A True Hero

Chapter Eight: Percy

I was worried about Elena. When we launched into the air she stumbled with the air a bit. I thought she was fully healed from the fleece but she must've lied to me. And with Thorn back at the school she seemed more hurt than I was when we got hit with equal force. She stayed next me, I reached over and grabbed her hand. She looked over and smiled, I returned it.

"Tell me when it's over!" Thalia screamed, her eyes clamped shut.

"It's okay!" Elena reassured her.

"Are...are we very high?"

I looked down as we soared over snowy mountain tops, "Nah, not really." I said.

"We are in the Sierras!" Zoe exclaimed, "I've hunted here before. We should be in San Francisco in just a few hours."

"Hey, hey Frisco! Hey Chuck, you remember those parties we'd go to?" Our angel asked the other.

"Oh I'm so there."

"You guys have been to San Francisco?" I asked.

"Just because we are statues doesn't mean we can get out there. Those mechanical statues took us to some marble ladies and-"

"Hank! They're kids, man." Chuck cut in.

"Right focus on flying." Hank decided.

We flew through buildings and streets. They dropped us off by a giant building and flew off.

"So what now?" I asked.

"We should find out what the monster Artemis was searching for was." Elena suggested.

"But how?"

I looked into her eyes, the gleaming lilac color seemed a hundred miles away. She was thinking, I looked at Thalia and Zoe. They had the same look etched on their faces.

"Nereus." Grover said.

"Who?" I asked.

"The old god Nereus. Isn't that the guy Apollo told you to find?"

I nodded completely forgetting about my audience with the sun god, "The old man of the sea. That's what Apollo said. I have to find him and force him to tell us what he knows. But how in the Hades do we find him?"

I saw Zoe make a face, "Old Nereus eh?"

"You know him?" Thalia asked.

"My mother was a sea goddess. Yes I know him. Unfortunately he was never really hard to find. Just follow the smell."

"What do you mean?" Elena asked.

"Come," she said unemotionally, "I will show thee."

We stopped at a Goodwill drop box. Zoe had fitted me with a flannel shirt, jeans three sizes too big, bright red sneakers, and a big floppy rainbow hat.

Elena was trying to hold in her laughter but clearly failing. I gave her a look and she responded with a wink and a smirk. My face went red and I turned away. I silently cursed her ability to do that.

"Oh yeah," Grover said smiling, "You look totally inconspicuous now."

"A typical male vagrant." Zoe said with a satisfactory look all over her face.

"Thanks a lot," I grumbled, "Why am I doing this anyway?"

"I told thee, to blend in." Zoe answered bluntly.

Zoe led us to the waterfront where a bunch of homeless people were on the docks, "He'll be down there somewhere," she said, "He never travels far from water and he likes to sun himself during the day."