Chapter 8 What Happens In Vegas

Percy POV

"I cut its head off," I told Annabeth obviously, gesturing to the severed neck of the robotic dragon. "You're a daughter of Athena I'd hope you'd be able to figure that out."

"Oh shut up!" Annabeth stormed over to me. "That's not what I meant and you know it. I was referring to the whole shadows tying the dragon's head up and pulling it to the floor."

"Oh yeah," I rubbed the back of my head with my left hand. "Honestly, I don't know what that was, it just kinda happened." Annabeth looked at me with narrow eyes.

"Maybe that's what the woman meant by you'll discover new abilities, it was a life or death situation after all," she said after a pause. "But I don't know why that would be one of your powers, shadow manipulation is usually something Hades's children can do."

"I've got no clue," I told her.

"How did you do it? What did it feel like?" she asked me evidently the appearance of a new power of mine had piqued her interest.

"I don't really know," I thought for a second trying to remember how I'd done it, in the heat of the moment it had all happened so quickly. "I was standing in the shadow of the building," I nodded my head towards the shack behind me, "And I felt like something was waiting for me to tell it what to do, I guess, it's hard to explain. Next thing the shadows tied it up," I tried my best to explain the strange phenomenon. "I felt something in my stomach when it happened." Annabeth grabbed my arm and dragged me back into the shadow of the building. She gets bossy when she wants to know something.

"Do you feel it again?" she asked me once we were back in the shadows. Sure enough there was the same feeling as earlier although it felt less intense than before, maybe because I wasn't fighting for my life.

"Yeah, a bit," I replied.

"Good, now try to do it again," she commanded me.

"I don't know how I did it the first time, how am I supposed to do it again?" I had no idea where to start with trying to control the shadows. Annabeth thought for a second before walking slightly away from me.

"Try doing the same thing only wrap them around my leg," she explained.

I focused on the expectant feeling I was getting from the shadows and tried to recreate what I'd done with the dragon. At first nothing happened I just stood there feeling awkward while staring at Annabeth's leg. After what felt like a while -but was probably only thirty seconds or so- of nothing a small tendril of shadows formed and worked its way around Annabeth's calf. Like with the dragon I felt the same strange sinking feeling in my gut only it was much weaker, I assume because the shadow rope was much smaller and Annabeth wasn't struggling against it.

"That's so cool," Grover commented, watching the shadows wrap around Annabeth's leg.

"Weird," Annabeth murmured inspecting the dark restraint around her lower leg. She tried pulling her leg away but the shadows held it still. "I've never seen anything like this." She crouched down and grabbed the shadows which had taken a solid form. "Did it take a lot of energy to do this?"

"Not really, once I figured out what to do it was pretty easy," I told her as she continued inspecting the shadow.

"What about against the dragon? Did it make you feel weak, light headed or anything like that?"

"Nah all I felt was the feeling in my stomach."

"Strange, normally it takes a lot of energy when demigods discover new powers, especially elemental manipulation," she explained to me. "Could you let me go? We can continue to figure out your powers later but we'd probably be best getting the shield back to Ares."

I'd temporarily forgotten the whole reason we'd come to the abandoned amusement park. I thought about releasing Annabeth and the shadows immediately retreated away from her leg. This ability seems like it could be really useful, I thought to myself, I need to practice and see what I can do with it.

The walk back to the diner was uneventful, Annabeth carried Ares's shield as we wandered down the road. Once we got to the diner we saw Are's motorcycle sitting out front with the god waiting for us inside eating a steak.

"So you managed to not get yourself killed," Ares commented as we walked up to his table.

"You knew it was a trap," I said, Ares' presence filling me with rage, partly just because that's what he does and partly because he was a dick. Ares gave us a wicked grin.

"Bet the old cripple wasn't expecting his dragon to be attacking a couple of dumb kids." I took the shield from Annabeth and chucked it towards the smirking god who caught it lazily.

"Here's your stupid shield, you jerk." Annabeth and Grover caught their breath, Ares didn't say anything and just casually spun the shield on his finger like a basketball.

