A/N: Credits for the PJO and HoO series, and the characters Percy, Annabeth and Grover to Rick Riordan.

Dawn sat at the corner of the room, staring out of the window at the streets of Brooklyn-bustling with traffic, cars honking and drivers sitting at the wheels with a stream of not-so-good words coming out of their mouths. She almost never cursed but it was good to know she had a supply ready if she ever wanted to. Often, she had almost given Mrs Perkins, the matron at the orphanage, a good dose of them. But she had always (wisely) kept her mouth shut. Mrs Perkins did not approve of cussing.
Dawn sighed. She hated her life. Her mind drifted back to better days...when her mom had been alive. Sure, they had lived in a small flat and been poor, but she had had her mother. Her sunny mom, with her love of life and her ability to always find a bright side in every situation.They had even played a game in which Dawn would think of the worst situations and her mom would find the bright side in it. She always knew the right thing to say, the right words to comfort her with. She missed her mom so badly.
Even she wouldn't have been able to find a bright side in this situation. Her mother dead, her father long since gone, no friends, being pushed around from orphanage to orphanage. A single tear ran down her cheek but then she heard someone come in.
Dawn hastily brushed the year away and looked around. It was one of the girls in her dorm-Kylie.
'What're you doing, moping around here?' Kylie asked. 'Mrs Perkins is in a hell of a bad mood. She's looking everywhere for you.'
'What have I done now?' Dawn swung her feet off the chair and slipped them into her flip flops, her mind running through the morning. Had she left her clothes on the dorm floor again? No, that wasn't it. She remembered putting them in the laundry.Was it her turn to wash the dishes? No, not that...
'No idea. Just get there quick.' Kylie disappeared.
Preparing herself for the worst, Dawn followed her out.

She was going to get into big trouble. Bunking off school...she imagined the punishments the delighted Mrs Perkins would give her and almost turned and ran into the school. Then she shook the thought away. She didn't care...at least not for now. There was absolutely no way she was going to face school and her bio teacher with no assignment to hand in.
'It's not my fault I didn't finish it,' she thought. 'How was I supposed to, with all that work yesterday?'
Mrs Perkins had given her a bunch of extra chores, on top of her mountain of homework, to do yesterday after she have yelled at her. Dawn had lost her cool and yelled back and that was the result.
'Forget that,' she told herself firmly. 'If I'm bunking off, I might as well have fun.'
She hoisted her backpack onto her shoulder and entered the mall. She had some money which she had saved for the right time and this was as good a time as any.
A double cheeseburger, large order of fries and soda later, she was feeling a lot better. She glanced around the food court, drinking in the happy noise and bustle all around her. The glowing McDonalds and Burger King and Subway signs stood out over the heads of the crowd. She imagined what it would be like to have her mom here with her, laughing and joking with her, then sneaking fries from her pack when she wasn't looking. A grin spread across her face despite herself.
As she looked around, she saw a group of three teens sitting just opposite her. A guy with dark hair, a girl with blonde curls and gray eyes and another dude with curly hair. What were they doing here at-she checked her watch-10:00 am? Probably bunking off like her. She imagined coming here with friends like that-laughing and talking as they were doing. The thought was so ridiculous she almost laughed too. Mrs Perkins would never let her do such a thing, and anyway what friends did she have?
Just then, there was an ear splitting crash from  above her. Everyone in the food court stopped what they were doing and looked up. They probably wished they hadn't a moment later. Glass flew everywhere, and people screamed and dived out of the way. Dawn herself quickly scrambled under the table, and crouched there, her heart thundering.
The glass wasn't the real problem. The real problem-or problems-were the group of birds that had crashed into the mall. You just imagined a bunch of pigeons or something, didn't you? Now revise your impression of the birds. They were certainly not pigeons. They were like no birds Dawn had ever seen. Even though she hadn't been able to see them properly, she had caught a glimpse of a long, cruel beak and metallic feathers with sharp pointed ends. She hugged the table leg and looked out at the limited view being under the table offered.
People were running around, shrieking at the tops of their voices as the birds flew everywhere trying to get at them. She still couldn't make out exactly what they looked like, only seeing flashes of silver. Feathers were flying everywhere. She cautiously reached out and picked one up. She sucked in her breath. The thing was as sharp as an arrow. If it went through someone..she shuddered. She had no idea what was going on, but she put that out of her mind for now. She looked out again at the pandemonium.
The strange thing was, no arrow-feathers  seemed to be hitting anyone at all. Every time they or the birds got near someone, she would see a flash of bronze as it was knocked out of the air. But with what? She couldn't tell.
Someone-or someones- was moving around so fast, it was impossible to see much of them except a blur of orange.
Finally she couldn't stand not being able to see anything properly. She crawled out on her hands and knees and stood up, almost knocking over a tall girl with blonde hair and an orange T-shirt-one of the teens that had been sitting at the table opposite her.
But now she had a wicked-looking dagger in her hand. Dawn instantly backtracked into the table.
'Sorry!' The girl yelled and then disappeared into the crowd. Not knowing what else to do, she followed her. She was one of the people she had seen fighting the birds-she was sure of it now. Might as well be close to her.
'Stupid Stymphalian birds!' The girl cried, as she hit out at one with her dagger. Then she said some words in a  language Dawn didn't recognize-but she could tell Mrs Perkins would NOT have approved.
She pushed through the crowd of screaming people toward the blonde.
'What are those things?' She asked, shouting to make herself heard. 'And why are you holding a dagger? Is that even legal?'
The girl knocked five or six arrow-feathers out of the air at the same time.
'You can see it?' She asked, sounding surprised.
'Of course I can! Why wouldn't I be able to?'
The girl looked as if she was trying to come up with a believable answer. Dawn knew that expression. She almost always wore it when she talked to Mrs Perkins.
'Look, I can tell you're going to lie,' she told her.It was blunt, but, well, she didn't have time for being polite right now. She wanted answers. That was one of the things about her. She was curious and once she wanted to know something, you couldn't stop her.'Tell me the truth, can't you?'
'Yeah, see, I can't,' she said, turning and hitting out at another bird. 'Look, you should go, okay? Like the rest of these mortals-'
'Mortals?'
Then the girl screamed. She lunged out with her dagger at a bird flying toward Dawn but she was too late. Dawn felt something pierce her, an excruciating pain shoot through her shoulder and then she blacked out.

