Vibe: Pumped Up Kicks by Foster The People
The Romans barely had any new recruits since the Titanomachy. So when Lupa was summoned to her courtyard by an irate Olympian, she decided to oblige since she had the time.
Irate wasn't really the word because Poseidon was in full war armour, trident at the ready. Her courtyard steamed and was on the verge of being boiled away around him. Her wolves avoided him, scattering away from the wrathful elder god.
"Lord Neptune," Lupa said cooly.
"You know very well that I am not him!" Poseidon growled.
"Ah, of course."
"Do not patronise me! What have you done to Perseus?!"
Lupa observed his towering twenty-foot form. She was not moved. "He and his compatriots have accepted my training, Lord Poseidon. Do you wish to veto them and their primordial patron?"
Poseidon snarled. The air currents shifted and Lupa smelled the seas growing turbulent. The skies grew dark.
"I see that without the king of the skies, you have assumed temporary control over his earthly domain," Lupa merely pointed out.
"Quiet! You will pay for this Lupa! You dare to raise a claw against my bloodline?"
Lupa lost her good mood. "Your bloodline has more than blood in his veins, my Lord. Surely you know this by now! Do not barge into my house and presume to order me! Your son arrived here and verbally accepted my training on the advice of your heir. Surely, Triton has explained how my methods work."
Poseidon scowled. "I will keep a close eye, Lupa!"
"Do as you wish," Lupa said. "But remember. Jackson, Potter, and Dare have given me their word. Do you demand for them to turn their backs on their promise?"
Poseidon's trident crackled with power. The air pressure bent and wavered, threatening to create a sonic boom and destroy the Wolf House.
Lupa glared back at him.
The god's eyes glowed. "Do not test me, wolf. Triton may be in agreement with your training methods, but I will not condone such a blatant murder again."
The wolf goddess regarded him closely. "Very well. The next time they die, it will be during my combat training or the quests I send them on. Is that agreeable?"
Poseidon's tall form shuddered. The earth rocked with him. He held back with the barest hint of control. Lupa waited, cool as a cucumber.
A full minute passed. Finally Poseidon vanished his trident and armour. He transformed into the body of a human, wearing a loud pineapple-printed Hawaiian t-shirt and board shorts.
Lupa wrinkled her snout.
"Fine," Poseidon said, suddenly smiling. "I should warn you, the Earth Goddess has become attached to the Dare girl."
Lupa frowned. "You mean her mother."
"No… I mean the goddess. It seems sharing the same body for the past several years has given our grandmother a familial love for Rachel Dare, as strong as Beatrice has for her."
Poseidon smirked. "So it may not be me who tears apart your precious wolf house with a well-placed earthquake, should you hurt them, Lupa."
She glowered at him.
He added, "Same with Potter. Sally Jackson has a primordial on her side as you yourself mentioned: the night goddess. Yes, she's quite enamoured by both Potter and my son. It's you who've grabbed the short end of the stick, Lupa. You may push them beyond mortal limits, but take care to not render both primordials incensed. If you do, I shall watch your punishment with popcorn."
Lupa watched the smug Olympian vanish back to his underwater kingdom. She sighed. She'd received many a family praying upon her to reconsider their legacies' applications… parents can be so attached to their children. But this took the cake.
"I speak to you, Primordial of the Moon and the night sky," Lupa whispered. "I seek to empower your champions. They will learn through their deaths. Jackson will wake up with better control over his powers. I swear to you."
Lupa wasn't one to cower. But she was no fool to anger Nyx.
Harry apparated with Rachel and Percy outside the gates of Frost mansion.
Scotland was far more frigid than West America and the difference in temperatures startled Rachel for a moment. But she wasn't shivering.
"How cold do you think it is?" Rachel asked as they rushed up the stairs.
"What?" Harry asked, incredulous. He hefted up Percy's dead weight in his arms. "It's December in the north. What d'you think?"
"I don't actually feel that cold," she pointed out.
