DAISY || P. Jackson x Fem O/C

1.5 |𝐇𝐢𝐣𝐚𝐜𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐚 𝐰𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐤 𝐢𝐬𝐧'𝐭 𝐚𝐬 𝐟𝐮𝐧 𝐚𝐬 𝐢𝐭 𝐬𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐝𝐬

 ~⚡~{[CHAPTER FIVE]}~⚡~

[Hijacking a water park isn't as fun as it sounds]

AS THEY FELL, it occurred to Percy that although the water might save him, it certainly wouldn't save Daisy.

Huh, he thought.

All he could hear was the rushing of the wind and Daisy's terrified yelp from beside him as they plummeted into the river. The river raced towards them at the speed of a truck. Wind ripped the breath from their lungs. Steeples and skyscrapers and bridges tumbled in and out of their vision. And then: Flaaa-boooom! A whiteout of bubbles. Percy's hand was ripped from Daisy as he sank through the murk, sure that he was about to end up embedded in fifty metres of mud and lost forever. But his impact with the water hadn't hurt. He was falling slowly now, bubbles trickling up through his fingers. He settled on the river bottom soundlessly. A catfish the size of his stepfather lurched away into the gloom. Clouds of silt and disgusting garbage – beer bottles, old shoes, plastic bags – swirled up all around him. At that point, he realized a few things: first, he had not been flattened into a pancake. He had not been barbecued. He was alive, which was good. Second realization: He wasn't wet. He could feel the coolness of the water. He could see where the fire on his clothes had been quenched. But when he touched his own shirt, it felt perfectly dry. He looked at the garbage floating by and snatched an old cigarette lighter.

No way, he thought.

He flicked the lighter.

It sparked.

A tiny flame appeared, right there at the bottom of the Mississippi. He grabbed a soggy hamburger wrapper out of the current and immediately the paper turned dry. He lit it with no problem. As soon as he let it go, the flames sputtered out. The wrapper turned back into a slimy rag. Weird. But the strangest thought occurred to him only last: he was breathing. He was underwater, and he was breathing normally. He stood up, thigh-deep in mud. His legs felt shaky. His hands trembled. He should've been dead. The fact that he wasn't seemed like... well, a miracle. He imagined a woman's voice, a voice that sounded a bit like his mother: Percy, what do you say?

Um... thanks.

Underwater, he sounded like he did on recordings, like a much older kid.

Thank you... Father.

No response. Just the dark drift of garbage downriver, the enormous catfish gliding by, the flash of sunset on the water's surface far above, turning everything the colour of butterscotch. Why had Poseidon saved him? The more he thought about it, the more ashamed he felt. So he'd got lucky a few times before. Against a thing like the Chimera, he had never stood a chance. Maybe he should just stay down here with the catfish, join the bottom feeders. Fump-fump-fump. A riverboat's paddlewheel churned above him, swirling the silt around. There, not two metres in front of him, was his sword, its gleaming bronze hilt sticking up in the mud. He heard that woman's voice again:

Percy, take the sword. Your father believes in you.

This time, he knew the voice wasn't in his head. He wasn't imagining it. Her words seemed to come from everywhere, rippling through the water like dolphin sonar. "Where are you?" he called aloud.

Then, through the gloom, he saw her – a woman the colour of the water, a ghost in the current, floating just above the sword. She had long billowing hair, and her eyes, barely visible, were green like Percy's.