When Fates's Too Cruel

Capture that Flag!

Kuros' POV~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-

So,

Forget sparring or running from monsters—those are child's play.

There's this amazing game coming tomorrow, and it's gonna be more epic than anything I've ever seen, I hope.

It's like everyone's going to war, decked out in enough metal to set off every airport detector in the country. It's not just a game; it's a full-on epic battle where the only thing missing is a dragon to slay. The cabins were bustling to prepare for the camp's famous sport. Spies were sent out, allies made, and weapons forged.

Capture the Flag was held every Friday and the rules were pretty simple.

There are two teams, both having flags. The objective was to get the opposing team's flag and still keep your own. You couldn't cover the flag and had to make it visible, and you couldn't place guards near the flags for more than fifteen feet. No traps or decoys could be made of the flag. Also, the flag had to be stationary, meaning it couldn't change places.

Since yesterday, the campers had been preparing for the grand clash that was capturing the flags. Sadly, I wasn't picked, yet. Percy was in Hermes' cabin, and they had allied with Athena.

I did nothing but mess around, slaughtering monsters in the forest and gaining more offerings for the gods. It never hurts to have a monster offering!

Percy and I ate together, alone, at a special table.

He was chowing down a blue muffin.

A speck of blue coloured his orange shirt.

"Hey, stahp tryna choke yerself, who'll be my boxing bag for the match then?" I huff at him, smiling annoyingly at him.

"Don't worry about it, sure as hell I'll beat you!" he said.

His face clearly said otherwise, pouting as if he didn't believe his own words.

That got my brotherly spirit rising.

"Tryna punk me? Heh, come at me, bro!" I replied, relishing the glare he threw at me.

In all my excitement, I went to the arena to try and practice, even though I didn't need it. Hey! An ADHD man's gotta stay on his feet, y'know?

The marble was shiny and pristine. Guess it was magic? Guess again. It was shined regularly by the nature spirits.

The sun glared down at me, as it usually does, but today felt a little harsher.

Warm-ups first, and then I get to it.

I don't usually go for hand-to-hand, since I'm sure I'll rarely encounter a situation as such, but today, I felt like it.

Messing around with the dummies, I was interrupted by-

"HEY NEWBIE!" A tough, husky female voice rang out from the entrance.

A tall girl, 'bout fifteen walked through the entrance to the arena. Two boys about the same age walked behind her. All of them had some kind of leather armour and tomahawk-style haircuts. The girl sneered at me and walked up to me.

"Get out, the arena's ours to use now," She shouted, throwing spittle at my face. I was tempted to pull out an umbrella.

"How 'bout... No." I growl back.

Yeah, I know, dumb move, but I was way too socially stupid at the time and thought this girl was some bully.

Her cronies looked at each other in glee, not that I noticed.