Harry nodded. "Huh. I think we can withstand extreme temperatures. We should try visiting Siberia and test it out. Or the North Pole."
"We don't have VISAs for that," Rachel said.
"Why would we need VISAs?"
She rolled her eyes.
Rachel opened the door to DJ's room and stopped short, her limbs freezing in place.
Harry crashed into her back, stumbling and nearly dropping Percy's body.
"What the blo—" his voice choked and disappeared.
Nico stood in the middle of DJ's room, with Kimmy cheerfully babbling in his arms. He stared back at them, his face going from surprised to confused to utterly horrified.
"Ba ba ba!" Kimmy greeted them happily.
"What…" Nico whispered. His eyes had gone round at the sight of Harry carrying Percy's unresponsive form quickly piecing things together.
Rachel quickly shielded the body from him. "Nico, look at me."
"Is that… that is! What—I mean…"
"Nico?" Annabeth called from the stairs, just about to come into view.
Rachel inhaled sharply. She shared an 'oh-shit' look with Harry who shoved Percy's body into Rachel's arms and shut the door on her.
Annabeth narrowed her eyes, suspicious of the way Harry had slammed the door.
It didn't help that he still had his hand on the doorknob, pointedly looking at the chandelier.
"You're back," she said in surprise. "What did Lupa say?"
Harry swallowed thickly. "Some pretty important things, yeah. We learned a lot."
Annabeth frowned. "Okay… and you guys are planning to take up her training?"
"Probably not," Harry said, still not looking her in the eye.
She nodded slowly and approached him. "Where's Percy and Rachel?"
"Who?"
Annabeth scowled. Harry was a terrible liar, they all knew that. But she'd never actually seen him this rattled. He'd always been so sure of himself, cocky and confident to the point she wanted to beat him up sometimes.
"They're at camp," he said belatedly.
Annabeth eyed him closely. "So they aren't in DJ's room with Nico and Kimmy, hiding from me?"
"Why on earth would they be hiding from you?" Harry said. "That's crazy talk, Chase."
"Did you just call me crazy?"
"Yes."
Well at least he was sounding more like himself now.
Annabeth marched forward and grabbed the door knob. But it remained stubbornly locked. She rattled the entire door and called out, "Percy? I know you're in there!"
He didn't answer her.
"Hey, Annabeth!" Rachel called from the other side. Her voice was strangely high. "Percy headed off to camp."
Annabeth turned back to Harry. "Why didn't you just say so?"
"Because I didn't know where he'd gone," Harry said. His tone had the same worried quality that echoed from Rachel's.
"She's gonna kill you," Nico's quiet voice reached Annabeth's ears.
"Shut up, she can hear you!" Rachel hissed at him.
Harry sighed.
The door rattled. "Harry, let us out!"
Harry stared, surprised. "It's locked? Um, Alohomora. "
The door clicked open and Nico and Kimmy appeared first, being pushed out by a frantic Rachel.
"Annabeth!" she said in a false cheery voice. "Girl, you are a sight for sore eyes. Let's talk in the backyard!"
The only reason Annabeth agreed was because Rachel practically dragged her down the stairs.
She told her.
Annabeth didn't breathe for a while, eyes focused on the hills in the distance.
Lupa had killed her Seaweed Brain.
That mangy, no-good, Roman bitch!
"My thoughts exactly," Rachel said earnestly. "The moment Percy wakes up, we're gonna let her know that we're turning down the deal."
"Good!" Annabeth spat. "I thought the Romans were diligent about attacking with warning! How could she just… How dare she kill him?! With an arrow to boot?"
Rachel looked confused. "To the neck, actually."
Annabeth stifled a gasp.
"Harry's sure he'll wake up!" Rachel added hurriedly. "It's just a matter of when. It could take a few days."
"Or weeks," Annabeth realised. "Like you."
"Yeah…" Rachel hesitated. "but that was my first death. Since this is Percy's second, it might not take that long. Harry woke up minutes after he died for the second time."
