☽
                         

WORD of the bathroom incident spread immediately. Whenever they went, campers pointed at percy and murmured something about toilet water. Or maybe they were just staring at annabeth, pandora and midas, who was still pretty much dripping wet.

Annabeth and Midas showed them a few more places: the metal shop (where kids were forging their own swords), the arts-and-crafts (where satyrs were sandblasting a giant marble statue of a goat-man and where buffy would definitely visit later), and the climbing wall, which actually consisted of two facing walls that shook violently, dropped boulders, sprayed lava, and clashed together if you didn't get to the top fast enough. To which pandora and percy shared horrified looks.

Finally they returned to the canoeing lake, where the trail led back to the cabins. "We've got training to do," Annabeth said flatly. "Dinner's at seven-thirty. Just follow your cabin to the mess hall."

"Annabeth, Midas, i'm sorry about the toilets." Liz looked at percy with feign hurt in her eyes, he should be apologizing to her as well, he did wet her with nasty toilet water.

"Whatever." Midas rolled his eyes, "It wasn't my fault." Percy tried, annabeth and midas looked at percy skeptically, and he realized it was his fault. He'd made water shoot out of the bathroom fixtures. He didn't understand how. But the toilets had responded to him. He had become one with the plumbing.

"You need to talk to the oracle," Annabeth said, Percy and pandora glancing at each other, very confused on who that is, "Who?" They said in sync, "Not who. What. The oracle. We'll ask chiron." Percy and pandora stared into the lake, wishing somebody would give them a straight answer for once.

They weren't expecting anybody to be looking back at them from the bottom, so their hearts skipped a beat when they noticed two teenage girls sitting cross-legged at the base of the pier, about twenty feet below. They wore blue jeans and shimmering green T-shirts, and their brown hair floated loose around their shoulders as minnows darted in and out. They smiled and waved as if pandora and percy were long-lost friends.

They'd didn't know what else to do. They waved back.

"Don't encourage them," Annabeth warned. "Naiads are terrible flirts." pandora looked back into the lake and looked back at annabeth and midas, "I kind of like them." pandora tilted her head down at the water.

"Naiads," Percy repeated, feeling completely overwhelmed. "That's it. We want to go home now." Percy said, looking at pandora then back at the other two.

Annabeth frowned and shared a look with midas.
"Don't you get it, percy? You guys are home. This is the only safe place on earth for kids like us."

"You mean, mentally disturbed kids?" He inquired, "I mean not human. Not totally human, anyway. Half-human." Pandora looked at annabeth with a very confused face. "Half-human and half-what?"

"I think you know." Annabeth stared at them.

Percy didn't want to admit it, but he was afraid he did. He felt a tingling in his limbs, a sensation he sometimes felt when their mom talked about his dad.

"God," He said. "Half-god."

Midas nodded, "Your fathers aren't dead, percy, pandora. They're both one of the olympians." They looked to the two siblings.

"That's..crazy." Pandora trailed off, staring off at the ground.

"Is it? What's the most common thing gods did in the old stories? They ran around falling in love with humans and having kids with them. Do you think they've changed their habits in the last few millennia?" Annabeth questioned.

"But those are just—" Percy almost said myths again. Then he remembered chiron's warning that in two thousand years, he and dory might be considered a myth. "But if all the kids here are half-gods—"

"Demigods," Annabeth said, "That's the official term. Or half-bloods." Pandora nodded to annabeth and asked, "Then who's your dad?" Her hands tightened around the pier railing. pandora got the feeling she'd just trespassed on a sensitive subject, she turned to percy who was already looking at her.

"My dad is a professor at west point," She said. "I haven't seen him since i was very small. He teaches american history."

"He's human." Pandora said in realization, Annabeth glancing at her, "What? You assume it has to be a male god who finds a human female attractive? How sexist is that." Pandora eyes widened, "What? No! I'm just saying!" She quickly denied.

"Who's your mom, then." Percy asked, getting the attention off pandora, "Cabin six." Percy paused, "Meaning..?" Annabeth straightened. "Athena. Goddess of wisdom and battle."

Okay, percy thought. Why not? "And you?" He looked to midas who was glancing around before his eyes stopped on percy, "Persephone." He sighed, "And our dads?" Percy asked. "Undetermined," Annabeth and midas said in sync.

