-Front steps of Big House, Camp Half-Blood; Where we last left off-

~Hazel's Point of View~

Nyke smiled a little. "The ship carrying Units 1 and 5 has arrived."

"Ship?" Leo asked, perking up with a mischievous grin. " Like a boat or-"

"An airship. One of the best in the universe." Vernandos explained proudly with a grin. "Would you be up for a tour?"

"Vernandos!" Several of the unit leaders exclaimed in shock.

"Head Commander." Hesper said, pointedly staring at him to do something.

Nyke sighed. "A tour of the airship doesn't seem like a bad idea." He shrugged. Leo let out a shout of glee. "On the condition that whoever goes on this tour is supervised the whole time. We don't need another incident because someone messed with something they weren't supposed to."

"It was one time!" Milos groaned.

"To be fair, we are all guilty of messing with things we weren't supposed to." Malantha interjected.

There was a brief silence between the leaders at those words.

"What?" Apollo questioned quietly, sounding baffled.

"What the Hades is wrong with you?" Thalia asked.

The Chaos' Army leaders turned to her in unison. "What isn't wrong with us?"

"Malantha!"

"What?" She shrugged. "Besides, isn't that rude to Hades using his name like that?"

"What she says is true." Apollo commented.

Will frowned at his dad. "Was that supposed to be a joke?"

"Are you going to stand around talking or are you going to go meet with the newly arrived units?" Several leaders jumped from the new voice that came from behind them. Milos yelped. "Is that how you greet a fellow army member, Unit Leader Milos?"

"Alala!" Hesper happily greeted her. "I'm glad to see you made it." The unit 1 leader seemed so serious that I didn't expect to hear her sound excited.

"It's good to see you as well, Unit Leader Hesper." She greeted her back.

"You're late, Alala." Nyke frowned. "What happened and who was flying the ship?"

Alala's demeanor changed as she huffed and crossed her arms against her chest. "We ran into some navigation problems, hit some turbulence, and our unit 5 pilot had fallen asleep around the time we hit Earth's mesosphere."

"Earth's what-sphere?" I heard Leo ask.

"The pilot fell asleep?" Vernandos asked. "Do you know the cause?"

Alala shook her head. "Not at the moment. Lord Chaos was informed, and we started an investigation, but the one that was appointed to be in charge of it is..." She trailed off, sounding uncertain.

"Who is in charge?" Nyke asked next.

Alala sighed. "He put Kosmos in charge of the investigation." The unit leaders started asking questions, talking over each other, and then they were getting louder.

"Why would he put Kosmos in charge?"

"Shouldn't Nyke be the one to investigate this?"

"Where did Kosmos even go?"

"I haven't seen Kosmos since before Percy showed up."

The last statement was said by Malantha. Looking around, I think I was the only one who heard her quiet statement. It was like she knew Percy personally.

"Nyke!" Jupiter - or Zeus? - yelled, walking towards us.

"Yes, Zeus?" The Head Commander asked politely.

"Why is there a flying ship trying to invade the border by my daughter's tree?" He demanded, glaring down at Nyke.

"Don't talk about my tree as if you aren't the reason why I was a tree." Thalia said under her breath, frowning at her father. I heard someone choke behind me.

"My apologies, Zeus. It seems our ship carrying units 1 and 5 ran into a bit of trouble landing. We are taking care of the problem as we speak. If you will excuse us, we will be checking in with our comrades to figure out what went wrong." He quickly bowed slightly. "We apologize for any inconvenience."

Several unit leaders coughed and laughed slightly. Hesper even scoffed.

Zeus' face contorted in anger. "Are you disrespecting me? How dare you-"

"Lord Zeus." Everything stopped. Everyone turned at those words seeing the assassin of Chaos. "Please keep in consideration that there are children present at this camp. Children that belong to your own children as well as demigod children of yours. Out of everyone present, there are only two gods aside from yourself. Please do not attempt to act on your anger."

"Kosmos." Nyke sounded surprised.

"Head Commander." He dipped his head slightly, respectively. "Lord Chaos informed of the situation, if you would come with me to the ship we can resolve this situation." The unit leaders tensed at those words, acting as if there was another meaning behind them. 'Resolve the situation...?' I thought over the words, realizing what Kosmos might mean.

"Annabeth, does that mean...?" Piper asked the daughter of Athena quietly.

"Yes." She nodded, her gray eyes wide in slight fear.

"Kosmos." Poseidon stepped forward. "What do you mean you will resolve the situation? You don't mean you will-"

"No." The assassin interrupted. "Depending on the findings in this investigation, there will be consequences to match the offense and that will be done by Lord Chaos. I will not be using my skills here as long as I can help it. And if there comes a time for me to use them, I will try to shield the children of the camp. I do not harm children." Kosmos promised. Even though his voice stayed monotone, I can hear the sincerity in his words.

"Alright." Nyke spoke. "I will go with you to the ship."

"Nyke!" Hesper hissed.

"If you are worried, Unit 1 Leader. You can come as well." Kosmos turned to Alala. "I will also be requiring your help." He suddenly started walking away in the direction of Half-Blood Hill. Nyke followed. Hesper and Alala shared a look before going after them.