"I'll sweeten our deal from before," he said, waving a hand summoning a large red hiking backpack on the seat opposite him. "A little gift."

"Wow thank you so much lord Ares," my voice dripped with sarcasm. "If there was one thing we didn't have, it was a backpack."

"Mind your tongue punk," the war god told me dangerously. "This is more than just a bag, anything you put in here will feel half the weight when you're carrying it." To be honest that did seem kind of cool but there was no way I was going to tell Ares that.

"Thank you lord Ares," Annabeth said on my behalf.

"It was the least we could do," I said, "I'm sure that dragon would've been a tough fight for you."

"Like I said, watch it punk." Ares' eyes flashed literally from behind his shades. "Obviously I could've dealt with the dragon but I wanted to see what you were made of, you don't stand a chance against Hades if that dragon was too much for you," he said, "Plus it was funny." I fought back the urge to grab the shield and swing for the fences to see how hard I could hit the god.

"I don't think fighting a robot dragon and getting the bolt from Hades will have anything in common," I said, Ares shrugged again.

"Just be glad I told Dad that Hades had it in the first place," he said.

"Wait, that was you?"

"Of course, first rule of warfare, figure out who has the most to gain from your downfall. Anyway, see that truck?" Ares asked nodding his head out of the window, "That's your ride west, straight to L.A with one stop in Vegas." The 'truck' wasn't your average truck, it was one of those armored cars that carry cash and other valuable stuff. On the side it said, Freedom Funds Freightage in big red letters next to a giant flag.

"Lord Ares," Annabeth said respectfully, "How are we supposed to get into an armored truck."

"Don't worry about that," Ares said, snapping his fingers causing the truck's rear door to swing open slightly. "I'd get in there quick before the drivers finish their piss." He said before taking another bite of his steak.

Annabeth and Grover quickly bowed to the god, I just turned and left. We quickly hopped in the back of the truck hoping that no one saw us get in and shut the door which locked automatically behind us. The inside of the truck was plain, with gray metal walls and floor and two large locked crates filled with more cash than I'd ever seen were sitting up near the wall dividing us from the cab. The only light that entered the back of the truck came from a small window above the door, it was maybe an inch tall and eight inches wide which made the back of the truck pretty dark. It wasn't a problem for me but I assumed that Annabeth and Grover were having trouble seeing.

"I guess we're going to be here for a while," Grover muttered dropping his backpack on the floor.

"Shhh," Annabeth responded, "I doubt that wall is very sound proof," she said quietly.

The three of us made ourselves as comfortable as we could on the hard metal floor as we heard the driver start the engine. Once we were on the move we were able to speak slightly louder as the noise of the road and the engine would help drown out our voices.

"I still don't get why Ares would force us to go and get his damn shield," I said before the truck hit a hole in the road which was very uncomfortable for the three of us.

"It was probably just for entertainment," Annabeth said, "The gods have a history of messing with mortals for nothing more than amusement." Grover nodded but I didn't fully buy it, something still seemed off to me but I didn't say anything else, electing to follow the lead of the others and sit in silence.

As the truck continued to bounce along the road we chatted about random things. The topic of conversation ended up on how Annabeth got to camp and how she'd ran away from home before finding Thalia and Luke. Grover -on the verge of tears- explained how he was supposed to bring Thalia to camp only for her to die and be turned into a tree trying to protect Annabeth, Grover and Luke. After Annabeth and I managed to console the satyr that it wasn't his fault before he ended up falling asleep. Annabeth followed suit leaving me alone.

I listened to the engine sound and Grover's snores and decided to play around with my newfound ability. Focusing on the darkness that surrounded us I tried to form yet another tendril of darkness, it didn't take as long as it had done with Annabeth earlier. I continued to play around with the darkness the more I played around with it the easier it seemed to be, it was less like learning and more like something in my subconscious remembering -like riding a bike for the first time in years- as after a little while I found that I could manipulate the shadows into pretty much anything I wanted. This is going to be so cool, I thought to myself. I drifted off to sleep content that I'd finally discovered a cool ability.

