{BOOK 2} Percy Jackson's Sister

I Don't Suppose Anyone Has a Big Ball of Yarn?

       After a couple of hours of singing along to the radio, everyone except Zoë and I were asleep.

      "Thy voice is like a siren," she said.

      "How so?" I asked.

      "Everyone is asleep, why do you think?"

      I thought about that for a moment. Sirens were meant to lure you in and eat you but those were obviously not my intentions. Percy had told me I had a nice voice and to calm him from nightmares I would sing to him. It worked every time. I never thought about it much.

      But Zoë was right, everyone seemed to be in a peaceful sleep.

      "The prophecy said six," I changed the subject. "There's only five of us."

       Zoë considered this. "This is true."

       "So who's the sixth?"

        Zoë opened her mouth to answer but Grover shot awake all of a sudden and yelled, "Exit! Here! Exit here!"

      Zoë jerked the wheel to the left and jolted everyone awake in the process. Angry honking erupted from the other cars as Zoë steadied the car again.

      "You could not have said something sooner?" Zoë demanded.

      "Sorry!" Grover said.

      "Grover has nothing to be sorry about, you should've been paying attention," Thalia said.

      "To what?" Zoë retorted. "Our guide was sleeping!"

       "Why didn't you wake us up if you were unsure?"

       "Smithsonian!" Grover interrupted yet another argument. Zoë glared at him from the rear view mirror.

       "Head to the Smithsonian," he repeated. "Next left."

       Zoë nodded and followed Grover's directions. We pulled into the parking lot of an arrangement of large buildings.

      "That one," Grover pointed. We all got out of the car and stared at the building Grover was pointing at.

      "Okay," Thalia nodded, not questioning why Grover wanted us to go there.

      The big letters on the building indicated we were at the National Air and Space Museum.

      Under different circumstances, I would've been extremely excited. Ever since the astronomy class I was forced to take at camp, I was fascinated by outer space. But I couldn't shake the feeling that we were in danger here.

     As we walked in I asked, "Anyone else get the feeling we're being watched?"

     "There must be cameras all over this place," Thalia reasoned. I nodded but I still wasn't convinced.

      We walked around the corridors admiring the space shuttles and all the exhibits.

     "No way," I gasped. "It's just like The Space Odyssey!"

     There was a room with a replica of the room they used in the film. It was gorgeous and practically screamed outer space.

     "Space geek, much?" Thalia teased.

     "Film geek," I corrected her. I only knew about the room because of the iconic film.

      "A little bit of both," Grover said.

       "Why are we here, anyway?" I asked

       Grover shuffled his feet nervously. "Artemis was tracking a beast. I tracked the beast here hoping it would lead to Artemis."