1. Thanks to Ana-DaughterofHades who helped me a lot with a prior version of this chapter, though it has changed a lot since then.
2. It's a long one, but I hope you don't mind. I had a lot of ground to cover with Percy introduction plus moving the plot forward and setting some pieces in place.
3. Any error here is mine and not from my reviewer. If you spot anything or have a doubt about the grammar used or plot just PM me, I'm always swift to answer.
4. Enjoy
The whole world turned crazy as soon as Percy woke up; his surroundings were entirely new to him, and they looked like something out of a Disney movie. Everywhere he went there was something he couldn't explain, something that couldn't possibly be real.
As he followed Chiron through camp, Percy was careful to stay away from the centaur's behind. Chiron — that was Mr. Brunner's name now — didn't seem to notice as he gave Percy a staggering explanation of the Greek gods and their role in Western Civilization. Percy felt lost through most of it, wondering if all of it was nothing but a silly dream. Grover's furry legs and a man-bull charging at him in underpants was the stuff silly dreams were made of after all.
It wasn't a dream though. No matter how much Percy would've wanted it to be.
His mother was gone. Squeezed into the nothingness before his very own eyes. That was the truly incredible part; because as much as Percy was willing to accept everything else, he would much rather believe that Nancy Bobofit was secretly a lovely mermaid before admitting that his mother didn't exist in this world anymore.
In a way, focusing on his insane surroundings helped distract Percy to some extent. Even so, Percy still held tight to a painful and undeniable reminder of his mother's fate — a shoe box Grover had given to him containing the Minotaur's Horn.
Camp Half-Blood seemed to have no room for gloom, only bright sunshines and green fields. After the Big House, Chiron took him straight to the strawberry fields since the volleyball courts were in maintenance for some reason. They found satyrs there, some had definitely gotten their hands in one too many BigMacs, yet most were agile and bigger than Grover. As they played their pipes, a few boys and girls in orange T-shirts picked up the strawberries; they were older than Percy and the way they nudged at each other as he passed made him uneasy.
That was where Chiron told him of Mr. D and how he commanded the satyrs in camp.
Considering how Grover had talked of him, the camp director couldn't be anything but a chubby old bully in a boy-scout uniform. Percy could already tell that he wasn't going to like him. He didn't even get to meet the guy, as the supposed Olympian was away at an all-important meeting — at the Empire State Building of all places.
Talk about little known secrets of popular attractions.
Chiron told Percy of Grover's role and failed report, though he didn't dwell on the first mission his friend had, many years ago. As it turned out, Grover was a twenty-eight year old keeper. He claimed to be Percy's protector or whatever, so he took all the blame for what had happened. How did Grover pretend to protect Percy and his mother against a massive bull-monster…? Well, that was well beyond Percy. Maybe Grover's crutches were secretly a deathly pair of nunchucks.
At this point, why not?
"And these are the cabins," Chiron announced later on their tour when they reached a disparate-looking set of buildings spread on an U shape formation.
A peculiar thing Percy noticed was that some of the cabins were packed with kids, while others seemed to be all but abandoned. One of the empty ones caught his attention, it was a low and long building with seashell and coral stuck to its walls. While passing by it, Chiron glimpsed discreetly inside, only to turn away and continue the tour with no word about it.
Percy didn't know what that had been about, but he had a more pressing question to ask.
"So Chiron, what was all the commotion about yesterday?"
The centaur's expression straightened, "Grover told you?"
"Not much, but I heard things. You know, while I was out."
It was the truth. Percy had asked Grover about it earlier, and the satyr had stuttered a scant explanation at him. Mostly, that the turmoil had been real and that it had happened the day before, but he said Chiron should be the one giving explanations.
Chiron better explain things, since Percy's memories from then were blurry at best. Most of what Percy could remember was a girl yelling and voices calling for someone named Luke or Duke. He had vague memories of people shouting about a traitor too.
The troubled look Chiron gave him was impossible to decipher. "We had quite a problem at camp yesterday. We lost a camper."
