Callie Jackson, The Redemption

Chapter V

Callie's POV

We ran through the woods. Finally, after what seemed like forever, we all came to a stop. I collapsed against a rock, as did Noah, and Malcolm fell to the ground wheezing.
"Are you ok?" Noah asked him.
"I'm fine. Just not used to running that much. Except for running through that other thing."
  "Did you see who took you from that couch?" I blurted out.
  "Nothing took me Callie. I went on my own."
  "Why?!" I asked him.
  "Well, I didn't really go, I heard Annabeth and Paisley. They were screaming, and something was laughing."
"But you knew they weren't in there, right?" Noah said.
"I do now. But the other voices-" he stuttered
"Other voices?" I said, looking at him like he was an undiscovered species of animal.
"There were tons of them. They spoke, telling me I could save them, that they would reward me, and a bunch of other crap and–"
"Why'd you listen?" Noah asked him.
"Gee, I don't know, maybe because I heard your voices!" He said, angered.
"Malcolm, we didn't know." I whispered.
"Well now you do. Let's just go to sleep." He said crawling over to the only other Boulder in sight and closing his eyes.
"So who did you to see Kirke as?" He asked, still with his eyes closed.
"Who?" I said, sitting up a little straighter.
"The person in the cave." Malcolm told us impatiently.
  "Luke." Noah said, shuddering.
  "Good gods." Malcolm muttered.
  "Who's Luke?" I asked.
  "Percy hasn't told you?" Noah asked, looking confused.
  "Does it sound like Percy's told me?" I asked.
"He was possessed by Kronos. He brought demigods into this ship, trying to get them to join him. Our" he gestured to Malcolm and himself "older siblings brought us along. It was horrible, monsters around every corner. But your brother and Annabeth talked to him during his last moments, and he killed himself to kill Kronos."
  "Oh. Percy actually never told me that. He just said there was another war before Gaea's. What'd you see it as Malcolm?" I said.
  "My dad." He said, shuddering.
"What happened with your dad?" Noah whispered.
"Crazy scientist." He snorted. "Experimented on me." He lifted up the bottom of his shirt to where you could see his hip bones. But on the skin were scars. Thick and thin, pink scars ran down his back. I ran my thumb over them. He put his shirt back down. "When I refused, he beat me. He's the reason I ran away. I left behind a mortal sister."
"I'm sorry." I said. "We never knew."
"We see how much silence can hide things." He whispered, his sterling eyes staring into mine. "Chiron doesn't even know I have those."
"So what'd you see Kirke as?" Noah whispered to me. They were both staring at me.
"Gaea." I said. "Her human form." I fiddled with my bracelet. I looked over towards the way that I thought was the mystic house. It was dawn.
"Let's get going." Noah said, standing up and pulling me by my hand.
"Thanks." I said, wiping dirt from my shorts. We all set off through the woods from the opposite direction we came.
"Do you see that?" Noah asked, pointing through the trees. I did. There was a small little beach. I ran up to the water and jumped in. Noah and Malcolm laughed as a pranced through the water without getting wet. I finally came out.
"So how are we going to get to Alaska?" Noah asked.
"The water." I told him.
"Callie, we can't all swim and not get wet or breath under water." Noah told me.
"I know stupid." I snapped at him.
"Well, you're acting like we can all go and swim around like three Dolphins–"
"You two idiots." Malcolm said to us. "My moms the goddess of crafts. I can build a boat, Callie can make it go."
"So I'm once again useless." Noah muttered.
"No." I said, crossing my arms. "You will help me and Malcolm. Come on." We started back through the woods.
"Ok." Malcolm said, looking up at all the trees. "We need thick limbs. And leaves to patch up holes. And we also need something that could act as a rope."
"We all need to split up. Callie, you look for the thing acting as rope–"
"And what do you want that to be Malcolm?" I asked, looking at all the trees. There was nothing like a rope in those things.
"Anything you can find. Think outside the box." He said.
"All of us are so outside the box we didn't even know there was one to start with." I muttered, storming off to look for anything like a rope. I looked up.
'Might as well climb a tree. Maybe there's something up there.' I thought. I stumbled over to the tree. I stood on the roots and thought. After I grabbed for a limb and found one, I pulled myself up. I pulled myself upwards by the branches, praying to the gods that they wouldn't break. Finally I got about halfway and stopped, leaning against the trunk of the tree. After I looked around, I saw vines hanging in front of me. I slowly moved myself to the edge of the branch. I grabbed the vine and pulled down. 'Seems strong enough.' I thought. Suddenly, the branch under my feet snapped. I screamed as I fell, but something caught me. I was still holding onto the vine. I let out a terrified laugh.
  "Callie." Noah yelled. I looked up into his fear filled eyes.
