Ring, Ring...
"Hey, Mom? You haven't been answering my calls. Are you okay? I'm on my way to check up."
The message went to voicemail.
Felicia's mother hadn't answered any of her calls all day, even though they had made a pact to call twice everyday - once in the morning, and once in the evening, since she had moved to Brooklyn a year ago.
They hadn't missed a call ever.
"Can you go faster?" She asked the taxi driver who was behind the wheel, just as they entered the Brooklyn-Battery tunnel.
To her luck, she had managed to catch a taxi just before the state announced that all connections to Manhattan would be closed, for some strange reason.
"Can't, ma'am. This is already a bad idea as is."
Felicia sighed, leaning back on her seat and checking her phone for any sign from her mom. Still none.
She had already bribed the driver enough to keep going, even when he had insisted multiple times that it was a bad idea to keep going.
A thousand dollars to get to the end of the tunnel. She had to repeat, so that the driver would keep going. Her gambling money had payed off.
Felicia had been extremely lucky ever since she was a child, and it was sometimes unnerving.
A near death bus accident when she was two.
Won the lottery at six, and again at twelve.
Raised enough money for her Mother's cancer fundraiser at the last hour.
"What can I say, Felicia? It's just in your genes." Her mother had always joked, but Felicia was afraid she might never here her voice again.
"Hey, Ian?" She asked the driver, recollecting his name from a sticker on his bumper.
He did not respond.
"Ian. Sir." She shook his seat.
The man was asleep.
Felicia panicked, grabbing the steering wheel from the backseat and trying to maneuver her way down the tunnel when the shape of a woman stood in the distance, unmoving.
In a panic, Felicia swerved the car to the left, ramming into a wall as she jumped out the door, pulling Ian with her, using him as a landing cushion, to the misfortune of the man, who was unharmed at still asleep.
Dazed by the impact of the crash, Felicia wobbled onto her feet, stumbling over to the woman. "Help.." She muttered, but she was not met with assistance.
The woman hissed, revealing fangs, and then leaped at Felicia, mouth wide open.
Stumbling back, Felicia landed back onto the ground as she saw herself reflected in the fanged woman's eyes, but in a split second, something slammed into Felicia, sending her flying yards back into the tunnel as the monster lunged into the crashed taxi.
Another green thing - a vine, she noticed, slithered down into the car, as moments later, with the vampire-thing still scrambling to get out,
it exploded.
With a shriek, Felicia got back onto her feet, staring at the flames in horror. Everything had been going too fast, and she needed a second to process the events of the past minute, but she did not have a minute.
From the sea of cars in the distance, which for some reason were not moving, a crowd of teenagers in orange shirts sprinted out, chased by an even bigger crowd of more vampire women.
This time, the monsters began to sing, which confused Felicia even more, but in mere seconds, the males of the orange shirted group began to slow down, and walk backwards.
They were going to die.
The girls began to slow down to, but not because they were hypnotised by the vampires' singing. They were trying to stop the boys, and now they were all dead meat.
Felicia knew she couldn't just stand there. She had to do something.
Running to the group, she screamed as loud as she could so that they would notice her, but they could not hear her.
Still dazed by the crash, or perhaps due to clumsiness, I tripped over something, right next to Ian, still unconscious. He really was a heavy sleeper.
Looking back, I noticed the thing I had tripped on was a lighter. Perfect.
Grabbing it, I threw it at the monster women, hoping it would explode, or something of the sort.
It flew at a vampire girl, and over her shoulder.
I puffed in rage, getting back on my feet as the lighter bounced down, under the cars, and
BOOM.
The front row of cars all burst into flames, sending both the monsters, and the teens flying back, lasting long enough for the boys to regain consciousness.
A girl with brown hair sprinted up to me, with a dagger in hand.
"Thank you, dear." She said, but there was a hint of surprise on her face. She brushed it aside, probably for later.
"Take this and use it to take out the Empousa." She signalled towards the vampires, who were now regaining their foot.
The girl turned around quickly, shouting out "Children of Demeter! Now, we show Kronos our might!".
Vines and plants began to spill through cracks in the walls overflowing the tunnel. The Empousa attempted to lure the kids in with their song, but they were too disoriented to try.
The girl turned back to me, as I shook my head to focus myself, running towards the Empousa, and using the dagger to slice through them as they burst into gold dust.
Two of the Empousa broke free from their flowery chains, charging at me as I tried to jump out of the way, but only tripping onto a bed of leaves as the vampire women crashed into each other, wailing in pain.
I regained my footing as more of the teenagers rushed in to help me finish off the Empousa, as the tunnel was now more of a jungle than a tunnel.
Tumbling down in exhaustion, the brown haired girl came back up to me, helping me on to my feet.