"You lost a camper? As in missing, right?" Percy wanted to be sure. After all, Chiron had talked about the sword fights and they had passed by the armory already.
At the question, Chiron seemed to turn hard of hearing, his eyes found a distant point that became suddenly interesting for him.
"Yesterday's situation was complicated, and… regrettable," he finally said. "You will be informed about it in time. Soon, it's my hope. Olympus knows that what transpired here isn't precisely a secret. Nevertheless, it might be better to delay bringing you up to full speed in the matter. It could be hard to digest if you haven't had time to let the basics sink in first."
"The basics?"
"Why, the Western Civilization of course! The camp, the gods. All that we're going through just now."
Oh, yeah, the basics.
Percy could understand Chiron not wanting to overwhelm him, but his curiosity had spiked and didn't think another wild discovery would make a difference at this point. He would have insisted on knowing more if it weren't for them stopping abruptly in front of a cabin with walls made of metal. The building was some kind of bunker, with its circular metal door resembling the entrance to a high-guarded vault.
In front of the cabin, there was a boy talking to a black-haired girl, both a few years older than Percy. The boy leaned on a couple of crutches as Grover had done at Yancy. However, judging by the cast signed in multicolored inks that the boy had on the foot, it was almost a given that he was truly injured instead of being some secret mythological creature.
Almost. Percy wouldn't bank on anything at this point.
"Can you excuse me for a moment?" Chiron asked.
After a confused nod from Percy, the centaur strode towards the cabin. Meanwhile, the black-haired girl made a resigned gesture to crutch-boy and came in Percy's direction, exchanging a word or two with Chiron as they crossed paths.
"I'll save you the question. There's no news on Beckendorf yet," she said to Percy, but once she saw that Percy didn't understand who or what was a Beckendorf, her eyes narrowed. "Oh, you're new."
"Err… yeah. My name's Percy," he acknowledged.
Her words hadn't been hostile, still, there was an intimidating edge to her. She was tall enough to look down at him, and probably strong enough to kick his ass. Her skin was tanned and her dark hair rested on a side braid on her right shoulder almost lazily. It was partly because of it that one couldn't miss the stark contrast with her eyes, the light gray in them giving her look an unyielding feel.
There was an intrigued look as she noticed Percy's shoebox, "I didn't know Chiron was giving sneakers away. I only got the usual," she said, grabbing her orange Camp Half-blood T-shirt.
"These aren't sneakers. It's something I earned fighting my way here. My friend Grover got it for me."
The interest in the girl grew, and her look turned even more curious. "You're the one they were talking about the other day then. Aren't you a bit scrawny to be playing rodeo with the Minotaur?" She didn't let Percy answer. "I'm Val. Cabin 6."
When Percy's eyes looked around trying to find which one was cabin 6, Val let out a small laugh, "Boy, you really are new. Good luck with that, especially with how crazy things are now."
"What do you mean?"
"You'll find out. I have a meeting to catch and, between you and me, my siblings can be very annoying when one goes a little off the schedule." After a lazy wave, the girl walked away, "See you around, rodeo-boy."
Val had barely left the cabin area when Chiron returned, the boy with the crutches had already gone inside the metal bunker.
"I see you're starting to get to know the campers. Val wasn't too blunt with you, was she?"
Percy shrugged. "No, it was okay… Ehmn, she mentioned something about a Beckendorf though. I'm not sure what she meant."
The expression on Chiron turned darker, and somewhat sadder as well. "That would be Charles. He suffered an injury recently and is recovering at his cabin right now — that would be the metal one at our backs. No need to worry there, he's not in major danger," the centaur said, and Percy wondered how or why had that happened. "The boy I was talking to just now is Lee Fletcher, — Apollo's cabin counselor. He's looking into Charles' health as we speak and has kindly agreed to get help for us."
"Help?" Percy raised an eyebrow.
"I have a masters' archery class at noon so, unfortunately, I can't finish this informative trip. Lee would do it himself but, as you must've noticed, he's not in his best walking shape."
