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chapter four. ☄︎. *. ⋆
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AFTER THE SCRAWNY, ANNOYING NEW KID was claimed as Poseidon territory, you would think people were flocking to his side in apologetic whimpers for the way they underestimated him and his powers—at least, maybe Percy had been expecting for people to do that—but no such luck. In fact, the kid became more of an outcast than ever before. He lived by himself in cabin three, ate by himself at the table for cabin three, did activities all by himself (seeing as he was the head counselor for cabin three.)
I had not a sliver of empathy for him. Nada. If he wanted my pity, he shouldn't have been such a douchebag towards me.
And I'm not saying it's his fault he's Poseidon's son, but I am totally blaming him for being so insufferably annoying.
To my pleasure, it was a few days until I saw Percy after the game of capture the flag. Either I managed skillfully enough to duck and weave when he came around, or he took it upon himself to not be present where I was; but either way, I was back to spending my free time the way I liked it: With either Annabeth, Will, or any of my other siblings, sparring and doing normal camp activities.
Not much happened, though, since Percy's claiming. It was like Poseidon had made this big decision to announce that Percy was his son, and now the gods went silent in preparation for Zeus's response.
And by the looks of it, he was about ready to unleash it. The skies over camp were a dark gray—sorta like the color Annabeth's eyes are when she's upset—and the winds were picking up. If I didn't know better, I'd say a storm was brewing; but this is Camp Half-Blood, and storms literally can't brew here.
It was four days after capture the flag that Annabeth rushed up to me with the glee of a kid in a candy store. She was breathless—perhaps from running all the way from wherever she had chugged four gallons of coffee—but still grinning from ear to ear. I could swear she was shaking. Maybe it was the electricity from the growing storm in the air, but her hair looked to be on edge, too.
"Something...wrong?" I asked, for lack of a better word, setting down my bow. She had interrupted my archery lesson with Cass, a second-year Apollo camper. I gestured for Cass to wait a second, then led Annabeth off to where we could talk in private.
"Percy's going on a quest." Her eyes literally sparkled. I wasn't sure I heard her correctly at first, but she swallowed and repeated (very quickly), "He's going on a quest, and I think I'm gonna get to go with him, and we're gonna get Zeus's lightning bolt back!"
I scoffed of surprise. No way Percy was going on a quest. He was too dimwitted, and Chiron must have known it would be too stupid to send him out so quickly after being claimed as a child of the Big Three. Percy must have been playing a prank on Annabeth.
