Chapter 12
Car wash dude
Helicopters, police cars, ambulances, and news reporters kept arriving.
Percy still wasn't here.
Grover and I started to panic.
The newswoman continued with her report. "Probably not a terrorist attack, we're told, but it's still very early in the investigation. The damage, as you can see, is very serious. We're trying to get some of the survivors, to question them about eyewitness reports of someone falling from the arch."
Wait... what? Someone fell from the arch? That had to be Percy! Oh, no! "Percy fell off from the arch," I choked out to Grover.
"I hope he didn't make the trip to Hades suddenly very quick," Grover whimpered, pacing back and forth nervously.
"Witnesses believe the cause of the explosion was by an adolescent boy," Another reporter said. "Channel Five has learned that surveillance cameras show an adolescent boy going wild on the observation deck, somehow setting off the freak explosion. Hard to believe, John, but that's what we're hearing. Again, no confirmed fatalities, but you never know. The survivors will be checked upon for any injuries not seen by the eye."
That just made me even more nervous. What had really happened to Percy?
Suddenly, Grover cried out, "Annabeth, I think I saw him!"
I whipped my head around to wear Grover was pointing and saw a brown head making its way through the crowd.
"Come on!"
Grover ran over to Percy while I followed.
"Perrr-cy!" Grover cried.
The boy turned around and his green eyes lit up. Percy had survived!
Grover tackled Percy in a hug and said, "We thought you'd gone to Hades the hard way!"
I stood behind him and tried to look angry with him for causing such a commotion. But I was too relieved that Percy was alive to pull it off. "We can't leave you alone for five minutes! What happened?"
"Um... I sort of fell..." Percy said.
"Percy! Six hundred and thirty feet!" It was a wonder he was still alive. I scanned around the Arch and saw a river by the Arch. Oh. That made sense.
"Gangway!" A cop shouted behind us. We jumped out of the way as paramedics hustled out and rolled a woman on a stretcher. She was one of the survivors.
"And then this huge dog, this huge fire-breathing Chihuahua-" The woman was stuttering.
Wait - the Chihuahua owned by the creepy lady. I knew it. I knew it. They were both monsters.
"Okay, ma'am," the paramedic said. "Just calm down. Your family is fine. The medication is starting to kick in."
"I'm not crazy!" The woman protested, and I agreed with her. "This boy jumped out of the hole and the monster disappeared." The woman glanced at Percy. Oh, Styx. "There he is! That's the boy!"
Percy stiffened and quickly turned away, pulling Grover and me after him. We disappeared into the crowd.
"What's going on?" I demanded. "Was she talking about the Chihuahua on the elevator?"
Percy looked around, and then nodded. "The woman and her Chihuahua- they were monsters. The woman was Echidna and the dog was Chimera."
My eyes widened in horror. The Chimera was a monster composed of different animals: a head from a lion, a body and hooves of a goat, and a tail of a snake. He was really dangerous. Echidna was Chimera's mother, which made sense since Echidna was mother of all monsters. She was half nymph and half snake. Truly, she was an ugly sight. She had scaly green skin and eyes like a reptile's.
