"I have never been gladder to have made a deal." Nico groaned contently as he sipped his Turkish coffee. Percy smirked at him.
"That's why we should make one for the Tiramisu as well." He said nonchalantly. Nico snorted.
"Which recipe are you willing to trade for it?" he asked Percy.
"Nobody said it had to be a dessert so I'll give you the Dakos recipe. From what I remember you ate half the plate." The son of the sea god replied with a raised eyebrow. Nico tapped two fingers on his chin as he thought about what Percy was offering. Such major life decisions couldn't be made in a second after all. Fighting a war, yeah that was easy to decide.
"We have ourselves a deal but I have one condition." Nico said. Percy gestured for him to continue as everybody else looked on in interest. They had been awfully disappointed when Nico and Percy didn't reach a deal before.
"It has to be a blood pact." Nico declared. Percy grinned at that.
"Deal." He said. Everybody else on the big three table grinned and whooped as the deal was finalized but the elder gods' and Jason's eyes widened when both the boys brought out their swords.
"Whoa whoa whoa! This blood pact isn't a fight to death or something is it?" Poseidon asked, holding his hands out to stop Percy and Nico.
"Yeah, I have enough annoying demigods in my realm as it is." Hades said amusedly with raised eyebrows. Percy, Nico and Thalia burst out laughing at everybody's shocked and concerned expressions.
"Relax. Its not a fight to death. We aren't Fremen." Percy chuckled.
"Who now?" Poseidon asked.
"Desert people from a movie called Dune." Zeus answered. All the demigods looked at him in shock. Zeus shrugged.
"You do realize that I am younger than these two? I understand pop culture more than you think." The sky god said amusedly.
"Damm, is our dad cool?" Thalia whispered to Jason who looked just as bewildered and Zeus snorted in amusement.
"I heard that." He said. Thalia grinned sheepishly. Percy and Nico then looked at each other and slightly pressed the tips of their index finger to the points of their blades and drew a drop of blood. Both of them then proceeded to do a hand shake but only with their index fingers.
"I feel like I'm watching some cult perform a ritual." Jason whispered and the elder gods, Amphitrite and Persephone nodded in agreement. Thalia snickered.
"The pact has been sealed." Percy declared.
"I bear witness." Thalia nodded. Nico and Percy then had a stare down for a few seconds and nodded in unison and wiped their fingers on their pants. They then grinned at everybody else.
"I have a feeling I would have preferred a fight after what I just saw." Hades said dryly. Percy and Nico grinned sheepishly.
"So, what's up?" Nico asked as he poured his second cup of coffee. Persephone raised an eyebrow at that.
"One wasn't enough?" she asked. Nico shook his head and so did Hades.
"Never." They said in unison and high fived.
"I'm planning on finishing Hunger games today. I really want to be done with the books by mine and Annabeth's anniversary. We have a no-gift policy this year but we're still planning our own dates. I'm taking her to one and she's planning one for me." Percy grinned.
"Ooh that sounds interesting." Jason said with a vigorous nod. "I was planning a date for Piper and me as well." He said.
"How's that going?" Nico asked, leaning behind Percy to see Jason.
"Figuring out some technicalities but otherwise I'm done." Jason said happily.
"What'd you plan?" Percy asked as he ate a chip.
"Yeah, pitch it to us as if you're in a business meeting and we'll be the critics." Nico nodded.
"So basically, Piper isn't one for big gestures. I mean, sure, I know people who might have loved to go on a date to Paris and eat a candlelight dinner near the Eiffel Tower but Piper isn't one of them. But what Piper and I do love is trying out different foods. So I'm taking her out on a food tasting. 10 different cuisines in 2 hours. We gonna taste everything and from every kind of place. From Indian in fine dining to pizza from a café to burgers from a street food vendor." Jason grinned. Percy and Nico nodded sagely as if they were the CEOs of some huge company.
"You started off strong and then it got even better. All in all, I think this is a success." Percy said, rubbing his chin as if there was a beard there. "Mr. Di Angelo?" he said. Nico nodded.
