Chapter 13: Eavesdropping and Sightseeing
Half-away through their trip in the woods, the kids got too exhausted from not sleeping at all the night before, so Albert suggested setting up a temporary camp next to a good spot in the forest. Percy could take the first nap, while he took the watch.
"Hey, nerd, you sure you don't want to take a nap too?" Albert asked the girl was was preparing a quick meal out of the loot from Medusa's House. "Jackson is out for three hours now, and Grover is out scouting. I can take care of everything while you rest."
Annabeth pressed her lips into a thin line of annoyance, "I can't tell whether I liked it better when you avoided me, or if I think your words are flattering or insulting. It's exhausting... I don't feel like sleeping, anyway. It's not the first time I had to stay up for this long."
"Story time?"
"Absolutely not!" The girl shook her head, "I am not in the mood for that. Maybe one day, not now. Oh, Grover is back!"
Albert turned to the direction Annabeth was looking and blinked a few times, "Is that a... dog? Where did he even get that thing?"
"I bet you gonna like it though, it's pink," The girl said with a smirk. "You two will be matching, isn't that fashionable enough for you, your highness?"
"Well, I can tell you one thing," The boy said with a gloomy expression, "I liked you better when you weren't a smart mouth! Jackson is enough of sass for the group, don't you agree?"
"Whatever."
"Guys, I made a friend!" Grover excitedly sprinted towards them, carrying the thing in his arms. He proudly held her up like Simba in The Lion King, "Allow me to introduce you to Gladiola, she is nice! And-!"
Just as he was about to finish the group heard a gasp, they all turned their focus only to watch a trembling Percy Jackson looking a bit disorientated. A nightmare, Albert concluded. He learned about them too, some demigods suffer from bad, vivid dreams, But Percy was special, his dreams were the clues he got and how the King of the Titans taunted him.
"Well," Annabeth said. "The zombie lives."
Still trembling a bit, the boy asked, "How long was I asleep?"
Albert replied, "Three hours, almost four. It's okay, you should calm down first."
Long enough for us to rest and eat," Annabeth said offering him a container with a weird mixture of Doritos, rice, and some fried pepperoni that she made. "Albert was pestering me while Grover went to scout, he brought a friend back with him."
Percy shook his head and narrowed his eyes as if he was having some problem focusing. His eyes landed on a cross-legged satyr with a fat, dirty, unnaturally pink poodle on his lap. The boy shot a confused look to the other two demigods, who turned away with helpless expressions.
"Where did you get a stuffed animal?" Percy asked in disbelief.
The poodle yapped at the boy suspiciously and quite obviously displeased.
"No, he is not," Grover explained gently to the dog.
"Her name is Gladiola," Annabeth offered with a tone that made them feel like she was numb to everything.
"She is a lady, Jackson. Have some manners!" Albert quickly jumped in with an admonishing playful tone.
"Am I still dremaing?" Percy said giving himself a small slap on the face. He then looked over at his horned friend, "Are you... talking to that thing?"
Gladiola, the magenta-pink poodle, growled at him baring her teeth menacingly, looking very pissed off. Albert thought that dyeing the dog with such a glaring tone of pink was animal abuse in itself, maybe he should called 911 on Gladiola's owners. There is no way she was naturally pink.
"This thing..." Grover said in a warning tone. "is out ticket west. Be nice to her."
"You can talk to animals?!" Percy exclaimed in surprise. "Since when? Why didn't you tell me?"
"If we survive," Albert poked Annabeth, and quietly whispered, "you should expand his curriculum on basic knowledge of creatures from our world, or at least ask Chiron to do it."
The girl only gave him a defeated look, nodding as if she agreed with him.
Grover simply ignored his questions, shamelessly so, "Percy meet Gladiola. Gladiola, meet Percy.
The boy looked at them for help, but they also ignored him. Percy shook his head in denial, "I'm not seriously saying hello to a pink poodle. Forget it."
"Percy," Annabeth warned. "I said hello to the poodle. Albert said hello to the poodle. You say hello to the poodle."
Gladiola growled at him again.
Percy ended up saying hello to the poodle.