"Like we told you before. Nobody knows."

"Except our mother. She knew." Percy tried, "Maybe not, percy. Gods don't always reveal their identities." Midas shook his head. "My dad would have. He loved her."

Annabeth and midas gave him a cautious look. They didn't want to burst his bubble. "Maybe you're right. Maybe they'll send a sign. That's the only way to know for sure: your fathers has to send you a sign to claiming you as their kids. Sometimes it happens."

"You mean sometimes it doesn't?" Pandora asked, Annabeth ran her palm along the rail. "The gods are busy. They have a lot of kids and they don't always.. well, sometimes care about us, percy, pandora. They ignore us."

Percy and pandora thought about some of the kids they'd seen in the hermes cabin, teenagers who looked sullen and depressed, as if they were waiting for a call that would never come. They'd known some kids like that at yancy academy, shuffled off to boarding school by rich parents who didn't have the time to deal with them. But gods should behave better.

Percy and pandora looked at each other, "So we're stuck here," Percy said. "That's it? For the rest of our lives?" He questioned, "It depends," Annabeth said. "Some campers only stay the summer. If you're a child of aphrodite or demeter, you probably not a real powerful force. The monsters might ignore you, so you can get by with a few months of summer training and live in the mortal world the rest of the year. But for some of us, it's too dangerous for us to leave. We're year-rounders. In the mortal world, attract monsters. They sense us. They come to challenge us. Most of the time, they'll ignore us until we're old enough to cause trouble—about ten or eleven years old, but after that, most demigods either make their way here, or they get killed off. A few manage to survive the outside world and become famous. Believe me, if i told you the names, you'd know them. Some don't even realize they're demigods. But very, very few are like that."

"So monsters can't get in here?" Pandora asked, The two other demigods shook their heads, "Not unless they're intentionally stocked in the woods or specially summoned by somebody on the inside." soleil explained, "Why would anybody want to summon a monster?" Pandora's questioned with furrowed brows.

"Practice fights. Practical jokes."

"Practical jokes?!" The girl with glasses exclaimed loudly, "The point is, the borders are sealed to keep mortals and monsters out. From the outside, mortals look into the valley and see nothing unusual, just a strawberry farm."

"So...you're a year-rounder?" Percy asked the both demigods who nodded. From the under collar of their t-shirts they pulled leather necklaces with clays beads of different colors. it was just like leah and luke's, except annabeth's also had a big gold ring strung on it, midas had a silver ring, like a college ring, they both had five beads on theirs.

"We've been here since we were seven," Annabeth said,

"Every august, on the last summer session, you get a bead for surviving another year. I've been here longer than most of the counselors, and they're all in college."

"Why did you two come so young?" Percy asked,

"None of your business." Pandora pursed her lips with a nod, "Okay, miss snappy." She muttered to herself, her eyes darting around.

"Oh." They stood there for a minute in uncomfortable silence. "So..we could just walk out of here right now if we wanted to?" Percy questioned, speaking up after a moment.

"It would be suicide, but you could, with Mr. D's or Chiron permission. But they wouldn't give permission until the end of the summer session unless.." Midas trailed off.

"Unless?"

"You were granted a quest. But that hardly ever happens. The last time.." His voice trailed off. pandora and Percy could tell that the last time hasn't gone well.

"Back in the sick room," Pandora said, "when you were feeding us that stuff—" She paused, forgetting the word, "Ambrosia." Pandora nodded. "Yeah. You asked us something about the summer solstice." Annabeth's shoulders tensed and she glanced at her friend.

"So you do know something?" She asked. "Well..no. Back at our old school, we overheard grover and chiron talking about it. Grover mentioned the summer solstice. He said something like we didn't have much time, because of the deadline. What did they mean?"

She clenched her fists. "I wish i knew. Chiron and the satyrs, they know, but they won't tell us. Something is wrong in the Olympus, something pretty major. Last time we were there, everything seem so normal."

"You've been to olympus?" Percy and pandora asked, staring at annabeth and midas, "Some of us year-rounders—Luke, leah, Clarisse, eden and me, midas and a few others—we took a field trip during winter solstice. That's when the gods have their big annual council."