"I am bound to agree with Mr. Jackson here. I think you should definitely go ahead with this." He said. Jason grinned while everybody else chuckled.
"What about you, Perce? What are you planning?" Thalia asked Percy. She knew what Annabeth was planning so she wanted to know what Percy was doing though she wasn't going to tell either one.
"I'm planning on taking her to a bookstore and paying for how many ever books she wants. She always talks about how if somebody would fund it, she would buy all the books that she could." Percy explained.
"Yeah, she's gonna love that." Thalia grinned. Percy nodded happily.
"You think I could steal that idea?" Hades asked amusedly. Percy smirked at him.
"Its copyrighted." He said. Hades groaned playfully.
"Gonna have to come up with something original, my love." Persephone teased and Hades grinned at her. Everybody continued sipping their coffee in silence for a while after that with small conversations in between.
"Percy, do you want to start your training after your birthday or today itself? We won't be reading today anyways anymore." Zeus said as made to get up.
"Why won't be continuing to read?" Poseidon asked in confusion. Zeus shrugged.
"I don't feel like it anymore. And I think everybody wants to spend some time with their families." He said. Poseidon shrugged as that explanation satisfied him.
"I'd love to start today itself." Percy grinned. Zeus nodded.
"Great. Put on a suit and tie and meet me in my quarters in-" Zeus checked his watch "-10 minutes." He said.
"There's a dress code." Nico muttered to Percy.
"Obviously." Percy shrugged. He nodded to Zeus and got up.
"See you guys." He said and snapped his fingers as he mist travelled back to the Poseidon quarters.
"I just got a noseful of sea breeze." Nico complained.
"Is that your best man suit?" Triton raised an eyebrow as Percy walked out after getting ready. Percy nodded.
"Might as well use it. Its not like there's a wedding coming up." He said. Triton shrugged and nodded.
"Make the best of it." He agreed.
Percy was thrilled when he came back to the table after his training right when everybody was putting food in their plates for dinner.
"Ahh, here's the lawyer." Jason hooted. Percy grinned widely as he sat down and grabbed a packet of chips.
"How was your training? You and Zeus aren't going to destroy the world, are you?" Hades teased. Percy stuck his tongue out at Hades, making the god snicker.
"It was actually soo good." Percy grinned. "I won't lie but I have not had teachers that good at school." He said.
"I did not expect that." Nico remarked.
"It was better than I expected." Percy admitted. "In fact, instead of taking 15 days, uncle says that I might done within the week itself." He said happily.
"Wow." Poseidon said in astonishment. "Taking only a week is pretty impressive. I've not seen many that my brother is confident enough about to tell them that they'll be done with their training in 7 days." He said. "Good job, Perce." He smiled at Percy.
Nobody wanted to continue reading the next day and everybody drew up the conclusion that they wanted a longer break rather than small breaks of a few hours as they were taking a lot of those and it was more unproductive than taking a week long break. So they took a break of a good 10 days to just hang out with each other.
Percy finished his training within a week itself. He worked long hours, no doubt. He went to work in the morning when Zeus did and ended his shift only when his uncle did. Once his last day of training was done, Percy went to join everybody else on the beach and whooped when he reached them.
"Guess who just finished their lawyer training?" he grinned and pointed to himself.
"That guy." Jason said, pointing to Percy with a grin and the two high-fived.
"That's brilliant!" Triton smiled at Percy and gave him a side hug.
"He's right. Its beyond impressive to finish the course within a week. I genuinely don't think that Zeus and Apollo have ever trained somebody who was able to finish that fast." Poseidon nodded.
"We haven't." Apollo's voice came from the background and he hugged Percy. "Good job, cousin." He said proudly and Percy's face brightened as he plopped down on the sand next to Amphitrite. Zeus showed up a few moments later and raised an eyebrow at Hades who normally did not come to beaches but Hades pointed miserably to Nico who in turn miserably pointed to Persephone who raised her eyebrow back at her father and Zeus snorted in amusement.
