Chapter 13: Highway to Hades
"Adin, get up were stopped," Sabrina was shaking me to wake me up. I slowly picked myself up from the ground, wiping the drool from my face. I looked toward the back and Glen was trying to see through the door cracks.
"Where are we"?
"Don't know. I think we're at some gas station but definitely not in California," Glen mumbled loudly.
"Obviously we wouldn't be in California. We've only been on the highway for less than a day from Illinois." Sabrina shook her head.
" Well I'm starving, I'm going to find something to eat!" Glen said as he started to untie the rope, unsecuring the trailer doors.
Sabrina put her hand over her stomach. "I could eat something too. I don't think any of us have eaten the whole day". The mention of food made my stomach growl followed by a little pain.
"Same" I replied.
Glen opened up the trailer doors and made sure no one was around to see three teenagers get out of the back of a semi. He jumped out and Sabrina was about to follow before he stopped her.
"What do you think you're doing?" He asked as he put his hand out to stop her.
"What do you mean? I'm hungry too! You can't be the only one who goes to get food and fresh air!".
I couldn't see their faces from where I was from. But I could definitely tell they looked mad. Glen then breathed in and then let his breath out. Something he probably learned to control his anger.
"I know! But if that trucker from before sees you he'll figure something out!" Glen said, whispering.
"He does make a good point," I said.
Sabrina turned around and looked at me. She threw her hands up and headed to the back of the trailer. She plopped down leaning against the wall. Sabrina took her bow out and started to play with the string.
Glen left and I headed over to her. "Sorry, I get grumpy when i'm hungry," She said.
"Me too, growing kids like us need our meals!" I told her and she laughed. "Just because Sabrina Driver can't get spotted doesn't mean you can't go out," I continued saying. She looked at me and tilted her head.
"What do you mean"?
"You helped disguise me, let's disguise you". A light bulb went above her head. I didn't exactly help her like I said I would. She ended up doing all of the work. First she put her hair in a ponytail. Then she took out a shirt to change into. It was an orange Camp Half-Blood shirt, I looked away as she changed of course. Finally out of her backpack she took out a blue medical mask and put it on.
"How do I look!" She said.
I pondered on the question for a second which didn't seem to make Sabrina happy. Then I reached in my bag, I searched around for the perfect thing. My half-siblings packed a bag full of useful items and clothes. After a second I pulled out a red baseball hat with a white nike symbol on it. Sabrina put on the hat with glee. She looked good, even if I couldn't see her iconic smile.
We were cautious coming out of the trailer. We jumped out and I examined our surroundings. It was pitch black but the area was lit up. We were at some type of mega gas station/ truck stop. Right next to the gas station was a 24/7 diner. We were also right next to the highway which had a huge gas station sign nearby.
"CharrCharrs?" Sabrina said.
I was confused, which is nothing new. "Like the guy from Star wars?"
Sabrina looked at me and shook her head. "No, that's Jar Jar. CharrCharrs is the name of the gas station," She said pointing to the sign. It was a dark blue sign with blue writing and a star next to it. We walked toward the gas station and Glen was standing out front tapping his foot.
"Nice disguise," Glen told Sabrina.
"Thanks," She forced out mumbling.
"So, how are we getting food?" I asked.
"Don't know maybe we could steal some food or steal some money from one of these cars?" Glen said as a person walked by hearing us talking about stealing. He looked at us but seemed to ignore us.
"Lets not steal considering we might be around here for a while. If someone calls the cops, we lose our ride to California," I said.
Glen frowned then nodded his head. "Good point. Mhhh maybe Sabrina could use her acting skills to get us some money?"
Sabrina looked shocked. "That's actually a pretty good idea! Adin, you're going to help me too!"
"I can't act"!
"You won't need to, just follow my lead". She took my arm and we went to the other side of the gas station in front. We sat down on a bench and waited for a little bit. Even though it was nighttime, this gas station was busy. After a couple minutes a car pulled up to the pump near us. "Perfect," Sabrina said.
A man stepped out of a Subaru and headed toward inside. Almost on command Sabrina started to fake cry. I looked at her and tears started to come down her face. The man looked at her and headed in. Sabrina continued to cry, I had no clue where to go from this. Then the man came back out with a coke bottle and approached us.
"Is she alright?" He asked.
"Oh yeah, um shes just not feeling great right now..." Sabrina then took the lead.
"I get these awful migraines and we don't have money for Tylenol. It hurts so much!" She whined before continuing her fake crying.
The man gave a sympathetic look. "Here, maybe you can buy a single use packet with this," He pulled out his wallet and handed us a five dollar bill.