In my dream I found myself back at the edge of the giant pit I had been standing next to in my dream a few days ago. The dark cavern I stood in was the same with gray smoky figures drifting in and out of existence. The same cold, evil voice I'd heard before rang up from the pit, only it didn't seem focused on me.

The exchange went well, I see. The voice said. And the boy suspects nothing? Another voice, one I nearly recognized answered from my side.

"Nothing my lord, he's ignorant to everything." I looked over but couldn't see who was speaking.

Good, good. The voice from the pit replied. Deception upon deception.

"Was it really necessary, my lord?" The voice from besides me asked, "I could have brought you it directly."

You? You've already shown your limits and would've failed me, this task is too important to be left to you.

"But my lord-"

Quiet little servant. Soon you shall have the reward you want but in the mean tim- The voice cut itself off. He's here.

"You summoned him, my lord?" the servant asked sounding tense.

No. I could feel the presence from the pit searching for me. He brought himself.

"That's impossible!" The other voice cried out.

For a weakling like you, yes. There's something about him, something that I need to find out desperately. The voice turned to me, I wasn't sure how I could tell the disembodied voice was focused on me but I could. Begone!

With that I woke with a start, panting. I sat up and stretched my stiff limbs and neck, the metal floor of the truck might be able to stop an IED but made for a terrible mattress. Annabeth and Grover were still asleep so I sat in silence as the truck continued on. After a while of sitting by myself the other two woke up and we had a breakfast of pringles and oreos that Annabeth had gotten from the train from St Louis. The back of the truck started to get warm, uncomfortably warm as we began to bake in the morning heat.

"We must be close to Vegas," Annabeth said fanning herself with her baseball cap, she -like Grover and I- was sweating as she leant up against the side of the truck. Sure enough it wasn't long before the van came to a stop and we heard the cab's doors open. "Hide!" Annabeth whispered as she put her magic cap on leaving Grover and I to scramble behind the only cover in the back of the truck, the crates of cash.

"You go get the deposit," we heard a muffled voice say from outside the truck. The door to the back of the truck then swung open flooding us with bright light. I could hear the sounds of music and people so while I couldn't see outside I assumed we'd parked somewhere on the Vegas strip. "Right let's make some space," the voice said as it sounded like he got into the back of the truck.

Knock, knock, knock

"Huh?" the guy said. "Eddie that you?"

Knock, knock

"Eddie cut it out!" the guy in the van called out. It sounded like the guy got out of the truck.

"Run!" Annabeth said from by the door. Grover and I didn't waste any time and sprinted out the door.

"Hey!" The driver yelled from behind us but we didn't look back and continued to run as fast as we can. It probably looked pretty suspicious two teenage guys (Annabeth was still invisible) running out the back of an armored truck with big rucksacks.

"In here!" Grover said running down the entrance to a nearby casino. As I followed him I just had enough time to read the neon sign under a giant pink light up lotus flower, with my dyslexia I wasn't a hundred percent sure what it said but I think it read, Lotus Hotel and Casino.

The entrance to the casino led into a giant games room, the room was so big you could've parked a boeing 747 in it easily. The room was filled with every game you could imagine, slot machines, air hockey, poker tables, skeeball you name it and the casino had it. A giant slide snaked around the room and there was a five story climbing wall up against one wall. A glass elevator ran up probably about forty stories and an indoor bungee jump was set up from a balcony high above. There were virtual reality games and racing simulators blaring noise from giant speakers. Bars and food stands were dotted around the casino. There were no cues for any games, a few people wandered about but most were focused on whatever they were playing.

"Hi! Welcome to the lotus hotel and casino!" An overly cheerful bellhop greeted us. I assumed he was a bellhop as he wore a white button up shirt with a pink vest embroidered with a lotus flower on the chest. "Here's your lotus cards," he handed each of us a green plastic credit card. "It works as your room key, you guys are in room 4001 on the top floor, it also works at the restaurants and on all the games and rides."

"Err but," I started to try and explain that there must've been some sort of mix up, this guy must think we were the kids of some rich guy.

"No worries, the bills taken care of," the guy cut me off basically forcing the card into my hand.