"Percy, here you go." Zeus said, holding out a small envelope. Percy raised his eyebrows as he took it and opened it slowly. Everybody saw Percy's eyes widen and a grin spread over his face as he looked at the contents of the envelope.
"What is it?" Thalia asked, her curiosity getting the better of her. Percy held up a license of practice which Zeus had given to him in the form of a card. Thalia took it and high fived Percy.
"This is the one photo of yours which is actually good." She teased and Percy snickered.
"That's true." He said, his voice slightly shaky.
"What's wrong, brother?" Tyson frowned. Percy took a deep breath and shook his head.
"Nothing's wrong." He said with a smile. "Its just that despite me getting into college and everything, I just really think that some part of me believed that I wouldn't stay alive long enough to see myself graduate from NRU. I think that I just figured that I'd probably be killed by some monster or god or be caught in another prophecy which would finally end with me dying." He admitted shakily.
"Seeing this-" he said holding the card between his index and middle finger "-Seeing this, its like seeing proof of the fact that I actually made it. I mean, my eighteenth birthday's coming up and that's surreal enough as it is but to see that I actually got a license without dying just makes it all feel more real." He said and rubbed his eyes to wipe of the tears that gathered in them.
The demigods nodded in understanding as they knew exactly what Percy was talking about. A child of the big three rarely ever saw 14, let alone, 18 and that too after all the prophecies that he had faced and after going through literal hell. Jason hadn't made it to 18 the first time around. He'd gotten a second chance now but he knew what it felt like to get into college and end up in the middle of another prophecy just a few days after feeling that you'd climbed the mountain and that you'd never have to again.
"Well, you made it, Perce. You did it, brother." Jason smiled and hugged Percy who had the biggest and most genuine smile on his face. Poseidon, Hades and Zeus looked at each other, internally grimacing at all the challenges that their kids had had to face and all three of them had a feeling that they still didn't know half of it.
"So how's this gonna work?" Percy asked Zeus, holding up his card.
"Right." Zeus said and got to explaining. "You're basically going to be approving or rejecting a lot of proposals from other pantheons as well as from the mortal world. Now, we have one or two people from our world at the top in every legal position in USA and a few places in Europe as well and a bit of Asia so we get every single case that comes to each court and we have to analyze each and every one of those. The extremely stupid cases, we can just ask to not take up but the others, we have to analyze each argument and make a decision on whether or not somebody wins the case." Zeus said.
"Aren't their juries for that?" Percy asked in confusion. Zeus raised an eyebrow at Percy.
"We're gods, Percy. Its our job to monitor the juries." He said. Percy looked sheepish.
"Kinda forgot about that bit." He said and Zeus couldn't help but chuckle at that. "So, when do we start?" Percy asked.
"Tomorrow."
"So how was the first day of work?" Annabeth asked, as she approached Percy, gave him a light kiss and pulled a chair to sit next to him.
"Awesome." Percy grinned. Annabeth smiled at his excitement. She was glad that Percy was doing something that he liked and wanted to do for a while. He'd told her the details of what he was supposed to be doing and she couldn't be happier that he was finally getting to help people in the way that he always wanted.
"When are we starting reading again?" Nico asked the elder gods.
"Day after tomorrow." Zeus answered and Nico nodded.
"This has been a relaxing break. It was a much needed one." Annabeth said, stretching her arms.
"Please tell me that you mean it was much needed because of what we have already read and not much needed so that we can brace ourselves for what we are going to read?" Poseidon asked with furrowed eyebrows.
"I feel like you need me to say that its because of what we read." Annabeth said with a small smile but Percy was much blunter especially just to say the words that he did next.
"Brace yourself." Percy said. Triton burst out laughing as he understood where that came from and even Annabeth chuckled. Poseidon stuck his tongue out at Percy.
"Why can't you give just a bit more information?" he complained.