'She'll be okay, won't she?' Dawn heard the voice of the blonde, sounding almost tearful. 'It's my fault-I should've been faster-'
'Don't say that, Annabeth,'a guy's voice interrupted. 'You were great-we couldn't have saved all those mortals without you. She'll be fine!'
Dawn opened her eyes and sat up, wincing as her shoulder stung.
'She's awake!' The blonde-Annabeth-cried. Her face was full of relief.
'Yeah, I'm awake all right,' Dawn said, looking around. She was lying on two chairs set together, and Annabeth, the guy who'd been comforting her and another guy all sitting on chairs opposite her. There was no one else on the entire floor and she couldn't
hear any ordinary mall noise from the floors below. Chunks of glass and arrow-feathers lay around on the ground. 'And now I am, I want some answers.'
Annabeth shifted uncomfortably. The dark-haired guy whose voice she's heard-the one who'd been sitting with Annabeth earlier-cleared his throat.
'Answers for what?'
'What were those bird things? Why did they break through the roof of the mall? Why was she-' she pointed at Annabeth-'holding a dagger? How-'
'Okay, okay, slow down,' the guy said. 'First, let's introduce ourselves. I'm Percy Jackson. This is Annabeth Chase. And this-' He pointed at the other guy, who nodded nervously-'is Grover Underwood.'
'I'm Dawn McCarthy,' Dawn told them.
'Okay, well, Dawn-'
He took a pen out of his pocket and uncapped it. It immediately turned into a bronze sword.
Dawn gasped.
'What can you see in my hand?'
Dawn stared at him like he was nuts-which she was beginning to think he was, along with Annabeth. 'A sword.'
All three of them looked stunned.
'What?' she said.'Why would you think I can't see it ?'
Percy ignored Dawn's question. He turned to Grover.
Grover seemed to understand what he was about to ask.
'I could sense a demigodish-'
'Say what?'
'-aura in the crowd here but there were so many mortals I couldn't really tell where it was coming from. This must be it.'
'So that's why she could see the birds and my dagger and your sword!' Annabeth cried.
'Umm...' Dawn stared at them.
Percy looked at her and grinned.
'You have no idea what we're talking about, right?'
'Right.'
'Well..this will be really really weird at first but-'
'But what?' Dawn pressed.
They looked at her.Annabeth's expression was gentle, as if she'd been through all this before.
'You're a demigod.'