Jace Irons: The Shard of Chaos

Chapter Twenty-Three: The Battle of the Labyrinth

"Briar!" I yelled running towards him. He did the same. We gave each other a hard bro hug, exchanging a multitude of questions and answers.

"You're alive!"

"So're you! How?"

"Modern medicine, bruh. Metal arm?"

"Lost it to the manticore."

"Thought I dreamed that..."

"I'm good though. What're you doing?"

"Heading back to camp, what about you?"

"Same."

"Let's frickin go, dude!"

We bro hugged again and turned around to see David standing there on the sidewalk, waving awkwardly.

"Oh, damn!" I said, realizing he and David probably didn't know each other. "Briar, this is David. He's had my back throughout our entire quest."

David stepped forward. "Hey. David Vorhees, son of Hermes."

Briar shook his hand. "Hey, I'm Briar. Licensed searcher and protector."

"This is the guy who escorted me to camp. Thought I lost him when this happened during the manticore attack on the way to camp." I said, gesturing to my metal arm.

David balked. "That's the guy? Well it's good to meet you, bro."

"Same, man." said Briar.

We began walking down the sidewalk. "So the camp sent you guys on a quest?" asked Briar, incredulous.

"Eh, not exactly." I said. "Kind of a personal quest. Ditched camp to get an item that can help us defend it better."

"Yo, what?" said an astounded Briar.

"You guys just left?"

"Yup,"

"For what?"

"This." I pulled the power core out of my backpack and showed it to Briar. The morning sun shone bright overhead, but the power core glowed with an intense fiery light. Briar's eyes widened.

"That's not..." he began.

"Oh yeah." I assured. "Went all the way to a volcano in Arizona to get it."

"Did you meet Hephaestus?" asked Briar earnestly.

"Yeah," I replied. "Turns out he's my dad,"

"No way,"

"Way."

"Well jeez, bro. Glad your quest was a success. Can't wait to get back to camp."

"Yeah, about that..." interrupted David. "We actually gotta get back there pretty fast."

"Why? What's wrong?" asked Briar, concerned.

"Come on, I'll tell you on the way." I said.

We ran to the nearest bus station and hopped on the next bus to New York City. On the way, David and I told Briar all about our quest, about my dreams, my exosuit, the snake, the cyclops, everything. The only things we left out were Phillip and Reyna, because we had sworn up and down not to tell anyone at Camp Half-Blood about Camp Jupiter. The prevention of another war depended on it.

We rode on the bus for about an hour, when soon the scenery along the road became somewhat familiar. Soon after that, the bus pulled over at a rest stop. We decided to hop off and stretch our legs and/or hooves. I knew we had to be close to camp. I took a look around and noticed that the rest stop we were at was the same one I had stolen that truck from a few weeks ago. It seemed like forever.