Sorry I didn't upload a chapter in two weeks, I had a family emergency and my mind was not in the right mind set to try and work on a chapter. Everything is better now, and I will be uploading once a week again.

Hephaestus was sometimes considered the son of both Zeus and Hera, though other accounts say that Hera gave birth to Hephaestus parthenogenically in response to Zeus giving birth to Athena by himself.

I DO NOT OWN PERCY JACKSON RICK RIORDAN DOES! I only have rights to Atlanta and, just Atlanta. The stories are still in Percy's POV.

Chapter fifteen: A God Buys Us Cheeseburgers

The next afternoon, June 14, seven days before the solstice, our train rolled into Denver. We hadn't eaten since the night before in the dining car, somewhere in Kansas. We hadn't taken a shower since Half-Blood Hill, and I was sure that was obvious.

"Let's try to contact Chiron," Annabeth said. "I want to tell him about your talk with the river spirit."

"You guys can't use phones right?" Ermis asked.

Annabeth ignored him. Atlanta annoyed repeated the question. I was getting tried of Annabeth's treatment of Ermis too.

"I'm not talking about phones."

We wandered through downtown for about half an hour, though I wasn't sure what Annbeth was looking for. The air was dry and hot, which felt weird after the humidity of St. Louis. Everywhere we turned at me, like a tidal wave about to crash into the city.

Finally we found an empty do-it-yourself car wash. We veered toward the stall farthest from the street, keeping out eyes open for patrol cars. We were five adolescents handing out at a car wash without a car; any cop worth his doughnuts would figure we were up to no good.

"What exactly are we doing?" I asked, as Grover took out the spray gun.

"It's seventy-five cents," he grumbled. "I've only got two quarters left. Annabeth?"

"Don't look at me," she said. "The dining car wiped me out."

I fished around in my pockets, but I only had two nickels and one drachma from Medusa's place. Atlanta dug in her pockets, but it was Ermis who handed Grover the last quarter needed.

"Excellent," Grover said. "We could do it with a spray bottle, of course, but the connection isn't as good, and my arm gets tired of pumping.

"What are you talking about?"

He fed in the quarters and set the knob to FINE MIST. "I-M'ing."

"Instant messaging?"

"Iris-messaging," Annabeth corrected. "The rainbow goddess Iris carries messages for the gods. If you know how to ask, and she's not too busy, she'll do the same for half-bloods."

"You summon the goddess with a spray gun?" Ermis asked.

"Seems kinds of disrespectful." Atlanta mumbled.

Grover pointe the nozzle in the air and water hissed out in the thick white mist. "Unless you know an easier way to make a rainbow."

Aure enough, late afternoon light filtered through the vapor and broke into colors.

Annabeth held her palm out to me. "Drachma, please."

I handed it over.

She raised the coin over her head. "O goddess, accept our offering."
She threw the drachma into the rainbow. It disappeared in a golden shimmer.

"Half-Blood Hill," Annabeth requested.

For a moment, nothing happened.

Then I was looking through the mist at strawberry fields, and the Long Island Sound in the distance. We seemed to be on the porch of the Big House. Standing with his back to us at the railing was a sandy-haired guy in shorts and an orange tank top. He was holding a bronze sword and seemed to be staring intently at something down in the meadow.

"Luke!" Atlanta called.

He turned, eyes wide. I could swear he was standing three feet in front of us through the mist, except I could only see the part of him that appeared in the rainbow.

"Atlanta, Percy!" His scarred face broke into a grin. "Is that Annabeth too? Thank the gods! Are you guys okay?"

"We're….uh…fine," Annabeth stammered. She was madly straightening her dirty T-shirt, trying to comb the loose hair out of her face. "We thought-Chiron-I mean-"

"He's down at the cabins." Luke's smiled faded. "We're having some issues with the campers. Listen, is everything cool with you? Is Grover all right? And who's the other kid?"