"Exactly." Percy smirked at Poseidon who pouted at him. That only made the situation funnier to Percy who grinned like a Cheshire cat.
Hades snickered at his brother. "Karma." He said. Poseidon flipped him off and Hades flourished a dramatic hand to his chest. "Is this how you treat your elder brother?" he said dramatically.
"Yes." Poseidon said plainly. Nico snorted in amusement at that.
"Traitor." Hades pouted at Nico and Nico snickered and high fived Persephone.
"Hey, Nico. We got to go talk about that thing?" Thalia said, making exaggerated eyebrow movements, trying to get Nico to get up Nico raised his eyebrows amusedly and nodded.
"Yes, its very important." He said and got up and he and Thalia raced off to the Dionysus table, picked up Grover and drove off to gods know where.
"Well, that wasn't weird." Percy said dryly.
The next day onwards, Percy worked as a lawyer with a pretty busy schedule. Hey, it wasn't easy when you were basically one of the lawyers of the whole world and at the end of it, he was pretty happy, feeling like he had actually made an impact and helped some people out there.
However, it was 2 days after getting his license that he pulled his first all-nighter. Seeing as Percy had already drunk a good 4 cups of coffee in the day, he was as far from sleepy as he could be. Everybody else in the Poseidon quarters had already retired for the rest of the night as even they'd had a busy day and were tired by 11pm itself and had gone to sleep by 1am. Percy figured that as everybody was asleep and he was bored, he might as well get some additional work done and save a few more people's lives from getting destroyed due to some insane lawsuits.
Percy went to his room to sit down only to realize that he had left his books in the Zeus quarters from where he had been working in the morning. It wasn't that he hadn't read them but his uncle had always encouraged checking the books whenever he needed to especially at the start. He sighed and mist-travelled to the study of the Zeus quarters (which he had been given access to at any point in the day). He'd expected it to be empty but to his surprise it wasn't.
"Hey uncle." Percy said with slight confusion in his voice. Zeus looked up and nodded in greeting.
"Your books are on the chair. I had to use your table to keep the fresh paperwork on it." Zeus informed, while signing the current paperwork. Percy nodded and walked to the said chair and before he turned around, he took a look at his deck which stacked with the fresh paperwork and then he looked Zeus' table which was also stacked up with paperwork and both the tables were covered. Now, although it was a lot of paperwork, it didn't take too long to finish one file but the amount of paperwork that was there would take a good 10 more hours.
"How long have you been doing this, uncle? You said you had work during lunch and you weren't there during dinner either?" Percy asked with sudden worry. He peeked inside the dustbin near the tables and it was filled with empty coffee boxes and energy drink bottles and his eyebrows shot up to his hairline.
"A couple of hours." Zeus shrugged, not looking up.
"What's a couple? Because this stuff looks enough to last for 2 days." Percy remarked.
"Well, then you know the answer." Zeus told his nephew.
"Hold on." Percy said, keeping his books back on the chair and walking in front of Zeus' table. "Stop." He said and covered the paper that Zeus was signing.
"What?" Zeus asked tiredly, looking up.
"You haven't slept in more than 48 hours and have barely eaten in hourse and while I know that this paperwork probably due tomorrow, I know that this isn't only about finishing it by the deadline. If this is going to take me 10 hours, its going to take you only 5 hours if not less. So I don't know what this is about but I do know that this is not really alright and you need rest because clearly work isn't the only thing bothering you right now." Percy stated.
"Okay, can I get back to this now?" Zeus asked with a raised eyebrow, not wanting to get into this right now.
"No!" Percy said, throwing his hands up in exasperation. "That was the point of my entire monologue!" he said. Zeus just stared at him, waiting for him to get to the point if there was one. Percy sighed in annoyance and pinched the bridge of his nose, feeling the like a mother hen when he said the next words.
"Get up right now or no more coffee." He chided.
"What?" Zeus said in amusement.