Grover then proceeded to explain the situation to the rest of them. He had come across Gladiola in the woods and the two of them struck up a conversation. The poodle had run away from a rich local family, who'd posted a $200 reward for her return. Gladiola did not want to return to the family, but she was willing if it meant to help Grover. Albert faintly recalled such a scene happening in his memories, but he had forgotten most of it since it all sounded pretty unimportant. Now the nice dog lady was trying to help them, he felt a bit sorry for forgetting her.
"How does Gladiola know about the reward?" Percy couldn't help but ask.
"She read the signs," Grover looked at him as if he was dumb. "Duh."
"Of course," The black-haired boy nodded in resignation as he ran his hand through his hair, "Silly, me."
"Are going to return Gladiola then?" Annabeth asked in her strategy mode voice, "We get the money, we buy tickets to Los Angeles. Simple."
"Why would we take the money?" Albert suddenly asked looking genuinely confused.
"Do you have enough money for all the tickets?" The girl asked.
"No, I didn't," He quickly answered. "I found some in Medusa's office though. She kept some cash, nothing much, but we don't really need the $200 of the reward," Seeing that the group looked at them in shock, he quickly added, "You didn't ask!"
Grover looked grateful again and so did the dog lady. Annabeth sighed in defeat and Percy looked at him with a strange and oddly impressed look.
"Are we taking another bus?" The boy asked darkly.
"No," The girl replied equally against the idea. She pointed downhill, toward what they now could see as train tracks, it was a bit far, but they could see it now. "We are taking the train."
"Oh, Gladiola said that there is a station a mile that way. She said that the westbound train leaves at noon." Grover gingerly translated the dog barks. Before he put the pink poodle on the ground, "Thank you for your help, friend. I hope you enjoy your life in the wild."
They spent two days on the Amtrak train, heading west through hills, over rivers, and past amber waves of grain. They were glad that weren't attacked once, but I didn't relax. Albert had talked to Percy after the other two had fallen asleep one night and the boy confessed he felt that they were traveling around in a display case, being watched from above and maybe from below, that something was waiting for the right opportunity.
Albert explained that the gods although incredibly and almost obnoxiously powerful, were not omniscient so Percy should not worry. Not even the King of the Gods, since he did not notice and knew who had his master bolt.
Percy insisted they tried to keep a low profile because my name and picture were splattered over the front pages of several East Coast newspapers. The Trenton Register-News showed a photo taken by a tourist as he got off the Greyhound bus. The boy had a wild look in his eyes in the picture. Riptide, his sword, was just a metallic blur in his hands. It might've been a baseball bat or a lacrosse stick, the Mist had done its magic.
Albert suggested he could use his Charmspeak to make sure that the mortals would ignore them, but Percy was against it saying he felt weird and uncomfortable with the idea. Very well, Albert said in response. Percy's worries were valid, the nature of Albert's part is something anyone would think is morally ambiguous or revolting. He could control the minds of others, play with their wills, and mold them (at least temporarily) to his wishes.
Good Boy Percy had been uncomfortable with this for a while since he had witnessed it being casually used on Clarisse at Cam Half-Blood. Albert was oddly proud the boy mustered up the courage to express his thoughts to him, it must have taken a lot of courage. Albert nodded in agreement, saying he would follow this arrangement, but if the necessity arose... he would not hesitate.
The picture's caption read:
[Twelve-year-old Percy Jackson, wanted for questioning in the Long Island disappearance of his mother two weeks ago, is shown here fleeing from the bus where he accosted several elderly female passengers. The bus exploded on an east New Jersey roadside shortly after Jackson fled the scene. Based on eyewitness accounts, police believe the boy may be traveling with three teenage accomplices. His stepfather, Gabe Ugliano, has offered a cash reward for information leading to his capture.]
"There is no way his family name is Ugliano," Albert said as he finished reading the article.
"It is! I saw on his documents, when we moved in with him I was so mad," Percy explained. "Mom said Gabe hates that name too"
"Don't worry," Annabeth told him. "Mortal police could never find us." But she didn't sound so sure.
The rest of the day they spent alternately pacing the length of the train (because Percy had a really hard time sitting still) or looking out the windows. Albert had been peacefully looking over the window, there was a herd of centaurs riding along the fields. Grover had explained when they first spotted the centaurs the first time that they were all around the country, divided into tribes, but weren't friendly to demigods usually. The little boy centaur, who was the size of a second-grader on a pony, caught his eye and waved.