"I'm right here," Grover called. He held the nozzle out to one side and stepped into Luke's line of vision. "This is Ermis, we met him while traveling. He's cool. What kind of issues?"

I couldn't help but notice Grover left out the son of Medusa part, and Atlanta elbowed Annabeth before she could open her big mouth.

Just then a big Lincoln Continental pulled into the car wash with its stereo turned to maximum hip-hop. As the car slid into the bass from the subwoofers vibrated so much, it shook the pavement.

"Chiron had to-what's that noise?" Luke yelled.

"I'll take care of it!" Annabeth yelled back, looking very relieved to have an excuse to get out of sight. "Grover, come on!"

"What?" Grover said. "But-"

"Give Atlanta or Percy the nozzle and come on!" she ordered.

Grover muttered something about girls being harder to understand than the Oracle at Delphi, then handed me the spray gun, getting punched in the arm by Atlanta, and followed Annabeth.

I readjusted the hose so I could keep the rainbow going and still see Luke.

"Chiron had to break up a fight," Luke shouted to us over the music. "Things are pretty tense here, Atlanta, Percy. Word leaked out about the Zeus-Poseidon standoff. We're still not sure how-probably the same scumbag who summoned the hellhound. Now the campers are starting to take sides. It's like the Trojan War all over again. Aphrodite, Ares, and Apollo are backing Poseidon, more or less. Athena is backing Zeus."

I shuddered to think that Clarisse's cabin would never be on my dad's side for anything. In the next stall, I heard Annabeth and some guy arguing with each other, then the music's volume decreased drastically.

"So what's your status?" Luke asked Atlanta and me. "Chiron will be sorry he missed you."

I told him almost everything-leaving out Atlanta's time powers and the fact Ermis was the son of Medusa- including my dreams. It felt so good to see him, to feel like Atlanta and I were back at camp even for a few minutes, that I didn't realize how long I had talked until the beeper went off on the spray machine, and I realized we only had one more minute before the water shut off.

"I wish I could be there," Luke told me. "We can't help much from here, I'm afraid, but listen…it had to be Hades who took the master bolt. He was there at Olympus at the winter solstice. I was chaperoning a field trip and we saw him."

"But Chiron said the gods can't take each other's magic items directly," Atlanta pointed out.

"That's true," Luke said, looking troubled. "Still…Hades had the helm of darkness. How could anybody else sneak into the throne room and steal the master bolt? You'd have to be invisible."

We all went silent, until Luke seemed to realize what he'd said.

"Oh, hey," he protested. "I didn't mean Annabeth. She and I have known each other forever. She would never…I mean, she's like a little sister to me."

I wondered if Annabeth would like that description. In the stall next to us, the music stopped completely. A man screamed in terror, car doors slammed, and the Lincoln peeled out of the car wash.

"You'd better go see what that was," Luke said. "Listen, are you wearing the flying shoes? I'll feel better if I know they've done you and Atlanta some good."

"Oh…uh, yeah!" I tried not to sound like a guilty liar. "Yeah, they've come in handy."

"Really?" He grinned. "They fit and everything?"

The water shut off. The mist started to evaporate.

"Well, take care of yourselves out there in Denver," Luke called, his voice getting fainter. "And tell Grover it'll be better this time! Nobody will get turned into a pine tree if he just-"

But the mist was gone, and Luke's image faded to nothing. Atlanta, Ermis, and I were alone in a wet, empty car wash stall.

Annabeth and Grover came around the corner, laughing, but stopped when they saw our faces. Annabeth's smile faded. "What happened, Percy, Atlanta? What did Luke say?"

"Nothing, just wishing us luck," Ermis lied. "Come on, let's find some dinner."

My empty stomach agreed with his plan with a loud rumble.

A few minutes later, we were sitting at a booth in a gleaming chrome diner. All around us, families were eating burgers and drinking malts and sodas.

Atlanta was counting her half of the money, when a waitress finally come over. She raised her eyebrow skeptically. "Well?"