"I'm serious. I might not have stolen your lightning bolt but I will steal your coffee and for that matter, I will take it from you in front of you and tell everybody else to not give you any." Percy said. That was an idea that Zeus was not fond of at all and so he got up. This seemed like a hostage situation. He'd get back to work after the break.
"Go sit on the couch." Percy said, pointing to the couch. Zeus raised his eyebrows at him but was genuinely too tired to argue. Percy went to the kitchen and took two eggs and quickly made two omlettes and went to the tv room and put on fuller house as he sat down next to Zeus and gave him the omlettes.
"Thank you." Zeus said gratefully and yet in surprise. The last people who had ever done something like this for him in his family was Demeter and Poseidon but that was millennia ago.
"Don't mention it." Percy waved him off. "Watch this show. Its soo good." He told Zeus.
"I haven't seen this show. Never really had the interest." The elder god mused.
Once the episode was over, Percy was about to change it when he noticed that Zeus was asleep and he raised his eyebrows at that and shook his head. He had no idea whether Zeus was voluntarily not going to sleep or insomnia or both. He got back and quietly walked to the study and sighed as he saw the paperwork. He cracked his knuckles and did a neck exercise, grabbed a pen and sat down at the table and started on the first file. This was going to be a looong night. Luckily, he'd already had 4 cups of coffee.
Zeus, surprisingly woke up at a good 10 am next morning and he almost choked on the water that he was drinking when he saw all the paperwork done and stacked in an ordered way. He ran a hand through his hair and walked over to the table and saw a sticky note on top of one of the piles.
'Its all sorted and proofread and proofread again. And yes, I quadruple checked it. Take it easy, uncle. I gotcha.'
Zeus couldn't help but smile at that. His nephew really had been a lifesaver. Zeus hadn't slept in more than 48 hours and hadn't eaten before the omlettes last night. He hadn't talked to Hera and when he had, they'd had an argument and while it wasn't a major argument, it'd still felt like that after so long or at least, it'd hurt like that. He'd thrown himself into work after that and the rest of it had been a blur. Fates, it hurt how much he loved her.
Zeus got ready and went to breakfast and his kids and his nephews and nieces were slowly trickling in and he plopped down on a chair next to Poseidon who nodded his greeting which Zeus reciprocated.
"Oh hey, morning guys." Percy grinned as he came in.
"Sleeping beauty has woken up." Nico announced.
"Hey, at least I'm a beauty." Percy smirked at him. He grabbed a cookie box and sat down next to Nico.
"You're gonna start with cookies?" Triton asked. Percy nodded.
"Its always the best to start with dessert." He said sagely.
"I'm sure Will would agree." Nico said dryly. Everybody snickered.
"Annabeth and I follow the same rule when it comes to this." Percy said. "Can't beat the girlfriend logic." He shrugged and munched on the cookie.
"Yeah, I'm sure that it was her logic before." Thalia snorted.
"Oh well."
"Percy, a word?" Zeus asked and Percy nodded and got up.
"12 hours of sleep. I'd say that's good." Percy said amusedly and Zeus chuckled.
"Thanks a ton." He said to Percy.
"I told you. Don't mention it. Take it easy and process everything. Don't worry about work. Apollo and I are there anyways." The son of the sea god grinned.
"Yeah, well, I guess I got to reap the benefits of having 2 other lawyers as well then." Zeus chuckled. Percy snorted in amusement.
"Exactly." He said. Zeus snickered and clapped Percy on the shoulder.
"Guess I'm going to be giving you a lot more paperwork to handle now." He said.
"Sounds fun." Percy said with a dramatic sigh.
"We're going to be getting back to reading today." Zeus announced once the two returned to the table.
"Oh joy." Nico said grumpily.
"What's with him?" Thalia raised an eyebrow at Hades who looked equally grumpy.
"Both of them haven't had their 2nd cup of coffee today because of having a good 6 yesterday." Persephone shook her head in amusement.
"How the hell are they able to sit after drinking 6 cups of coffee?" Jason shook his head in wonder.
