and the others seemed to accept her as part of Percy's group, but at this point, I had fully lost count of who was where and against whom.

Percy's watch exploded into another shield and if I hadn't been sore all over and freezing in the snow, I might have thought this had to be a dream after all. In the distance, the helicopter we had been hearing moved through the fog and reminded me that this was not only no dream, we would probably, well, die.

My thoughts jumped to the school, who would probably never find us, and for a split second, I mourned the chance to tell Mr Grimes goodbye, or finally punch out Anthony's teeth before we died.

Grover crashed into the snow next to me—yep, those were hooves, no doubt—and Dr Thorn—the manticore—whatever, the thing yelled 'yield!'

The pirate girl attacked him, but just then, the helicopter rose over the cliff and blinded everyone with its lights, probably brighter than the sun. Pirate girl was tossed aside and Percy ran to help her, swatting away a spike from Thorn and defending her with his shield. He fought like… like what, actually? I didn't think I had ever seen anyone fight like that, not at the pictures, on the rare occasions mamma would take us, and certainly not anywhere else. If anything, he came close to the ancient heroes in Mr Grimes's history class. Even now that I've seen more heroes fight than I can count, Percy remains one of the best swordsmen I've ever seen, and his first display back then will remain burnt into my memory forever.

I had to have missed some talking and fighting over admiring Percy, because the next thing I noticed, a horn was being blown and Dr Thorn was shooting volleys of spikes at the forest and was met with arrows, silver like moonlight and sticking him like a hedgehog, coming from a dozen girls and women swarming from the woods.

'The Hunters!', not-pirate girl cried, and pirate girl didn't seem to happy about that, but I didn't catch her words, so fascinated was I staring at this battle. Now that we didn't seem to be dying any time soon, the fight drew me in like a Mythomagic battle, and three thousand attack power or not, the Thorn/manticore didn't seem to be faring well.

'Permission to kill?', one of them asked, and a girl our age—somewhere between Bianca and me, probably—allowed her, after insulting Dr Thorn a little, and I would be lying if I said I didn't enjoy that.

The manticore charged at Percy and pirate girl, and then not-pirate girl jumped before them, and then the hunter—Zoë, she had been called—and her friends started shooting him, and with an overdramatic 'this is not the end, Huntress!', our vice principal grabbed the girl and jumped into the sea.

Yeah, just like that. Just jumped over the cliff.

Percy screamed 'Annabeth!' and then the helicopter, which we all had kind of forgotten about, started shooting, with actual guns, and I screamed and dove into a pile of snow, and when Bianca dug me out of it, Percy was busy fighting with Zoë and a couple of other girls who tried to stop him from jumping to his death.

'You have to let us save her!'

The girl who seemed to lead the whole group (even though she looked younger than Zoë) shooked her head.

'I'm sorry, Percy Jackson, but your friend is beyond help. You are in no condition to be hurling yourself off clifs.'

'Let me go!', he shouted. 'Who do you think you are?'

Zoë seemed about ready to beat the crap out of him for that, but—

'No. I sense no disrespect, Zoë. He is simply distraught. He does not understand.'

She stared him down with the most pale eyes I had ever seen.

'I am Artemis. Goddess of the Hunt.'


A/N: So going forward, I'm not going to make the mistake of promising an update schedule I can't keep anyway. However, consider this fic un-hiatus'd and expect new chapters, hopefully soon (no promises though).

As always, comments are appreciated endlessly, and constructive criticism (concrit) is very welcome.