I said, "We, um, want to order dinner."

"You kids have money to pay for it?"

Atlanta still counting the money said, "No the green pieces of paper in front of me are figments of your imagination."

Grover started laughing. I was afraid he would start bleating any second. The waitress gave Atlanta an annoyed look.

I was trying to get her attention away from Atlanta when a rumble shook the whole building; a motorcycle the size of a baby elephant had pulled up to the curb.

All conversation in the diner stopped. The motorcycles headlight glared red. Its gas tank had flames painted on it, and a shotgun holster riveted to either side, complete with shotguns. The seat was leather-but leather that looked like….well, Caucasian human skin.

The guy on the bike would've made pro wrestlers run for Mama. He was dressed in a red muscle shirt and black jeans and a black leather duster, with a hunting knife strapped to his thigh. He wore red wraparound shades, and he had the cruelest, most brutal face I'd ever seen-handsome, I guess, but wicked-with an oily black crew cut and cheeks that were scarred from many, many fights. The weird thing was, I felt like I'd seen his face somewhere before.

As he walked into the diner, a hot, dry wind blew through the place. All the people rose, as if they were hypnotized, but the biker waved his hand dismissively and they all sat down again. Everybody went back to their conversations. The waitress blinked, as if somebody had just pressed the rewind button on her brain. She asked us again, "You kids have money to pay for it?"

Atlanta once again gestured to the money on the table, when the biker said, "It's n my." He slid into our booth, which was way too small for him, and crowded Ermis into Atlanta, which pushed her against the window. I sent him a glare. Ermis pushed back against him, which actually moved him a bit.

He looked at Ermis with a smirk, before looking up at the waitress, who was gaping at him and said, "You still here?"

He pointed at her, and she stiffened. She turned as if she'd been spun around, then marched back toward the kitchen.

The biker looked at me. I couldn't see his eyes behind the red shads, but bad feelings started boiling in my stomach. Anger, resentment, bitterness. I wanted to hit the wall. I wanted to pick a fight with somebody. Who did this guy think he was?

He gave me a wicked grin. "So you're old Seaweed's boy, huh?"

I should've been surprised, or scared, but instead I felt like I was looking at my stepdad, Gabe. I wanted to rip this guy's head off. "What's it to you?"

Annabeth elbowed me in warning "Percy, this is-"

The biker raised his hand.

"S'okay," he said. "I don't mind a little attitude. Long as you remember who's the boss. You know who I am, little cousin?"

Then it struck me why this guy looked familiar. He had the same vicious sneer as some of the kids at Camp Half-Blood, the ones from cabin five.

"You're Clarisse's dad," I said. "Ares, god of war."

Ares grinned and took off his shades. Where his eyes should've been, there was only fire, empty socket glowing with miniature nuclear explosions. "That's right, punk. I'm also the father of your little Gordon buddy over here."

"You'd better been sipping the adult juice," Atlanta said.

Ares cleared his throat. "Heard you broke Clarisse's spear."

I wanted to continue, but Atlanta shook her head, gesturing to Ermis, who looked pale. "She was asking for it."

"Probably. That's cool. I don't fight my kids' fights, you know? What I'm here for-I heard you were in town. I got a little proposition for you and your sister."

The waitress come back with a heaping trays of food-cheeseburgers, fires, onion rings, and chocolate shakes.

Ares handed her a few gold drachmas.

She looked nervously at the coins. "But, these aren't…"

Ares pulled out his huge knife and started clearing his fingernails. "Problem, sweetheart?"

The waitress swallowed, then left with the gold.

"You can't do it," Ermis told Ares. "You can't just threaten people cause you feel like it."

Ares laughed. "Are you kidding? I love this country. Best place since Sparta. Don't you carry a weapon, son? Or do you just use your mummy's eyes? You may want to consider a weapon, if you don't want to accidently stone your little friends. Dangerous world out there, even for a Gorgen. Which brings me to my proposition. I need old Seaweed's kids to do me a favor."