"Thank you so much sir! Wait here I'll go get you some tylenol," I said putting on an act. I headed inside the mega gas station but stayed near the entrance. I waited until the man drove away before I headed back out.
" That was awful! I'm surprised that man gave us anything at all!" Sabrina scolded me.
"Sorry, not like I got a script or anything to go off of".
"This time you're going to be the one crying".
"I can't cry on command like that," I countered.
"Just think of something sad, look!" She pointed to an expensive looking RV coming up where the Subaru was.
I quickly tried to think of something sad. My mind immediately thought of the day Sydney left. I tried to confess my feelings to her but that just made me feel embarrassed. I was so upset I went home that day and didn't say anything to my dad. Then the thought of my dad made me think of my mom.
The last day I saw her was in the hospital. My dad took me to her room where she was sleeping. Because of her brain tumor she wasn't just sleeping, she was in a coma. My dad stood next to me with his arm around my shoulder as we stood there staring at her. "Mr. Peterson?" a doctor entered the room.
"Yes?" My dad replied.
"Can I talk to you for a second in the hallway"?
My dad followed him and I took a seat next to my moms hospital bed. The voices were loud in my head like I was still there. My mom was sleeping in a hospital gown and had special socks on her feet.
I put my hand through her hair. Her hair was brown and gorgeous, everyone would talk about how rich her hair was. Everyone would also tell me I had my moms hair. Now I know that I never had my moms beautiful hair.
The door closed and I looked back up and saw my dad entered the room with the doctor. His face and eyes were both red. Before he could say anything my eyes started watering. My ADHD was acting up and the fluorescent lights seemed to get brighter. The hospital equipment seemed to get louder. "Adin…" My dad started to say before I started bawling my eyes out.
"Oh dear, is everything alright?" I heard an old lady's voice say. I snapped out of my memory and realized where I was. Tears were coming down my face and I was sobbing. Out of the RV was an elderly couple with the husband filling up the RV and the wife in front of Sabrina and I.
"Oh yeah he's…" I seemed to have caught Sabrina off guard with my actual crying. I tried to pull myself together for our mission.
"My mom, she's- sob -she's in the hospital and we ran out of gas money," I continued my crying. Sabrina was silent but put her arm around me.
"Oh dear, that's so tragic. Duke honey come here," The old lady waved for her husband to come over. Once he did she explained our 'situation'.
"Oh no, how awful," he said with very little sympathy.
'Isn't it? Give them some money for gas won't you?" She grabbed one of her husband's hands. Through the tears in my eyes I could see the man almost unwillingly take out his wallet.
"Oh no we could never..." Sabrina said.
"We insist dear don't we, dear?" the elderly lady said.
The man grumbled then took out two twenties and handed them to Sabrina. The elderly couple went back to their RV and finished filling it up with gas before taking off. Sabrina continued to pat my back as I finished crying.
"Adin, i'm sorry I didn't think- I didn't mean for you to…"
I wiped off my face and stopped her. "It's ok," I was able to say. "I didn't mean to think of that memory, It just popped up in my head," I told her. We sat there as I continued to calm down. We eventually got up after I was done and found Glen on the side of the building.
"How'd it go?" He asked.
"Forty five bucks!" I said as I flashed him the cash.
"Wow i'm impressed, that's more than I thought you two could get. I kept an eye on our ride. The truck driver had a bed in the semi, he pulled the curtains and I could hear him snore from outside."
"Sounds good, let's go check out the diner," I said.
The diner seemed exactly like what you would think of at 11pm at night. There were a couple other truckers at the breakfast bar section drinking some coffee. A waitress who seemed tired of working. And a greasy looking guy in the kitchen cooking wearing a hair net. Not to mention how dirty the place was.
The waitress came up to us, not caring that there were three teenagers in the middle of nowhere close to midnight. We placed our order. Glen got a barbecue cheeseburger, Sabrina ordered a chicken sandwich with avocado, and I ordered the chicken strips with a side of ranch. We all got fries with our order, not to mention the free refills of soda. After not eating or drinking all day, the food tasted like Heaven or Olympus I guess. And the cherry pepsi was even better than some nectar I've had.
As we were finishing our meal three more people came in. They seemed to be what I can only describe as delinquents. All of them were wearing white wife beaters with stains on it and khaki pants which were sagging. They were talking loudly about their rides and which one was better. Then we caught their attention and they all stared at us with ill-intent.
Luckily our waitress came over and gave us a check. It was only $23 so we paid our bill and left a five dollar tip. On our way out I casually glanced back and saw the three guys still staring at us. The waitress went up to them and they started ordering, no longer keeping an eye on us.
