Before they crashed into Camp Half-Blood, I was once again begging Chiron when I was going to lead a quest.

I had been trying for years now, ever since Luke got back from his quest to retrieve a couple of golden apples from the Garden of Twilight, where the daughters of Atlas were located. I knew I was asking a lot because it was seriously dangerous - Luke was proof of that because when he got back he had a long scar on the side of his face, and he refused to talk about his quest at all. He just got back to camp and just went to the Hermes cabin, slamming the door shut.

Chiron had not let a single quest happen ever since, which drove me crazy. I've been trying to get Chiron to give me a quest for years but he flat out refused. He kept on saying that it wasn't my time to go out there in the real world, which was one of the worst excuses he would tell me. I was more than capable of going out in the mortal world and do my own quest, if I could go out with luke and another camper who was willing to go along with me.

I was really bummed as Chiron told me no for the thirty seventh time in a row, which to be fair really iritated him.

"Annabeth, you are too young to do a quest at the age you're at," he grumbled. "If you were to go out there, there's a massive chance that you could get hurt just like your friend Castellan. I'm not risking the life of one of my campers just so that they can go on a pointless quest."

"At least I would be able to go and see the outside world!" I complained. "Chiron, it's not fair for me that I'm the only one that stays here while others go on quest's and come back as heroes! I want the chance to prove that I am a hero as well!"

"Do you really expect me to give you a quest and do it, when you don't know the very reason why demigods go on quests in the first place?" he asked me sceptically. "Annabeth, this is serious - you go on a quest you will never be the same again. You said once before that you didn't even want to go back out there in the mortal world again after your time with your father."

That was a sore subject. He knew that I have a rocky history with my dad - it was so private that I barely told anyone about it, except Chiron, Luke...and Thalia. Just even thinking about her name almost made me cry.

Chiron must've sensed my thoughts because his voice softened. "I'm sorry Annabeth, but you just ain't ready. Keep training and your time will come. I promise you."

Without another word, and feeling like I was being crushed, I walked out of his office.

=========

I sat there at the edge of the forest, just drawing meaningless diagrams in the dirt.

As a daughter of Athena, me and my half-siblings were a lot smarter than others. Some like the Ares cabin boast that it is only strength that wins battles and wars but to honest it isn't that at all. During the Trojan War, it was wisdom and cunning that won the war for the Greeks - Odysseus made that happen because he was the smartest of all the Greeks during that particular war and was the sole leader of making and building the Trojan Horse, which made him a hero to the children of Athena, and to Athena herself. 

So there I was in a gloomy mood doing practically nothing but drawing. Just then, Luke came over and sat next to me, sighing as he sat down. As usual, my heart started beating very fast - over the years we've known each other I started to get attracted to him because when we were traveling when I was no more than seven he became my hero - he was an amazing monster fighter and was very skilled at combat. His blonde hair and blue eyes were so dazzeling...

"So how are you?" he asked, sounding just as bored as I was.

I shrugged. "Chiron refused to give me a quest, as per freaking usual. I don't now what I'm doing wrong Luke - I really want to go on a quest, but he just won't give me it!"

Luke looked sympathetic. He patted me on the shoulder. "Don't worry - you'll get your chance. But to be honest, I don't think you need a quest to prove that you're a hero. And trust me when I say that if you go on a quest, there's a ninety percentage chance out of a hundred that you're gonna end up getting hurt. This-" He pointed to the scar on his face. "-is the proof."

I shook my head. "Chiron knows that I'm extremely careful, but he's just too scared to let me go. I even asked Dionysus if I could go, but he just snapped at me to leave his office."

"Too focused on trying to drink wine," Luke barked out a laugh. "When will that guy just give it a rest and just accept the fact that his punishment won't leave him until his time here is up?"

That made me laugh as well...but I stopped laughing as soon as I looked up at the sky. One moment it was a clear blue sky that trickled down snow - next thing I know it's a very dark and very thundery storm that slowly spread throughout the entire camp, engulfing us like a coffin. The sky rumbled loudly as thunder and lightning flashed here and there. The winds picked up and it blew my hair all over the place.

Even Luke noticed it because he stood up and turned in circles as the weather kept getting worse. "What in the name of Holy Hermes is going on here?" he asked bewildered.