"But..how did you get there?" Percy asked, "The long island railroad, of course. You get off penn station. Empire state building, special elevator to the six hundredth floor." He and Annabeth looked at them like they were sure they must know this already. "You are a New Yorker, right?"

"Oh, sure." As far as they knew, there were only a hundred and two floors in the Empire state building, but they decided not to point that out. "Right after we visited," Annabeth continued, "The weather got weird, as if the gods had started fighting. A couple of times since, we've overheard satyrs talking. The best we can figure out is that something important was stolen. And if it isn't returned by summer solstice, there's going to be trouble. When you two came, we were hoping..I mean—Athena can get along with just anybody, except for ares. And of course she's got the rivalry with poseidon. But, i mean, aside from that, i thought we could work together. I thought you might know something." Percy and pandora looked to each other then shook their heads.

They wished they could help them, but they felt too hungry and tired and mentally overloaded to ask any more questions. "We've got to get a quest," Annabeth muttered to herself. "We're not too young. If they would just tell us the problem.." Percy could smell barbecue smoke coming from somewhere nearby.

Annabeth must've heard their stomachs growl. She and midas told percy and pandora to go on, they'd catch them later. Percy and pandora left them on the pier, annabeth tracing her finger across the rail as if drawing a battle plan.

☽

Back at cabin eleven, everybody was talking and horsing around, waiting for dinner. For the first time, they noticed a lot of the campers had similar features: sharp noses, upturned eyebrows, mischievous smiles. They were the kind of kids that teachers peg as troublemakers. Thankfully, nobody paid much attention to pandora and percy as they walked over to their spots on the floor and plopped down with their minotaur horns.

The counselor, luke, came over. He had the hermes family resemblance, too. It was marred by that scar on his right cheek, but his smile was still intact. "Found you some sleeping bags," He said, "And here, i stole you some toiletries from the camp store." Percy and pandora couldn't tell if he was kidding about the stealing part.

Percy said, "Thanks." pandora nodded, "No prob." Luke sat next to them, pushed his back against the wall. "Tough day?" He asked, "We don't belong here." Pandora shook her head. "We don't even believe in gods."

"Yeah," He said. "That's how we all started. Once you start believing in them? It doesn't get easier." The bitterness in his voice surprised pandora and percy, because luke seemed like a pretty easygoing guy. He looked like he could handle just about anything.

"So you dad is hermes?" Percy asked. Luke pulled a switchblade out of his back pocket, and for a second percy thought he was going to gut him and pandora, but he just scraped the mud of the sole of his sandal. "Yeah. Hermes."

"The wing-footer messenger guy." Pandora smiled slightly, she thought hermes was cool, she only loved his wings though, "That's him. Messengers. Medicine. Travelers, merchants, thieves. Anybody who uses the roads. That's why you're here, enjoying cabin eleven's hospitality. Hermes isn't picky about who he sponsors."

Percy looked to pandora, He figured luke didn't mean to call them nobodies. He just had a lot on his mind.

"You ever meet your dad?" The girl asked. "Once." They waited, thinking that if he wanted to tell them, he'd tell them. Apparently, he didn't. Percy wondered if the story had anything to do with how he got his scar.

Luke looked up and managed a smile. "Don't worry about it, Percy, pandora. The campers here, they're mostly good people. After all, we're extended family, right? We take care of each other." He seemed to understand how lost percy and pandora felt, and they were grateful for that, because an older guy like him—even if he was a counselor—should've steered clear of two uncool middle-schoolers like them.

But luke had welcomed them into the cabin. He'd even stolen them some toiletries, which was the nicest thing anybody had done for them all day. Percy decided to ask him their last big question, the one that had been bothering them both all afternoon.

"Clarisse, from ares, was joking about us being 'Big Three' material. Then annabeth and midas..twice, they said we might be 'the ones.' They said we should talk to the oracle. What was that all about?" Luke folded his knife.

"I hate prophecies."

"What do you mean?" Pandora asked, Luke's face twitched around the scar. "Let's just say i messed things up for everybody else. The last two years, ever since my trip to the garden of the hesperides went sour, chiron hadn't allowed any more quests. Midas and Annabeth's been dying to get out into the world. They'd pestered chiron so much he finally told them he already knew their fate. He'd had a prophecy from the oracle. He wouldn't tell them the whole thing, but he said annabeth and midas wasn't destined to go on a quest yet. They had to wait until..somebody special came to the camp."