Annabeth nodded. She recalled when Percy had told her about the Third Task in the Triwizard Tourny. The Killing curse had struck him for the second time in his life, taking him out of commission. And yet Harry had woken up in front of everyone and thrown up spectacularly.
"I need to see him," Annabeth mumbled.
"I don't think—"
"Don't even start with me!"
"Trust me, Annabeth," Rachel pleaded. "Just until he looks a little better. Please."
They spend the next few days lying to everyone.
The Greeks accepted Annabeth's excuses reluctantly. Thalia and Clarisse were suspicious but didn't push too much. Bianca and the hunters stayed out of it, but she did give Nico a calculating stare. The Romans shrugged it off. Jason and Reyna were quietly sympathetic. Octavian… seemed to have guessed it, but he said nothing. Chiron also understood something was truly wrong, but he didn't call out on them. Dionysus didn't care.
Sally, by far, was the hardest to convince.
She knew something was off. After two days of not seeing or hearing from Percy, she tried calling Chiron. Rachel panicked and pulled out the landline cord from the wall. Harry threw her mobile phone out the window. Nico stole Kimmy's pacifier and the baby cried finally distracting Sally.
"Would you atleast ask him to call?" Sally asked, annoyed.
Harry remained tight-lipped, nodding. He stared down at his lunch quietly.
"Percy isn't picking up his mirror either," she mentioned.
"Maybe it broke," Nico hedged. "You know Percy. He's pretty clumsy."
Sally stared at him. "Clumsy? Wait, he broke his mirror."
"What Nico means is that," Rachel interjected, trying not to panic. "Percy wouldn't answer if he was in a really important situation. Like back-to-back meetings or rushing off into the ocean to save turtles."
"Right!" Harry nodded.
"Yes, that," Nico added.
Sally pursed her lips. "Uhuh."
Aside from Nico, Annabeth, Harry, and Rachel (and Lupa + Poseidon) the only other person who knew Percy was dead was the baby.
"Awubah!" Kimmy told Rachel seriously.
"Yes," Rachel told her sadly. "I miss him too."
"Guga."
"Will you do me a favour?"
"Awa!"
"Take care of Miss Kitty for me."
Rachel placed the stuffed tiger into Kimmy's crib beside the baby. Kimmy's tiny hand clamped over the toy's nose. She dragged it close and began gumming on its head.
"I suppose it's not nice to give away a gift," Rachel told her. "But this has been getting me down for a while. See, it reminds me of Bolt… do you remember Bolt?"
Kimmy was engrossed in the soft toy, now ignoring Rachel completely.
"Octavian somehow knew about her," Rachel sighed, leaning her arms over the crib's bars. "But I think he also knew that I had a tiger just like this one when I was a kid. I lost it in a lake."
She paused for a moment, recalling the time she'd fallen through the ice. Five-year-old Rachel had wandered on a frozen lake in Finland clutching her beloved tiger. They'd stepped on thin ice that'd cracked right away. Her mother had dragged her out, but the tiger had long since sunk.
Rachel had cried for days.
"You'll take care of this one, Kim?" she asked, peering at the baby.
Kimmy garbled, drooling liberally over her new favourite toy.
They hoped Percy would wake up soon. The wound on his neck healed well enough there was but a pale patchwork of lines. Rachel still found it hard to look at him directly. Nico approached the body, careful to avoid touching him. Rachel figured he would be able to sense the death and the lack of soul underneath his skin.
Harry still didn't let Annabeth into the room. She threatened to tell Sally but he called her bluff. None of them would want to hurt her like that.
Rachel had once taken Harry aside and whispered, "You have the time turner, right?"
Harry shut her down right there. "We can't!"
"But we can go back and stop the arrow—"
"We can't change the past," Harry said firmly. "Trust me on this. I can't think of a single moment when it's safe enough for us to go back and actually start meddling!"
Rachel didn't talk to him for a full day.