"I don't know," I murmmered. I stood up as well and looked at the sky. Suddenly, it turned an even darker colour, like an inky black and I knew that something was up. And before I knew it, the sky began to roar and groan and a bright flash blew right in our eyes, temporarily blinding us. I looked on at the sky and thunder flashed in the clouds.

Event he campers started to get agitated, because they kept glancing at the sky. What in Hades name was Zeus up to? Was he and Poseidon having yet another argument - that's how it was between those two because whenever those two crossed each other the sky and the sea just started to boil as the rising power of the two storm gods was just unleashed. But somehow I knew that this was a different matter - this even felt different somehow.

I then noticed that the clouds were starting to turn slightly red, like the sun was trying to shine through the thick barrier of clouds. Luke noticed it because he said, "What the hell?"

Just then, to my utter shock, two massive fireballs shot right out of the clouds directly above me and zoomed towards the ground. My eyes widened as I saw them hurtle over our heads, making the most loudest roars in history, sort of like the sound of a zylophone as it's being tipped upside down. They dissappeared into the trees and the ground shook violently as they crashed into the earth, sending a shockwave through the trees and blasting me and Luke and the rest of the campers off our feets.

I groaned as I got back to my feet, but what I saw made my stomach feel really bad. Rising above the trees - most of them toppling over - a large plume of black smoke rose into the sky, like some sort of powerful bomb had just been set off which would've made every stationed marine in New York stand by waiting for orders as if the Taliban had come to America.

Luke looked at the scene before us. His eyes were wide open, making me think that he would need a doctors appointment to treat his eyes. "What was that?" he exclaimed.

I didn't bother answering that. Before I knew it, I was running off into the forest, the whole camp following me as I entered the dark shadows that the trees were casting and the smoke that was seeping out through the bushes and leaves.

========

We ran through the thick bushes and branches of the forest, before we came to a clearing that was just made me think that we were stepping into the fires of hell.

Before Chiron could stop me, I broke through the branches and came to a massive area that was engulfed in flames. The surrounding trees were ablaze with fire, so the satyr's nearby were frantically trying to put them out to save the nymphs that live in them. Boulders the size of van's were turning a glossy volcanic black as the rising heat of the fires surrounding them roasted them. I thought it looked horrible, but nothing could compare to what caught my immediate attention - right in front of me, going maybe forty feet deep, was a massive crater that was covered with smashed up slate and dirt. Some of the dirt had been sand, but it had now heated up into sheets of glass that snapped as the tempreture of the fires got too hot.

Every camper gathered around the edge of the crater, looking down and around the area. Some of them had even gone over to help the nature spirits to try and tackle the rising inferno of the forest fire. The others, with Chiron and Dionysus present, just looked down at crater. I looked down into it and to my horror I saw something down there that became visible as the smoke coming from it cleared away. In the centre lay two figures in grey robes and were lying unconscious in the heated up crater.

"Oh my gods." I rushed down the crater. I came up to one of the two figures, and pulled him onto his back. He was wearing a hood so for a moment I couldn't see his face. Then when I pulled the hood down I saw his face - his eyes were closed and they flickered now and again; his face was pale and was streaked with black smudges and slash marks, like he had been through a cheese grater. His light grey robes and under clothing was ripped and bloody in some places and his left arm was bent at a painful angle. His raven black hair was messy and grey at the temples, which was the result of him getting burnt.

I looked over to the other figure and saw that it was a girl maybe the same age as the boy - seventeen to eighteen at most.  Her hair was a more glossy black than the boys, and she was barely moving like he was. Both of them were breathing but it sounded weak to my ears, and I knew straight away that they were in a critical condition.

"I need a medic down here!" I shouted out to the campers, trying to lift the boy under his arms. He was lighter than I expected though he was still too heavy for me. Some of the Apollo campers got out of their shock and raced down into the crater to help me. A couple of them had gone over to the girl and picked her up gently. Another camper came to help me lift the boy and we climbed back up the crater.

Chiron came up to the boy and looked at him, his face transforming into one of recognition. "That's Perseus Jackson, the Champion of Olympus. Di Immortales, what happened to him?"

Lee Fletcher from the Apollo cabin came forward and placed a hand on the champions chest, closing his eyes in concentration. "He's badly hurt - that I can tell. But I'm sensing some other injuries to his leg, waist and chest. We need to get him and the girl to the infirmary right away."

