The Daughter Of Night

Chapter Forty - I Ignore Doctor's Orders

Chapter Forty - I Ignore Doctor's Orders
Posted: Monday 15th July 2024

Rapping was not one of my talents, but I was able to halfheartedly clap along in form of support.

Apollo's plan was insane but it worked, and just a few moments later, we were all loaded onto flying ants and soared above the woods back towards camp.

I almost laughed when I saw the statue. It was an eighty-foot tall, near exact statue of Apollo's preferred form. It was, as most classical statues were, completely naked.

"What's the plan?" I asked over the sounds of whipping wind.

"You get to safety," Apollo declared, "the rest of us-"

"As if!" I snorted, "You're stuck with me."

Apollo looked as if he wanted to protest, but held back, in favour of wracking his brains to come up with a plan. His first instinct appeared to be to look to me for help.

"I've never fought a statue before!" I reminded him.

"You've fought just about everything else," Apollo stated.

"I'm not exactly a planner!" I said, but Apollo looked so hopeless that I sighed, "Fine! but you're going to have to let me shadow travel if I'm even going to get close to it," I said.

"Go," Apollo said, "I'll work out the rest of the plan if you can distract it. Please be careful!"

"I always am!" I winked. I wasn't sure if it was just because of how starved I had been for a proper fight for the last few months, or if I was trying to give Apollo a heart attack, but I fell back off of the ant and found myself free-falling. At the last second, before I hit the ground, I spun into the shadows in mid-air, landing on my feet on the Colossus' head.

I understood immediately why Will had advised me not to shadow travel. It had sapped my strength almost completely, I supposed because I was carting around two people instead of one.

Nevertheless, I couldn't afford to pass out now, so I grabbed at the colossus' sun crown for support. I hadn't planned past this point, but I drew my sword and began trying to stab the colossus in the head. It proved a useless effort as my sword glanced harmlessly off of the bronze. I hoped that Apollo was able to come up with a better plan as I wasn't doing all that great at the distraction part.

"Hey, bronze butt!" Shadows deposited Percy Jackson on the head of the colossus. He was riding on his hellhound, Mrs O'Leary, who promptly peed on the Colossus' head. "What the? Mrs O'Leary jeez!" he complained.

"Welcome to the party," I said. He spotted me standing there.

"Percy!" I looked over to the source of the shout and saw that Apollo, Kayla and Austin had commandeered the Ares' cabin's chariot.

"All right, who unleashed the giant bronze guy? Apollo, did you do this?" Percy demanded.

"I am offended!" Apollo complained, "I am only indirectly responsible for this! Also I have a plan to fix it."

"Oh yeah?" Percy glanced off at the partially destroyed camp, "how's that going?"

I was surprised Apollo did not have some retort to this, but he was plainly focused on the problem at hand, "If you two could please keep the Colossus from stomping on the camp's hearth, that would be helpful, I need a few more minutes to enchant this arrow."

"Of course you do."

"Scatter!" I yelled, just before the Colossus flattened us with his hand, trying to rid himself of the trespassers on his head.

Percy and I ran different ways. Percy began slicing off prongs of the Colossus' crown, stabbing one into his forehead and throwing one like a javeil towards the beach, Mr O'Leary immediately chased after the thrown golden stick. Percy then jumped from the head and began scaling down the side of the statue.

I was less graceful, as I scattered, I slipped in the puddle of hell hound wee and ended up using the state like a sheer drop slide. I managed to catch myself on the statue's private parts before I crashed down to the ground, and then allowed myself to drop the rest of the way to the ground, not certain of my ability to free climb down the statue's legs with the obstacle of my pregant belly.

Percy and I hit the ground at a similar time and began shouting insults to the statue, drawing it away from the camp off towards the beach. The rest of the demigods of Camp Halfblood joined our plight and soon we were leading a procession of kids shouting obscenities at the statue.

Unfortunately we all watched as Apollo's chariot went crazy and crash landed in the dunes. I rushed over along with a large group of demigods.

"The plague arrow is ready!" Apollo announced, "we need to shoot it into the Colossus' ear!" It would have offered everyone gathered some hope, but Apollo's chariot was gone and his bow was too. Also, Kayla and Austin were both collapsed on the floor coughing and sneezing.

"Are they contagious?" Ceil asked.

"No, well probably not, it's the fumes from the arrow," Apollo said. Everyone backed up a few steps. "They need healing," Apollo said, gesturing at his children.

"Cecil, Harley, help me, we need to get them to the Apollo cabin," I said, hurrying towards Kayla and Austin. It was clear to me that Apollo needed to remain focused on the task at hand and it seemed like a good wife would ensure the health of his children- I supposed they were my step kids, but I didn't want to think about it that hard.

"But they are the Apollo cabin!" Harley complained, "besides, my flamethrower-"

"You can play with your flamethrower later," Chiron promised, "run along with Ariadne. The rest of you, do what you can to keep the Colossus at the water's edge. Percy and I will assist Apollo."

By the time Harley, Cecil and I had lugged Kayla and Austin to Will we watched the miraculous sight of the Colossus sneezing it's own head free from it's shoulders. Then is massive body fell forwards, into the long island sound, and the day fell quiet.