UnTamed [Book 3]

It's Barking Mad Part I

To Mad_Eyed_Maddy for your review, this is my response: “Oops.”

I know, I’m evil.  Okay, enjoy! :)

Chapter Quote:

“Most people never run far enough on their first wind to find out they’ve got a second.”

~ William James

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Chapter 7: It’s Barking Mad Part I

Derek 

Luke, Silena, and Derek slipped away from the crowd heading to the campfire, and went to the Poseidon cabin instead to use Luke’s laptop.  He leapt into sitting position on his bed with his sister and the son of Hades plopping down on either side of him.  Luke typed in the name ‘Ned Drew London’ in a Google search; over six million results popped up.  One page was for his Facebook page.  The man gave off the impression of being tall; he had sharp green eyes with light brown hair that went down to his shoulders.  His Facebook page was also very secure, meaning nothing could be seen except for his name, profile and cover photo, and where he lived, which was London.

“Let’s see if we find any more stuff on this guy,” Luke remarked aloud.  He exited out of the link and went back onto Google, scrolling through the results.

“Wait, back up!” Silena ordered.  Her brother did as she told until she told him to stop.  He clicked on the link she was pointing at.  It was a short journal article, no pictures, on an occurrence at a major weapons business in London, the most successful one in the business.  The demigods began to read the article:

It has been a long-time speculation that Michael Drew, co-founder of Aurum Arms, has been dating his boss, Penn Winchester, the founder and current president of the most successful and fastest-rising arms company in the world.  Today Michael’s younger brother, Ned Drew, happily announced the couple was engaged.  The workers threw a huge celebration for the couple, shooting fireworks off the top of the thirty story building.  Miss Winchester later showed off her four-carat diamond ring as she and her future husband stepped out of the building that night.  When asked how long they’ve been dating, Michael replied, “A few years now, right before we started the company.  We’ve known each other for almost thirty years, pretty much since we were kids.  I’ve watched her children grow up, we’ve helped each other when we’ve had our ups and downs, and now that our business is going strong and is stable, it just seemed like the next step to take.”

Penn added, “We came from very different backgrounds, but when we met, we just simply hit it off wonderfully.  When I was working for the bank, I hired Michael to watch after my kids because I trusted him the most of anyone.  He made a joke at some point that if I ever wanted a butler, he would gladly do so.  I took the joke but also asked him if he really wanted to and he said yes.  After that he lived with me and my children full time.  I had my best friend living with me.  It was amazing.  And then I quit my job at the bank after some personal problems which he helped me through and that’s when I realized I really wanted to be with him.  I asked him out.  Then we started our company and our lives fell into place.  We’ve been together ever since.”

From Britain’s top gossip blog, our best wishes go out to the happy couple and their family! 

The three demigods sat in silence for a few minutes, reading the article over and over again.  Derek had a sudden realization that Bryn had said her mother’s name without any of them noticing.

“Bryn’s using her mother’s name as an alias,” Derek pointed out, leaning against the wall.

“She didn’t think we’d try and search for her mother,” Luke added.

“We need to talk to Penn Winchester.  We need to warn her about what her sons are getting themselves into,” Silena said.

“We can’t just call her up and say ‘hello, we were friends with your sons and your dead daughter.  We need to warn you about what Brady and Bradley are getting themselves into.’ I don’t think that’d go over well,” Derek said. “Plus she’s one of the most highly guarded people in the business.  The only people who see her are her fiancé and other top executives at the company.”

“She hires people personally,” Luke said, scrolling through another article. “It says right here.  Penn has human resources find candidates and they go through a series of interviews, getting eliminated from the pile as they get closer to the top.  The top candidates talk to her Michael first, then her.”

“Can we make an appointment to talk to her?  Say it’s urgent?” Silena queried.

“Bad idea.  They’d ask about the emergency and if we say anything about her sons, they’ll put her on the phone immediately.  No, we need to talk to her in person.”

“How are we even going to get there?  Now that Derek knows he’s a son of Hades, Amphitrite and Triton won’t let him on any ship and none of us can take a plane because Zeus will zap us out of the sky.”

“What about shadow travel?”

“Can you do that Derek?”

“If I can, I haven’t discovered the power yet.  Besides, from what I’ve heard, Hades hasn’t passed down that power in years.  The last person to have had it was Nico Di Angelo and no one knows what’s happened to him.  Another thing, from stories I’ve heard, Shadow travel takes a lot of energy.”

“Maybe my dad will know what to do,” Luke said.  He switched over to Skype and dialed his dad who thankfully was online.  Mr. Jackson picked up after two rings and greeted everyone with a cheerful hello. “Dad, I have a question.  Actually we all do.  How would we get to London if we can’t fly or go by boat or shadow travel?”

“I don’t know how you’d shadow travel in the first place unless you had a kid of Hades with you.  Maybe Mrs.- wait a minute, why do you need to go to London?” Percy eyed them warily.

“We think we found Bryn’s mom.  We wanted to talk to her.”

“No matter what I do, you’re going to go see her aren’t you?  Children of Poseidon tend to be rather… carefree?  Wild?  No…”

“Untamed?” Luke suggested.

“That’ll work.  Actually I think it suits for any child of the Big Three, but particularly Poseidon.  You can’t travel by boat or by air, but you can still shadow travel.  Pack your things.  I’ll come over in the morning with your ride.”

“What ride are you talking about?” Silena inquired.

Percy grinned. “You’re going to think it’s barking mad.”

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What do you think Percy is doing?  That last line should give you a hint :P  Read and review people!  If I get ten reviews on Wattpad and Fanfiction combined, then I’ll give you a line from a future chapter, how about that? REVIEW