"What kind of favor?" Atlanta asked.

"Something a god doesn't have time to do himself. It's nothing much. I left my shield at an abandoned water park here in town. I was going on a little…date with my girl. We were interrupted. I left my shield behind. I want you to fetch it for me."

"Why don't you go back and get it yourself?" I asked.

The fire in his eyes sockets glowed a little hotter.

"Why don't I turn you and your sister into prairie dogs and run you both over with my Harley? Because I don't feel like it. A god is giving you an opportunity to prove yourself, Percy, and Atlanta Jackson. Will you prove yourselves a coward?" He leaned forward. "Or maybe you only fight when there's a river's to drive into, so your daddy can protect you."

I wanted to punch this guy, but somehow, I knew he was waiting for that. Ares's power was causing my anger. He'd love it if I attacked. I didn't want to give him the satisfaction."

"We're not interested," I said. "We've already got a quest."

Ares's fiery eyes made me see things I didn't want to see-blood and smoke and corpses on the battlefield. "I know all about your quest, punk. When that item was first stolen, Zeus sent his best out looking for it: Apollo, Athena, Artemis, and me, naturally. If I couldn't sniff out a weapon that powerful…" He licked his lips, as if the very thought of the master bolt mad him hungry. "Well…if I couldn't find it, you got no hope. Nevertheless, I'm trying to give you the benefit of the doubt. Your dad and I go way back. After all, I'm the one who told him my suspicions about old Corpse Breath."

"You told him Hades stole the master bolt?" Ermis asked.

"Sure. Framing somebody to start a war. Oldest trick in the book. I recognized it immediately. IN a way, you got me to thank for your little quest."

"Thanks," Atlanta and I grumbled.

"Hey, I'm a generous guy. Just do my little job, and I'll help you on your way. I'll arrange a ride west for you and your friends."

"We're doing fine on our own," I said.

"Yeah, right. Barely any money. No wheels. No clue what you're up against. Help me out, and maybe I'll help protect Ermis here."

"What you mean?" Atlanta asked.

"Well he's a Gorgen. You try to take him to camp, he'll be killed in a heartbeat. But if you do this, I'll clam him officially. Nobody can kill him without angering me."

"Percy-" Annabeth tried, anger in her voice.

Grover elbowed in her in the side, glaring at her. Atlanta looked at me and I knew we had to do this. Annabeth won't like it, but I didn't care. He was our friend.

Ares grinned. "That got your attention. The water park is a mile west on Delancy. You can't miss it. Look for the Tunnel of Love ride."

"What interrupted your date?" I asked. "Something scare you off?"

Ares bared his teeth, but I'd seen his threatening look before on Clarisse. There was something false about it, almost like he was nervous.

"You're lucky you met me, punk, and not one of the other Olympians. They're not as forgiving of rudeness as I am. I'll meet you back here when you're done. Don't disappoint me."

After that I must have fainted, or fallen into a trance, because when I opened my eyes again, Ares was gone. I might've thought the conversation had been a dream, but Ermis's grateful expression, Grover's and Atlanta's worried expression, and Annabeth's angry expression told me otherwise.

"Not good," Grover said. "Ares sought you and Atlanta out, Percy. That's not good."

I stared out the window. The motorcycle had disappeared.

Could Ares really keep others from attacking and killing Ermis or was he just playing with us? Now that he was gone, all the anger had drained out of me. I realized Ares must love to mess with people's emotions. That was his power-cranking up the passions so badly, they clouded your ability to think.

"It's probably some kind of trick," Annabeth said. "We need to forget Ares and focus on finding the master bolt."

"You mean like visiting the Arch?" Atlanta snapped.

"We're not going to risk Ermis, just because you can't get over who is mother is. We're going to the water park and getting Ares his stupid shield."