"Coffee equates to water in their systems." Poseidon joked.
"Exactly. That's why 8-10 cups of coffee are important for us." Hades retorted. Everybody else burst out laughing and Nico nodded in agreement as the father-son did a no-look high five.
"Using your own tricks against you." Amphitrite grinned Poseidon who chuckled.
"At least they listen and remember." He shrugged.
"That's where half my trauma comes from." Nico told his uncle dryly. "60-70% of your body is made of water." He said, imitating Percy.
"Aww, you remember the percentage." Percy said teasingly.
"Its so nice to see that all that effort pays off." Poseidon continued with a smirk. Hades and Nico looked at each other, nodded and flipped off their respective brothers, making everybody else laugh. Once they were all done with breakfast, Zeus announced the unpausing of the reading and everybody walked to the hall to continue.
"I'll read." Castor said and picked up the book. "Annabeth XX." He announced.
THE NEW CIVIL WAR HAD BEGUN
"No, that's not a stress-inducing way to start the chapter at all." Hermes said sarcastically.
"The annoying thing is that we have absolutely no idea of what happened at all seeing as we were having the mind-split during this time so the only thing that we vaguely remember during that time is when Greeks and Romans were praying so we don't know the details at all. So, this just makes it all the more worse." Poseidon shook his head.
"Yeah, but you knew that the two camps were not on good terms, right?" Dakota asked in confusion.
"We knew that and we knew that some confusion had happened during the peace talks and now the two camps were at odds with each other but we didn't know the details or the sequence of what happened and now that the mind-split is over, we've forgotten most if not all of it anyways. What happens during the mind-split happens during so much confusion that a lot of it is forgotten afterwards." Ares explained. Dakota nodded in understanding.
"That sounds annoying." Pollux remarked. All the gods who had faced the mind-split looked at him miserably.
"You have no idea." Dionysus sighed.
Leo had somehow escaped…who screamed and ran in circles.
Hephaestus and Beckendorf heaved sighs of relief.
Tour guides kept yelling…maybe a Kool Aid freak?
Dakota grinned at Annabeth. "I do find vampires interesting after all." He said. Annabeth snickered at that.
As Annabeth watched…Dakota crumpled.
Dionysus winced in pain as he felt a blow on his head as well and rubbed the back of his head to reduce the pain but it didn't work.
"Yeah, that hurt, by the way." Dakota pouted at Jason but the son of Bacchus didn't seem mad about it. Jason gave him a sheepish look, making Dakota laugh.
"Jason!" Annabeth called…no reinforcements coming
"Why would you think that at a time when you're already in the middle of a fight? Wouldn't that just make it worse?" Lee asked Annabeth in confusion.
"It actually helps. Makes you analyze the surroundings in a different manner than you already are and it also helps in coming up with some solution or the other if you try to put yourself in the place of a soldier who'd already fought here before rather than thinking of it as a first-time experience. Its sort of like role-play. And anyways, right now I'm looking for the map so I'm trying to get into the head of the person who hid it there in the first place especially since some of the union defenders had been children of Athena." Annabeth explained.
"Huh. That's interesting." Lee admitted.
Some of the Union defenders…This couldn't be real.
Athena felt Annabeth's panic bubble up in her chest and she took a deep breath to relax.
"What the hell?" Persephone asked in confusion and surprise. "Why are you seeing spiders?" she asked Annabeth.
"I think it might be explained." Annabeth said. Persephone nodded and gestured for Castor to continue reading.
Terror plunged her into memories…You're scaring your baby brothers.
Most of the people in the room shivered at whatever was going on with the spiders when Annabeth was younger. It already sounded horrifying, imagination or not.
"Was it true?" Percy asked her quietly. Annabeth gave him a subtle nod and his jaw hardened at the thought of the way Annabeth's step-mother paid no attention to Annabeth's fears. Even if it had been her imagination, she was still a little girl at that point of time. He'd used to think that there were monsters under his bead but his mother never ended the topic at saying that it was only his imagination.