Nico hadn't known about their argument and was convinced Lupa had done more than just kill Percy. The goddess had gotten into their heads and twisted something inside them.
Meanwhile, Annabeth dropped by every day now.
Sally was quite sure something was going on. It was now five days since Percy had died.
"You think we can lie to Sally for another week?" Annabeth hissed. Rachel and Nico lounged about on the couch watching them solemly.
"I think I don't want to tell her that her first-born is dead!" Harry snapped.
"She'll be broken up even more if she found out later that we didn't tell her!"
"You know what, be my guest!" Harry threw his hands into the air. "I don't know what to do, alright?! When Rachel died, we could only wait for her. It's the same with Percy!"
Annabeth glowered at him. "I remember when you were dead for weeks, Potter! Things went haywire so fast. We totally missed the bullshit that Tom had been pulling with Percy on puppet strings! That's how bad things had gotten. We can't keep this to ourselves and we can't be divided about this!"
Nico hesitated. "Maybe we should ask Lupa—"
"No!" Annabeth, Harry, and Rachel yelled.
Nico slumped further into the couch. He was in real danger of disappearing into the throw cushion's shadow.
"What we need is to be proactive," Rachel said. "Because we actually have a way to fix this."
Harry stiffened. "Don't—"
"It's just a little golden chain!" Rachel insisted. "We're asking for a solution and it just dropped into our laps. We can do something with it!"
"What chain?" Annabeth asked, alarmed.
"The only one stopping me is you," Rachel said glowering at Harry. "And the only thing stopping you is your own incompetence."
Nico's jaw dropped.
Harry advanced, towering over her. "Say that again."
"You're afraid," Rachel said, staring up at him boldly. "I heard you screaming when Percy fell. Lupa asked you what you're afraid of and you said nothing. Nothing?! She proved you wrong. And now, you're so scared that you won't touch that moment for fear it will turn out worse?"
Harry's eyes burned into hers. Rachel gave back as good as she got.
"But you're willing to risk it?" Harry whispered, shaking all over.
Annabeth and Nico watched the confrontation wide-eyed.
"If we sit down and talk it over, we'll get the answer," Rachel insisted.
"Life's not so simple!" Harry snarled.
"This is death. And it is simple!"
"We'll get stuck in a paradox if we change anything!" Harry shouted.
"You don't know that!" Rachel screamed.
The doorbell rang.
Harry and Rachel flinched. Annabeth jumped and Nico almost collapsed.
They never received many visitors here at Frost. The last time someone had dropped by, Rachel had nearly gotten arrested.
Harry stomped over to the front door and yelled, "Who is it?"
"It's me, Hermione Granger! Let me in, it's freezing!"
Rachel gasped. Hermione? Had the universe heard her complaints of the time turner and sent the very person who'd time-travelled hundreds of times successfully without setting off paradoxes?
Harry grabbed the door handle and called out, "Answer this. How many trolls did Ron and I kill in our first year?"
"Zero! You stuck your wand up its nose and Ron knocked it out with its club."
Harry yanked the door open and everyone stared at Hermione standing on the doorstep, wrapped up in two layers of winter jackets.
"It's one of the better ways to make friends," Harry agreed as Hermione launched at him with a fierce hug.
Hermione had barely gotten to say hello to Annabeth and Nico before Rachel dragged her and Harry to the kitchen.
"What d'you think they were talking about?" Nico mused to Annabeth. "Golden chains and paradoxes?"
Annabeth said nothing. He turned around and blanched when he realised he was alone in the hall.
He heard the doors to the back porch creak open.
Nico cursed and dropped into the couch's shadow, reappearing in the yard below DJ's room. Annabeth was scaling the wall, finding handholds along the window frames.
"Annabeth!"
"I need to see him," she said fiercely. "We can't just hide him from everyone forever!"
Annabeth reached DJ's window. The heavy curtains blocked her view. She slammed her elbow into the window and cracked the glass.
