The Stories of Our Heroes

A Very 21st Century Christmas

Frank's POV

I love Christmas time. The one time of year that Camp Jupiter relaxes and takes a break, not to mention what goes on in New Rome. A huge tree was put up in the center of the city, carolers of all ages were everywhere, lights were strung all over, and shops were lit up with the latest technology. Currently, the iPhone 7 was pretty popular.

Speaking of iPhone's and technology, Hazel was a little overwhelmed with all of it. She tried not to let me see, but I noticed how she gaped at laptops, the confusion that crossed her eyes when her gaze snagged on phones, and her amazement at all the moving Santa's and snowmen out in front of people's houses. Now, it might seem crazy that all of this still surprised her after spending so long with Leo and his inventions; after all, she spent about two months riding a flying ship with a bronze dragon figurehead that was certainly moving and very much alive, not to mention Buford. He's got his own living household object category. But that was all different from the mortal technology of today. Leo's things were crazy, bizarre, and, well, godly. It went along well with all the demigod stuff; everything so unbelievable that it made sense. But smartphones? That was just weird to her.

Don't get me wrong, Hazel has been adjusting to 21st century life amazingly well. But I still feel like I should help out a bit.

I opened my mouth to say her name, but she beat me to it.

"Frank?" 

"Yeah?"

"We should probably start shopping for everyone," she said with a smile. The Argo ll crew was getting together to have a Christmas party, and Hazel and I haven't bought any gifts yet.

"Good thinking. Any ideas?" I asked her. 

"Um... I was hoping you would be good at knowing something that they would like. I'm not really familiar with that stuff." She seemed a little embarrassed and she looked down to speak. I wanted to punch myself. I was literally just thinking about this, how stupid am I?

"Oh, right, yeah I can work on that. But I have no idea off the top of my head, so let's go get hot chocolate and think about it." I led Hazel to a little cafe that I knew had really good hot chocolate. Pros to being Praetor: Reyna shows you the best places to get warm drinks.

We sat down and ordered, then we started to talk about what to get our friends. We were pretty clueless.

"Well," Hazel mumbled, defeated, after ten minutes of us coming up with nothing.

"I guess we could just go look around and see if there's something we like," I tried.

"Sure," Hazel agreed, finishing off the last bit of her hot chocolate. We stood up and left, heading off towards the nearest shop.

"Yo, Praetor Zhang! Miss Levesque!" a voice shouted behind us.

"Who...?" I wondered out loud before turning around.

"Oh my gods Percy, can't you just greet them like a normal person?" Annabeth Chase chastised her boyfriend.

Hazel laughed softly as we made our way over to our Greek friends.

"Hello, Ex-Praetor Jackson. Miss Chase," I replied jokingly.

Annabeth and Hazel hugged and I shook Percy's hand and he clapped me on the back. Hazel gave Percy a quick squeeze and I nodded awkwardly to Annabeth. She smiled back.

"So, what are you guys doing?" Percy asked Hazel and I.

"Oh, you know..." Hazel shuffled her feet. "Just a little shopping."

"We still have to finish that up too, right Perce?" Annabeth said, nudging him with her elbow.

"Ugh, whatever you say," he responded with his face screwed up in disgust.

"Wow, little dramatic aren't we? Shopping isn't that bad," Hazel teased. The other three of us mumbled something along the lines of yes, yes it is.

"What are you guys up to?" I questioned the couple.

"Well, we're headed out for the holidays. We're stopping at my dad's house here in Cali, then we're going to Percy's parent's for the rest of break," Annabeth responded happily. "Oh don't forget the party, too, first!"

"How could you forget?" I said sarcastically. "Leo's little mini-Coach Hedge that runs around screaming the date, the time, and to put some clothes on, isn't attention-grabbing at all."

"Dude, I almost Iris-Messaged Coach to ask him to borrow his baseball bat so I could take it to that thing," Percy grumbled. I chuckled in agreement.

"I suppose we'll let you guys go on your way," Annabeth told us, grabbing Percy's hand.

"Yeah, have fun shopping!" Percy added with an amused expression. They took off with a wave of their hands, leaving Hazel and I alone again.

"I love having them here for college," Hazel grinned while telling me.

"Me too."

We made our way to the first shop and Hazel stopped right outside the door.

"Duh!" she cried and face palmed (something that I did not teach her the name of; I think it was Piper).

"What?"

"We should have asked Percy and Annabeth for ideas!"

"Duh!" I mimicked her and face palmed. "Humph. We'll just have to make do."

We wandered into the annoyingly crowded store. Hazel looked around with wide eyes.

"A little crazy, huh?" I asked her.

"Uh, yeah, yeah, just a bit. I like it though." She gave me a very sure smile. "But, what's this?" She held up a iPod Nano box.

The cool air was brimming with our laughter and horrible singing (well, Piper's sounded great but everyone else... not so much). The Seven was sitting around a fire (courtesy of Leo) on the edge of the Pomeranian Line. The Argo ll had been destroyed in the final battle with Gaea, or we would be there, but this was the closest thing to the deck as it came. It was unusually crisp for California, but nobody minded. We had eaten a lot of food (mostly Sally Jackson's cookies) and had done a lot of just talking and joking and enjoying each other when we didn't have to worry about saving the world. I was enjoying every minute of it.

"I need advice," a voice said right beside me. Leo.

"Uh, sure?" Why was Leo coming to me for advice? Why not Jason?

"So... Calypso is having a bit of a problem with life, you know, now. Like, all the 21st century stuff. And American stuff. I know Hazel's transition wasn't as drastic, but do you have anything that could help?"

"Well, to be honest, I've got nothing. Hazel did it all on her own, pretty much."

"Yeah, that's what I figured. Caly will get it all sorted out on her own probably, too. She'll probably be eating chicken nuggets and playing the X-box by time I get back." He flashed a crooked grin. "Gotta love her."

I laughed slightly before replying, "You could ask Hazel though if you needed to."

"Yeah. Thanks Zhang."

"No problem, Valdez."

We sat around the rest of the night, having the best Christmas party ever.