The three of us went into CharrCharrs and started exploring. They had all kinds of different and useful items. There was a clothing section which for some reason had three bins of walking canes. The snack section was enormous which had Glen almost drooling worse than I did. Then Sabrina found the restroom section. There was a sign that had showers probably for the truckers.
Sabrina and I went back to the truck's trailer and grabbed a change of clothes. We argued with Glen about taking a shower and eventually he agreed to. We all went in and the hot water felt amazing, it was probably 3 no 4 days now since I took a shower. It was so nice to feel clean and smell good too. There was only one other person in the mens shower area who was shaving his beard.
By the time I got out of the shower the man was done shaving and cleaned his stuff up. He put everything back into his little bag he had except for a small metal object.
"Excuse me, I think you forgot this," I picked up the metal object and showed it to the former hairy man.
"Oh" He said as he looked at it closer. "Thanks, but that's not mine," the man said as he exited the shower area.
I was confused and decided to look at it closer, it felt familiar. "No wayyyy," I said dumbfounded. Then Glen came out of the shower wiping his body with the towel. I was glad he put his towel around his waist before he came up to me.
"What's up?" He said.
"Look at this!" I showed him the object. "It's the same switch comb that you gave me back in Illinois.
"So?" He asked.
"Well… I kinda threw it away when no one was looking." I said sheepishly.
"Oh, OH!" he said. One 'Oh' for me throwing away a gift he gave me. And one 'OH' for him realizing it returned to me. Across states this small magic object somehow came back into my life. Hey if I didn't need to keep track of it then I guess a magic hair comb could come in handy. It really came in handy right now since my hair was a mess. I pushed down the button and the five thin blades came out. This time I made the mistake of keeping my thumb on the button.
I looked in the mirror combing my hair. Glen was in the background getting dressed. He had just put his pants on when I noticed that the hair comb was changing. Within three seconds of me combing my hair the switch comb started to change. The five thin blades started to merge together toward the top. I stopped and watched the transformation.
Within seconds the comb had transformed into a celestial bronze sword. It was shorter than most other swords I've used, but not by much. On the blade held a swirling design that reminded me of flower stems. The design swirled separately on the left and right side of the front blade. The back of the blade had the same design as well.
I saw Glen watching in the mirror with his mouth open like me. "Bet you're glad I snagged it for you now," Glen laughed and gained a sly smirk. I held down the button again and it reverted back to a switch comb. I looked back at him with a big smile on my face."Thanks dude, I owe you one".
Glen and I picked out snacks and we both got a Big Gulp slurpee with the remainder of our money. We waited for Sabrina to finish showering which seemed to take forever. I was worried those creeps from earlier got to her but she eventually came out. She had new makeup on, she had blush that looked good on her and new eyeliner. We all went back to the truck's trailer. Glen started to retie the doors as I took out my new weapon.
"Check this out!" I told Sabrina who was sitting on a box. I put the comb in some light that was coming in through the crack of the door.
"You're comb?" Sabrina said, recognizing it.
"Yes, but now watch this," I held down the button and it transformed into the celestial bronze sword which also gave us a dim light source.
"Can I see it?" Sabrina asked and I handed it over to her. She seemed to examine it and put it in the light. "Look here. On the hilt it says something in greek." I tried to look at it but it was hard. One because the only light source we had WAS the sword. Two, i'm still trying to learn greek.
"Faith?" I tried to guess what it said.
Sabrina shook her head. "Close, it says FATE."
I swung the sword around gently, illuminating the area. I thought about the name of my new sword Fate. "So, like its fate that the sword returned to me?" I asked Glen and Sabrina.
Sabrina just shrugged. "I guess. Although how it returned to you seems kinda weird. You said that it was near a trucker's shaving kit? How did he end up with it?"
"I don't know, magic? You guys know more about this stuff than I do".
They both gave out a little chuckle. After Glen was done tying the rope on the broken doors he went to his back corner. I honestly thought he was going to go back to sleep even though we slept all day. Instead he decided to do some push ups and sit ups. I thought about asking if I could join him. Instead I decided to snoop around the trailer.
There was nothing noteworthy inside. Just boxes of supplies and ingredients to make alcohol. I hated that smell, it just smelt like something went rotten. Which I guess is how you make alcohol, luckily the inside didn't smell like anything besides the occasional whiff of gasoline.
Sabrina decided to open one of the boxes, inside were equipment that reminded me of chemistry class back at Juliet High. All those letters and formulas, ugh luckily Sydney mostly did that class work. There were chemicals too which I didn't recognize but looked like something out of a sci-fi movie. All of the equipment and chemicals seemed like some out of Breaking Bad. Fortunately, there was purified drinking water in plastic jugs in case we got thirsty.
