Hurricane ~ L. Valdez

1.29- Aphrodite Gives Us a Quick Change

        I dreamed up another memory... well, in a way. I need to ask Chiron about that later... could be the PTSD.

       I woke up on the floor of a large white room, rubbing my eyes sleepily. There was nobody there, and there were large picture frames everywhere, like... a museum? Except instead of art or mythology, the pictures were of me.

      I stood up, walking to the first one. The moment I touched the picture frame, I heard the words, "We're in this together, Ellie." Percy. The scene stopped, and when I touched it again, the same memory played on loop. It was exactly as I remembered it, and looked to be from an outside point of view, as if our moment had been filmed. That was from the week Percy and I got to camp.

       I walked around, looking at a couple different ones, all seeming to be from different periods if my life.

      Then I got to a specific one and I froze.

      "Come on, Ellie. I thought you were tired of living in Percy's shadow. Zeus doesn't care about you. He left you and forced you to grow up with your aunt and her abusive husband."

      My eyes widened as I remembered these next few seconds.

      "Luke, I'm not doing this." I said shakily. "I'm not helping you raise Kronos."

      He made a tsk-ing sound with his mouth. "You're really giving this opportunity up? He won't like that, Ellie."

      "I can't do this, Luke. It's not right."

      "Well don't you dare come running back to me when it's too late, Elara Jackson. Because you will not be spared. Kronos is rising, with or without you. And no matter how close we were, you will not have a second chance."

       Tears ran down my cheeks as the memory stopped. And then, I woke up.

~~

       When I woke up, I was sitting at a table at a sidewalk cafe. It was a sunny morning, and I didn't even have to blink to know where I was. California.

       The rest of the group sat in chairs around me—all of them had their hands calmly folded across their chests, dozing pleasantly.

       They also all had new clothes on. Piper was awake, and when she looked down at her outfit she gasped.

       "Mother!" She yelled. Jason flinched, bumping the table with his knees, and then everyone else was awake.

       "What?" Hedge demanded. "Fight who? Where?"

      "Falling!" Leo grabbed my arm swiftly. To be fair, I wouldn't have been surprised if we were. "No—not falling. Where are we?"

      Jason blinked, trying to get his bearings. He focused on Piper and made a little choking sound. "What are you wearing?"

       Piper blushed. She had on a turquoise dress with black leggings and black leather boots, and her old snowboarding jacket from her dad. She also had gotten her hair done, too.

       "It's nothing," she said. "It's my—" She paused. "It's nothing."

     Leo grinned, looking me up and down. "Aphrodite strikes again, huh? You're definitely the best-looking warrior in town, hermosa." He smirked, sending me a wink.

       I looked down at my outfit. I was wearing black high-waisted jeans, a black and white striped shirt, combat boots, and a green army jacket, which I recognized immediately, by both look and smell, as Leo's. My cheeks flushed. My hair was cut short, so that it was now a little bit past my chin, and it was curled in large waves.