It didn't take long for a new girl to walk out of the metal cabin. She had dark shoulder-long hair and a long nose. Also, hanging from one of her belt loops, there was a large yo-yo that for some twisted reason had a picture of a dog in a white coat with the label 'Trust me, I'm a Dogtor.'
Once she reached them, the girl presented herself as Kiara Romano, another resident of Apollo's cabin.
"Good, now if you please follow me," said Chiron, "Cabin eleven awaits its new resident."
o0o0o
If there was anything like a quality survey at the end of his tour, Percy was willing to give Kiara top marks.
In the beginning, the girl hadn't been as ready as Val to engage in conversation, but once she warmed up to him, Kiara proved to be a better guide than expected. She was slightly younger than Percy, yet she was more experienced and left little space for doubts with her straight answers.
After the cabin eleven debacle, where Percy had made a fool of himself with the whole undetermined status, Kiara had rescued him and explained the real basics to him. They both agreed that Chiron didn't really put himself in the new kids' shoes when he came up with the structure of his induction talk — which may not be the best way to phrase it at that, as Percy doubted Chiron had ever worn shoes.
"The Western Civilization deal is good and all — it's the foundation for everything, I guess," Kiara had argued, "But it's like the academic side of things, and an awful place to start if you ask me."
Her words couldn't be more true, as it was a small crime that the first phrase said to a new camper wasn't 'Hey, you're here because your father is an immortal god.'
That revelation alone had almost knocked Percy out of his feet, and he was still getting a hold of it as they visited the metal shop. Unlike most of the campers they had passed — who looked more like regular kids in orange T-shirts than demigods — the guys in the metal shop looked downcast as if they couldn't find joy on the shields with cup holders they were working on.
"It's because of Charles Beckendorf, he's their cabin counselor. Hephaestus kids might look tough but they care about their own and, well, everyone likes Charles," Kiara explained, looking worried as well.
Percy nodded absently.
As it turned out, he had no spirit to ask more about Beckendorf or the Luke guy — who the Stoll brothers had mentioned as if by mistake back at eleven. Percy's head kept going mostly over the new truths he found out about himself, and how they changed everything he ever thought he knew about his parents.
How could his father possibly be one of the Olympians? If Percy was really the son of a god, he would've had a breeze of a time in school, right? Sure, Kiara had explained the ADHD and dyslexia part, but still… It made no sense. If his father was really that powerful, why hadn't he helped him? Why hadn't he saved his mom for that matter?
He was supposed to love her.
"I know it's a lot to take in, but you'll find that many here have gone through similar experiences," Kiara said on their way to arts-and-crafts, noticing Percy's mood.
"It's something alright."
They went the long way around the canoeing Lake, as Kiara insisted on steering him clear of a group of big girls in camouflage jackets who had been roaming not far away. She warned him that those girls were trouble and had the habit of hazing the newcomers. Percy got the feeling that even Nancy Bobofit would look small next to them.
"Chiron didn't tell me much about you, so I don't know what to say," Kiara said after a while, peeking at him through the corner of her eyes. She must have noticed Percy straightening, because she hurried to add, "Not that you need to share your story with me if you don't want to. It's just— I know Chiron has a lot on his plate now but he would've been more helpful than I can be."
"Don't worry about it, you've been a top-notch guide so far. But, come to think of it, I feel kind of dumb for all the obvious questions I didn't ask Chiron when he first told me about Mr. D," Percy admitted, scratching his head, "I don't know what I was thinking. It's not like gods would make all of this only because they came up with rad rhymes and needed some strange kids to practice them in sing-alongs."
At that, Kiara let an honest laugh out, "That sounds like one of them at least."
It took a moment to realize who Kiara was talking about, "You mean... Apollo? He's your father, right?"
"The one and only," Kiara responded amused, "My older siblings say he's the kind of father who usually enjoys doing things that embarrass his children, not that I have been subject to it yet," she joked, though looking upwards as she did so.