Another time, toward evening, he saw something huge moving through the woods, Percy was by his side at the time and he saw it too. Percy said he could've sworn it was a lion, except that lions don't live wild in America, and this thing was the size of a Hummer. Its fur glinted gold in the evening light. Then it leaped through the trees and was gone. Albert knew just what the thing was, but the best he could do about it was that it was dangerous and they should be more careful.
The money had only been enough to purchase tickets as far as Denver. They couldn't get berths in the sleeper car, so the group dozed in their seats instead. Their neck got stiff from sleeping in those positions.
Grover kept snoring and bleating and waking Percy up. Albert couldn't sleep, but he decided to pretend he did at least, maybe he would manage to actually do it if he tried hard enough. At one point during the night, Annabeth and Percy had to stick it back on before any of the other passengers noticed. Albert did his best to listen to what they were saying, even if he suspected what was happening.
"So," Annabeth asked. "Who wants your help?"
"What do you mean?" Percy asked a bit too defensive.
"When you were asleep just now, you mumbled, 'I won't help you.' Who were you dreaming about?" The girl explained, without hostility.
The silence that followed denounced the boy's reluctance to say anything. It was the second time I'd dreamed about the evil voice from the pit, Albert still remembered how Percy was trembling when he woke up in the woods. Percy told her about his dream.
Annabeth was quiet for a long time. "That doesn't sound like Hades. He always appears on a black throne, and he never laughs."
"He offered my mother in trade." Percy repeated, "Who else could do that? He is the King of the Underworld. Albert remembers us all the time of this fact." There was some annoyance in his voice by the last sentence.
"I guess . . . if he meant, 'Help me rise from the Underworld.' If he wants war with the Olympians.," Annabeth said with her standard serious tone, "But why ask you to bring him the master bolt if he already has it? Albert was right back at the Big House. Something is off. Alecto also said something that sounded a bit off back in the bus."
Albert contemplated getting up and explaining the entire conspiracy to them, but this was way too risky even for him. Percy and the other's resolves along with their bond are forged by the difficulties of their quest. He was the outlier who wasn't even supposed to be there. Where is it? Where?
Annabeth suddenly said, "Percy, you can't barter with Hades. You know that, right? He's deceitful, heartless, and greedy. I don't care if his Kindly Ones weren't as aggressive this time—!"
"This time?" The boy suddenly asked. "You mean you've run into them before?"
The girl hesitated before finally saying, "Let's just say I've got no love for the Lord of the Dead. You can't be tempted to make a deal for your mom."
"What would you do if it was your dad?"
"That's easy," She said firmly. "I'd leave him to rot."
"You're not serious?" Percy asked in shock.
"My dad's resented me since the day I was born, Percy," The girl said. "He never wanted a baby. When he got me, he asked Athena to take me back and raise me on Olympus because he was too busy with his work. She wasn't happy about that at all. She told him heroes had to be raised by their mortal parent."
"But how . . . I mean, I guess you weren't born in a hospital. . . ."
"I appeared on my father's doorstep, in a golden cradle, carried down from Olympus by Zephyr the Spirit of the West Wind. You'd think my dad would remember that as a miracle, right? Like, maybe he'd take some digital photos or something. But he always talked about my arrival as if it were the most inconvenient thing that had ever happened to him. When I was five he got married and totally forgot about Athena. He got a 'regular' mortal wife, and had two 'regular' mortal kids, and tried to pretend I didn't exist."
Albert opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling. What that how his mother informed his father about him? Unnounced and in a golden cradle carried by a spirit? Did his dad ever resent him? He didn't want to find out. There was no point now, he had a good life and his father never truly said something cruel to him. Still, he understood why Annabeth's dad reacted this way. He must hate Athena a bit, a maiden goddess who decided to have a kid with him on her own, born out of her mind or something else. But saying such things to a child? That was just cruel.
"My mom married a really awful guy," Percy told her. "Grover said she did it to protect me, to hide me in the scent of a human family. Maybe that's what your dad was thinking."
