ENTRAPPED ₂

117

MADELEINE DIDN'T GET TO SAY GOODBYE TO HERMES, BUT SHE THOUGHT THAT WAS PROBABLY FOR THE BEST. She had already tested her limits with the gods that didn't like her, like Hera and Zeus. Also, she thought that Hermes knew her plan. If he asked her not to do it, she wasn't sure she would have the strength to ignore him. The closer they got, the more hesitant she became.

So the last Madeleine saw of her dad was his small figure looking up at Zeus, now a hundred feet tall, holding the Argo II by its prow. He boomed, HOLD ON!

Then he tossed the ship up and spiked it overhand like a volleyball.

If Madeleine and Jason hadn't been strapped to the mast together with one of Leo's twenty-point safety harnesses, they both would have disintegrated. As it was, Madeleine's stomach tried to stay behind in Greece and all the air was sucked out of her lungs.

The sky turned black. The ship rattled and creaked. The deck cracked like thin ice under Madeleine's legs, and with a sonic boom, the Argo II hurtled out of the clouds.

"Jason!" Leo shouted. "Madeleine! Hurry!"

Madeleine's fingers felt like melted plastic, but together, she and Jason managed to undo the straps.

Leo was lashed to the control console, desperately trying to right the ship as they spiraled downward in free fall. The sails were on fire. Festus creaked in alarm. A catapult peeled away and lifted into the air. Centrifugal force sent the shields flying off the railings like metal Frisbees.

Wider cracks opened in the deck as Jason and Madeleine staggered toward the hold, Jason using the winds to keep them anchored. 

The hatch burst open. Frank and Hazel stumbled through, pulling on the guide rope they'd attached to the mast. Piper, Annabeth, and Percy followed, all of them looking disoriented.

"Go!" Leo yelled. "Go, go, go!"

For once, Leo's tone was deadly serious, and Madeleine understood why. If they didn't evacuate this ship before it imploded, then they would all die. Also, Leo's plan would be crushed into little pieces.

They'd talked through their evacuation plan, but that slap across the world had made Madeleine's mind sluggish. Judging from the others' expressions, they weren't in much better shape. Stupid Zeus.

Fortunately, Buford the table saved them. He clattered across the deck with his holographic Hedge blaring, "LET'S GO! MOVE IT! CUT THAT OUT!"

This irritated Madeleine enough to get her head on straight as Buford's tabletop split into helicopter blades and Buford buzzed away.

Frank changed form. Instead of a dazed demigod, he was now a dazed gray dragon. Hazel climbed onto his neck. Frank grabbed Percy and Annabeth in his front claws, then spread his wings and soared away.

Jason grabbed Piper around the waist and made to fly off, but then he glanced down and stumbled. 

Madeleine caught his shoulder. "Don't look," she told him. "It helps Ethan."

Jason nodded. He took a deep breath, then glanced back at his boyfriend.

"Leo, you won't make it!" he shouted. "Come with us!"

"No!" Leo yelled back. "Get out of here!"

"Leo!" Piper tried. "Please―"

"Save your charmspeak, Pipes! I told you, I've got a plan. Now shoo!"

Jason and Piper both looked helplessly at Madeleine.

"Trust him," Madeleine told them. "That's all you have to do right now."