ONE LAST TIME . . . heroes of olympus

11

THEY STOPPED AT the doors so Kat could calm Leo down and hide her ruby pendant, which was lighting up. That meant that monsters were nearby. Leo was breathing heavily; and she guessed it wasn't just from the running, although he's very non-athletic. Which is fine; though when they were at the Wilderness School, she'd laughed at him during lessons because of how hilariously slow he was.

Kat peered inside. Nothing looked different. Gray morning light filtered through the hole in the roof. A few lightbulbs flickered, but most of the factory floor was still lost in shadows. She could make out the catwalk above, the dim shapes of heavy machinery along the assembly line, but no movement. No sign of Jason or Piper.

She almost called out, but she restrained herself. Something smelled wrong — like burning motor oil and sour breath. Her body shifted into high gear, all her nerves tingling.

Somewhere on the factory floor, Piper's voice cried out: "Kat, Leo, help!"

But Kat held her tongue. How could Piper have gotten off the catwalk with her broken ankle?

"Leo," she whispered, turning around and looking at him seriously, for once. She waited until he made eye contact with her. "I know this is a horrible, scary situation. But I need you to not do anything impulsive. Okay?"

He stared at her with an anguished expression before slowly nodding.

"We don't know what's in there, so I don't have a plan," her hands were shaking, but she willed them not to. "But we need to stay calm, be silent and sneaky. We need to get Piper and Jason and leave, in any way possible. But fighting's the last resort, because you can't fight. But it's fine, I'll go on my rampage and we'll all be fine." Kat tried to joke, but it was shaky. "Okay? I need your support in there."

"Yeah," Leo promised. "I got your back."

They slipped inside and ducked behind a cargo container. Slowly, making sure her sword wasn't visible, Kat worked her way toward the center of the room, hiding behind boxes and hollow truck chassis, Leo following her with a sneakiness she was proud of. Finally she reached the assembly line. She crouched behind the nearest piece of machinery — a crane with a robotic arm.

Piper's voice called out again: "Leo? Kat?" Less certain this time, but very close.

Kat peeked around the machinery. Hanging directly above the assembly line, suspended by a chain from a crane on the opposite side, was a massive truck engine — just dangling thirty feet up, as if it had been left there when the factory was abandoned. Below it on the conveyor belt sat a truck chassis, and clustered around it were three dark shapes the size of forklifts. Nearby, dangling from chains on two other robotic arms, were two smaller shapes — maybe more engines, but one of them was twisting around as if it were alive.

Then one of the forklift shapes rose, and Kat realized it was a humanoid of massive size. "Told you it was nothing," the thing rumbled. Its voice was too deep and feral to be human.

One of the other forklift-sized lumps shifted, and called out in Piper's voice: "Guys, help me! Help—" Then the voice changed, becoming a masculine snarl. "Bah, there's nobody out there. No demigod could be that quiet, eh? Let alone two?"

Rude. Kat's mastered the art of stealth. Well, that and her papa's blood in her veins helped her out with that.

The first monster chuckled. "Probably ran away, if they know what's good for them. Or the girl was lying about a third and fourth demigod. Let's get cooking."

Snap. A bright orange light sizzled to life — an emergency flare — and Kat was temporarily blinded. She ducked behind the crane until the spots cleared from her eyes. Then he took another peek and saw a nightmare scene even her mama couldn't have dreamed up.