"How much is on here?" I asked, if he was going to force me to take it I wasn't going to complain, we were in desperate need of a little r before we finished the quest.

"What do you mean?" the bellhop asked with knitted eyebrows.

"Like when does it run out of money." The guy just laughed.

"Ah, that's funny man! Anyway if you guys need anything, more bubbles for the hot tub, your mini bar refilled or different balls for your bowling alley just ring the front desk." With that the guy walked off leaving us confused.

We took the elevator up to the very top floor and checked out our room. There were three separate bedrooms, a lounge with a huge probably eighty inch TV and leather sofas, a bar stocked with drinks, soda and candy. We even had our own open air pool and hot tub on a balcony with a cabana to shelter from the Vegas sun with yet another bar. The view from the balcony over the strip was pretty amazing, the people wandering about were tiny, lights flashed on the front of each of the huge casinos.

We each took showers (in our private en suites) and I found that the clothes in the closet fitted me perfectly which I found a little strange but ignored and went to raid the bar. After three cokes, a whole thing of Reese's pieces and a snickers I was feeling good as I lay back on one of the giant sofas. Annabeth and Grover came out of their bedrooms each in a fresh change of clothes, while I had been looked after for a night by the strange woman the two of them had been on the road for the entire quest and had both taken extra long showers.

Grover followed my lead and began to rummage through the snacks while Annabeth grabbed the TV remote and began flicking through the channels. I had a nagging feeling that I should talk to them about something, maybe about a dream but I wasn't sure. Whatever it is, it can wait, I thought laying my head back against the cushions. Annabeth finally stopped the TV on the national geographic channel.

"Out of everything there is to watch, you choose this?" I asked her unbelievably.

"What? It's interesting."

Grover hopped over the back of a sofa with his arms full with bags of chips.

"What now?" Annabeth asked. "Sleep?" Grover and I looked at each other grinning, I held up my green lotus card.

"Party time!"

This place was heaven. We bungee jumped several times, raced around a virtual silverstone in F1 cars and found out I suck at bowling. The three of us set new records on the climbing wall, while it was longer than the one at camp it was much easier as you didn't have to worry about getting roasted alive. Grover was the fastest thanks to his natural climbing ability, Annabeth set the second fastest time and I came in third. Feeling chuffed with ourselves we split up after the climbing wall.

I wandered about taking in everything there was on offer -which was nearly anything you could imagine- while sipping a slurpee which strangely was giving me a warm tingly feeling. I saw Annabeth on a virtual city building game which had a giant holographic version of her city. Grover was sat in a giant bean bag holding a controller fishing in a pixelated game called something like Sundew Valley. Both of the games the other two were playing seemed pretty lame to me so I kept walking around the giant casino. I ended up in the more typical casino area and decided to try my hand at blackjack. Neither the dealer or any of the other staff seemed to bat an eyelid at the fact a young teenage boy was gambling so I played a few hands. I turned out to be fairly good at blackjack but got bored and decided to keep exploring. My friends hadn't moved from before, they were still engrossed in their games. As I walked around I noticed that not many people were actually going between games, most of them just sat zoned in on whatever they were playing, never looking up. I looked around trying to find a game to play. Star soldier?… nah… Moto madness?… not right now… Alien ambush?... maybe later. Unable to find something that interested me I sat down at one of the food shacks and ate some pizza which like the slurpee gave me a comforting warm feeling making me feel relaxed.

I continued to look around at the busy casino, there was a wide array of people. There was a guy dressed in flared bell bottom pants and a shirt with a giant collar, there were a couple of girls dressed like Avril Levigne early 2000s era skaters. I saw a couple dressed like they were going to a '90s rave and a guy with a corduroy jacket and aviators on. It was like the casino had a fancy dress policy of different old fashion but I didn't see any signs about it so it was pretty strange to see everyone dressed like that. The pizza was making me drowsy and something was telling me I didn't want to keep thinking, I wanted to go play games but how could I play games and relax when in the next couple days I was going to face the lord of the dead. All the more reason to relax now, one part of me said. Or maybe I should focus on how I'm going to get the master bolt, another part of me fought back. While I was having an internal battle on whether or not to keep enjoying myself the guy in flared pants came up to the bar.