"And Ares wasn't kidding about turning Percy and Atlanta into rodents," Grover said.

I looked down at my cheeseburger, which suddenly didn't seem so appetizing. "Why does he need us?"

"Maybe it's a problem that requires brains," Annabeth said. "Ares has strength. That's all he has. Even strength has to bow to wisdom sometimes."

"But this water park…something there scared him, why else would a war god run away like that?" Ermis asked.

Grover and Atlanta glanced nervously at each other.

Annabeth snapped. "Well now thanks to you three insisting on helping the Gorgen, we'll have to find out."

The sun was sinking behind the mountains by the time we found the water park. Judging the sign, it once had been called WATERLAND, but now some of the letters were smashed out, so it read WAT R A D.

The main gate was padlocked and topped with barbed wire. Inside, huge dry waterslides and tubes and pipes curled everywhere, leading to empty pools. Old tickets and advertisements fluttered around the asphalt. With night coming on, the place looked sad and creepy.

"Ares is bring a girlfriend….here?: Ermis asked. "For a date?"

I staired up at the barbed wire. "I'd hate to see what she looks like."

"Percy," Annabeth warned. "Be more respectful."

"Why? Ares is a jerk," Atlanta said.

"He's still a god. And his girlfriend is very temperamental."
"You don't want to insult his looks," Grover added.

"Who is she? Echidna?" I asked.

"No, Aphrodite," Grover said, a little dreamily. "Goddess of love."

"I thought she was married to Hephaestus?" Ermis asked.

"What's your point?" Annabeth snapped.
Grover elbowed Annabeth in the side once more. I cleared my throat, changing the subject. "So how do we get in?"
"Maia!" Grover's shoes sprouted wings.

He flew over the fence, did an unintended somersault in midair, then stumbled to a landing on the opposite side. He dusted off his jeans, as if he'd planned the whole thing. "You guys coming?"
"Show off!" Atlanta laughed.

Annabeth, Atlanta, Ermis, and I had to climb the old-fashioned way, holding down the barbed wire for each other-though Annabeth tried to lower it on Ermis- as we crawled over the top.

The shadows grew long as we walked through the park, checking out the attractions. There was Ankle Biter Island, Head Over Wedgie, and Dude, Where's My Swimsuit?

No monsters came to us. Nothing made the slightest noise.

We found a souvenir shop that had been left open. Merchandise still lined the shelves snow globes, pencils, postcards, and rack of-

"Clothes," Annabeth said. "Fresh clothes."
"Yeah," I said. "But you can't just-"

"Percy this place is closed down, whose going to care that we take fresh clothes?" Atlanta asked.

Annabeth and Atlanta snatched an entire row of stuff of the racks and disappeared into the changing room. A few minutes later they came out in Waterland flower-print shorts, a big red and blue Waterland T-shirts, and Annabeth had commemorative Waterland surf shoes. A Waterland backpack was slung over Annabeth's shoulder, obviously stuffed with more goodies.

"What the heck." Grover shrugged. Soon, all five of us were decked out like walking advertisements for the defunct theme park.

We continued searching foe the Tunnel of Love. I got the feeling that the whole park wad holding its breath. "So Ares and Aphrodite," I said, to keep my mind off the growing dark, "they have a thing going?"

"That's old gossip, Percy," Annabeth told me. "Three-thousand-year-old gossip."

"What about Hephaestus?" Atlanta asked.

"The blacksmith," Annabeth said. "He was crippled when he was a baby, thrown off Mount Olympus by Zeus-"

"It wasn't Zeus," Ermis said. "it was Hera."

Annabeth glared at him, before continuing. "So he's not exactly handsome. Clever with his hands, and all, but Aphrodite isn't into brains and talent, you know?"

"And she likes Ares of all people?" Atlanta asked.

"Must really be into bikers," I said.

"Whatever," Annabeth said.
"Hephaestus clearly knows about it," Ermis said.