Percy decided to tell Kiara about his mother. She already knew about the Minotaur which appeared to be public knowledge, the detailed tale would come out eventually too and there was no point in hiding it. After his tale, Kiara gave Percy encouraging words and insisted that he would find dozens of similar stories in camp. People who were alone in the world. Thankfully, she didn't say that things would be better with time.
"I can't really relate to that though. My mother is alive, and lets me know that I'm not meeting her expectations as often as possible," Kiara confided to him, "She's the daughter of a renowned Italian tenor and has a beautiful voice herself. She must have thought that any daughter of hers and the god of music wouldn't turn out to be anything short of a singing wonder. A scrawny girl with a horrible voice who inherited the medical side of Apollo instead was a surprise for sure," she went on, tapping the Dogtor yo-yo on her belt, "Guess life can turn out different to what you expected."
Percy hoped death could turn out to be different and not what one would expect too. Considering Chiron's mention of the Underworld and the discovery of his father's nature, Percy wanted to believe there was still a way to save his mother. To bring her back.
And if there was any, he was going to find it.
o0o0o
Arts and Crafts Center wasn't Percy's favorite place in camp by any means, or an exciting one even. It mostly involved kids weaving or painting. The only highlight ended up being a boy who was doing a killer sculpture of a centaur. The boy captured a realistic expression for the centaur, who had a party hat and was beating the crap out of a harpy with a baseball bat.
After leaving the place, they headed straight for the climbing wall.
The whole thing was crazy. It consisted of opposing walls spraying lava at any climber who wasn't fast enough to reach the top on time. Percy saw a girl already climbing down, descending effortlessly over the nearest wall as if she had just been doing some stretches.
"Cool, isn't it?"
Percy tried shrugging it off casually as if it wasn't a big deal and he climbed lava walls for breakfast. It wasn't easy to hide his dumbstruck reaction though.
"I thought it was imposing as well on my first day," Kiara reassured him.
Imposing didn't seem to cut it.
At the climbing wall, the girl Percy had been following had already jumped down the last few feet to the ground and was meeting a group of fierce-looking kids there. Her friends greeted her casually, almost as if she hadn't just made the lava wall look like a piece of cake. Percy could almost imagine the group betting on who could climb up the thing next using only one hand.
Surprisingly, one of the kids waved at Percy rather enthusiastically from afar. Percy turned back, wondering if the call was meant for someone else — he didn't know many people around after all.
"Hey, rodeo-boy! Nice seeing you around!" the waving girl's voice finally reached Percy.
It was Val, the girl he had met at the cabins.
Percy waved back but didn't go to meet her. The group seemed to be having a pep talk and a tall brown-haired girl was looking at Val's distraction with judgemental eyes. It was hard to tell if Val had noticed that as she continued to distract her peers, elbowing them and pointing at Percy.
Kiara soon walked Percy back to the cabins, pointing out a few curious facts about the Amphitheater as they passed by it. Her tone was excited at times and low-spirited at others.
"Your mother taught you all of this?"
"Yeah, back when she still held hopes I could mend my way," Kiara said, with a quiet huff.
"It must be hard to deal with some of that, but at least you have her around," he said, giving her a pointed look.
Kiara straightened and Percy wondered if he shouldn't have said that. After all, he had just met the girl, "Yeah, I know. Thanks."
A few moments of silence passed before Percy realized that it would be better to change the conversation. "So, you've been here for some time?" he asked.
"Not really. I'm just starting my second year and I don't stay year-round," Kiara admitted, her mood improving at the new topic.
"You're still way ahead of me."
The girl gave Percy an encouraging smile. "Relax. You'll get a hold of it sooner than you think. It's in your blood."
Of that Percy wasn't so sure, still, he wasn't going to balk away from the challenge. At least not without giving it a try. It wasn't like he had any other place to go, and in the few minutes he had been at the lava wall no kid had fallen down to his death so far. That was a positive.
Besides, if they asked me to choose between lava walls and Smelly Gabe, I would be already climbing now.
