In a way, it's nice to know there are Greek gods out there because you have somebody to blame when things go wrong. For instance, when you're walking away from a bus that's just been attacked by monster hags and blown up by lightning, and it's raining on top of everything else, most people might think that's just really bad luck; when you're a half-blood, you understand that some divine force is trying to mess up your day.
So there we were, Annabeth Grover and I, walking through the woods along the New Jersey riverbank, the glow of New York City making the night sky yellow behind us, and the smell of the
Hudson reeking in our noses.
Grover was shivering and braying, his big goat eyes turned slit-pupiled and full of terror. "Three Kindly Ones. All three at once."
I was pretty much in shock myself. The explosion of bus windows still rang in my ears. But Annabeth kept pulling us along, saying: "Come on! The farther away we get, the better."
"All our money was back there," I reminded her. "Our food and clothes. Everything."
"Well, maybe if you hadn't decided to jump into the fight—"
"What did you want me to do? Let you get killed?"
"You didn't need to protect me, Percy. I would've been fine."
"Sliced like sandwich bread," Grover put in, "but fine."
"Shut up, goat boy," said Annabeth.
Grover brayed mournfully. "Tin cans ... a perfectly good bag of tin cans."
We sloshed across mushy ground, through nasty twisted trees that smelled like sour laundry.
After a few minutes, Annabeth fell in line next to me. "Look, I..." Her voice faltered. "I appreciate your coming back for us, okay That was brave."
"We're a team, right?"
She was silent for a few more steps. "It's just that if you died ... aside from the fact that it would suck for you, it would mean the quest was over. This may be my only chance to see the real world."
The thunderstorm had finally let up. The city glow faded behind us, leaving us in almost total darkness. I couldn't see anything of Annabeth except a glint of her black hair.
"You haven't left Camp Half-Blood since you were seven?" I asked her.
"No ... only short field trips. My dad—"
"The history professor."
"Yeah. It didn't work out for me living at home. I mean, Camp Half-Bloodis my home." She was rushing her words out now as if she were afraid somebody might try to stop her. "At camp, you train and train. And that's all cool and everything, but the real world is where the monsters are. That's where you learn whether you're any good or not."
If I didn't know better, I could've sworn I heard doubt in her voice.
"You're pretty good with that knife," I said.
"You think so?"
"Anybody who can piggyback-ride a Fury is okay by me."
I couldn't see, but I thought she might've smiled.
"You know," she said, "maybe I should tell you ... Something funny back on the bus ..."
Whatever she wanted to say was interrupted by a shrill toot-toot-toot, like the sound of an owl being tortured.
"Hey, my reed pipes still work!" Grover cried. "If I could just remember a 'find path' song, we could get out of these woods!"
He puffed out a few notes, but the tune still sounded suspiciously like Hilary Duff.
Instead of finding a path, I immediately slammed into a tree and got a nice-sized knot on my head. Add to the list of superpowers I did not have: infrared vision.
After tripping and cursing and generally feeling miserable for another mile or so, I started to see light up ahead: the colors of a neon sign. I could smell food. Fried, greasy, excellent food. I realized I hadn't eaten anything unhealthy since I'd arrived at Half-Blood Hill, where we lived on grapes, bread, cheese, and extra-lean-cut nymph-prepared barbecue. This boy needed a double cheeseburger.
We kept walking until I saw a deserted two-lane road through the trees. On the other side was a closed-down gas station, a tattered billboard for a 1990s movie, and one open business, which was the source of the neon light and the good smell.
It wasn't a fast-food restaurant like I'd hoped. It was one of those weird roadside curio shops that sell lawn flamingos and wooden Indians and cement grizzly bears and stuff like that. The main building was a long, low warehouse, surrounded by acres of statuary. The neon sign above the gate was impossible for me to read because if there's anything worse for my dyslexia than regular English, it's red cursive neon English.
To me, it looked like ATNYU MES GDERAN GOMEN MEPROUIM.