"Somebody special?"

"Don't worry about it, kid," Luke said. "Annabeth and midas wants to think every new camper who comes through here is the omen they've been waiting for. Now, come on, it's dinnertime."

The moment he said it, a horn blew in the distance. Somehow, percy knew it was a conch shell, even though he'd never heard one before. pandora stood up quickly, clearly happy to eat and dragged her brother to his feet.

Luke yelled, "Eleven, fall in!" The whole cabin, about twenty of them, filed into the commons yard. We lined up in order of seniority, so of course percy and buffy was dead last. Campers came from the other cabins, too, except for the three empty cabins at the end, and cabin right, which had looked nothing in daytime, but was now starting to glow silver as the sun went down.

They marched up the hill to the mess hall pavilion. Satyrs joined them from the meadow. Naiads emerged from the canoeing lake. A few other girls came out of the woods—and when percy say out of the woods, he means straight out of the woods. He saw one girl, about nine or ten years old, melt from the side of a maple tree and come skipping up the hill.

In all, there were maybe a hundred campers, a few dozen satyrs, and a dozen assorted wood nymphs and naiads.

At the pavilion torches blazed around the marble columns. A central fire burned in a bronze brazier the size of a bathtub. Each cabin had its own, covered in white cloth trimmed in purple. Four of the tables were empty, but cabin eleven's was way overcrowded. Percy and pandora had to squeeze on to the edge of a bench with half of percy's butt hanging off.

They saw grover sitting at table twelve with Mr. D, a few satyrs and a couple of plump blond boys who looked just like Mr. D. Chiron stood to one side, the picnic table being way too small for a centaur.

Annabeth sat at table six with a bunch of serious-looking athletic kids, all with her gray eyes and honey-blond hair. Midas sat with the hermes cabin, engrossed in a small conversation with leah.

Clarisse sat behind them at are's table. She'd apparently gotten being hosed down, because she was laughing and belching right alongside her friends.

Finally, chiron pounded his hoof against the marble floor of the pavilion, and everybody fell silent. He raised a glass. "To the gods!" He exclaimed and everybody else raised their glass. "To the gods!"

Wood nymphs came forward with platters of food: grapes, apples, strawberries, cheese, fresh bread, and yes, barbecue! Percy and pandora's glasses was empty, but leah said, "Speak to it. Whatever you want—nonalcoholic, of course." Percy and Pandora glanced at each other.

They said, "Cherry coke." The glasses filled with sparkling caramel liquid, Pandora gasped in awe, Then they both had an idea. "Blue cherry coke." The sodas turned a violent shade of cobalt.

Percy took a cautious sip. Perfect. He nodded to Pandora and they both drank a toast to their mothers. She's not gone, they told themselves. Not permanently, anyway. She's in the underworld and maybe even their mama is there too. And if that's a real place, then someday..

"Here you go, Percy, pandora," Luke said, handing them platters of smoked brisket. They loaded their plates and was about to take a big bite when percy noticed everybody getting up, carrying their plates toward the fire in the center of the pavilion. Percy wondered if they were going for dessert or something.

"Come on," Luke told them and got up with the two following him.

As they got closer, they saw everyone was taking a portion of their meal and dropping it into the fire, the ripest strawberry, the juiciest slice of beef, the warmest, most buttery roll.

Luke murmured into their ears, "Burnt offerings to the gods. They like the smell." Pandora looked to him, "You're kidding. I have to give my food—mine to a god?" She muttered.

Luke's look warned them not to take this lightly, but percy couldn't help wondering why an immortal, all-powerful being would like the smell of burning food.

Luke and Leah approached the fire, bowed their heads, and tossed in a cluster of fat red grapes. "Hermes."

Pandora and percy were next. They wished they knew what god's name to say. Finally, they made a silent plea. Whoever you are, tell me. Please. They scraped a big slice of brisket into the flames.

When they caught a whiff of the smoke, they didn't gag. It smelled nothing like burning food. It smelled of hot chocolate and fresh-baked brownies, hamburgers on the grill and wildflowers, and a hundred other good things that shouldn't have gone well together, but did.