"You must be a demigod too." She murmured, as I stared in confusion. I could not be a god.
The girl held out her hand for me to shake, as the other teens grouped up. "Katie Gardner, daughter of Demeter and counsellor of the Demeter cabin at Camp Half-Blood.".
I shook her hand, looking around in confusion. The day's events had all started to sink in now.
"Camp? Gods? Why is everybody asleep?" I asked the girl, and she stifled a small laugh.
"I'll explain soon. Now, just get in the vans. We're heading to the Empire State Building."
I turned around to find a handfull of vans with the name "Delphi's Strawberries" stickered onto the sides. Not knowing where to go, I followed the girl's orders, getting into the van.
On the ride to Empire State, Katie, along with her half-siblings, who I came to now were children of the Goddess of Agriculture, were from a camp made for children of the gods, and that I was one of them.
"You don't seem like a child of the main twelve." She said to herself, as another boy chimed in.
"Maybe she's a minor demigod. Good thing we found her first." He snickered.
Katie quickly shut him down, as the window to the driver's seat rolled down, and a girl spoke through it. "We're here.".
The doors burst open, and my heart immediately dropped.
This horde of monsters was even larger than the last. And we were supposed to kill them all?
Stepping outside, vans that arrived from other parts of the city were there too.
More campers had arrived, but she was the only one without any power.
Holding the dagger Katie gave her, she looked up, ready to fight.
Even though she knew these people for only a few hours, she was ready to risk her life to defend the city from whatever those things were.
Two dark haired boys, supposedly the leaders of another cabin at the camp came up to Katie, both with mischievous grins.
"Percy's up there. Pray to the gods he doesn't die."
One said, half joking.
"He's got a daughter of Zeus and the smartest girl in camp. He'll be fine." said the other.
"Focus, Travis." Katie reminded the two, pointing her blade at the incoming horde.
"Gather the other cabins. Take half, and defend the left. We'll take the rest to the right."
The twins rushed to gather the cabins, and ready for war.
Felicia was handed a spherical object by one of the Hermes campers. Tricksters, Kate had told her.
"Stink bomb." The girl had replied when Felicia had asked about the thing, and was handed a handful more, which were then stuffed in her pockets. She wasn't of any use, without powers, but she could throw the bombs really far - a skill she learnt when rolling dice at the Brooklyn casinos.
Minute's later, the Ares cabin had rallied the campers together for a motivational speech, although Felicia couldn't understand most of it - something about Kronos, and a Percy Jackson. All she knew was to defend the entrance of the Empire State Building, because the Gods were on top of it(?).
A camper in the crowd blew a conch shell as the Apollo campers fired flaming arrows, which slowed down most of the horde, which let of deafening wails from the fallen monsters.
They still kept moving though, and pretty fast.
Most campers were distracted by the flock of birds (Stymphalian Birds, she learnt later), desceding down on the campers, while a Cyclops charged straight at Felicia. She picked up a rock from the ground, aiming for the Cyclops' eye, instead hitting a crumbling building next to it.
To her luck, the rock had just enough force to displace the crumbling structure of the building as the debris rained down on a part of the crowd of monsters, including the cyclops.
Felicia let out a satisfied yell as the camper next to her gave her an annoyed glance.
"Beginner's luck." He muttered under his breath.
Wanting to prove herself, she held up her dagger, looking at him to make sure he was watching, before throwing it straight at a group of giants, missing again.
This time, the dagger instead slashed an oil barrel, which was then hit with some of the Apollo campers' flaming arrows, burning up the street and the giants with him.
"Maybe you're right." She retorted.
The boy muttered again, but she couldn't hear him this time.
Distracted by his muttering, one of the man-eating birds flew straight at him, as Felicia shouted a warning. Trying to throw her second dagger at the bird, she instead tripped over a sword that had been misplaced, pushing both her and the boy onto the floor, avoiding the bird as it crashed down onto the ground.
The pair quickly got off of each other, getting up.
"Great." The boy grumbled, holding up his arm. "You scratched me."
"Would you rather die?"
"I can handle myself." He said as he picked up the sword, stabbing it into the incapacitated bird.
The battle continued on for around an hour longer, as Felicia sampled the use of flaming arrows, bombs, and even exploding dentures created by the Hermes cabin. She had failed most of the time, but luck always seemed to grant her an equal, if not bigger victory.
In the end, almost all the monsters had been slain, and the campers were all waiting for the legendary hero she had heard of.
"They're saying he's making a deal with the gods." A girl next to her whispered.
"Immortality." She heard another murmur.
They stood as the campers waited for the arrival of Percy Jackson, while Katie Gardner took her aside to help tend to the injured campers, along with a few other cabins.