"Oh sure," Annabeth said. "He caught them together once. I mean, literally caught them, in a golden net, and invited all the gods to come and laugh at them. That's why they meet in out-of-the-way places like…"

She stopped, looking straight ahead. "Like that."

Infront of us was an empty pool that would've been awesome for skateboarding. It was at least fifty yards across and shaped like a bowl.
Around the rim, a dozen bronze statues of Cupid stood guard with wings spread and bows ready to fire. On the opposite side from us, a tunnel opened up, probably where the water flowed into when the pool was full. The sigh above it read, THRILL RIDE O' LOVE: THIS IS NOT YOUR PARENTS' TUNNEL OF LOVE!

Grover crept toward the edge. "Guys, look."

Marooned at the bottom of the pool was a pink-and-white two-seater boat with a canopy over the top and little hearts painted all over it. In the left seat, was Ares's shield, a polished circle of bronze.

"This is too easy," I said. "So we just walk down there and get it?"

Annabeth looked at the bottom of the pool, muttering under her breath a plan. Ermis was looking at the nearest Cupid statue.

"There's a Greek letter carved in the base," Ermis said. "It's Eta."

"Isn't that an H?" Atlanta asked.

"Yeah. You…you don't think this is something Hephaestus set up to trap Ares and Aphrodite do you?"
"Don't be ridiculous," Annabeth scuffed.

I glared at her. "Grover," I said. "you smell any monster, and Annabeth do not comment on Ermis."

He sniffed the wind. "Nothing."

"Nothing-like, in-the-Arch-and-you-didn't-smell-Echidna nothing, or really nothing?"

Grover looked hurt and both Atlanta and Ermis punched me in the arm. "I told you, that was underground. And I wasn't familiar with Ermis's scent yet."

"Okay, I'm sorry." I took a deep breath. "I'm going down there."

"I'll go with you," Grover didn't sound too enthusiastic, but I got the feeling he was trying to make up for what had happened in St. Louis."
"No," I told him. "I want you to stay up top with the flying shoes. You're the Red Baron, a flying ace remember? I'll be counting on you for backup, in case something goes wrong."

Grover puffed up his chest a little. "Sure. But what could go wrong?"

"I don't know. Just feeling. Annabeth, come me-"

"Are you kidding?" She looked at me as if I'd just dropped from the moon. Her cheeks were bright red.
"What's the problem now?" I demanded.

"Me, do with you to the…the 'Trill Ride of Love'? How embarrassing is that? What if somebody saw me?"

"Who's going to see you?" But my face was burning now, too. Leave it to a girl to make everything complicated.
"Fine," I told her. "I'll do it myself." But when I started down the side if the pool, she followed me, muttering about how boys always messed things up.

We reached the boat. The shield was propped on one seat, and next to it was a lady's scarf. I tried to imagine Ares and Aphrodite here, a coupe of gods meeting in a junked-out amusement-park ride. Why? When I noticed something I hadn't seen from up top: mirrors all the way around the rim of the pool, facing this spot. We could see ourselves no matter which direction we looked. That must be it. While Ares and Aphrodite were smooching with each other they could look at their favorite people: themselves.

I picked up the scarf. It shimmered pink, and the perfume was indescribable-rose, or mountain laurel. Something good. I smiled, a littles dreamy, and was about the rub the scarf against my cheek when Annabeth ripped it out of my hand and stuffed it in her pocket. "Oh, no you don't. Stay away from that love magic."

"What?"
"Just get the shield, Seaweed Brain, and let's get out of here."

The moment I touched the shield, I knew we were in trouble. My hand broke through something that had been connecting it to the dashboard. A cobweb, I thought, but then some kind of metal filament, so fine it was almost invisible. A trip wire.
"Wait," Annabeth said.

"Too late."
There's another Greek letter on the side of the boat, another Eta. This is a trip."
"Geeeeee, it's almost like we were warned this was a trap."

