Changing the Future

Chapter 4

That night, after lights out, I reached into my bag and pulled out the note Salina had left me, rereading it until the words were burned into my memory. She didn't know who my parent was, and seeing that the Fates hadn't shown up to tell me, I was just in the dark as Salina was.

I was tempted to Iris-message Rick Riordan to update him, but I figured as the official scribe of Olympus, he was well aware of what had changed so far. I reached into my bag again, taking out a tiny flashlight and the first book, The Lightning Thief. I flipped through the pages, reading the parts that talked about Thalia's pine tree.

All of a sudden, as the light touched those words, they disappeared, leaving the page blank. Then the page shimmered and a new story filled the page, talking about me and Thalia taking a stand against the monsters that wanted her dead. I also learned through the newly written paragraphs that Zeus had still created a new pine tree that was taller than any other tree in the valley and imbued it with magic to serve as the magical barrier that kept monsters and mortals out. Instead of being called Thalia's pine tree, the tree was now called the Crest of Camp Half-Blood.

Before anyone could see my greatest secret, I turned out the flashlight and shoved both the book and the flashlight back into my bag. Settling in on the sleeping bag on the floor, I adjusted my bag so that it was under my body while I slept. While Salina had blessed it to hold an infinite amount of things, there was no protection preventing someone from reaching inside and stealing from me. And seeing that I was surrounded by children of Hermes, the god of thieves, you can see why I was a little concerned.

I eventually fell asleep and found myself standing at the edge of a black hole, completely void of any warmth or color. Even I appeared to be black and white, my orange t-shirt and jeans fading to onyx black in the setting.

Tartarus, I thought to myself, clutching my bag tightly to myself. And if I was brought here in my dream, I knew with a sinking feeling who had summoned me to talk.

"Kronos?" I asked timidly, cursing at how weak I sounded. I was terrified out of my mind, but he couldn't know that, not when I was trying to foil his plans. Well, not so much foil as much as postpone.

"How do you know?" he hissed, his voice sounding like someone had taken a knife and dragged it across stone, reminding me of someone dragging their nails across a chalkboard. "How do you know?!"

"A hunch," I answered, trying to keep myself from visibly trembling in my boots.

"No, no, this simply won't do," he said coolly, but I could sense he was trying to conceal his anger and fear. "It's much too early for me to be discovered. We will meet again, daughter, this I promise."

The dream dissolved and now I found myself transported to an apartment on the Upper East Side. I don't know how I knew the location, but as I walked around the apartment, I knew where I was. Beer bottles, poker chips, dirty laundry, and a ton of other garbage were strewed around the room, and even though this was a dream, the repugnant order that filled the apartment was enough to make me want to hurl my dinner.

I forced myself to keep exploring, freezing dead in my tracks as I saw a walrus of a man slumped over in a tan recliner seat, an unopened bottle of beer still gripped in his hand. From the bathroom in the hallway, I could hear silent sniffling, but I wasn't sure if it was Percy or Sally.

I opened the door and found Percy sniffling quietly on the floor, picking out pieces of glass from his arm and chest with his mom's tweezers. He winced as he pulled out the glass, determined to stay as quiet as possible so that Smelly Gabe wouldn't come back to hurt him. Once all the glass was gone, he stepped into the shower, and Percy watched in fascination as the water healed his cuts.