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i woke up a few minutes before san francisco came into view.
i had a dreamless sleep, which i was grateful for.
"where do you guys want to land?" hank asked.
percy and thalia shook awake.
"there," zoë suggested. "by the embarcadero building."
"good thinking," chuck said. "me and hank can blend in with the pigeons."
we all looked at him.
"kidding," he said. "sheesh, can't statues have a sense of humor?"
as it turned out, there wasn't much need to blend in. it was early morning and not many people were around. we freaked out a homeless guy on the ferry dock when we landed. he screamed when he saw hank and chuck and ran off yelling something about metal angels from mars.
we said our good-byes to the angels, who flew off to party with their statue friends. i looked around. what are we going to do now?
we'd made it to the west coast. artemis was here somewhere. annabeth too, i hoped. but we had no idea how to find them, and tomorrow was the winter solstice. we didn't even have any clue what monster artemis had been hunting.
it was supposed to find us on the quest. it was supposed to "show the trail," but it never had. now we were stuck on the ferry dock with whatever money was in my pack (although that wouldn't really be a problem), no friends, and no luck.
after a brief discussion, we agreed that we needed to figure out just what this mystery monster was.
"but how?" percy asked.
"nereus," grover said. i put a hand to my forehead in realization.
percy looked at him. "what?"
i slapped percy's arm. "apollo, you idiot." i reminded him. "that's what he said. seek out nereus."
percy nodded. "the old man of the sea," he remembered. "i'm supposed to find him and force him to tell us what he knows. but how do i find him?"