Percy and his sister could almost believe the gods live off that smoke. When everybody had returned to their seats and finished eating their meals, Chiron pounded his hoof again for their attention. Mr. D got up with a huge sigh.

"Yes, i suppose i'd better say hello to all you brats. Well, hello. Our activities director, chiron, says the next capture the flag is friday. Cabin five presently holds the laurels." A bunch of ugly cheering rose from the ares table that made pandora look at them with concern written on her face.

"Personally," Mr. D continued, "I couldn't care less, but congratulations. Also, I should tell you that we have new campers today. Peter and Pandory Johnson." The girl gasped quietly, and looked at percy who tried to keep his laugh in.

Chiron murmured something. "Er, Percy and Pandora Jackson," Mr. D corrected. "That's right. Hurrah, and all that. Now run along to your silly campfire. Go on."

Everybody cheered. They all headed down toward the amphitheater, where apollo's cabin led a sing-along. They sang camp songs about the gods and ate s'mores and joked around, and the funny thing was, percy and pandora didn't feel anyone was staring at them anymore. They felt as they were home.

                                              ☽

Later in the evening, when the sparks from the campfire were curling into starry sky, the conch horn blew again, and they all filed back into their cabins. They don't realize how exhausted they were until they collapsed on their borrowed sleeping bags.

Percy's fingers curled around the minotaur horn. They thought about their moms, but they had good thoughts: their smiles, the bedtime stories they would read them when they were kids, the way they would tell them to not let the bedbugs bite. When they closed their eyes, they fell asleep instantly. That was their first day at camp half-blood. They wish they'd known how briefly they would get to enjoy their new home.

                                              ☽

The next few days they settled into a routine that felt almost normal, if you don't count the fact that they were getting lessons from satyrs, nymphs, and centaur.

Each morning they took ancient greek from annabeth and midas, and they talked about the gods and goddesses in present tense, which was kind of weird. They discovered annabeth and midas was right about their dyslexia: Ancient greek wasn't that hard for them to read. At least, no harder than english. After a couple of mornings, they could stumble through a few lines of homer without too much headache.

The rest of the day, percy and pandora rotated through outdoor activities, looking for something they were good at. Chiron tried to teach them archery, but they found out pretty quick they weren't any good with a bow and arrow. He didn't complain, even when he had to desnag a stray arrow out of his tail.

Foot racing? no good either. Well, for percy at least. The wood-nymph instructors left him in the dust with pandora trailing behind them slightly. The nymphs told percy to not worry about it. They'd had centuries of practice running away from lovesick gods. But still, it was a little humiliating to be slower than a tree.

And wrestling? Forget it. every time percy or pandora got on the mat, clarisse would pulverize them. "There's more where that came from, punk." she'd mumble in their ears.

The only thing they excelled at was canoeing, and that wasn't the kind of heroic skill people expected to see from the kids who beaten the minotaur.

They knew the senior campers and counselors were watching them, trying to see who their dads were, but they weren't having an easy time of it. They weren't as strong as the ares kids, or as good at archery as the apollo kids. They didn't have hephaestus's skill with metalwork—or—gods forbid—dionysus's way with vine plants.

Luke told them they might be children of hermes, a kind of jack-of-all-trades, master of none. But they got the feeling he was just trying to make them feel better. He really didn't know what to make of them either.

Despite all that, percy and pandora liked camp. They got used to the morning fog over the beach, the smell of hot strawberry fields in the afternoon, even the weird noises of monsters in the woods at night. They would eat dinner with cabin eleven, scrape part of their meals into the fire, and try to feel some connection to their real dads. Nothing came. Percy just had that warm feeling he'd always had, like the memory of his smile.

They tried not to think too much of their mom, but they kept wondering: if gods and monsters were real, if all this magical stuff was possible, surely there was some way to save them, to bring them back...

Percy and pandora started to understand luke's bitterness and how he seemed to resent his father, hermes. So, okay, maybe gods had important things to do. But couldn't they call once in a while, or thunder, or something? Dionysus could make diet coke appear out of thin air. Why couldn't their dads, whoever they were, make a phone appear?

Thursday afternoon, three days after they'd arrived to camp half-blood, they had their first sword-fighting lesson. Everybody from cabin eleven gathered in the big circular area, where luke and leah would be their instructors.