They were almost near the stream that would lead them back to the Lake when a new voice called for Percy. He was seriously starting to wonder how many people in this weird camp knew him already.
A blond girl was sprinting in their direction and by the time she stopped in front of them it was easy to recognize her. It was pudding-girl.
"So it's true. You're up already?" the girl asked, glimpsing at Kiara as she addressed Percy. "I thought Chiron was going to ask me to give you the tour."
Percy was sure she was the girl he had seen climbing down the lava wall just moments earlier, which proved that she was as athletic as she looked. She was sweating and her cheeks were flushed, however, she didn't appear to be out of breath. The girl was maybe a couple of inches taller than Percy, though she seemed to be around his same age. Her skin was tanned and she was pretty without a doubt, still, her startling gray eyes were daunting and impossible to ignore. Almost like a waiting storm, holding for the right moment to strike.
"Oh, Chiron didn't mention it. Sorry," Kiara apologized.
"It's okay, he had only mentioned it in passing. There was nothing set in stone," the blond girl admitted. "I was just wondering about— Nevermind, your name is Clara, right? Cabin 7?"
"Kiara, and this is Percy Jackson. He was the guy who beat the Minotaur the other day. I take you already knew that, don't you?"
Pudding-girl nodded lazily. "I'm Annabeth," she said before turning her questioning eyes back to Percy, which felt even more piercing than Val's had been. "I was around when you were recovering. You drool when you sleep, you know that, don't you?"
At that, Percy thought as if lightning had struck him and his cheeks turned a deep tone of red. Kiara was using her hand to hide her laugh, though she was doing a very poor job of it.
Before Percy could attempt to come out with an excuse, Annabeth changed the topic casually. "Anyway, I just wanted to ask... Did Chiron say anything about a quest?"
Percy had no idea what she was talking about, but he looked forward to discussing anything else. "A quest? No. Was he supposed to?"
Annabeth sighed in frustration as Kiara glanced at her, intrigued. "I had hoped he would. I know you just arrived but with everything that went on yesterday a quest is needed. Now more than ever."
Yesterday. Percy had almost forgotten about that after discovering his father was a god. Even so, once Annabeth mentioned it, a memory came to him.
"It was you! The girl who was yelling yesterday. I heard you from bed," Percy almost shouted, catching the two girls by surprise. "It was about that Luke guy, wasn't it? Was he the traitor people were shouting about?"
Annabeth's expression soured at once. "It's complicated."
Before he could ask anything about that, an unexpected interruption made them turn in the climbing wall's direction.
"Mum! There you are!" a little black-haired girl yelled as she rushed to Annabeth.
A blond boy came after, he was slightly younger than Percy but still noticeably older than the little girl. "Mum, can I go next on the climbing wall? Aunt Lauren said I needed to ask you first." he said to Annabeth, once he was close enough.
Percy was stunned by the two younger kids. It was a given that they were children of the same god as Annabeth and Val, since the boy's eyes were as gray as them and the little girl was the spitting image of Annabeth. Still, the resemblance was more striking to Annabeth than to Val, and Percy didn't miss the way the kids had addressed her.
"Mom? Are you a mom? How old are you?"
By now Percy wouldn't have been surprised if Annabeth actually was quite older than she appeared to be. After all, Grover was twenty-eight years old. Weirdest things had happened since he left Yancy.
Although, the unexpected thing was the two kids almost jumping after Percy spoke. They stared at him wide-eyed as if they had seen a monster and not a regular kid.
"I'm twelve," Annabeth replied, frowning. Her cheeks were getting even redder. "These are my kids. They just arrived yesterday, from the future."
Okay, now it was official. This was crazy.
"The future? As in Back to the Future?"
Annabeth looked questioningly at Kiara.
"Chiron didn't say much to him. He wanted him to go through the usual stuff first."
With annoyance, Annabeth turned back to Percy. "We don't know how they got here, alright? They just did."
"But, really?"
"Look, Jackson, this is weird even here, but they're telling the truth. Chiron believes them and I do too," Annabeth insisted, crossing her arms over her chest as if daring Percy to put that in doubt.