The rest of the sea gang had also seen Annabeth's nod seeing as they were sitting next to Percy and even they looked at each other with horrified expressions. If it had been true then what had happened to Annabeth that night?
They're not my brothers…her mouth, and nose
Everybody shuddered this time and even more so when they saw some the spider bites on Athena's face as well due to the curse. The goddess of wisdom had wide eyes and Annabeth looked concerned at that.
"Oh my gods." Rachel whispered.
"That woman was insane." Beckendorf shook his head, unhappily and trying to keep the anger out of his voice.
"I think I might have a few words with her." Apollo said, clenching his fists.
"No no no." Annabeth shook her head "She's great now. And she apologized. Don't worry about it." She said with a small smile. Percy looked at her and squeezed her hand in support and she gave him a smile.
The bites faded before she…ran away from home.
"Yeah, I don't blame you." Chris scoffed and shook his head. "You were 7 and that's not the way that such a young kid should've been treated." He said.
Later, at Camp Half-Blood…"Who—who is the weaver?"
"Sister." Apollo growled as his fears about Arachne were basically confirmed by now. "You knew!" he yelled before Athena could say anything to defend herself.
"Whose the weaver?" Travis whispered to Hermes in confusion and even the other demigods who didn't know who it was looked concerned now while most of the gods looked enraged.
"How could you send her alone to meet her?" Apollo demanded, trying to keep his voice from shaking due to anger.
"Apollo, maybe that's not how it turned out. Lets just wait for it to confirm it." Hermes placated his brother. Apollo glared at him.
"They ended up in Tartarus at the end of it all. Of course, we know how it ended." He said in a furious whisper that only Hermes heard. Hermes winced as he remembered the time when he'd found out that Percy and Annabeth were in Tartarus and even though he didn't know the details of it at all, the events that they were reading about and all this talk of Arachne was making him feel that somehow it was definitely linked. None of the demigods who'd gone looking for the Mark had come back alive and while Annabeth survived, he highly doubted that her quest had ended with anything good either.
"But who is the weaver?" Travis asked again once everybody calmed down a little.
"I think we should just read. There's no point in freaking out right now." Hermes answered and shook his head at Travis' protests. "If its not mentioned in this book, then I'll tell you, son. I promise." He said. Travis sighed but nodded and Castor continued reading as the Seven and Nico exchanged knowing looks.
The spiders became excited…scare her as much as those spiders.
"Good. What doesn't kill you makes you stronger." Thalia encouraged.
"Awfully true in this situation." Annabeth chuckled.
Roman demigods had formed…hand inside the cannon.
"That is so clever." Leo said with wide eyes. "I mean, I wonder if a normal mortal dagger would be able to loosen the plug?" he wondered out loud.
"I highly doubt that. This was hidden by demigods and it was hidden for demigods and dare I say, from some demigods. They're going to have to take some extra measures to ensure its safety." Hephaestus answered.
Her fingers touched something… "You'll need them for the trial."
"I'm actually a little surprised that you didn't believe her the minute that she said it was Gaea's fault, seeing as the whole was her fault." Hermes chuckled at Reyna who gave a small smile.
"I knew that." She said finally
The dogs snarled and inched…the whole mortal world.
"That's good. Where swords don't work, use your words." Ares nodded approvingly.
"Reminds me of Odysseus." Apollo chuckled. Poseidon couldn't help but scowl at the mention of the demigod but Percy on the other hand nodded in agreement.
"His tricks worked for us once before with the whole 'nobody' thing." Percy shrugged. "Clever guy, really. Nico, you think I could meet him?" he asked Nico who shrugged.
"Sure."
"Honestly, your dagger wouldn't have saved your life as much as your words did that day." Reyna told Annabeth who nodded.
"Yeah, I figured." She said.
"Don't you think I know that…"It wasn't me!"
"It won't matter to Octavian." Apollo said grimly and painfully at what the augur had turned out to be like.