They started with basic stabbing and slashing, using some straw-stuffed dummies in greek armor. Percy and pandora guessed they did okay. At least, they understood what they were supposed to do and their reflexes were good.

The problem was, they couldn't find a blade that felt right in their hands. Either they were too heavy, or too light, or too long. Luke and Leah tried their best to fix percy and pandora up, but the siblings agreed that none of the practice blades seemed to work for percy or his sister.

They moved on to dueling in pairs. Luke and Leah announced they would be their partners, since it was their first time.

"Good luck," One of the campers told them, "Luke's the best swordsman in the last three hundred years." Leah took offense to that, "Hey, hello?! I'm right here, and totally better than this guy." She pointed her sword to luke who grinned.

"Maybe they'll go easy on us," Percy said.

The camper snorted.

Luke and Leah showed them thrusts and parries and shield blocks the hard way. With every swipe, they got a little more battered and bruised. "Keep your guards up, Percy, Pandora." Luke'd say than he and leah would whap them in the ribs with the flat of their blades.

"No, not that far up!" Whap! "Lunge!" Whap! "Now, back!" Whap!

By the time luke called a break, Pandora and percy was soaked in sweat. Everybody swarmed the drinks cooler. Luke poured ice water on his head, which looked like such a good idea, Pandora pushed percy out the way and did the same then kept complaining about the heat.

"I'll hit you in your ribs if you do that again." Percy threatened then poured the ice water over his head while pandora glared at him.

Instantly, Percy felt better. Strength surged back into his arms. The sword didn't feel so awkward while pandora's arms still felt weak, still complaining about how it is and the need for a little breeze.

"Okay, everybody circle up!" Luke ordered after whispering into his sisters ear. "If percy and pandora doesn't mind, we want to give you a little demo." Great, Percy thought and looked to pandora. Let's all watch percy and pandora get pounded.

The hermes guys gathered around. They were suppressing smiles. Percy figured they've been in his and pandora's shoes before and couldn't wait to see how luke and leah used them for a punching bag.

Luke told everybody he and leah was going to demonstrate a disarming technique: how to twist the enemy's blade with the flat of your own sword so that he had no choice but to drop his own weapon.

"This is difficult," He stressed. "I've had it used against me. No laughing at percy and dory, now. Most swordsmen have to work years to master this technique." Leah and Luke demonstrated the move on percy and pandora in slow motion. Sure enough, the swords clattered out of their hands.

"Now in real time," He said, after they'd retrieved their weapons. "We keep sparring until one of us pulls it off. Ready, Percy, Pandora?" They nodded nodded, and luke and leah came after them.

Somehow, they kept the hermes siblings from getting a shot at the hilts of their swords. Their senses opened up. They saw leah and luke attacks coming. They countered. They stepped forward and tried thrusts of their own. Luke and Leah deflected it easily, but they saw a change in luke and leah's faces. Their eyes narrowed, and they to press them with more force.

The swords grew heavy in percy and pandora's hands. The balance wasn't right. They knew it was a matter of seconds before luke and leah took them down, so they figured, what the heck?

Pandora and Percy quickly glanced at each other and tried to do the disarming maneuver.

Their blades hit the base of luke and leah's and percy and pandora twisted, putting their whole weight into a downward thrust. Clang. Luke and leah's swords rattled against the stones. The tip of percy and pandora's blades was an inch from leah and luke undefended chests.

The other campers were silent. pandora and percy shared another look and lowered their swords. "Um, sorry."

For a moment, luke and leah was too stunned to speak. "Sorry?" Luke's scarred face broke into a grin along with his sister. "By the gods, percy, dory, why are you sorry? Show us that again!"

They didn't want to. The short burst of manic energy had completely abandoned them. But luke insisted. This time, there was no contest. The moment their swords connected, luke and leah hit the hilts of percy and pandora swords and sent their weapons skidding across the floor.

After a long pause, somebody in the audience said, "Beginner's luck?" Luke wiped the sweat of his brow. He appraised percy and elizabeth with an entirely new interest. "Maybe," He said. "But i wonder what percy and dory could do with a balanced sword.."

"I'm tired." Pandora dropped her head onto percy's shoulder and let out a huge sigh while percy patted her head before pushing her off of him.

                                              ☽