We ended up sitting around in the trailer for a few hours. Which for three kids with ADHD seemed like an eternity in Hell or in the Underworld. During the time Sabrina and I played around with the brewing equipment. I tried to connect some of them like legos. The daughter of Apollo used some as target practice. Finally, around 2 or 3 o'clock we heard the trucker move around in the front. Then the engines started and finally we were back on the highway.
The ride just like waiting, sucked. There was nothing to do except sit around and talk. The good news is we all had something to talk about, including Glen. We talked about camp life, both the good and the bad. Sabrina shared the story of how right before the second Titan war the Apollo cabin cursed the Ares cabin to rhyme their sentences, even though at the time she was in the Hermes cabin. Glen talked about all the times the Ares kids won at capture the flag. Even though Sabrina whispered in my ear that it was the same amount as the other team.
This unfortunately didn't last forever. By daylight Glen eventually got bored and went to go practice with his swords at the back of the trailer. When he took a break I went up to him and asked to spar with him.
"You want to spar with me?" he asked like I insulted him.
"Yeah, why not? Before we left camp I told you I need you to train me. Not like we have a lot of other things to keep us occupied. Plus I have a new weapon I want to get used to".
"Fair point. First show me your stance".
I readied myself and took out Fate. Glen seemed to inspect me for a moment with his hand on his chin. He then corrected my hand placement and told me to stick my hands out farther. "Good, now swing like this," he said as he took out one of his own swords. He copied my stance identically and quickly slashed at the air diagonally. His brown fluffy hair which was lighter than mine bounced with the movement covering his eyes. Glen's rigid face and muscles bulged as he swung.
"Good now slash at me," He took one of his swords to protect himself and I slashed at it. It clanged but didn't budge that much. "Good force, keep on swinging until you knock my sword against the wall," He positioned himself next to the wall with his sword on the opposite hand. I kept on slashing and slashing. I eventually did hit his sword on the wall a few times. This went on for about an hour before Sabrina got bored of watching and spoke up, getting both of our attention
"Glen, I was thinking…" She said which took me by surprise. She was making progress talking to Glen like an actual human being. "Do you know anything about Eric"?
I saw Glen raise an eyebrow through the glow of my sword. "Who's Eric"?
" Erichthonius, the guy from G-Mart. When we were fighting he said that he was the first human king of Athens. There's not a lot of stories about him but shouldn't he be dead?" Both Glen and I lowered our weapons.
" I- I didn't think about that. I don't know much about him either".
Silence filled the trailer except for the sound of cars and wind on the highway. "Didn't he say he had a patron? Maybe a god revived him or something?" I said.
Sabrina shook her head. "A god reviving someone would upset the balance of things. Too many gods would be upset over it."
Everyone was quiet. It was like we were trying to figure out a timeline or a puzzle. I could tell everyone was thinking the same thing. First Glen said that the mist seemed to 'glitch'. Then we had our run in with Eros trying to stop us, although his reason was more to stop my "Love story". Then we had a run in with an ancient dead king.
I wasn't much help in brainstorming anything. It didn't help when all of us started to hear music which got louder and louder from behind us. It was a song I had heard before. I couldn't remember the name of it, luckily Sabrina chimed in as it sounded like it was right behind the truck.
"Is that Metalica?" She asked.
"I don't know what song it is." Glen said as he went to go check the crack of the door.
"It IS Metallica. More specifically their song "Fuel"." She said confidently nodding her head with a smile.
Glen said something but I couldn't hear him over the music. I went over and peaked my eye out of the crack right below Glen's head. Behind us was a crazy looking modified car with orange and green coloring. Next to it was a guy on an old Harley Davidson motorcycle with flames on the side. I looked into the car and recognized who was driving it.
"Those guys were at the diner!" I shouted so everyone could hear me.
Then the worst part happened. I focused on the vehicles and after what seemed like a 'glitch' they started to change. The two car doors changed into an ancient looking chariot, although it still had the coloring. In front were two metallic looking robot horses. One of them snorted and fire shot out. I looked at the motorcycle, It changed into a horse just like the ones pulling the chariot. This horse however was larger and had exhaust pipes on the side which shot out fire towards the back
I looked back at the people driving. The two in the car started to morph. Both of their arms started to elongate and became thinner. The color of their skin changed to a palish green. The guy on the motorcycle had similar coloring, except this guy shrunk to about three feet.
The monster who was driving the chariot whipped the reins which made both robo-horses speed up hitting the doors of the trailer. Glen and I flew back as the trailer shook and we both landed on Sabrina who quickly pushed us off. I looked toward the doors which were now bashed inward. The passenger monster leaped from the chariot and was now in the trailer with us.