"Groovy place huh," he said to me. Groovy? Who the hell says that?

"Yeah, it's pretty sick," I replied which seemed to confused him.

"Sick?"

"Yeah, like cool or awesome," I tried to explain the common use of the word but the guy didn't seem to get it.

"Whatever, this place is great. What do you think of Elvis' new record? It rocks eh," the guys said to me in a Canadian accent.

"Err what new record? Last I checked he was dead."

"Nah, don't say that, that's not cool bruh," the guy said seriously, "You got bad vibes." The guy walked off leaving me confused.

Something is wrong here, I thought, I'd had a nagging feeling that something was off here but that guy seemed to confirm it. It was like he wasn't just dressed in 60s fashion, more like he actually was from the 60s -or whenever Elvis was from.

"Excuse me, miss," I hurried over to a woman in her early thirties who was wearing an old maybe 40s style dress and hat.

"Yes?" she turned to me.

"How long have you been here?" I asked her, she seemed surprised by my question but I had a theory.

"About a week perhaps," she spoke with a slightly southern accent. "It's a marvelous place isn't it sweetie. To think a place like this is able to exist during the war." I turned away leaving the woman confused. This place is full of old people, I thought, none of them were literally old but they were all from different periods in time. That woman should be dead or in an old folks home, something is definitely wrong. I started walking over to Annabeth who was still playing her city building game to share my concern with her. On my way over to the giant simulated city I heard something over the noise of various games that made me stop walking.

"And Hades would totally beat Zeus in a fight."

I scanned around the casino trying to find whoever was talking about the gods, subconsciously slipping my hand into my pocket around riptide. Whoever was talking seemed to know about the gods and the tension between them. My hand relaxed around riptide when I found who was speaking but I kept it in my pocket as not everything in the Greek world is what it seems. The person talking about the gods was a young boy with olive skin who was dancing around sword fighting the air behind a girl who I assumed was his older sister. The girl -like her brother- had silky black hair running down to her mid back, she was facing a claw machine trying to get a stuffed unicorn toy.

"Urgh!" the girl slammed her fist against the console of the machine as the claw opened up, dropping the toy inches away from the chute. She instantly swiped her lotus card for more credits on the totally not rigged machine.

"Bianca," the boy tugged at the girl's sleeve. "When Kronos ate his kids do you think he swallowed them whole or had to chew them up?"

"Nico, for the last time," the girl said sounding bored, not bothering to look away from the claw machine, "The Greek gods aren't real, no one actually ate anyone."

I smiled to myself as I turned away, it seemed like they were normal mortals with the boy just interested in Greek 'mythology'. I resumed my mission of finding Annabeth and talking to her about whatever weird stuff was going on in this time capsule of a casino.

"Annabeth!" I called out as I approached the blonde head of curls that was still concentrating intently on her simulated city. Annabeth didn't seem to hear me so I called her name a few more times but to no response. I shook her arm.

"What?" she asked looking up annoyed.

"We need to get out of here."

"What are you on about? I've just got my water treatment facility upgraded."

"This place is a trap." I told her trying to look her directly in the eyes but she kept glancing back at her city.

"What are you on about?"

"Remember our quest? Find Zeus' bolt and stop a war between the gods," I said getting slightly annoyed that she wasn't seeming to grasp my urgency. "Something is wrong here, it's a trap."

"A trap?"

"People come here and they never leave, there's people here from the 40s."

"So? Can you imagine a better place?" I grabbed her by the wrist and dragged her away from her simulated eutopia. "Hey!" I dragged her over to a woman in a crop top, leggings and leg warmers who was playing roulette while absentmindedly blowing bubblegum.

"Excuse me," I tapped the woman on the shoulder, still holding Annabeth with my other hand to prevent her from returning to her game.

"Yeah?" The woman didn't look away from the ball.

"What's the date?" I asked her.

"I dunno, like fourth of June or something."