"The gods are probably too busy right now." She assured Felicia. "Your parent will probably claim you as soon as this is done." She added, grabbing a bandage roll to wrap around a young camper's leg.
"Even if I was a 'demigod'". She stopped to make air quotes, "Who's child would I even be?"
"Well," Katie replied, handing her the rest of the bandage roll, and nodding at a camper sitting at the end of the healer's tent. "You could go ask Eli. He's an Athena kid. They're smart."
Looking at Eli, Felicia gulped. It was the 'beginner's luck' boy. "Uh- Are you sure you don't want to-" She mumbled to Katie as the boy glared at her.
"No. I've got to go welcome Percy." She said with a small grin. "You'll do well." Katie patted Felicia's shoulder before leaving the tent with a wave.
Felicia walked up to the boy, applying antibiotics before unrolling the bandage. "Luck not on your side?" She joked passive aggresively.
"Funny." The boy mumbled once again. "Where's your camp shirt?" He pointed out.
"Oh." Felicia looked down at her outfit. A gold jacket on top of a silver shirt, with a silky green skirt that she had torn pieces off in the battle. She looked like a leprechaun.
"I'm new here. Joined in the middle of the fight." She answered, closing up the bandage.
"But it's none of your business.".
"New, huh? And with that amount of luck.." He thought for a second. "Have you heard of-"
Eli's words were cut off by a loud cheering outside. It seemed the hero had returned.
The boy stood up, putting on his circular glasses. "Guess I'd better welcome the Hero of Olympus." He said, now holding out his hand. "Elias Theodosia." He introduced himself. "Son of Athena."
She didn't shake his hand back. "Felicia. Boone. Felicia Boone." She replied, crossing her arms.
"Boon, huh? Well, you certainly saved me back there." He joked. He seemed to have now been grateful for her 'assistance'.
"Oh, and-" The boy fumbled through the pockets in his jacket, pulling out a feather.
"A trinket from the Stymphalian Bird." He said, handing it to her. "Consider it a lucky charm." He added, before leaving the tent too.
She watched him leave, but was then reminded of her duty to aid the rest of the campers in the tent.
"Back to work." She muttered.
- 7 P.M - Camp Half-Blood -
Felicia sat by the fireplace, along with Elias, who was holding a book under his arm.
"Quite calming, isn't it?"
Felicia didn't reply. She was lost in her thoughts. Earlier that day, after she had finished her job of tending to wounded campers, one of the Hermes kids had returned to the tent to inform the campers still inside.
"He's making sure everybody's being claimed. Even the kids of the minor ones." The girl had said.
This gave Felicia hope, but even now, she had been sitting here, still unclaimed.
Eli noticed her sorrow, immediately chiming in.
"You know, I hadn't been claimed for months. The gods didn't care. My mom didn't care." He looked into the fire.
"Oh, and.." He looked back at her. "I have something to tell-"
Eli was once again interrupted by a loud humming sound, as Felicia began to feel a warm glow above her head. "Huh-?" She looked up.
A glowing cornucopia.
Elias' eyes widened. "I knew it.. Tyche." He said.
"Huh..?" Felicia repeated.
"The goddess of luck." Said a voice from the trees. Katie.
"Come on, you two." She said. "Dinner time."
At the dining hall, Felicia had been seated at the Demeter table. There weren't any tables for the minor gods yet.
Percy Jackson, who had now become a camp legend began his toast, thanking all the demigods, and honoring those who perished in the battle.
"And, one more thing. Up in Olympus, I made a deal with the Gods."
People began to whisper.
"This entire war had been ignited by their ignorance. Let's just say, they weren't the best parents. But from now on, we're changing that. Every camper here will have to live without the knowledge of their heritage no more, and for the campers without a cabin, we will soon have homes for you too."
Felicia heard a few sighs of relief from the Hermes table.
"We're starting with Cabins, for Iris, Nemesis, Hades, Boreas
Katie got up from her seat, smiling at Felicia as she walked towards Percy, whispering something in his ear, as the two glanced at Felicia.
".. and Tyche too! For the rest of you, Annabeth and I will be working hard to ensure you get your cabins too. The list of upcoming cabins are up on the Big House billboard, and enjoy your meal!" He finished as campers cheered and clapped, some even whistling.
Katie walked back to the table as campers chattered, excited, and some nervous.
She could see Elias, who spotted something in Katie's hand, before looking back at Felicia with a warm smile.
Katie walked straight back to Felicia, something shiny in her hands.
"Well, Felicia. I can't thank you enough for your help back at the tunnel, but me and Percy spoke, and I think this is the least we can do."
She held up a badge shaped like a cornucopia.
"Congratulations, Felicia Boone, Demigod, Camper, and now.."
She pinned the badge onto Felicia's chest.
"Camp Counsellor."