madness and ecstasy // leo valdez

-don't vape, kids-

Teqi was still. Her heart was about to beat out of her chest, but she pretended to be sedated. Something cold and hard wrapped around her wrists, and they clinked loudly. Then the cold metal was around her neck, but not stopping her from breathing, which she tried to do slowly. 'Just stay calm, you can get out of here.' Teqi thought, her body feeling floaty and light with panic. Coach couldn't be far; he had just been looking at the skull.

She swayed like a rag doll when Keto put her down, leaving her discarded and chained up in the back of the van. Teqi nearly flinched when Keto touched her face, but then the cold metal was over her mouth and the sea goddess's slimy fingers were the least of Teqi's problems.

She heard footsteps head towards the other side of the little tin box, and then the squeaking of a door opening and shutting. The van started, vibrating underneath Teqi. The loud engine was hopefully loud enough to block out the sounds of the chains moving as Teqi sat up, blinking rapidly. She waited a moment for her eyes to adjust to the darkness, and she was thankful for the cracks in the tin.

Teqi looked down at where the needle had been jabbed into her ribs, but instead there was just a slightly squashed golden toucan in her pocket. 

She smiled, putting it back in her side pocket, though it had a bent wing.                                                                                                                     The coldness on her wrists were thick handcuffs, not the type police use, but the type that are in movies, the ones they use to chain up feral dogs or prisoners of war. The chain connecting them split off and connected to a large circle of metal around her neck, that was rubbing against her skin and hurting. They were heavy, and weighing her down. She was already slumped; she didn't need encouragement.

Teqi blinked back tears, her breathes becoming shaky. No one else was in the back of the truck, there were a few cages in one corner, for something the size of a rabbit, but they were empty. She slid across the floor slightly, and felt the truck turn a sharp corner. Where ever Keto was driving her, they were in a hurry.

Teqi bent down so her hands could reach all the pockets in her pants, and found her knives. The one she had been holding was long gone, probably lost in the aquarium somewhere, but she tried to cut at the cuffs on her wrists with the remaining two. It just clinked loudly, and Teqi turned to the glass in between where she was, and where Keto was driving the truck. She would be able to hear her.

Teqi shuffled to the glass, straining her ears to see if anybody else was in the cab. Only the sound of Keto humming along to 'baby shark', and then the robotic voice of the direction's lady on Google Maps.

"Turn left in three hundred meters and continue along Georgia aquarium lane."

That meant they weren't too far away from the aquarium. Hopefully Frank and Percy had escaped whatever trick mister krabbs had made, and Coach had found them. Even if Teqi was shipped off to somewhere else, they would be safe. A tear slid down her cheek and onto the metal covering her mouth, which stretched around the back of her neck, and was impossible to slide off.

Percy thunked his forehead against the glass of his own personal fish tank. Well, that's it, he thought dejectedly. I'll have to live in a plastic gingerbread house the rest of my life, fighting my giant goldfish friend and waiting for feeding time. Quite ironic for a son of Poseidon, but the gods did think they were funny. Look! Frank said, waving one of his flippers frantically.