Annabeth glared at me, her face reddening. Noise erupted all around us, of a million gears grinding, as if the whole pool were turning into one giant machine.

"Grover yelled, "Guys!"

Up on the rim, the Cupid statues were drawing their bows into fire position. Before I could suggest taking cover, they shot, but not at us. They fired at each other, across the rim of the pool and anchoring where they landed to form a huge golden asterisk. Then smaller metallic threads strands, making a net.

"We have to get out," I said.

"Duh!" Annabeth said.

I grabbed the shield and we ran, but going up the slope of the pool was not easy as going down.

"Come on!" Atlanta shouted.

Atlanta, Grover, and Ermis were tying to hold open a section of the net for us, but whatever they touched it, golden threads started to wrap around their hands.

The Cupid's heads popped open. Out come video cameras. Spotlights rose up all around the pool, blinding us with illumination, and a loudspeaker voice boomed: "Live to Olympus in one minute…Fifty-nine second, fifty-right…"

"Hephaestus!" Annabeth screamed. "I'm so stupid! Eta is 'H'. He made this trap to catch his wife with Ares. Now we're going to be broadcast live to Olympus and look like absolute fools!"

I wanted to again point out Atlanta and Ermis tried to point this out to her, but thought against it. We'd almost made it to the rim when the row of mirrors opened like hatches and thousands of tiny metallic…things poured out.

Annabeth screamed.
It was an army of wind-up creepy-crawlies, bronze-gear bodies, spindly legs, little pincer mouths, all scuttling towards us in wave of clacking, whirring metal.

"Spiders!" Annabeth said. "Sp-spaaah!"

I'd never seen her like this before. She fell backwards in terror and almost got overwhelmed by the spider robots before I pulled her up and dragged her back toward the boat.

The things were coming out from all around the rim now, millions of them, flooding toward the center of the pool, completely surrounding us. I told myself they probably weren't programmed to kill, just corral us and bite us and make us look stupid. Then again, this was a trap meant for gods. And we weren't gods.

Annabeth and I climbed into the boat. I started kicking away the spiders as they swarmed aboard. I yelled at Annabeth to help me, but she was too paralyzed to do much more the scream.

"Thirty, twenty-nine," called the loudspeaker.

The spider started spitting out strands were of metal thread, trying to tie us down. The strands were easy enough to break at first, but there were so many of them, and the spiders just kept coming. I kicked one away from Annabeth's leg and its pincers took a chunk out of my new surf shoe.

Grover hovered above the pool in his flying sneakers, trying to pull the net loose, but it wouldn't budge.

Think, I told myself. Think.

The Tunnel of Love entrance was under the net. We could use it as an exit, except that it was blocked by million robot spiders.

"Fifteen, fourteen," the loudspeaker called.

Water, I thought. Where does the ride's water come from?

Then I saw them: huge water pipes behind the mirrors, where the spiders had come from. And up above the net, next to one of the Cupids, a glass-window booth that must be the controller's station.

"Guys!" I yelled. "Get into the booth! Find the 'on' switch!"

"But-" Grover said.

"Do it!" It was a crazy hope, but it was our only chance. The spiders were all over the prow of the boat now. Annabeth was screaming her head off. I had to get us out of there.

Grover, Atlanta, and Ermis were in the controller's booth now, slamming away at the buttons.
"Five, four-"

Grover, Atlanta, and Ermis looked up at me hopelessly, raising their hands and shaking their heads. They were letting me know that they'd pushed every button, but still nothing happened.

I closed my eyes and thought about waves, rushing water, the Mississippi River. I felt a familiar tug in my gut. I tried to imagine that I was dragging the ocean all the way to Denver.

"Two, one, zero!"

Water exploded out of the pipes. It roared into the pool, sweeping away the spiders. I pulled Annabeth into the seat next to me and fastened her seat belt just as the tidal wave slammed into our boat, over the top, whisking the spiders away and dousing us completely, but not capsizing us. The boat turned, lifted in the flood, and spun in circles around the whirlpool.

