BY fates design

Pink poodle

Flash back
Dream

Once everyone settled back down and silence slipped over the hall, the screen stuttered to life.

"Hello little hero," Cassiopeia flinched at the gravely voice, her eyes flickering around the area, she was stood at the edge of a pit, one that appeared to have no bottom, dark whispy figures surrounded her. "So young, so young indeed, but strong. You will do well." The voice was ancient, dripping in cold, heavy power. "Come down little hero, come join me." It coaxed, "they have misled you, come, barter with me, I can set you free." Cassiopeia gasped, when a shimmering image of her father appeared, his face cold and unmoving. "Help me." The voice became hungrier.

Cassiopeia jolted awake, someone was shaking her. She shot up, immediately regretting it when she felt the pain course through her stomach. "Good morning." Annabeth chimed, approaching the dishevelled girl. "How long was I out?" She slowly pushed herself up, Percy reaching out to help her stand. "Long enough to make breakfast." Annabeth tossed a bag of corn crisps from Aunty Em's snack bar at her. "And Grover went exploring. Look he found a friend." Cassiopeia looked over to the satyr, sitting in his lap was a fuzzy unnaturally pink stuffed animal. No. It wasn't stuffed, it was a pink yapping poodle. Grover looked over at Percy and said, "no he's not." Percy stared judgmentally, "are you talking to that thing?" The poodle growled. "This thing," Grover sassed, "is our ticket west. Be nice to him." Cassiopeia tried to control her face, she didn't want to insult Grover or the dog. "Percy, Cass, meet Gladiola. Gladiola, Percy and Cassiopeia." Both glanced at Annabeth wishing for her to laugh and say it was a joke but she looked dead serious. "Hi Gladiola." Cassiopeia forced out, a little uncomfortable. "I'm not saying hello to a pink poodle." Percy denied. "Percy," Annabeth warned, "I said hello to the poodle, you say hello to the poodle." Gladiola growled, "hello." Percy sighed defeated. Grover explained how he had come across Gladiola in the woods and how he had ran away from a rich family who was offering $200 for his return. Cassiopeia half listened as she dug through her bag for another ambrosia square, hoping to dull the pain of her injury. "Not another bus." Percy whining was the first thing Cassiopeia registered when she tuned back into the conversation. "No," Annabeth agreed pointing down the hill to a train track they hadn't seen the night prior due to the dark. "There is an Amtrak half a mile away. According to Gladiola, the west bound train leaves at noon."

The first night they were on the Amtrak Percy was restless, sleep seemed to evaded him as he thought back to his reoccurring nightmare. The voice in the pit. He stared up at the ceiling from his spot on the floor, Cassiopeia was behind him and Grover was to the side next to Annabeth. "You awake?" He muttered when he heard Cassiopeia stir. She breathed out a quiet laugh, "yeah. Just thinking, what about you?" She asked turning to face him. "Nightmares." He muttered vaguely. "I get it, they're super common among demigods." She murmured. "What are you thinking about?" Percy brushed past his night terrors, wondering what could possibly be keeping the great warrior, Cassiopeia, awake. "Camp, and before I left." She admitted, "the night before I had a... moment." She struggled to find the words, her eyes glasses over slightly. "What happened?" Percy probed, his curiosity switched for concern. "Well it was the night before we left and I had gone for a walk in the woods, I couldn't sleep..." her gaze became unfocused as she stared ahead.
"Chiron." Cassiopeia acknowledged, her eyes not straying from the rows of headstones that lay before her. "It is late, what are you doing up?" Chiron trotted to her side, looking down at the girl as she pulled her knees to her chest. "How do you do it?" Her voice was meek as she spoke, "you trained all the known heroes of Greece and every one of them ended in tragedy. How do you live knowing that the person you tried to hard to train and prepare died, and then do it all over again? I have been here longer than anyone else, except you and Mr D, I helped train every single person here and it kills me when one of them gets hurt, before you banned quests it would tear me apart when one of them did not return, so how? How do you do it?" Tears were streaming down her face as she spoke, her eyes fixed on the flower covered stones beside her. "I do it because I know one day this will all be over, one of you will succeed where so many others failed and there will be no more need for quests and fighting. I send you on quests because you are the most capable person here and while a low chance, you have the best possibility of coming back alive." Chiron gazed down at the distraught girl in sympathy. "I know that but I am scared, Chiron, I am scared that Jake, Alex, Eleana or Kira will get hurt on these quests, that they will die, that I will fail again."
"You did not fail the first time, you know part of how I do this is because I know that no matter how sad, their deaths aren't directly my fault."
"But their deaths were directly my fault, I was there, I could have helped them." Her voice rose as her breathing became more sporadic. "You were four, Cassiopeia, four years old facing off against nearly a hundred monsters. That wasn't your fault." Chiron tried to reassure the girl. "Sometimes I think I'm going crazy, I can still hear them. I have forgotten what they look like now, their faces blurred in my mind, their features marred by their own blood, smeared and indistinguishable. But I could not forget the cries, my mind never lets me forget their cries. The sound as they begged somebody to help them. I can see their blood on my hands, I can feel it, the warmth of the liquid as it spread over me while I tried to stop the bleeding. I... I couldn't help them, Chiron, they died and I couldn't help them." Sobs shook her form as her head began to spin, there was blood everywhere, she was covered in it. "None of that was your fault child, you should never have been in that situation to begin with. You are safe now, it is all in the past, nothing will go wrong on this quest, Cassiopeia, have faith." Chiron placed a hand on the girl's head. "You should rest, tomorrow you begin your quest."