"What year?"

"You having a laugh or something? 1987."

"You get it now?" I asked turning back to Annabeth, the message seemed to be sinking in with her.

"Oh my gods…" she muttered. "How long have we been here?"

"No idea but too long," I replied.

"I'll go get our stuff, you get the goat," she told me, starting to walk towards the elevator.

"Is that a priority?" I asked.

"If we want to get to L.A then yeah!" she called over her shoulder leaving me to go and find Grover. I hope he's not as hard to convince him as Annabeth was.

Grover was still where I'd last seen him -slowly becoming one with the bean bag. He was still playing Sweetdew Valley or whatever and was planting pixelated carrots.

"Grover!" I called out, like Annabeth he didn't pay me any attention. Not wanting to go through all the same stuff as with Annabeth I took a more direct approach and walked around the back of the giant TV and pulled out every wire I could see.

"Hey!" I heard Grover shout from the other side of the TV. "I was playing that!"

"Not anymore." I said grabbing him and pulling him up from the bean bag.

"What's your problem Percy?" He asked me annoyed I'd interrupted his gaming session.

"I'll explain later," I said dragging him away as I spotted Annabeth with the red superlight rucksack over her shoulder.

"Good, you've got him," She said as we met up.

"Yeah, was less effort than with you," I teased. Grover was still protesting wanting to get back to his game. "You were quick."

"I just grabbed the essentials," she explained. "Come on, let's go."

"Go?" Grover asked incredulously. "Why would we go?"

"Cause this is a trap." I said bluntly, dragging him along.

"Are you kids ready for your platinum cards?" asked the bellhop from before.

"We're leaving."

"Such as shame," the guy said sounding genuinely sad. "We've just added a whole new floor for platinum members, new games, bigger rides and better food. All for platinum members." He held out the cards, part of me wanted one but I knew that if I took it I'd never leave here again, I wouldn't return the bolt, the gods would go to war and I'd never figure out the answers to all my questions about my life. Who cares about the gods? And does it matter what's going on with your memory and who the woman is? A little voice in my head said but as soon as it mentioned the woman I seemed to sober up more and pushed the card back towards the bellhop.

"No thanks," I said walking away dragging Grover along with me, he still had his arm outstretched reaching for the card. I was vaguely aware of the bellhop leaning over the reception desk muttering something to the brunette behind the counter but I turned away and focused on trying to wrangle my satyr friend.

We'd only made it around halfway out of the casino's giant foyer when two huge dudes started walking straight towards us. They looked like your stereotypical bouncer/bodyguards, both were above six foot and probably about 250 pounds wearing back suits, shades and earpieces clearly visible thanks to their close cropped hair. I have a feeling that they don't want to ask us if we enjoyed our stay, I thought breaking into as much of a run as I could while still dragging Grover along. I had been so focused on Grover and the two bouncers that I hadn't noticed Annabeth vanish from sight. I tried to direct Grover -who was still trying to wander back into the time trap- away from the suited guys when one of them tripped tumbling to the floor causing his colleague to fall over him.

"RUN!" I heard Annabeth shout from the pile of black suited limbs.

We'd made it out of the casino and started sprinting along the strip before the bouncers had got back to their feet. Once we were out of the casino Grover was a lot less desperate to go back which was good as my shoulder was starting to feel like it would be pulled from its socket if I had to continue to drag him. Once we were half way along the strip we looked back and saw that we weren't being chased. I wonder if we ran that whole way unnecessarily. I thought as we all panted and tried to catch our breath from sprinting in the Vegas heat.

"What's the plan now?" I asked once I had enough breath. Annabeth just walked off and dug a newspaper from a trash can.

"Shit," she cursed, handing the paper to me. I took it careful to avoid the many stains it had. At the top I saw what caused her to curse. The month and year were thankfully the same as when we went into the casino but the date was five days later; meaning that we had to get the bolt in one day.

AN: I hope you enjoyed! I know it was a very canon chapter but things will be less canon and more exciting in the next one. In the mean time please let me know what you thought of the chapter (& story as a whole)!

Cya!