"Okay, let's go," Luke said, sounding apprehensive all of a sudden like he'd been caught doing a crime. He grabbed the other girl from the other medics and lugged her out of the woods, while we were left carrying Perseus.

==========

Clarisse, who was present amongst the crowd of demigods, bashed the infirmiry doors open so that we could be let in. Before we knew it, we had both unconscious warriors on two medical beds. Their backs were that soaked in blood that the sheets they were placed on were red in seconds. The girl was knocked out completely, but Perseus was only semi-conscious at the moment. He regained some level of consciousness while we were carrying him, though he only mumbled something that made absolutely no sense.

"Thief...murderer...Omega..." he mumbled in his sleep. He was shaking rather badly.

"We need to see the injuries he's got," Lee Fletcher said, already getting the girls cloak off and ripping her black top off. "Annabeth, get his clothes off NOW!"

I didn't feel comfortable doing it, but I did as I was told and started pulling his robe off. I had to unbuckle his belt in order to do so because it was connected to his light grey cloak; then I managed to remove his black top which was ripped and shredded. As I got it over his head, I had to admit I did blush deeply because the guy was seriously ripped - his chest was taut with muscles; his waist had a muscular eight-pack and his arms made him look like he spent all his time climbing mountains.

Even some of the Aphrodite girls notice because some of them gasped in surprise and in glee. They even giggled when they saw him. They were actually etching towards him, up to the point where Dionysus bellowed, "Everyone out now!" The campers didn't argue - after they left it was just me, Chiron, Mr D and Luke helping the Apollo campers out with the demigods.

"He's even worse than he looked," Chiron stressed. He was wrapping a white strip of cloth around Perseus's waist, which turned red as his arrow wound gushed out blood. He then forced ambrosia into his mouth, trying to get him to heal. As usual it did work because the cuts and slashes on his face and chest vanished. He then started to breathe more easily as he inhaled air through his nose.

The girl was also doing well because after one of the medics poured nectar on her burnt skin, they started to fade and she easily rested easily.

I sighed in relief, bending over so that my hands were on my knees. Luke on the other hand looked scared out of his mind, as he glanced at the two warriors of Olympus. 

What was his problem?

=========

Two days later and they still had not woke up.

I was sitting next to Perseus's bed, watching him sleep rather peacefully. He was in a pair of black jeans and a brand new black t-shirt, which kind've made him look like some sort of punk star because as I looked at his bare right forearm he had a trident tattoo, which had a blue and green outline glow to it. As I looked further, just below his shoulder was a line of Japanese words that I couldn't read (duh, I can only understand Ancient Greek and some amount of Latin). On his other arm I could see some sort of tribal tattoo because when I look at it, it looked sort of like black flames stretching across his entire left arm and forearm.

The girl looked at peace as well - her hair had been smoothed down and her skin was fully healed from the burns she sustained. Her frame was slim and her she snored slightly which made me wonder if the guy sleeping next to me ever snored. Stop it Annabeth, I chided myself. The last thing I need to do was think about weird thoughts.

I looked at the desk table next to the head of Perseus's bed; his grey cloak was was neatly repaired and was folded on the desk. Laying on it were the objects that he was carrying on his belt - two cylinders the same width but made from two different metals: one was silver and the other was Celestial bronze. I didn't know what they were exactly, though I didn't ask questions when Chiron told me to look after them until they woke up. The girl was seen carrying a bow earlier - now it rested on her bedside, it's sheath of arrows lying flat on the floor.

I couldn't resist looking at the two cylinders. I reached out and picked up the silver one, and I almost dropped it because the metal was cold as if it came straight out of Antarctica. I gripped it by it's leather grip lightly and then I noticed that it had a little black button on it, sort of like a lightsaber from Starwars. I didn't know what came over me, but I pressed it and I gasped in shock - as I watched, a single silver blade shot outwards from the tip of the cylinder and got bigger and longer, until it reached a metre and a half. The blade was all silver and glowed with a dark blue aura, looking rather sharp and beautiful in a way.

"I'd put that down if I were you."

I snapped my head downwards and saw that Perseus was awake, his eyes opened slightly as if he were drifting off again. His eyes were the most intense sea green colour ever, almost like they were on fire which made them intimidating and mesmerising at the same time.

"The last thing that you need to do is pick up Riptide," he smirked.