"Okay, okay," Percy conceded, raising his hands in surrender. Something told him he didn't want to get on Annabeth's bad side. His eyes landed back on the kids, deciding to go with it. "So, hey, I'm Percy. Welcome to the present."
Annabeth rolled her eyes. Her little future daughter giggled instead, finding Percy's words amusing.
The kids introduced themselves as Rio and Sophia, and putting aside the whole time traveling affair, Percy found them to be perfectly normal kids. Sophia even started a casual conversation with him, sharing which were her favorite spots at camp and what had changed since they last were there. As if Percy was some old friend they hadn't seen in a while instead of this rando new kid at camp.
It looked like Annabeth was finding that weird as well.
"The camp is different! I don't know where the rest of the cabins went!" Sophia said enthusiastically.
"Yeah, we couldn't find Uncle Nico's cabin. That one is the coolest!" Rio added, though he gave a wary look at Percy.
"Uncle Nico?" Annabeth asked.
"Err… nevermind," Rio rushed in a hurry.
Percy turned to Kiara and Annabeth, "Someone you know?"
Kiara shook her head, "Doesn't ring a bell."
"Not yet, I gather," Annabeth said.
At that moment, their small group received visitors and the mood went downhill.
"Well, well, what do we have here?" a husky voice echoed.
Kiara almost winced. The big girl she had avoided for them earlier was sauntering toward them. Two other girls were behind her, all big and ugly and mean looking like her, all wearing camo jackets. One had spiky black hair which was painted red only at the tips, the other was dark-skinned and her hair was braided and pulled to the side.
Annabeth sighed heavily, "Clarisse, don't you have anything better to do? Go play with your spear or something."
"Play? At least I know how to use it. It's a shame I cannot say the same thing about everybody here. You rather let the traitors run away."
The frown on Annabeth hardened, "We need all the facts. Things might not be what they seem."
Percy wasn't following. Who were they even talking about?
"Ha! I thought you weren't supposed to be that stupid!"
Before Annabeth could answer, little Sophia came in her defense, "She's not! Mom is the smartest person in the world! Dad says that all the time!"
Clarisse and her friends laughed loudly, "Well, then your daddy is not very bright either."
With Annabeth's hard look and the kids fuming, it wasn't hard to imagine a fight breaking out soon. Kiara even moved his eyes from Annabeth and Clarisse, as if waiting to see who would start it
A handful of kids came by then. A couple Percy recognized from the climbing wall and were most likely Annabeth's siblings, Val was among them. The others had been at the Arts and Crafts when they heard the commotion, the boy who made the sculpture of the centaur going berserk was among them.
"What's going on here?" said an older girl with brown hair and deep gray eyes.
"It's just Clarisse being Clarisse. Nothing I can't handle, Lauren," Annabeth said.
The older girl nodded and stood behind, glaring at the big girls in camo jackets.
Clarisse seemed amused by the new crowd, as if the prospect of having witnesses for her fights was her life fuel, "Hey, Huntington! Has your cabin picked a competent leader yet? Having to deal with little girls who freeze under pressure must suck."
"I'll show you who—" Val muttered. She gave a step forward, but the girl named Lauren stopped her.
"How we manage our cabin is not of your business, Clarisse," Lauren said, putting as much irritation on her voice as possible
Clarisse's friends chuckled loudly.
"We're so going to crash you on Friday if you don't pick a real leader soon," Clarisse warned.
One of her friends, the one with spiky hair, gave Annabeth a mocking smile, "Bet the princess is afraid of using that butter knife of hers, Clarisse."
Annabeth was throwing daggers at them with the look, it was a given that Percy wouldn't want to find himself the target of that it. She might have been trying to keep a hold of herself in front of her kids, but for Percy it was enough. He didn't like bullies, demigods or not.
"Hey, Clarisse, isn't it? Why don't you get lost? Don't you have something to do? I suggest taking a bath, for everyone's sake," he said as loud as he could.
