Kalliope (PJO)

11. The bigger picture is... ugly

Heeeyyy...

I'm so sorry this took so long! I started my last year of school and it's kicking my butt, so I had NO TIME to do anything, and I'm really sorry about that. Anyways, I hope y'all enjoy the chapter.

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The ocean would have probably been really pretty if it wasn't full of things that wanted to eat her.

Percy and Annabeth had questioned her for what felt like hours (it was probably only ten minutes) until they were satisfied that she wasn't a spy for Circe trying to bring them back, or whatever the fuck they'd thought she was.

They seemed to believe her now, or at least enough for Annabeth to go to bed and leave her alone with only Percy.

He seemed to be in his element, literally. He waved his hand around his head and a wave of water that had been about to crash into the ship made a wide arc over them instead. Mari could see the little fish swimming around  inside, and it reminded her of a school trip to the Aquarium when she was six. The teacher had taken her whole class through a tube under the water to see the fish up close.

Mari had named one of the fish Fin (because she'd thought it was clever) and followed Fin around instead of filling in her sheet. Then she'd tried to jump into the tank to play with Fin. An employee ended up having to fish her out with a mini crane, and the trip was ended early (and Mari wondered why she'd had no friends). She was smart enough not to try and jump into the Sea of Monsters to play with the fish this time around, though.

The Sea of Monsters.

She'd wondered how much conspiracy theorists online would pay to hear what the Bermuda triangle really was. Probably a lot. Either that or she'd be blocked. It didn't matter, it wasn't like she could use technology without sending out a signal to every hungry monster in the vicinity, anyway. That and the fact that the gods would probably murder her.

But sailing through it on a death quest to find an evil cyclops? Not the top of her to-do list. At least she'd get back to camp... if she survived. It was the 'if' part that was freaking her out. But what were her other options? Make a raft and sail back on her own? That was an easy way to get killed by a monster, or just drown. And what would she make a raft with, anyway?

Even if by some miracle she managed to get back to camp, camp wasn't safe anymore. Luke had gone crazy and poisoned Thalia's tree.

Well, according to Percy he'd done some other stuff in between the going crazy part and the poisoning Thalia's tree part. Like joining Kronos. And trying to kill Percy. And stealing Zeus's lightening bolt (Seriously, how did he survive?). Not to mention kidnapping her and dumping her to rot on Circe's island for five years.

Five fucking years.

There wasn't any time on Aeaea, she'd known that. Part of her had been scared that when she finally escaped it would be the year 3056 and everyone would be flying around on hoverboards, but a larger part of her had hoped she'd only been gone for a few months...

Mari still didn't understand why Luke had had Circe train her and not just imprison her in a dungeon or something. Maybe she never would. Mari squeezed her eyes shut. She needed to stop thinking.