Chapter Twenty-Nine:
Rescued By War's Daughter.
— Her eyes look sharp and steady
into the empty parts of me !
Things could've gone horribly.
There were so many different possibilities to what could've happened on the massive boat, and many of those would've had to do with the quartet being severely injured (possibly fatally) by the traitor and his non-human henchmen. While Percy Jackson appreciated his female companions regardless of their usefulness in battle because of the company they'd given him the previous summer on their first quest, he'd never been so grateful for the Sun's Daughter and her quick thinking. He'd been paralyzed by his fear of the traitor because of the Pit Scorpion Incident™, and he genuinely didn't understand how Colette could move or act normally around him with how close she had been to him after everything he'd done, but Percy was so beyond glad for the amount of gall she had. He didn't think he (or any of them) would be entirely intact without her help in escaping the hostage situation they'd found themselves in.
With one look behind him, his eyes bugged out. So many of the monsters that'd been on the ship were rushing toward them. "Thermos!" Percy yelled out.
"What?" Annabeth's expression was so incredulous that it was impossible to ignore the inkling that she'd thought Percy had lost his fucking mind. Both she and Colette were holding onto the boat straps for dear life. Colette's hair was flying straight up like a torch, and it made her pissed expression look a little less serious. Annabeth's baby hairs were the only one's really moving, but the beads at the ends of her braids were clinkling loudly.
Tyson seemed like the only one to understand Percy. He managed to open his older brother's duffel bag and take out Hermes' magical thermos without losing his grip on it or the boat.
Percy grabbed the thermos and prayed he was doing the right thing. "Hang on!"
"I am hanging on!" Annabeth yelled back, sending him a dirty look.
"Tight'a then!"
Percy hooked his feet under the boat's inflatable bench, and as Tyson grabbed the three demigods by the backs of their shirts tightly, the older boy gave the thermos cap a quarter turn. Instantly, a white sheet of wind jetted out of the thermos and propelled them all sideways, turning their downward plummet into a forty-five degree crash landing. The wind seemed to laugh as it shot from the thermos, like it was glad to be free. As they hit the ocean, they bumped once ... twice ... skipping like a stone, then they were whizzing along like a speed boat — salt spray in their faces and nothing but sea ahead. There was a wail of outrage from the ship behind them, but they were already out of weapon range. The Princess Andromeda faded to the size of a white toy boat in the distance, then it was gone.
"Gracias a los dioses." Thank the gods. Percy let out the loudest sigh of relief. Colette narrowed her eyes at him, waiting for her thanks for getting them out of the situation. "An—and thanks t'you, too, obviously."
As the four of them raced over the sea, the demigods tried to send an Iris-Message to Chiron. Percy and Annabeth figured it was probably important to let at least someone know what Luke was doing.
Colette gave them a deadpan stare as they voiced their inner monologue. "'Probably?'" She mocked their train of thought. "We very obviously need to tell someone, and he's the only one we can trust after all this."
"Yeah," Percy flushed sheepishly, "ya' right." He glanced to the side to see Annabeth looking down like she'd been chided, the tip of her nose a shade of light pink.
