I flopped onto my bed, Kalos ignoring me in favour of his bacon breakfast.
I sat up, staring at him.
"So when do you start helping?" I sighed, staring at the mess of egg and bacon bits on the floor.
Kalos let out a very annoying fox shriek.
"Ugh, Kalos! Don't do that!"
He growled and yipped at a corner in my room.
"So you're gonna be one of those pets, huh?" I grumbled. "There's nothing here, see?" I swung my arms around.
He snarled and chomped down on seemingly nothing. Keyword there would be 'seemingly'.
"Ow!" Someone shrieked.
I turned around slowly.
"Um... Kalos? Who's there?"
Kalos jumped on top of something I couldn't see and toppled onto the floor.
A black baseball cap flew to my feet.
"Ugh, bad dog, bad!!"
I looked up to see Kalos now on top of a girl.
"Hey, call your dog off!" she yelped.
"Why should I? How did you get in here?" I backed up. "Okay, Kalos enough!"
Kalos let the girl go instantly and retreated in between my legs. It was the first and basically last time he would listen to me.
The girl got up slowly, scowling. She looked like a California girl, skin tanned, and beach-blonde hair in soft curls. When she finally stood up, she was a good inch taller than me and really athletic looking. Someone I didn't want to be messing with. Her grey eyes stared right through me.
"Um, how did you get in here?"
She sighed and brushed her shoulder.
"That's not important," she said. "I'm Annabeth Chase. You're Bella Cooper, right?"
How come everyone I meet knows me already? And why was she so calm about being in my house?!
"Yes, I am. Now, what are you doing here? Don't you know what breaking-and-entering is?"
She ignored me. "I've come from Camp Half-Blood. I'm sure by now you know what that is, right?" she yanked her cap from the floor unhappily as Kalos snarled at her.
"Um..."
"Right. And you met Daisy and Percy."
"Uh..."
"Perfect. Percy says you got away before he could explain anything, so let me give you the rundown."
"Bella, what on earth was that?" my dad yelled from his study.
"Uh... I was... moving my dresser, sorry!"
"Your dresser- Bella Cooper, why must you insist on making the most atrocious noises and then lying about it?"
I frowned. "I don't do that!"
"Yes, you- Nevermind! Next time I'm coming up there!"
"Okay, sorry!"
I looked back at Annabeth, who had her arms crossed.
"Maybe we should take this outside. Here, I'll knock on your door. Pretend I'm one of your friends. We'll go someplace else to talk."
"Yeah, I don't think my dad will fall for that!" I called, but she was already hopping out my window. Who died and made this lady queen?
"God, what is with all these crazy people? Kalos, stay here."
Kalos, in fact, did not stay there.
"Fine. But you can't attack any more people. You need a leash or something."
He didn't like that idea either, so he stayed on my bed.
I rolled my eyes and headed downstairs.
"Hey Dad, I'm going for a walk!"
He mumbled something in response.
I opened the front door and nearly hit Annabeth in the face.
"Hey, I said I would knock!"
"Yeah, but I don't have any friends and my dad knows it."
"...Oh."
She grabbed my wrist and dragged me onto the sidewalk, where the sun hit me in the eyes.
"Ow," I said quietly, covering my eyes.
"What, are you a vampire or something?" she said sarcastically. Jeez, she has no chill.
Well now, I guess that's half true. She's probably a demi-god though, so I can't actually tell her anything.
Just pretend and get answers.
"Wow, very original," I muttered. "Okay, you're gonna tell me stuff now, right?"
"No," she said, looking both ways before dragging me across the street. "After we get to camp I'll explain. It's not safe here."
Oh.
That was going to be a problem.
"Uh... wait a second. I have to like, tell my dad first. I can't just leave."
She thought about this as if she left her parents without telling them all the time.
"Right," she sighed, crossing her arms. "Go tell him."
I stared at her. "You're... kidding, right?"
"No, go tell him! It's not like he doesn't know."
"Well..."
How was I going to get out of this one?
"He's... actually my stepdad. He doesn't know."367Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYVWyNxV9bA
Annabeth narrowed her eyes.
"Okay, then call your actual parent. We need to get moving."