The water was full of shot-circuiting spiders, some of them smashing against the pool's concrete wall with such force they burst.

Spotlights glared down at us. The Cupid-cams were rolling, live to Olympus.

But I could only concentrate on controlling the boat. I willed it to ride the current, to keep away from the wall. Maybe it was my imagination, but the boat seemed to respond. At least, it didn't break into a million pieces. We spun around one last time, the water level now almost high enough to shred us against metal net. Then the boat's nose turned toward the tunnel and we rocked through into the darkness.

Annabeth and I held tight, both of us screaming as the boat shot curls and hugged corners and took forty-five-degree plunges past pictures of Romeo and Juliet and bunch of other Valentine's Day stuff.

Then we were out of the tunnel, the night air whistling through our hair as the boat barreled straight toward the exit.

If the ride had been in working order, we would've sailed off a ramp between the golden Gates of Love and splashed down safely in the exit pool. But there was a problem. The Gates of Love were chained. Two boats that had been washed out of the tunnel before we were now piled against the barricade-one submerged, the other cracked in half.

"Unfasten your belt," I yelled to Annabeth.

"Are you crazy!"

"Unless you want to get smashed to death." I strapped Ares's shield to my arm. "We're going to have to jump for it." My idea was simple and insane. As the boat struck, we would use its force like a springboard to jump the gate. I'd heard people surviving car crashed that way, getting thrown thirty or forty away from an accident. With luck, we would land in the pool.

Annabeth seemed to understand. She gripped my hand as the gates got closer.

"On my mark," I said.

Atlanta has tutored me in math, I was confident I could do this.

"No! On my mark!"

"What?"

"Simple physics!" She yelled. "Force times the trajectory angle –"

I knew all of this, but we didn't have time to argue back and forth with one another.

"Fine!" I shouted. "On your mark!"

She hesitated… hesitated and passed my jump mark…hesitated…then yelled, "Now!"

Crack!

Annabeth was right. I would have cleared the gate and landed in the pool just fine when I said jump. She got us maximum lift.

Unfortunately, that was more than we needed. Our boat smashed into the pileup and we were thrown into the air, straight over the gates, over the pool, and down toward solid asphalt.

Something grabbed me from behind.

Annabeth yelled. "Ouch!"

Grover!

In midair, he had grabbed me by the shirt, and Annabeth by the arm, and was trying to pull us out of a crash landing, but Annabeth and I had all the momentum.

"You're too heavy!" Grover said. "We're going down!"

We spiraled toward the ground, Grover doing his beast to slow the fall.

We were heading toward Ermis and Atlanta, and a photo-board. Ermis grabbed Atlanta's hand and they ran out of the way. We smashed into a photo-board, Grover's head going straight into the hole where tourist would put there faces, pretending to be Noo-Noo the Friendly Whale. Annabeth and I tumbled to the ground, banged up but alive. Ares's shield was still on my arm.

Once we caught our breath- and Atlanta stopped yelling at Annabeth for not listening and waving Ermis off-, we got Grover out of the photo-board and thanked him for saving out lives. I looked back at the Trill Ride of Love. The water was subsiding. Our boat had been smashed to pieces against the gates.

A hundred yards away, at the entrance pool, the Cupids were still filming. The statues had swiveled to so that their cameras were trained straight on us, the spotlights in our faces.

"Show's over!" I yelled. "Thank-you! Good night!"

The Cupids turned back to their original positions. The lights shut off. The park went quiet and dark again, except for the gentle trickle of water into the Thrill Ride of Love's exit pool. I wondered if Olympus had gone to a commercial break, or if our rating had been any good.

I hated being teased. I hated being tricked. And I had plenty of experience handling bullies who like to do that stuff to me and Atlanta. I hefted the shield on my arm and turned to my sister and friends. "We need to have a little talk with Ares."