"Annabeth!" Nico called again. "The reason we don't want Sally to know about Percy, much less see him like that, is because it'll hurt her! And we know it's not permanent, so please… just let him wake up and come back to you."
She didn't listen. She broke through the window and reached inside and unclasped the window lock.
"Percy wouldn't want you seeing him like that!" Nico yelled.
Annabeth stopped.
"If it was the other way around, would you want him seeing you dead?" Nico demanded.
Annabeth didn't answer. Warm air from the room greeted her. The curtains were the last obstacle. They fluttered in the brisk breeze.
"He's not a demigod anymore," Annabeth whispered. "And he's certainly not mortal. Death is a short break for him. It doesn't mean the same thing for him the way it does for us."
She looked down at Nico, standing a dozen feet below her. "I guess that's why you didn't feel him die."
Nico stared. Annabeth climbed into the room.
"Percy basically got knocked out," she decided. "He's just unconscious in an immortal sense. I don't want him waking up alone."
She pushed the curtains aside and hopped into the room disappearing from Nico's sight.
He stood out in the falling snow. Times like this really reminded him how much he missed DJ. He used to like complaining about everything to him.
Nico sighed. "You believe this, DJ?"
A clump of snow fell on top of Nico's head.
"SPLHHHRR!"
He spluttered, brushing the cold wetness out of his hair and face. His heart thudded. For a second, he wondered if DJ had thrown a snowball at him!
Nico looked up at the wall. Nobody was there of course.
But Nico didn't feel so alone anymore.
He shadow-travelled into the room.
Percy was utterly still, lying in DJ's bed. He was atop the covers. Harry hadn't covered him in a sheet, which Nico was now thankful for. Annabeth was kneeling on the floor, beside Percy's head. She stared at him quietly. Her expression was raw and full of hurt.
The good thing was Percy wasn't waxy. His pallor was decent all things considered. But he didn't breathe or twitch. And if Nico concentrated enough, he could tell there was no pulse.
Nico sat on the floor beside her. He saw Annabeth's hand on the bed beside Percy's curled fingers. But she hadn't moved to touch him.
He reached out and graced Percy's knuckles with the tips of his fingers.
A wave of cold numbness washed over him. Nico shuddered. It wasn't as strong as true death, thankfully. This was just a taste of Thanatos's realm. He'd only ever felt this with Harry and Rachel.
Annabeth watched him, worried. Nico took her hand and tucked it into Percy's slack palm.
Nico said, "I didn't want you waiting for him alone."
Annabeth smiled. She brought Nico's hand back wrapping his digits in between hers and Percy's palms.
They sat in the quiet till Nico asked, "Did you brush snow off the window?"
She stared curiously. "No."
Maybe it was DJ who'd answered Nico?
Annabeth sucked in a breath. She smacked Nico's shoulder. "Is that supposed to happen?!"
Nico sat up, unable to believe it.
Percy's bracelet was glowing through his sleeve. His veins lit up in dangerous blue, but it didn't burn or hurt them.
Nico felt his limp hand grow warmer.
"You died again!" Hermione scolded Harry. She smacked him with a rolled-up newspaper that she'd bought from Paris that held news of his latest death via a muggle gun.
"Ron was saying something ridiculous about the Aurors killing you and arresting everyone else!" Hermione continued.
Harry reassured her, "Petunia killed me. But the Aurors arrested everyone except her."
Rachel rolled her eyes as Hermione began berating that no, Harry, that is not actually comforting!
"We have a question for you," Rachel interrupted her scolding.
Harry blurted, "Let's not just say things that we can't take back later!"
Rachel groaned. "Fine! Hermione, I'd like to interview you about your third year."
Hermione frowned. "Okay?"
"Namely the time turner."
The witch dropped her newspaper on the kitchen island with a sigh. "Oh."
"Yeah!" Rachel said excitedly. "I just wanted to know—"
"Let me stop you right there," Hermione warned. "Harry shouldn't have told you about it. But he did so I'll give you the first warning now. You cannot go back into the past and change things that already happened."
