Only a Game (Olympus Drive Chronicles)

Chapter 52: Out of the Sea

Calypso

"Come on, come on," I breath into the boy's mouth as I pound his chest. Water keeps bubbling up. He's limp and cold from the ocean. It wanted so badly to take him. So badly. But of course I snatched his still warm body from its grasp. The sea will claim no victims tonight.

"Come on, breath for me," I say, breathing more air into his lips.

Finally he starts coughing, coughing up more sea water, and gasping. His dark curls full of sand, and perfect chocolate eyes squinting at me, even though I'm only lit by the moon. I realize I ran into the ocean in just my blue sundress. I tug the damp fabric awkwardly.

The boy keeps coughing.

"Come on, I'll get you inside, I'm sorry you must be cold," I say, picking him up. He can't weigh more than a hundred pounds, scrawny devil, weighed down by a fifty pound backpack.

"Cally why did you let the little mongrel off his leash---oh sweet Lucifer not another stray? I don't like people in my house—"

"Shut up dad---I found him in the water," I say, carrying the boy to the sofa.

"Yes, I'd gathered. I found out who the little mongrel belongs to. I'll be mailing them chains so they can keep it properly locked up," my father, not even getting up from the table.

"You're safe now---I'm sorry my name's Calypso, Cally—that's basically my dad Mr. Helios," I say, helpfully, as the boy coughs and breaths deeply, looking around like he's never seen the inside of a mansion before.

"Basically your dad?"

"Shut up, I'm introducing us, what's your name? Do you speak English? Greek?" I try the last bit in Greek.

"English," the boy says, in a thick eastern European accent,  "English and Danish—and French—I'm sorry I'm ruining your sofa."

"Basically your dad?"

"Shush—you're fine lay still, I fished you out of the Agean do you remember going in?" I ask, fetching a towel.

"Your mother rejects me for two millennia and marries two of my stupid brothers for me to be BASICALLY your dad?"

"Feel free to completely ignore him. I do," I say, giving him a towel and wrapping one around myself.

"More than a thousand years of rejection and I am BASICALLY YOUR DAD?"

"Viktor Metion," the boy says, politely, he has a soft accent, though his English is fluid, "I----oh my god. What time is it? My dad is going to be furious with me."

"Oh is he basically your father as well?"

"Don't you have cows to feed?" I growl.

"My dad, I was supposed to meet him---he's going to kill me," the boy says, sadly.

"Well you almost died so we'll tell him that. And it's the middle of the night you're not going anywhere now. I have a phone, can we call your dad?" I ask.

"I have a phone—which is probably broken," he  feels his pockets, sadly. Of course the phone is quite drenched.

"Here, get that off—what were you doing?" I ask, helping him take off some sort of heavy backpack, as well as a messenger bag and harness.

"Fly---it's a jet pack," he explains, "it's solar powered----I can probably fix it."

"Do you know your dad's number?" I ask, holding up my phone.

"No," he says, "He doesn't have a phone---I'm sorry where are we?"

"On my basically my dad's island," I say, for my dad's benefit as he goes off to the kitchen to mumble to himself. "You're free to stay as long as you like."