"What the heck does that say?" I asked.
"I don't know," Annabeth said.
She loved reading so much, that I'd forgotten she was dyslexic, too.
Grover translated: "Aunty Em's Garden Gnome Emporium."
Flanking the entrance, as advertised, were two cement garden gnomes, ugly bearded little runts, smiling and waving, as if they were about to get their picture taken.
I crossed the street, following the smell of the hamburgers.
"Hey ..." Grover warned.
"The lights are on inside," Annabeth said. "Maybe it's open."
"Snack bar," I said wistfully.
"Snack bar," she agreed.
"Are you two crazy?" Grover said. "This place is weird."
We ignored him.
The front lot was a forest of statues: cement animals, cement children, even a cement satyr playing the pipes, which gave Grover the creeps.
"Bla-ha-ha!" he bleated."Looks like my Uncle Ferdinand!"
We stopped at the warehouse door.
"Don't knock," Grover pleaded. "I smell monsters."
"Your nose is clogged up from the Furies," Annabeth told him. "All I smell is burgers. Aren't you hungry?"
"Meat!" he said scornfully. "I'm a vegetarian."
"You eat cheese enchiladas and aluminum cans," I reminded him.
"Those are vegetables. Come on. Let's leave. These statues are ... looking at me."
Then the door creaked open, and standing in front of us was a tall Middle Eastern woman—at least, I assumed she was Middle Eastern, because she wore a long black gown that covered everything but her hands, and her head was completely veiled. Her eyes glinted behind a curtain of black gauze, but that was about all I could make out. Her coffee-colored hands looked old but well-manicured and elegant, so I imagined she was a grandmother who had once been a beautiful lady.
Her accent sounded vaguely Middle Eastern, too. She said, "Children, it is too late to be out all alone. Where are your parents?"
"They're ... um ..." Annabeth started to say.
"We're orphans," I said.
"Orphans?" the woman said. The word sounded alien in her mouth. "But, my dears! Surely not!"
"We got separated from our caravan," I said. "Our circus caravan. The ringmaster told us to meet him at the gas station if we got lost, but he may have forgotten, or maybe he meant a different gas station. Anyway, we're lost. Is that food I smell?"
"Oh, my dears," the woman said. "You must come in, poor children. I am Aunty Em. Go straight through to the back of the warehouse, please. There is a dining area."
We thanked her and went inside.
Annabeth muttered to me, "Circus caravan?"
"Always have a strategy, right?"
"Your head is full of kelp."
The warehouse was filled with more statues—people in different poses, wearing different outfits, and with different expressions on their faces. I was thinking you'd have to have a pretty huge garden to fit even one of these statues because they were all life-size. But mostly, I was thinking about food.
Go ahead, call me an idiot for walking into a strange lady's shop like that just because I was hungry, but I do impulsive stuff sometimes. Plus, you've never smelled Aunty Em's burgers. The aroma was like laughing gas in the dentist's chair—it made everything else go away. I barely noticed Grover's nervous whimpers or the way the statues' eyes seemed to follow me, or the fact that Aunty Em had locked the door behind us.
All I cared about was finding the dining area. And sure enough, there it was at the back of the warehouse, a fast-food counter with a grill, a soda fountain, a pretzel heater, and a nacho cheese dispenser. Everything you could want, plus a few steel picnic tables out front.
"Please, sit down," Aunty Em said.
"Awesome," I said.
"Um," Grover said reluctantly, "we don't have any money, ma'am."
Before I could jab him in the ribs, Aunty Em said, "No, no, children. No money. This is a special case, yes? It is my treat, for such nice orphans."
"Thank you, ma'am," Annabeth said.
Aunty Em stiffened as if Annabeth had done something wrong, but then the old woman relaxed just as quickly, so I figured it must've been my imagination.
"Quite all right, Annabeth," she said. "You have such beautiful gray eyes, child."