"She's... dead."
"What? What do you mean?"
"I mean what I mean! She's dead."
"You're lying. Do I look stupid?"
"...Would you like an honest answer?" I muttered.
"Gods, you're just like Percy!" she threw her hands up in frustration. "Look, I don't know what's wrong with you, but we need to leave before-"
She was cut off by a loud piercing scream from the other side of the street.
There was a huge guy that looked like a bodybuilder with huge bulging yellow eyes, swatting at people crossing the street.
"Wait..." I whispered, staring a little closer. When I strained my eyes enough, I could see he was definitely not a bodybuilder. Not a human one, anyway.
"Is, um... is that thing... looking at us...?" I pointed at the huge guy, screaming and thrashing about.
"Cyclops," Annabeth muttered. "It followed me. Okay, come with me."
She yanked me behind a crowd of people who came to watch the huge monster.
"Why aren't they running? Don't they see the huge ugly thing in the middle of the street?!"
"They don't know it's a monster," she said, shouting over the noise as we ran down the sidewalk, dodging people and bicycle stands. "The mist shields them."
"The mist?" I yelled back.
"I'll tell you later! We just need to get to camp!"
I'm not allowed to go there! I wanted to yell. This was going seriously downhill.
We ran past a few street vendors when she yanked me behind an alley.
"Um, it's still chasing us," I said as I peeked out from behind the brick corner.
"I know that!" she huffed. "Stop, Chariot of Damnation!" She tossed a thick gold coin onto the road.
"What are you doing?" I said, baffled.
"The Grey Sister's Taxi," she said, as if I knew exactly what she was talking about.
"The wha-"
In a huge cloud of grey mist, there was a taxi, except it looked like it was made of smoke.
"Is that thing tangible?" This was officially a nightmare.
"Yes, now get in!"
She shoved me in and I yelped, half expecting to fall right through.
"Pay first!" The driver shrieked.
I nearly screamed myself, because I was met with three really ugly, grey, wrinkly looking old ladies smiling at me with toothless mouths from behind the wheel.
"What the hell-"
"Here. Take us to Camp Half-Blood," Annabeth handed one of them the coin.
"Yes, yes! Heroes are all so rude!"
"Yes, rude indeed!"
One of the wrinkly old ladies took Annabeth's coin and proceeded to bite it.
"It's real!" she screamed.
"Great, then give me the tooth, Tempest!"
"You had it last, Wasp!"
"Give me the eye, Anger!" the third one yelled.
I stared at Annabeth in horror.
"Meet Tempest, Anger, and Wasp. Put your seatbelt on, trust me, you're going to want to."
I reached behind me, but instead of a seatbelt, there was an iron chain.
"How does this help?" I fumbled with the heavy chains.
"Safety first!" The one I assumed was Tempest shrieked.
"Yes, buckle up!" Anger yelled.
"Ha! I'm going now!" Wasp cackled.
"Wait, which one of you has the eye?" Annabeth asked nervously.
"The eye?" I whispered to myself, dumbfounded. I looked up to see that all three old ladies had sunken eyes and no teeth, except Anger, who had one bloodshot eye, and Tempest, who had a single yellow tooth.
"Um, yeah, maybe the driver should have the eye!" I said panicking.
"Nonsense!" Wasp screamed. "I'm a very good driver!"
"Fire hydrant!" Anger shrieked.
Wasp swerved right, narrowly missing another car.
"Oh my god, I'm going to die," I breathed.
"You'll be fine," Annabeth said not-so-convincingly.
"Anger, give me the eye!" Tempest yelled.
"If anyone should have the eye, it should be me!" Wasp yelled back.
"I'll trade you for the tooth!"
"I don't have the tooth!"
"I do!" Tempest screamed.
"How fast are we going?" I asked Annabeth.
She winced as we hit a curb. "Don't ask! We'll be there soon."
I braced as we narrowly avoided one obstacle after another, facing death about three or four times. It was like a deadly roller coaster from a theme park that was abandoned for insurance reasons.
"We're here!" Tempest screeched.
"Wait, what?" Annabeth looked at the window. I don't know what she could see, because we were going so fast.
