Falling Through Portals

Suicide Jumpers

Chapter 25

Percy couldn't remember the goodbyes that had occurred with America and Maxon. It was a blur. Not that Percy really cared anyway. He just needed a distraction. And falling into a different dimension sure seemed to fit that bill. Nothing is more distracting then a brand new world and people with nothing familiar.

He landed in the back of a huge auditorium. He landed on his feet and rolled to absorb the impact. When he stood back up he assessed the crowd. No one seemed to have seen him come rolling in. his eyes went to the stage. It was a plain stage with five different bowls on it and an announcer at a podium. He frowned.

what was weirder was all the people in the auditorium. All of them were separated into sections that seemed to be organized by color. It reminded him of high school homecoming week when every grade wore their own colored t-shirt and sat together as a class. But this was far from a homecoming pep rally, it ranged all ages. There were adults, children,. Then the teenager cut their own hand. and teenagers all intermingled. The speaker was saying names and then the owners of said name came up to the stage and took the knife provided and they slice their own hands.

Percy frowned, did these people enjoy watching people cut themselves? This is a weird one, he thought.

Then the kid on the stage who was in a blue shirt held his hand out over a bowl that was filled with water. A drop of blood fell into the water and the people in blue began cheering wildly.

Maybe they are from different teams and they are doing some sort of ritual? Percy tried to work it out as another name was called and a girl walked up.

She wore all black and had multiple tattoos on her arms. She cut her hand and held it out over the bowl with fire in it. Like clockwork as soon as the blood sizzled in the fire the people in black jumped up and cheered loudly. Percy was so caught off guard by the whole color thing. He was wearing his gray suit. He matched the one all gray group present

Then the next kid went up and did the whole thing. Percy kept shaking his head. This was weird. But it was about to get weirder.

"Next is Percy Jackson," said the announcer. Percy's blood ran cold. Did that guy just say my name?

Percy searched the crowed. No one was moving. People began looking around for movement. Percy's heart was racing, what was happening? How had my name gotten into this dimension? He was frozen. The man reread the name. He could have just waited it out and not done anything. But he didn't.

Instead, Percy walked slowly down the rows of chairs in between the blue group and the gray group. All eyes were on him. The gray people were all muttering amongst themselves. He heard them asking each other who he was. For a moment he locked eyes with this one blonde haired girl. She looked like she was about to write her death sentence. He smiled at her and hoped it looked more genuine then it felt.

Percy mounted the stage. He was not excited about cutting himself. He sure hope they disinfected the knife between each person. All the bowls were filled with something different. He had half a mind to put his blood in the one with the water. He looked at the crowd. Then in one of the open seats he spied his stuff. It was in the black clothed group. and ofcourse that made his discision; He had to get his stuff.

His hand burned as the knife sliced his skin. Then he let the blood fall into the fire. The black group cheered and he received a bandage. Percy made his way to the open seat and was greeted warmly by all the people there. In the back of his mind he wondered what he had just done, but he tried to ignore that part of his mind.

It seemed like forever before the, whatever it was, was over. The only thing that had kept him awake was the cheering they would do. The one blonde girl in gray had joined his group. It seemed like it had been a bigger deal then some of the others but Percy could have been wrong.