That caught her attention.
"Who's this little runt?"
The audience was in shock by Percy's boldness and Kiara was facepalming already. Percy understood them, he didn't think he could take on these girls, but there was no way he could have stayed silent.
After a heavy sigh, Annabeth did the formalities, "Percy Jackson, this is Clarisse, Daughter of Ares."
Ares. The god of war. Great.
"Is she though? Shouldn't she be bigger and stronger then?" Percy dared, knowing fully well that he might be signing his early sentence.
"Who do you think you are, you punk?!" spiky-hair whined, as the other big girl at Clarisse's side crossed her arms menacingly.
"He's new here. There's no point in him fighting," Kiara said. It had been hard for her to do so, she was sort of shy and didn't look like someone who liked trouble for trouble's sake. "Actually, we have a tour to finish. Come on Percy."
Before Kiara could get to him, Clarisse shouted, "Stop! The runt stays," she commanded, giving Percy a quick look from head to toes, "You mean to tell me this scrawny punk took on the Minotaur? Yeah right, and I'm a satyr. That was a fluke."
"It wasn't!" a voice in the crowd said.
"He took him down with a baseball bat!" the boy who made the sculpture of the centaur yelled.
"Heard he did it with a wedgie," another argued.
It couldn't be said that the campers didn't have imagination.
Clarisse snorted, "Nevermind, I just remembered. We have an initiation ceremony for newbies here, Prissy."
"Percy," he corrected.
"Whatever. I'll show you."
"Clarisse, Chiron doesn't approve of—"
"Stay out of it, Chase."
Annabeth did stay out of it, which was okay with Percy. He was the new kid and had to earn his own rep. Percy handed Kiara his minotaur horn and got ready for a fight he might as well lose. Even so, before he knew it, Sophia ran and stood between him and the big girl.
"Leave him alone!" Sophia yelled, glaring fearlessly.
Annabeth tried to call her back, without much success.
When Clarisse recovered from the surprise, she burst into laughter, the rest of her friends followed. "Oh, Jackson seems like you have someone to stand up for you."
Percy went red in embarrassment.
"Are we doing this or not?" he said as he walked to place himself in front of the little girl.
The crowd was muttering, and it almost sounded as if they were placing bets.
"Here, you can use these," a boy hurried from the crowd and gave Percy a sword and a shield.
Great, a sword fight.
Clarisse laughed loudly, "You kidding me? You really want to do this? Fine for me," she said, and her friends were quick in finding a spear for her.
Annabeth and her siblings turned nastily at the boy who had given Percy the sword and shield.
"What? If he sorts it out here she won't haze him. The last kid got a swirly," the boy argued.
Yeah, now I only need to worry about getting pierced.
The weight of the sword felt off, Percy couldn't seem to balance it properly. Though that obviously took a backseat related to other concerns, like not knowing the heck about sword fighting for instance.
"Relax, it'll go down better that way," Kiara said, not looking relaxed herself. She strapped the shield to his right arm as the impromptu coach. "She won't do any major damage. Just parry about, if she blows off some steam soon enough she won't try to take things too far… Or do you want to forfeit? Nothing wrong with it being the new kid."
"No, let's get this over."
Kiara nodded and let go, staring at him as if he was a dead man walking. Behind her, Annabeth was crossing her arms and looking at things unfold, attentively. Rio was nervous, while Sophia appeared to be yelling some words of encouragement that Percy had no head to pay attention to at the moment.
Percy nodded and walked to Clarisse. It didn't take long to discover that he had fewer chances than he had initially thought.
The spear on Clarisse's hand was like an extension of her arm, she swung it aptly and almost too fast to follow. The first Percy saw was the butt of the spear as it crashed against his cheek, then Clarisse turned it all around and let it fall heavily on his head.
Percy stumbled to his knees, with his head aching as much as his pride and feeling dizzy.
A loud laugh from Clarisse reached him, "I didn't need a spear to handle this wimp, Brianna. You should have brought me a spoon or something," she said to her dark-skinned friend.