Only later did I wonder how she knew Annabeth's name, even though we had never introduced ourselves. Our hostess disappeared behind the snack counter and started cooking. Before we knew it, she'd brought us plastic trays heaped with double cheeseburgers, vanilla shakes, and XXL servings of French fries.
I was halfway through my burger before I remembered to breathe.
Annabeth slurped her shake.
Grover picked at the fries and eyed the tray's waxed paper liner as if he might go for that, but he still looked too nervous to eat.
"What's that hissing noise?" he asked.
I listened but didn't hear anything. Annabeth shook her head.
"Hissing?" Aunty Em asked. "Perhaps you hear the deep-fryer oil. You have keen ears, Grover."
"I take vitamins. For my ears."
"That's admirable," she said. "But please, relax."
Aunty Em ate nothing. She hadn't taken off her head-dress, even to cook, and now she sat forward and interlaced her fingers and watched us eat. It was a little unsettling, having someone stare at me when I couldn't see her face, but I was feeling satisfied after the burger, and a little sleepy, and I figured the least I could do was try to make small talk with our hostess.
"So, you sell gnomes," I said, trying to sound interested.
"Oh, yes," Aunty Em said. "And animals. And people. Anything for the—"
Our conversation was cut short by a loud banging sound from the front door as if a hammer was being slammed against it.
"Ah, it seems your caravan came looking for you," Aunty Em said as she walked to the door.
I looked toward Annabeth and Grover and asked, "Is there actually a circus near here?"
The two both shrugged, not sure themselves.
As we ate we heard murmuring from the front door as Aunty Em spoke to whoever was at the door. It must have been a serious conversation as when Aunty Em came back she looked like her life was drained out from her.
Walking in with Aunty Em was a girl about my age, maybe younger. She had this oversized blueish-gray shark hoodie on with black cargo pants and a pair of creased jet-black timbs covered in what looked like grass steins.
"I'm sorry for leaving you three waiting," Aunty Em told us as she sat the girl on the bench next to me.
"This young man is looking for some help and shelter, you children wouldn't mind if I let him stay with us?" Aunty Em continued, her face returning to the same chipper expression it was before.
I looked at Annabeth and Grover, seeing what I should say. We weren't going to be here long due to the quest and if this kid was in need of help who were we to stop hi—
I did a double-take and looked back at the kid. His face was smeared with dirt and grime, coily black hair decorated by highlights of copper-red and specks of a golden liquid. Yeah, he looked dirty but you would easily mistake him for a girl.
I shook my head, it wasn't that important. "Yeah, he can sit with us."
"Ah, perfect, I'll let you young ones get to know each other while I go and get ... I'm sorry what is your name?" Aunty Em asked the unnamed kid.
The shark boy gazed up at Aunty Em, depthless black irises staring at her with zero thought behind them.
"Angros Cullin..." He said, barely above a whisper with a voice like an angel.
Aunty Em left the room to gather more food for Angros.
We sat in an awkward silence, the sound of Annabeth's slurping being the only sound we heard. Grover was the first of us to speak up.
"So, Angros... What is it you need help with?"
He asked, looking around the room.
Angros looked up from his lap, blinking repeatedly as if trying to remember what he was here for.
"...finding thief," he said, reaching into his pocket and taking out a small scroll.
I stiffened slightly. He couldn't mean me. We're in New York of all places. There are thousands of thieves all over this city.
"What was stolen?" Annabeth asked, glancing over the paper Angros had pulled out.
"Helmet... belonged to friend of father," Angros informed us.
My body relaxed, releasing a breath I didn't even know I had.
"Do you know who took it?" I asked him, eating some of my fries.
"Lightning thief."
... Fuck.
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Author's Note: Thank you all for reading, please critique my work heavily, I want you all to enjoy this. No this will not be specifically from Percy's perspective, if you want a love interest, there will be a place to vote for one or you can suggest one here.
Word Count: Two Thousand three hundred forty-two