The Olympians Read The Books

Break #5

As we were leaving the throne room, Luke came up to me.

"Hey, did you still want to have a duel?" he asked.

"Sure. It's been a while since we had a friendly duel," I said, putting a little more emphasis on the word 'friendly'.

"Great. Let's go," he said and the others followed to watch.

"Are you sure about this?" Annabeth asked me, on our way to the arena.

"Surprisingly, yes," I told her.

"You're a lot more civil towards Luke now," she said.

"Well, his last minute change of heart helps that. Plus, as you'll probably find out through the readings, I was kind of jealous of Luke," I said.

"Jealous? Why?" she asked.

"You were always defending him, even when he didn't deserve it," I explained. She just nodded in understanding

~~~~

When we got to the arena, Chiron laid out some ground rules.

"First, this is going to be a fair fight, which means no powers. Secondly, this is going to be like a practice duel, which means no maiming. The first one to disarm his opponent wins."

At his words, Luke and I started circling each other, until Luke made the first move. I easily blocked it and made one of my own, which he blocked as well. We kept going like this for a good 15 minutes, until I was able to disarm Luke, using the disarming technique he taught me all those years ago. 

"Percy wins!!" Chiron announced, and cheers erupted throughout most of the crowd.

"Nice job. I'm surprised you still remember that move," he told me in between gasps for air.

"Thanks. You taught me well," I responded.

"Yeah, maybe too well," he said.

"Alright, it's almost dinner, so you two go shower up, and then come to the dining hall," Hestia said.

~~~~

After a very refreshing shower, I was stopped by Paul on the way to the dining hall.

"Hey Percy, can I talk to you?" he asked me.

"Sure. What did you want to talk about?" I asked.

"I just wanted to make sure you were OK with me calling you son," he told me.

"I'm more than OK with it. I do see you as a second father figure, after all," I told him.

"Really?"

"Well, yeah. You've always been there for my mom and me, and you've taken all this craziness in stride, accepting me for who I am."

"It was a shock at first, I will admit."

"Yet, you stayed."

"Of course. Now, are you sticking with calling me Paul?"

"Yeah, for the most part. But instead of 'stepdad', your label will be 'bonus dad'. How does that sound?"

He smiled. "That sounds perfect."

~~~~

As we walked into the dining hall, and sat down, my mom asked, "What took you two?"

"We were discussing my calling Percy 'son'," Paul said.

"And how'd that go?" she asked.

"I decided to upgrade Paul's label," I said. "From 'stepdad' to 'bonus dad'."

"I like the sound of that," my mom said with a smile.

~~~~

After dinner we went our separate ways until it was time for bed. Annabeth, Grover and I decided to get in some much needed bonding time with just us three, so we went to the clearing Annabeth and I had gone to, where we sat down and started chatting.

"So what do you think the next book is about?" Grover asked.

"Probably my next summer at camp," I said.

"You mean..." Grover trailed off.

"Yep. I got two words for you, wedding dress," I said with a smirk, and he bit back a groan.

"Oh, like you have room to talk," Annabeth told me.

"Wait, what does that mean?" Grover asked.

"Nothing. It's not important," I said, before Annabeth could say anything about my furry little problem.

"Anyway, this next book is going to be interesting," Grover said.

"True. I just hope Tyson doesn't get too upset about how mean I was to him," Annabeth said.

"I wouldn't worry about him too much. He's very perceptive. I would worry about Frank though," I told her.

"Why?" she asked, hesitantly.

"Do you remember what you called those cannibals from my last day of school?" I asked her.

"Yeah," she said, gesturing for me to get to the point.

"Do you know what country Frank is from?" I asked.

"Yeah. He's from Canada... oh," she said, realizing what I meant.

"What are you talking about?" Grover asked.

"Well, on my last day of school there were some Laistrygonian giants and Annabeth called them Canadians as a way to simplify it for me," I explained.

"Ah. Well, fortunately Frank isn't the violent type," Grover said.

"That's true," Annabeth said, and we fell into a comfortable silence until it was time for bed.

~~~~

The next morning we had breakfast and then went to the throne room to start the next book.

"Who wants to read?" Hestia asked.

"I'd like to read about my son," Paul said.

"Here you go," I said, handing him the next book.

[The Sea of Monsters]

A/N: Here's the next chapter. I can't believe I am officially on Sea of Monsters!! On an unrelated note, I should be starting a new job soon, I just need to make a decision. Happy reading!!