ONE LAST TIME . . . heroes of olympus

23

KAT WHISTLED UNDER her breath. The central section of Aeolus's fortress was as big as a cathedral, with a soaring domed roof covered in silver. Television equipment floated randomly through the air — cameras, spotlights, set pieces, potted plants. And there was no floor. Leo almost fell into the chasm before Jason pulled him back.

"Holy—!" Leo gulped. "Hey, Mellie. A little warning next time!"

An enormous circular pit plunged into the heart of the mountain. It was probably half a mile deep, honeycombed with caves. Some of the tunnels probably led straight outside. Kat remembered seeing winds blast out of them when they'd been on Pikes Peak. Other caves were sealed with some glistening material like glass or wax. The whole cavern bustled with harpies, aurai, and paper airplanes, but for someone who couldn't fly, much like Kat, it would be a very long, very fatal fall.

"Oh, my," Mellie gasped. "I'm so sorry." She unclipped a walkie-talkie from somewhere inside her robes and spoke into it: "Hello, sets? Is that Nuggets? Hi, Nuggets. Could we get a floor in the main studio, please? Yes, a solid one. Thanks."

A few seconds later, an army of harpies rose from the pit; three dozen or so demon chicken ladies, all carrying squares of various building material. They went to work hammering and gluing — and using large quantities of duct tape, which didn't reassure Kat. In no time there was a makeshift floor snaking out over the chasm. It was made of plywood, marble blocks, carpet squares, wedges of grass sod — just about anything.

"That can't be safe," said Jason.

"Oh, it is!" Mellie assured him. "The harpies are very good."

Easy for her to say. She just drifted across without touching the floor, but Jason decided he had the best chance at surviving because he was some kind of macho alpha dude or some shit, so he stepped out first. Amazingly, the floor held.

Piper gripped his hand and followed him. "If I fall, you're catching me."

"Uh, sure." Jason was blushing. It was adorable.

Leo stepped out next. "You're catching me, too, Superman. But I ain't holding your hand."

Kat rolled her eyes, stepping forward and snagging Leo's hand. "I'll hold your hand, you lonely fucker," she said, sending a smile to Jason and Piper. "Sorry, but I'm taking pity on his crippling loneliness."

Leo gave her an unimpressed look that she could read very well. "Shut up, Kitty Kat."

"Meow."

Mellie led them toward the middle of the chamber, where a loose sphere of flat-panel video screens floated around a kind of control center. A man hovered inside, checking monitors and reading paper airplane messages.

The man paid them no attention as Mellie brought them forward. She pushed a forty-two-inch Sony out of their way and led them into the control area.

Leo whistled. "I got to get a room like this."

The floating screens showed all sorts of television programs. There were some news programs, gladiators fighting, demigods battling monsters. Your average tv shows.

At the far end of the sphere was a silky blue backdrop like a cinema screen, with cameras and studio lights floating around it.

The man in the center was talking into an earpiece phone. He had a remote control in each hand and was pointing them at various screens, seemingly at random.

He wore a business suit that looked like the sky — blue mostly, but dappled with clouds that changed and darkened and moved across the fabric. He looked like he was in his sixties, with a shock of white hair, but he had a ton of stage makeup on, and that smooth plastic-surgery look to his face, so he appeared not really young, not really old, just wrong — like a Ken doll someone had halfway melted in a microwave. His eyes darted back and forth from screen to screen, like he was trying to absorb everything at once. He muttered things into his phone, and his mouth kept twitching. He was either amused, or crazy, or both.