The Beginning of the End (J. Grace)

VI: Percy joins prank wars

Despite Hedge banging his baseball bat on every door he heard a noise from and screaming at us all to go to sleep for an hour after curfew, I couldn't fall into any kind of slumber.

It wasn't like the sleeping quarters were unpleasant, in fact, they were amazing! The room auto-adjusted to the occupants' preferred room temperature, the mattresses and pillows were stuffed with pegasi feathers (no pegasi were harmed, don't worry) and were super comfy and there was a bronze lantern hanging from the celling which glowed at any brightness the occupant wished.

So, why couldn't I sleep?

I was terrified about Nico. My son. I should have been there. I should have stayed with him. I shouldn't have let him go to Camp Jupiter this time. I should have...

There're so many things that I should have done, so I lay awake thinking about what a terrible mum I am.

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"Hey, Lara!" Percy knocked on my door after the night had passed. I had barely slept at all. "We're going to be landing soon!"

I was already awake and sat up, stretched, and crossed my room tiredly to where my two changes of clothes were kept. "Alright, Seaweed Brain!" I called back and he opened the door a crack with one of his hands covering his eyes which were determinedly squeezed shut.

"Annabeth and I are so bored." He stated, not taking a step into my room and still having his eyes tightly shut. "You decent?"

"Yeah, thanks for checking." I grinned and he slowly, cautiously removed his hands and opened his eyes; we both shared a troublemaker's grin before he took a step into my room.

"Annabeth told me about your prank wars with Jason and Leo... wanna do something?" He lowered his voice, his sea green eyes glinting with the mischief I live for.

"What do you have in mind?" I questioned, straightening up and intrigued.

Wise Girl walked around him, into my room and closed the door softly behind her. "We have a few ideas." She informed me, grinning from ear-to-ear. "But we need the prank queen's opinion."

"I'm all ears my royal subjects." I did a mock bow, causing them both to laugh a little, then explained their genius plan. "Let's do it!"

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"Leo!" I cried, barging into his room, feigning panic.

Gods of Olympus, he was shirtless, okay, advert your eyes, Elara. Yup, look away. Oh, my Gods. Alright, that wall's looking really wall-y today, huh? Oop, yeah, the celling's looking really celling-y this morning, isn't it? Wow.

"What is it?!" He exclaimed, shooting bolt-upright and looking around with fear in his face.

"Annabeth fell asleep while she was at the wheel!" I lied. "And I dunno how to steer this thing!"

I wrung my hands with fake-fear and really didn't expect him to believe the act, but he did.

"Oh my Gods!" He leaped up and out of bed, racing out of the cabin and up above deck... still shirtless. I grabbed one of his shirts off the ground for him and ran up after him.

I got up just in time to see him tearing across to the gadgets that controlled the ship where Bethy Baby was pretending to be asleep, and then Percy drenched him in water he'd summoned from the sea far, far below.

"Gah!" Iron Man fell back, looking around bewildered and dripping with water. "What?!" He looked around, seeing us all laughing, then seemed to catch on as Guineapig dried off the poor guy. "Oh, I see, you've sided with them, haven't you, Jackson?"