Rachel stared in disbelief. "How d'you know that's what I was gonna ask?!"
"It's what everyone asks about time-travel," Hermione shrugged.
"But Harry and DJ went back to save Sirius and Buckbeak! You also caught Wormtail!"
"Keep it down!" Harry hissed, looking out the kitchen worriedly.
"Sirius was still imprisoned in the tower as far as we knew," Hermione pointed out. "And Buckbeak… that was tricky. But we actually saw it wrong the first time around."
"Wrong?"
"We were standing too far away," Hermione explained. "When the executioner swung the axe, it hit a pumpkin. The last we'd seen was Buckbeak sitting, chained up among the pumpkins. We assumed he killed Beaky."
"But… but," Rachel blanched. "You believed he was dead but you went back for him anyway!"
"No, we went back for Sirius," Harry explained. "We only realised we could save Buckbeak when we were already in the loop."
Rachel stared at them. "What loop?"
"Time loop," Hermione said. "Harry and DJ went three hours back into the past. They looped back onto their timeline. So essentially, there were already two versions of them when the situation began."
Rachel groaned. "This is more complicated than Back to the Future. I was actually hoping for Hot Tub Time Machine levels of timey shenanigans. Is there a doctor or an expert on the subject?"
"There was one!" Hermione chirped.
"Who?"
"Not Doctor Who, Harry. He's fictional," Hermione patted his arm. "I'm talking about Professor Odin Caule. He made some major breakthroughs regarding stable time travelling! He holds the record for the longest time loop: twenty nine years!"
Harry exhaled, "He went back and lived for all that time?"
"Yes! I have all his books! It's so fascinating! See, the biggest problem with forming stable loops is that time itself functions around you. Regular people are free to make decisions and the timeline builds based on every choice and action we make. But the traveller has to assimilate to the timeline they have already built the first time. This is because the traveller is essentially a fourth-dimensional being!"
Rachel held out her hands in a stop gesture. "This is Flash levels of complexity."
Hermione grinned. "I'm saying Professor Caule solved the stability issues by figuring out the rules of time travel. He successfully avoided time paradoxes for almost three decades. He avoided his past self the whole time. He didn't let anyone who knew him see two versions of him. He mapped everything down and built the equation for stable long-term travelling. There's a reason why no other country in the world authorises time travel to such an extent. Many governments have even banned it. The risk of being timed out is too great if your time turner doesn't have the stabilising equation."
Rachel made a face. "I take it back. This is Reverse-Flash levels of difficulty! Do you just put 'time' in front of everything?"
Hermione shrugged. "You'll understand when you read Caule's papers. Rule number one is to always have the time turner on you while travelling."
"I thought rule number one was to never meet your past self," Harry interjected.
Hermione folded her arms. "I told you that because I knew you would have wanted to go find your past self to grab Pettigrew when Hagrid handed him to us in his hut."
Harry scowled. "I have some self-control, Hermione!"
"I'll believe that when I see it."
Rachel bit back a laugh at Harry's outraged face. "Alright, alright. Hermione, I need all the books you have on time-travelling."
Hermione shrugged. "Sure. But there's no point if you don't have a turner."
Rachel and Harry nodded after an awkward beat.
"Unless…" Hermione hesitated. "Unless you have some godly enchantment that allows you to travel?"
Harry stared at her wide-eyed. "Nothing like that?"
Hermione scowled at him. "Promise?"
"I promise no god or deity has given us any crazy time-travelling objects. Or abilities."
Rachel blinked. "Eh."
Harry and Hermione tilted their heads at her.
"What's with the eh?"
"Hypothetically, if I'm dead, but I sorta dream about the future and interact with my future self and everyone else… is that time-travelling?"
Hermione's jaw was on the floor.
Harry inhaled. "You mean the wasteland?"