"It doesn't matter…raze it and salt the earth."
"Its cute that he thinks he could end CHB. Firstly, we'd be damned before that happens and secondly, he uses only swords but we…well, we have a few tricks up our sleeves." Nico smirked.
"Honestly, I have no idea which camp would've been finished in that battle." Annabeth shook her head.
"I think our order can only work till a certain extent. It's a good idea to not get the Greeks mad." Dakota chuckled.
"Yeah, we prefer Chaos." Percy nodded with a grin.
Kill the Romans, she heard…exactly where to find it
"Yeahh, shouldn't have done that." Lee grimaced and looked at Annabeth who winced.
"Never going to do that again. I'll probably just offer a few tshirts and strawberries as a gift of friendship." She said. Lee chuckled.
"I'd befriend another camp for strawberries." He said. When the Olympians raised their eyebrows at him he shrugged. "That's exactly why I don't deal with all this kind of stuff." He grinned.
She couldn't leave it at the mercy…How can one person fix it?
"If only 1 person can start a war then its not so hard to believe that one person might end it." Ares said to Reyna with a small smile.
Annabeth wished she could give…Slow Octavian down."
"Permanently slow him down." Chris muttered darkly.
Reyna's eyes narrowed…your camp to destruction."
The Greeks all looked at each other with amusement and mischief in their eyes. They found it kind of funny that the Romans thought that they could easily defeat Camp Half Blood especially when they'd already met Percy. They found it even more hilarious that the Romans didn't think that they had a son of Hades and a daughter of Zeus as well and even Jason had fought for the Greeks. Oh, and the Romans hadn't even considered the powers of the other kids there and nor had they considered their military skill. So, all in all, it was a rather amusing thought to them that the Romans underestimated them so much.
"Don't underestimate Camp Half-Blood…ramparts and lightning flashed.
Percy and Jason whooped and did their signature handshake.
"That was so lit." Percy grinned
"Preach, brother." Jason grinned back.
"Would've been so lit if you'd been there too." Percy told Nico who chuckled.
"Yeah, couldn't these guys attack after we rescued you." Jason complained.
"Hey, I'm feeling kinda left out." Thalia protested. Jason, Percy and Nico laughed.
"Yes yes, we missed you too." Percy told her and she pouted at him.
Poseidon, Zeus and Hades looked at each other with small smiles on their faces, all three of them reminiscing the times that they'd fought together and played pranks on their sisters.
"That would have genuinely been so cool to see. We normally only see lightning and the water against each other. Would've been awesome to see it together." Apollo sighed. Percy and Jason grinned at each other and fist bumped.
Giant eagles were knocked…for her ever again.
Reyna grimaced, once more astonished by how perceptive Annabeth and Percy were. She really did not understand how Annabeth had gotten such a good idea of her beliefs and thoughts from just one cordial meeting and one argument. It had literally been the same with Percy as well. Genuinely, not something she was fond of.
Annabeth waited for her…tumbled onto the deck.
Everybody heaved a sigh of relief at that. At least Annabeth had made it onto the ship. They were pretty sure now that Jason and Percy could easily just maneuver the ship to get them out of there.
"Go!" Annabeth screamed…pushed it out to sea.
"Those are some strong winds and a pretty huge wave." Triton remarked. Percy grinned at him and Jason nodded.
"I actually specialize more in controlling winds than I do in lightning. Summoning lightning actually tires me out quite a bit. I can't do it too often. I can summon some pretty strong winds but Thalia's the one who specializes in lightning." He said.
"Yeah, well, the amount of lightning that you summoned seemed sufficient to get you guys out of that mess so I wouldn't worry." Triton smiled.
By the time the Argo II…toward the ancient lands.
"Chapter's done." Castor said, holding up the book.
"Wow. That was a crazy one." Demeter shook her head.
"It only gets crazier." Jason told her.
"That does not make me feel better." Poseidon told him and Jason gave him a sheepish grin.
"I'll read." Clarisse volunteered.