𝐃𝐄𝐉𝐀 𝐕𝐔 • Percy Jackson.

II-08

        THEY SNAKED THROUGH THE CORRIDORS. An attempt to find Luke was made as they all ventured from their cabin onwards to the admiralty suite.  Annabeth scouted ahead with her invisibility cap on. They hid whenever someone passed by, but almost everyone paid no attention to them. They seemed soulless with the trance they were in.

As they came up the stairs to deck thirteen, where the admiralty suite was supposed to be, Annabeth hissed, "Hide!" and shoved them all into a supply closet. Amani didn't have time to think before he was immediately squished between what he assumed was the wall and someone else. "What the hell!" Amani muttered feeling a sense of dread fall into his stomach. Oh he absolutely loathed tight spaces.

He felt his breath halt as he strained his ears to hear a couple of guys coming down the hall. "You see that Aethiopian drakon in the cargo hold?" He heard one of them say. Amani tensed his body as he felt someone shift besides him, feeling their entire existence way too fucking close besides him. The other laughed. "Yeah, it’s awesome." He felt someone squeeze his hand, he took a breath. He heard Percy mutter, "ow!" And it was then he realized he was crushing Percy's hand with his tight grip. He released his hold and whispered  a quick apology.

"I hear they got two more coming after Luke's assistant," the familiar voice said. "They keep arriving at this rate, oh, man – no contest!" The voices faded down the corridor. Amani immediately opened the door of the closet and took a deep breath. "That was Chris Rodriguez!" Annabeth took off her cap and turned visible. "You remember – from Cabin Eleven." Amani thought, real hard (he really did!), And he doesn't know who the hell that is. He nodded anyway.

"What’s another half-blood doing here?" Annabeth shook her head, clearly troubled. Amani only frowned, a sick feeling in his stomach as he recalled Val's words. He wonders where he is. They kept going down the corridor. "Guys." Annabeth stopped suddenly. "Look." She stood in front of a glass wall looking down into the multistorey canyon that ran through the middle of the ship. At the bottom was the Promenade – a mall full of shops – but that’s not what had caught Annabeth’s attention.

Instead it was a group of monsters assembled in front of the candy store: a dozen Laistrygonian giants, two hellhounds, and a few even stranger creatures – humanoid females with twin serpent tails instead of legs. "Scythian Dracaenae," Annabeth whispered. "Dragon women." The monsters made a semicircle around a young guy in Greek armor who was hacking on a straw dummy. Amani found it hard to swallow as the boy wore an orange shirt, "Luke was the only one who betrayed us. He can't have some group or army yet–" Yet here it was. The facts–the evidence.

The guy in armor stabbed the dummy through its belly and ripped upwards. Straw flew everywhere. The monsters cheered and howled.

Annabeth stepped away from the window. Her face was ashen. "Let's go." Amani said, Percy nodded. "The sooner we find Luke, the better." At the end of the hallway were double oak doors that looked like they must lead somewhere important. When they were ten metres away, Tyson stopped. "Voices inside." He warned. "You can hear that far?" Percy asked.

Tyson closed his eye like he was concentrating hard. Then his voice changed, becoming a husky approximation of Luke’s. "– the prophecy ourselves. The fools won’t know which way to turn." Before anyone could react, Tyson’s voice changed again, becoming deeper and gruffer. "You really think the old horseman is gone for good?" Tyson laughed Luke’s laugh. "They can’t trust him. Not with the skeletons in his closet. The poisoning of the tree was the final straw."

Annabeth shivered. "Stop that, Tyson! How do you do that? It’s creepy." Amani nodded, "sick as hell though." He complimented and Annabeth shot him a bewildered look. "What? It's true!" He defended. Tyson opened his eye and looked puzzled. "Just listening, thank you Amani." Percy urged, "keep going. What else are they saying?" Tyson closed his eye again. He hissed in the gruff man’s voice, "Quiet!" Then Luke’s voice, whispering, "Are you sure?" And it was then Amani realized what was happening.