"Kinda," Rachel shrugged. "I know you see Lily and James… like in present time, down in the Underworld—"
"I'm sorry, what?!" Hermione choked.
"... but what d'you think Percy's seeing now?" Rachel finished.
Harry was at a loss for words.
Unfortunately, Hermione wasn't.
"PERCY'S DEAD?!"
Before they could answer her, Nico skidded into the kitchen. He bounced on his feet, ready to catapult into the air with all the energy thrumming in him.
"Good news!" he crowed. "Percy's alive!"
The doorbell rang. Again.
Harry and Rachel were still standing frozen in the kitchen, gawking at Nico.
Hermione blinked. "So… he's not dead?"
"He was," Nico said. "But he just woke up now."
On cue, Annabeth arrived, pulling a confused Percy Jackson behind her.
He was wide-alert, eyes blinking rapidly darting around the room. He focused on Harry first before switching to Rachel. His neck had a pale white scar, barely visible. His grey patch of hair seemed darker. Percy even looked a little taller than Harry now. He was perfectly alright!
Harry gasped, stepping back and stumbling into the counter. Rachel was still frozen.
"You're okay!" Hermione announced, relieved. Then her face fell. "Wait, did Petunia shoot you too?"
Percy blinked. "Um, Annabeth said it was Lupa!"
Hermione mouthed the name, confused.
The doorbell rang again. Everyone ignored it.
Harry disapparated a grand distance of four yards, appearing in front of Percy to bring him into a tight hug. Percy's lower arms flailed in shock. He hooked his chin over Harry's shoulder and gaped at Annabeth like, Are you seeing this?
Rachel couldn't bring herself to say anything. She'd seen the arrow hit him. She'd seen Percy gurgle for air. She'd felt the hot spurt of blood from his neck to her face. She'd heard the death rattle in his throat. She'd never forget these details.
But here he was, standing, talking, and in danger of having his ribs crushed by Harry.
"His bracelet just activated," Annabeth said. Her voice was mellow and soothing, the complete opposite of her frantic self that had terrified everyone in the past few days.
Harry finally pulled back, both arms squeezing Percy's shoulders.
"You do care, bro!" Percy cheered.
"It's not funny!" Harry threatened.
Rachel finally spoke. "What's the last thing you remember?!"
Percy paused, thinking hard. "Er… a girl, I think."
Annabeth leaned back, some of the steel returning to her voice. "Who? Do I know her?"
Percy hesitated. "It was like a dream. I don't actually remember. So maybe she's not that important."
"Uhuh."
"Did you time-travel in your dream?" Hermione asked, amazed.
Percy was even more confused now.
Nico raised his hand. "First thing's first. Percy, you better call your mom. I'm pretty sure she's ready to ground you."
"Why?"
"Because you've been out for five days and nobody outside this house knows about it."
Percy groaned.
The doorbell rang yet again.
Rachel stepped out of the kitchen, but not before hugging Percy tight enough to actually make him grunt in pain.
"Don't ever scare us like that," she warned. He nodded seriously.
"It won't happen because we're going back to Lupa and rescinding the deal," Harry said fiercely. "I'm not training with anyone who we can't trust!"
"Triton will be mad," Percy sighed. "But we'll handle it."
They continued talking about Lupa. Rachel headed for the front door just as the bell rang again.
"Who is it?" she called, annoyed.
There was a pause.
"It's Destin," the bell ringer answered.
Rachel gawked. The voices in the kitchen fell silent.
She opened the door and there he was. Destin stood on the porch, smiling at her. His straw-like brown hair reminded her of Octavian's unkempt mess (totally different from Harry's). Up close, she saw how unevenly chopped and bitten it looked. It slumped over Destin's head, a mess that rivalled Harry's hair on a bad day.
"Hey, Rachel," he said as the cold winter air blew around him, freezing everything except for Destin. "May I come in?"
This has been a light break for everyone. In the next chap, we'll return to the meat of the story! Stay tuned.
Cabba K.