"Out!" shouted Tempest
"Get!" yelled Anger.
"Beat it!" screamed Wasp.
The car lurched to a stop, and as I expected, the seatbelt did nothing to stop me from flying forward.
We got off as fast as possible, and the taxi took off. I flopped on the ground.
"Ugh, that was awful," I groaned.
Annabeth looked a little green herself but brushed it off.
"We're fine, see?" she looked around.
"Um, is Camp Half-Blood invisible or something?" I looked at the huge empty field in front of me.
"No, we aren't there yet."
"I thought you asked them to take us right there?" I sat up. "What was all that for then?"
"It must be out of their range," she muttered. "C'mon."
I got up and started following her. "Where are we then?"
"Long Island," she said. "The camp isn't too far from here."
"Long Island? In such a short time?" I whispered to myself. This was the craziest week I've ever had, and this was only the beginning.
We walked on a nicely paved road, but it looked like we were in the middle of nowhere. There were a few paths that led to some hiking trails and the occasional telephone pole, but this was the closest thing to a forest I'd ever seen.
"Wow, this is really pretty," I said.
"Yeah, it is, isn't it?" Annabeth took a deep breath.
I heard some shuffling in the bush, and stopped dead in my tracks.
"Don't worry," Annabeth chuckled. "It's probably just a bird or something."
I continued slowly, but my eyes didn't leave the bush. A dark, cloudy ribbon surrounded it, and then I saw a familiar face. Or should I say, a furry face.
"Kalos?" I whispered.
"Huh?" Annabeth turned around.
"Oh, um, nothing."
If Annabeth saw that Kalos had made it all the way here, she was definitely going to get suspicious. How did he get here in the first place?
Of course, it wouldn't be Kalos if he didn't screw something up for me.
He jumped out of the bush, tackling me.
"Ow!"
Annabeth whirled around, and once she noticed Kalos, gaped at him.
"Is... that your dog?" she asked slowly.
I sighed. There was no getting out of this one.
"He's actually a fox. And his name is Kalos- oof," I struggled to push him off of me as I waited to see what she'd do, and silently cursed Kalos.
"How...?"
"Um... he was a gift..." I trailed off, hoping gifts were a normal thing for demi-god kids.
"Oh," Annabeth said softly. "From your godly parent?"
"Um... yeah." That was close.
"Oh," she said again. "Must be nice to get a gift without even knowing who your parent is yet," her voice turned a little bitter.
We walked for a bit in silence.
"So, um..." I walked a little faster to keep up with her, Kalos not far behind. "Who's your godly parent?"
She cleared her throat. "I'm a child of Athena."
That was... the wisdom one, right?
"That's pretty cool," I said.
"There are a lot of us," she didn't look at me.
I never really thought the gods would be the ones to have lots of kids and then leave them. I guess that was what Hecate meant when she said that demigod-parents were jerks.
"Your hat... was that a gift?"
"Yes."
"Do... all demi-gods get gifts?"
"No."
"Oh."
Jeez, this was awkward. "That's pretty special then, huh?"
She pulled the cap out of her bag, tracing the embroidered Yankees logo.
"I guess so," she sighed.
I realized that sometime soon we'd end up at Camp Half-Blood, and I didn't have a plan.
"So, um, can I ask about camp?" I asked.
She seemed happy to change the subject.
"Sure."
"Right, okay, so are there, like, any monsters in there? Like the one that was chasing us?" I count as a monster, right?
"Well, we have cleaning harpies, and sometimes we allow hellhounds and other things to come in. It's all very safe for us, though."
"Right..." Hellhounds didn't sound too safe.
"So, if you were a, I dunno, say a cyclops, how would you get in?"
"You have to get verbal permission from a camp member."
Uh oh.
"Oh," I tried to play it cool, but I could tell she knew something was up.
"What, is Kalos a hellhound or something?" she frowned.
"Um... I'm not sure."
I looked at Kalos pleadingly, but he just averted his gaze. He's supposed to be helping, and so far he's only cleared out my fridge and attacked me.
"Okay," Annabeth said. "Here we are."
ns 15.158.61.12da2