  "I'm fine." I said, and started to climb up the vine. I pulled myself up until I could sit on another branch, and started to cut down the vines. After cutting multiple vines down, I decided to use Zeus's blessing to get me down. I flew downward, but when I tried to land, I fell on my butt.
"Your powers are getting weaker as we get more Northern." Malcolm said, looking over a huge pile of leaves he was holding in his arms. I stood up.
  "Thanks for the info." I told him. I walked with him to the beach. Noah was already there, using his sword to cut bark off of the sticks he had gathered. He looked up at us.
  "Oh good. You came at the right time." I put the sword down. "All we need to do now is use the vine to tie it together. And do whatever your going to do with the leaves." He looked over at me. "You ok? I saw you fall."
  "Oh, uh, I'm fine." I said. He picked up my arm.
  "A briar must have caught you." He rubbed his finger over the apparent cuts. It stung a little, but he had put some kind of medicine on it.
  "And... Done!" Malcolm said. "Come on! Help me get it in the water." He started to push it. We laughed at him then went to help.
  "This looks awesome Malcolm!" Noah said. We got it into the water. Slowly, water leaked into the bottom. Finally it sunk, and Malcolm threw down his katana.
"Nothing I do works!" He said.
"Malcolm it was a really good idea, it just–"
"It didn't work! It wasn't good enough!" He yelled.
"Malcolm calm down. Let's just try and walk for a little while." Noah said. We thundered down the beach with him, and he muttered all the way. Suddenly, there was a loud screeching noise coming from the ocean.
"Callie, what are you do–" Malcolm said before I interrupted him.
"I'm not doing anything!" I told him.
"That" said a low, shallow voice "is from me." We turned around. There stood a tall man with shoulder length, greasy black hair, black robes, and a sunken face. He must have been handsome some years ago.
  "Hades." Malcolm whispered.
  "Um... Hello. Thank you for the... Uh–" I stuttered.
  "The ship, lord Hades." Noah said for me. "We are very grateful."
  "Oh my brother." Said a voice from the woods. I jumped back and hit Noah. "Always taking the praise. I helped with that too."
  "Uh huh." Snorted Hades. The man emerged from the woods. He had messy black hair, was holding a triton, and was wearing a Hawaiian print shirt with khaki shorts. As he got closer, I noticed his eyes were sea green. Exactly like mine and Percy's. Noah tried to whisper like Malcolm had earlier.
  "Posei–"
  "Dad." I said aloud.
  "Why, hello Callie. You're much more powerful than you look, huh? How's you quest going?" He asked.
  "I guess it's going ok, um, you can see we made it to Canada, but there were a couple monster attacks and–" Suddenly another man appeared right in front of me in the sand. I jumped back once again.
  "You two never know how to get to a point, do ya?" Grumbled the man. He was wearing cargo pants, a white shirt that seemed to be specked with blood, and had a spear on his back.
"That." He said, pointing out at a large, rusty ship on the water that had just appeared. "Is a part of all three of our blessing. The staff are dead marines. Have fun." He said, then vanished.
"Was that–"
"Ares." Dad told me. He got to where he could whisper in my ear "as grumpy as Zeus if you ask me." He let out a broad, bright smile, and I returned it.
"Don't speak of our brother that way Poseidon." Hades warned. He seemed to have materialized right before our eyes. Malcolm jumped backwards as I had twice today, but he tripped over his feet and landed on his back in the sand. Hades looked over at him, them back at us. Noah was helping Malcolm up. "We might as well get back to our ranges. You have a kingdom to run, and I have dead to see." And with that, Hades vanished. Dad looked at me.
"Hope you do well. Use that bracelet of yours now." He said.
"How– how'd you know about me bracelet?" I asked.
"Who'd you think gave that to you?" He asked, then walked under the shore to the water, and vanished.
"You look like him. You and Percy both." Noah said.
"I've heard that before." I said.
"How are we going to get to the boat?" He asked me.
"I'll fly you." I told him. "I'll take Malcolm first. Come on." I looked at Malcolm as he walked over to my side. I looked back at Noah. "And try not to be attacked by any monsters."
"No promises." He said. I picked Malcolm up with the air. We soared over the water. Finally, we made it to the ship. I set Malcolm down.
  "I'll be back in a sec, ok?"
  "Alright." He said. I went back over to the beach.
  "Come on." I said to Noah. He jumped back.
  "How do you do that?" He asked, wiping sweat from his forehead.
  "Do what?" I asked, raising him into the air.
  "Sneak up on me like that?" He asked.
  "I don't know." I told him.
  "So what's the people look like?" He asked.
  "Crap." I said. "I forgot they were dead. And I left Malcolm with them! We need to hurry!" We flew quickly to the ship, and fell onto the deck, right beside Malcolm.
  "You must be Callie." Said one of them throatily.
  "Yeah. I am." I said, trying not to let my voice quiver.
  "Pleased to meet you." Said another one. Their voices were scratchy and very low.
"This is going to be a long ride." Noah whispered in my ear.