The Path Of Glory (Annabeth Chase x Male Reader)

49. Zombie Gardening

What to start with?

Maybe with the number of times Ethan and Percy had almost caused serious traffic accidents on the Long Island Expressway, flying on Blackjack during daytime. Six. No more, no less. It's one thing for drivers to see Y/N flying overhead—a bird; nothing weird—but a pegasus with a fourteen-year-old boy and a twenty-eight-year-old satyr riding on it—that was too much.

They flew up in the clouds, which were, fortunately, pretty low in the winter. They darted around, trying to keep the white Camp Half-Blood van in sight. Eagle eyes were useful, but they didn't stop them from losing the van twice.

Percy said he had a pretty good sense that it would go into Manhattan first, so they went there.

Traffic was bad with the holidays. It was midmorning before the van got into the city, and Y/N, Ethan and Percy had already landed near the top of the Chrysler Building and were eating donuts as they watched it, thinking it would pull into the bus station. But it just kept driving.

"Where's Argus taking them?" Percy muttered, and he gulped down another donut.

Blackjack whinnied.

"Which girl?"

Whinny.

"Zoë?"

Whinny.

"What is it?" Y/N asked.

"Blackjack's telling me it's Zoë who's driving, not Argus," Percy said.

"Hey, Y/N," Ethan said, holding up his emptied box of donuts. "Can you get some more before we go?"

Y/N grinned. "What do you think? I won't let us starve. Start following them, I'll catch up."

Upon these words, he transformed into an eagle and fluttered down the building, toward the donut stall that was there.

"Get the hell away from here, birdie!" the owner shouted, throwing a pebble at him.

Next second, Y/N was soaring skyward, a box of donuts in his talons.

He was about to fly away, looking around for Ethan, Percy, and Blackjack. He found them—they hadn't moved from the top of the Chrysler Building. Someone else was there.

Y/N almost dropped the box of donuts. It was Mr. D.

"You," the god said, pointing at him. "Come here."

Y/N didn't try to fly away; better to comply than to get hit by a ninja grape vine coming out of nowhere.

He landed and transformed back to human next to Ethan.

"So," Mr. D said. "Going somewhere?"

He was leaning against the building with his feet levitating in the air, his leopard-skin warm-up suit and black hair whipping around in the wind.

Blackjack whinnied frantically.

Mr. D sighed in exasperation. "The next person, or horse, who calls me the 'wine dude' will end up in a bottle of Merlot!"

"Mr. D," Percy said cautiously. "What do you want?"

Ethan was shaking like a leaf. If he ever opened his mouth, Y/N was sure he would bleat madly.

"Oh, what do I want?" Mr. D said. "You thought, perhaps, that the immortal, all-powerful director of camp would not notice you leaving without permission?"

"Well . . . yeah," Y/N said.

"I should throw you off the building, minus the ability to transform into a bird, and see how heroic you sound on the way down."