"Maybe you should've waited a week for this, to make it more interesting," she answered.
It was a given that Percy was going to get a hard swelling on his face tomorrow. He glimpsed Kiara shaking his head at him from afar, telling him to stay down and call it a day. Sophia meanwhile looked surprised at him falling so quickly, while Rio was the one encouraging him now.
"You can do this!" Rio shouted.
"Pull yourself together, rodeo-boy!" Val's voice echoed from somewhere that was hard to place.
Percy shook his head and stood up.
On Clarisse's second attack, Percy tried to use his shield, a thing he sucked at. He ended up on the floor again. The third time, Clarisse actually used the tip of her spear and cut him on the shoulder.
"Argh!" Percy yelled as he fell backwards, knees deep into the stream that led to the Lake.
"This is your champion? Yeah right, the Minotaur must have stumbled after laughing at him!" Clarisse yelled at the crowd.
Most people were silent, but from the distance Percy was able to hear Annabeth and Clarisse exchanging nasty remarks.
"Like he's Big Three material. You bounce from traitors to weaklings, owl head," she scoffed.
"Shut up, Clarisse. We'll sort this out on Friday," Annabeth answered, keeping her kids from going after Clarisse.
"Let's go. Nothing to do here," Clarisse told her buddies, pushing her spear away.
For some unknown reason, Percy had recovered swiftly after falling on the water. It even felt as if he was stronger now and a mad idea told him he could take on Clarisse.
"Going somewhere? Didn't take you for a coward," Percy shouted, standing up. He grabbed the sword but left the shield on the water.
Clarisse turned back in surprise. The crowd around them had disbelief looks on them as well. Annabeth's hand even went to her forehead as she lowered her head, thinking Percy liked being beaten up or something.
Without wasting another moment, Clarisse picked up her spear and charged at him in excitement. However, things were different this time around, the sword even felt in control in Percy's hand. Once the beefy girl stormed into the water, Percy dodged her with ease, then smacked the pommel of his sword against her nose and the girl stumbled backwards, wailing.
Surprise gasps echoed nearby. Percy paid them no mind, he was in an adrenaline rush.
"So, round three?" Percy asked as he turned ready for her next charge.
Clarisse's nose was bleeding and broken, though she didn't seem to care. She attempted a tackle with a roar, yet Percy spun quickly and landed a hit with the flat of his sword. Then, he kicked her away and Clarisse splashed on the water like a big and out-of-control truck.
"You know, you really were quick about it when I told you to take a bath," Percy said to her. "The gargles will do you good too."
There were cheers as Percy came out of the stream. Clarisse's cronies came after him, but a couple of dodges and hard strikes from the hilt of his sword were enough to easily dispatch them. Kiara's eyebrows had gone upwards, while Annabeth and the Lauren girl seemed taken aback. Meanwhile, Val's whistles and Sophia's loud victory jumps echoed over the noise.
It was an amazing feeling, and annoyingly short-lived.
Clarisse came out of the water with her eyes almost flaming in rage. Percy saw her coming, but for whatever reason he felt as if things had changed now that he had left the stream. He was caught by surprise and the sword in his hand felt wrong all of a sudden. The big girl hit him harder this time, Percy thought he was almost going to lose a tooth as he took the first hit. Before he knew it, Clarisse spun her spear and a gash appeared on his left arm as the tip cut hard. Then he was kicked to the ground.
He tried to stand up, but another hit welcomed him as he tried to.
"It's enough. This is over," Lauren said as she and Val made to end the spectacle.
Annabeth and Kiara hurried there too, but among the chaos and loud mutterings, one voice echoed above them all.
"Daddy!" Sophia shouted as she ran to Percy and clung to his neck. "Are you alright?"
Everyone turned awestruck at her, even Percy himself. Annabeth's jaw fell open.
"Sophie!" Rio scowled his sister with a frown.
The little girl realized her words soon enough, since she frightenedly covered her mouth with both hands, "Oops!" she said.