The Half-Blood Project

15- Journey East

Percy Jackson. 

"Percy!" Grover bleated from across the warehouse and nearly slipped on his hooves a thousand times on the cold warehouse concrete. A couple of trainees caught up to him and before he slipped, managed to catch him. 

I gave him a goofy grin and he struggled to stand straight, his horns peeking out of his jumble of curly brown curls. In the past two, three weeks, Grover had grown on me, he reminded me of the kid who got bullied in middle school, peanut butter and ketchup threw into his hair, and just generally harassed, but was nice to everyone and he rubbed off on some. 

He was rubbing off on me. His smile was kind of a stupid, funny, oblivious smile that everyone either laughed at or smiled along with. 

"Whatsup G-Man." I smiled and elbowed him lightly, he returned the smile and elbowed me back, it was like a chicken was trying to fight me, funny. 

"We need to go to Olympus, in New York." He looked like he was gulping down a brick saying this. Had Annabeth gotten into his head? Told his we needed to go east? No. I refused to abandon my post here as a leader. Yes, I trusted my friends to take over, but it was so much more than leaving. 

I felt like a dad leaving his kids to go off on an adventure he may never come back from. 

"Slow, down, we don't need to go anywhere." 

Grover shook my shoulders, his grip was firm and alert, his swirling brown eyes a mess of crazy. 

"I'm serious Percy, I had a dream and it wasn't good, not good at all." He said in a shaky voice, trembling like an earthquake oncoming. I shook off his shoulders and stared him right into the eye.

"Grover, it was probably just a harmless dream," I assured him but he shook his head again, curls flying and flapping around his slightly pointed ears. A couple of trainees stared at us but moved on.

"No. Annabeth got the same dream. Did you?"

I wavered, opening my mouth to tell him I did have the dream, of the green fire and the face that hovered in the flames, but I clamped my lips shut. We were not going on a suicide mission to New York City across the country, we would die at the hands of Kronos, catch us in a cage made to destroy half-bloods. He may have sent the dreams as a clever trap.

But the answer spills from my lips. "The green flames, all of it," I mutter, and Grover's eyes light up like a kid on Christmas morning. He tapped around in his hooves, it sounded like a badly choreographed tap dance made by eleven-year-olds.

"It's a sign Percy, even you can admit that. We have to go to Olympus. Won't it be exciting to meet your father?"

I shake my head. No, I did not want to meet the man who had the power to let my mother live and live from the abuse Gave wrecked upon us. He could have stopped me from killing my abuser that shredded a part of my soul, could have done something. But he sat on the sidelines, watching, but was he watching? Or did he forget about me as all of the Olympians forgot about us? They let us be scarred, they let us be hurt and killed, maimed by turned half-bloods, taken by the enemy, and joining the side of darkness so deep no light can penetrate.

But if we did go to Olympus, did we have an advantage over him? Did we have an advantage of the past, the sacred pact that they all shattered with not being able to keep it in their pants?

"I'll think about it. But don't get any ideas, Grover." I mumbled and Grover practically leaped to the moon and back, skittering across the concrete to go find Annabeth and tell her.

I did not know what to do.

The complication of this was insane. Part of me was itching to find out more from Kronos and Luke, the darkness they bring. Another part of me wants to protect the family I've created and worked for, I deserve to have my friends around me and be there for them.