"Well, I better go to meet up with my unit." Milos stated, nodding to his fellow unit leaders before setting off towards the hill as well.

"Can I still see the ship?" Leo asked Vernandos.

Vernandos smiled, perking up at the topic change. "Let's give them time to figure out what happened during the flight before we can allow more people onboard." He stretched his face a little in thought. "How about you show me that ship of yours and then I can show you ours?"

Leo grinned, rubbing his hands together. "We have a deal."

"Leo!" Frank hissed, looking alarmed. "Remember what happened last time."

"It's fine, Frank." Annabeth said, staring at the distance to Half-Blood Hill where some retreating figures can still be seen. "Leo, you can take Vernandos to the Argo II."

Zeus sputtered. "Daughter of Athena-"

"Relax, Brother." Poseidon spoke up. "We are at Camp Half-Blood. The demigods have their own way of leadership here. We are merely guests."

"Poseidon!"

"Uncle Poseidon is right." Apollo grinned. "The kids have their own way of doing things. We can't come in and disrupt that."

Zeus gritted his teeth. "Fine." Was all he said after a tense stared down between the gods. "We will do things according to the camp leaders then."

"Thank you. Now let's go make sure the others are behaving." Poseidon moved towards the sky god, nudging him away from the big house.

Apollo let out a breath. "That could have gone worse." He winked at us. "Better be on your best behaviors." Was the last thing he said before walking back into the big house to the infirmary.

Will sighed. "Gods..." He shook his head, following behind the sun god.

"Ready for the grand tour of the great Argo II by the one and only Supreme Commander of the Argo II?" Leo grinned, throwing his arms out to the side as if to say "ta-da."

Vernandos chuckled. "Lead the way, Supreme Commander of the Argo II"

Leo beamed, moving towards Bunker 9 with the unit leader in tow, a spring in his steps as he excitedly talked with big hand gestures.

Jason whistled. "I have not seen Leo that happy in some time..."

"I don't think we've ever seen him that happy." Piper stared thoughtfully at the two getting further away.

Charis giggled. "I should go too. Just to make sure Vernandos doesn't lose track of time and misses dinner or something."

"We just had breakfast. Don't you mean lunch?" Frank asked.

She giggled again with a head shake. "No, I mean dinner." The fourth unit leader smiled softly. "Vernandos has a habit of skipping several meals in a row."

Piper groaned. "So does Leo." She looked towards Jason. "Are you going to watch him or should I?"

"You do have the ability to charmspeak him if need be." He replied.

Charis perked up. "Really?"

"Actually, Jason." Annabeth spoke before Piper could. "We should go to see Chiron."

Jason was taken back. "But-"

"No, Annabeth's right. I'll go too." Thalia glared at her brother.

He sighed. "Alright." Jason smiled apologetically at his girlfriend. "You can take Leo this time, Pipes."

Piper nodded with a slight smile. "Sure."

"You should come as well, Frank." The daughter of Athena stared, daring for him to refuse.

Frank only nodded, giving me a quick kiss on the cheek.

I smiled watching them leave.

"He seems nice." I jumped at the sudden voice. "Sorry, I didn't mean to startle you."

"No, I'm sorry. I must have forgotten that you were here." I smiled apologetically at Malantha.

The unit 2 leader smiled warmly. "Don't worry about it." She hesitated for a moment. "Could I talk to you for a moment?"

"Uh, sure." I nervously answered.

"Great. Come with me." She took my hand and took off towards the strawberry fields.

"What were you wanting to talk about?" I asked once we strolled through the fields for a few minutes.

"A long time ago, I left my brother behind to make my own path. Not long after that...I went away and failed to return." She started, smiling wistfully into the distance. "I had always looked after him. I needed some distance away from him to find my own path. Perhaps I took an easy way out. I left him in the care of those who saved us."

"Those who saved you?" I asked, feeling like I heard this story before.

The unit leader nodded. "Yeah. The life of a demigod isn't easy, you know?"

I stopped walking, blinking at the Chaos' Army member. "You...you're a demigod?"

"Yep, my brother and I were saved by a group of demigods. I ultimately became a hunter of Artemis." She shook her head. "But that's not what I wanted to talk to you about." Malantha turned her head to me, her bottom half of her face that I could see was serious. "What's it like being a daughter of Pluto?"

"What?" I was taken back by the sudden turn of topic.

"What's it like being a daughter of Hades' Roman form?" She restated her question.

"Bianca?"

This past work week was terrible. I am posting this at 10PM because I wrote the majority of  chapter 14 in the last two hours. 

This system of waiting to publish a chapter until I finish the next is working so well for this book. I seriously lost all motivation, but because I can't publish this chapter until the next one is written, I have something to kick my butt into gear to write. 

Anyway, it's late. I need to go to bed. I hope you enjoyed the slight cliffhanger. Chapter 14 has a few cliffhangers as well. And I hope you enjoy this chapter. 

I will be back next Saturday. 

~MsPenguingirl1234.

Published: April 15, 2023.