"He doesn't care about me," she said. "His wife—my stepmom—treated me like a freak. She wouldn't let me play with her children. My dad went along with her. Whenever something dangerous happened—you know, something with monsters—they would both look at me resentfully, like, 'How dare you put our family at risk.' Finally, I took the hint. I wasn't wanted. I ran away."
"How old were you?"
"Same age as when I started camp. Seven." Annabeth replied.
"But . . .how?" Percy asked. "You couldn't have gotten to Half-Blood Hill by yourself."
"Not alone, no. Athena watched over me and guided me toward help. I made a couple of unexpected friends who took care of me, for a short time, anyway."
Well, couldn't Athena ask that spirit to take her there?! Albert almost said it out loud. The girl he was used to banter almost all the time was talking about Luke Castellan and Thalia Grace, the first friends she ever made and also some of the sources of pain in her life. Thalia who died for her and Luke and the latter who had already betrayed her and she didn't even know.
If Albert didn't know how fucked up and tragic had been Luke's life and how much pain the gods had caused him it would be easier to hate the guy, but he couldn't. Not really.
Toward the end of our second day on the train, June 13, eight days before the summer solstice, they passed through some golden hills and over the Mississippi River into St. Louis. Annabeth craned her neck to see the Gateway Arch.
"I want to do that," she sighed.
"What?" Grover asked, but all the boys were curious (Albert made sure to look interested).
"Build something like that. You ever see the Parthenon?"
"Only in pictures," Percy replied.
"Dad never took me to anywhere near that area of Europe," Albert said. "I did see the Arch of Triumph in Paris five years ago when Grandma took me with her on vacation."
"I want to see that one too. Someday, I'm going to see it in person, you know?" The girl confidently announced. "I'm going to build the greatest monument to the gods, ever. Something that'll last a thousand years."
Percy laughed. "You? An architect?"
Her cheeks flushed. "Yes, an architect! Athena expects her children to create things, not just tear them down, like a certain god of earthquakes I could mention."
"Not now, children" Albert interjected. "First, Annabeth, you are better than that, your insecurities are louder if you act this way, my Granpa always says, confidence is quiet, insecurity is loud," He turned to Percy and said. "I know you didn't mean to offend, but you shouldn't laugh at another's person dream, Jackson. At least she got one. Grover has one too. I don't you about you, but I certainly don't. I haven't thought about anything I want to do yet."
There was an oppressive silence around them for a while.
"Sorry, Seaweed Brain," Annabeth said suddenly. "That was mean of me. He is right, I made a fool out of myself."
"It's fine. I shouldn't have laughed at you. We are working together, right?" Percy replied. "I mean, didn't Athena and Poseidon ever cooperate?"
Annabeth had to think about it. "I guess . . . the chariot, you're right..." she said tentatively. "My mom invented it, but Poseidon created horses out of the crests of waves. So they had to work together to make it complete."
"How about we all keep cooperating?" Grover suggested with a chuckle. "I am glad he came with us, I don't know what I would do alone with the two of you."
They rode into the city, Annabeth watching as the Arch disappeared behind a hotel. Albert was also curiously looking at everything, it was his first time ever in this city, and everything was interesting to him. They pulled into the Amtrak station downtown part of the city. The intercom told them they would have a three-hour layover before departing for Denver.
Grover stretched. Before he was even fully awake, he said, "Food."
"Come on, goat boy," Annabeth said. "Sightseeing."
"Sightseeing?"
"The Gateway Arch, I should have bought a Polaroid camera though," Albert explained with a much neutral tone, making sure to prepare his bow and arrows. "This may be my only chance to ride to the top before we have to leave. Are you two coming or not?"
Grover and Percy exchanged looks. The latter's expression clearly said he wanted to say no but after a moment of pondering to himself. He decided to tag along.
The young satyr just shrugged. "As long as there's a snack bar without monsters."
Albert let out a quiet nervous laugh. This was exactly what was gonna happen, and from what he could tell, there were gonna be two very nasty and powerful monsters. Still, this time around, Medusa's Head was never sent to Olympus by Percy. Athena was probably on good terms with Annabeth and wouldn't do punish her by letting her fend for herself for "embarrassing" her by not stopping Percy Jackson's impertinence.
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