The Return of the Sea

A Journey and Reminiscence

I may have never said it before, but I LOVE YOU GUYS, REALLY.

PERCY POV

This has been a disaster. It has only been a day since we started and I can't do this anymore. Both, Skye and Chase came on the quest for ulterior motives. The headache started back when we were leaving camp. Annabeth made her move by trying to come close to me and ride with me on the Blackjack. Fortunately, I got awkward, Artemis shot her down and sat down behind me before Annabeth could even move. In the end, Annabeth had to settle for Skye, the 'better' (only) choice.
As we were on our way to Detroit, we were intercepted by Hermes, and his (somewhat) Indian counterpart, sage Narada. As Artemis had briefed me, Sage Narada wasn't a god, but all the communication happened through him.

Hermes started "I would recommend you, heroes, to start by looking at regions with high monster density. Generally, that would mean searching the west from here." Narada nodded, "That would be correct. However, it would be a waste to search areas with high human density. Look for areas that have few mortals living by. Ah yes, Lord Shiva liked to live in mountains a lot, Rudra might have similar qualities, so Mountains might be a good bet." "Also, just so you know, try to avoid other Gods. They aren't as woke as we are." Hermes winked as he and Narada flashed out.
Completely weirded out, we decided to continue towards Yellowstone and the Rocky Mountains. We mostly flew on our pegasi over lands with low population densities, to avoid the public eye as well as look for possible hideouts since the enemy hid in low-density areas.
We took the pegasi slow as to not drain them completely. For the first two nights, we camped outside. We had four sleeping bags arranged around a fire to sleep. I whipped something up to eat. We ate and quickly went to bed. The first night, I had some weird feeling of someone staring at me. I woke up and looked around. But couldn't feel anyone around. Regardless, the feeling lingered on. I assumed it was just over-sensitivity and decided to ignore it. I woke up early the next morning, sore from being half asleep due to the staring feeling. I woke up Artemis who got up in an instance, Annabeth woke up from the sounds of me waking up Artemis. She stared grimly at Artemis. I ignored her thinking the only person left was Zack. Artemis coldly stared at Annabeth and ordered her to wake up her companion. Annabeth tried but failed to wake up that lazy oaf. Artemis sighed and kicked him with a disgusted face waking him in an instance. "If you hated coming in contact with him that much, you should have let me kick him." I pointed out. "Well yes, but that might have killed this weakling considering you hate him and don't know control," joked Artemis.
I chuckled and called upon the pegasi which were grazing. We started our uneventful journey. Artemis was behind me again as I asked her if she felt any weird feelings last night. She claimed that she felt a weird killing intent directed towards her. Weird, I thought. We continued our journey towards the mountain range observing the area around looking for any disturbances possible. The uneventful day came to an end around when we're more than halfway done on our journey. Night came and we decided to take a break again. Annabeth tried to be a bit more aggressive tonight and tried to sit next to me and tried to start conversations, though thankfully Artemis shut her down. The next morning was similar to the morning before as Zack had a rude awakening through Artemis' foot. I had the feeling again, but this time I knew where it came from. Annabeth. That vile woman had been staring at me the entire time. I wanted this thing to end.
We started our flight again when I got a text from Hermes regarding a weird thing happening in the town of Cody. On quickly telling the other two on the pegasi, we decided to head there and0 land in the Yellow Stone Airport and take the road from there. Along with that, we decided to not take breaks to make sure we do not miss anything. The Blackjack and the other pegasi were a bit in disagreement and the other one even took out a bit of its disagreement on Zack ky kicking him on the groin. While the kick wasn't unwelcomed, I talked it out with blackjack and settled on a decent amount of food, at least decent for the horses because my wallet will take a big hit with this settlement.
Once we took the air, I told Artemis about my discovery. Artemis flared up. "That vile bitch," she cursed. "Sheesh calm down." I calmed her. "Let her be, we cant fight among ourselves right now."

Artemis grumbled. "Then her face lit up, "Percy, Percy, Percy." She called me. I asked her what she wanted. "You never told anyone why you left the camp, did you? I mean, I know that that they threw you out, but what happened exactly? Could you tell me?" She asked.

"Ah, those incidents. I am past those events, so sure, I'll tell you." I started. "Well, things happened after some time of Zack's arrival. Everyone was excited about the new child of Zeus but were disappointed when they realised he was a slob. He thought it was somehow my fault that he no longer received any recognition of attention from Chiron or others. He tried to challenge me to a duel several times, failing each time made him angrier. He then decided to sabotage me. He started hampering with other cabin's and their work and skilfully blamed me. He destroyed the Demeter cabin's gardens and tracked the muddy prints to my cabin. He some weird concoction Apollo cabin's food and then placed the medicine in my cabin, while Apollo cabin traced me, he broke their instruments and framed me by bringing me there and making them believe those deeds were done by me. He didn't stop there and burned the Athena cabin library. Trust me, anything worse than dealing with a Kronos rising is Athena cabin when their books are damaged." I chuckled. "I was barely keeping it together. I made sure all the false blame didn't get to me. Ares cabin hated me anyway so Zack didn't have to do anything much there. Most of them just joined his cause and helped him out wherever they could.

I was on my edge. I sometimes ended up crying at night. It was getting more and more difficult to get by every day. More and more campers turned against me. Annabeth had started to get busy causing her to spend less and less time with me. She always avoided questions whenever I asked her what she was up to. Hermes cabin was soon targeted with dirt bombs, making their already stuffy cabin smell rancid. That made me the target of their meanest and outright unpleasant pranks. I could no longer take it. Even for someone as tough-skinned as me, the hate was getting too much to look take up.

That's when I decided to ask out Annabeth and leave the camp for good, maybe to Camp Jupiter or the mortal world. I got her a ring and got ready, but when I was going to confront her, I found her, cheating. I broke down and everything I was holding back came spilling out. Without thinking I ran away to the volcano to jump in. Should have just gone to my mother, maybe she wouldn't have been kidnapped today." I sighed.
Unexpectedly, when I finished, I had tears in my eyes. I felt a soft hand touch my hair. Artemis was patting my head. Her hand rustled through my hair calming me, "It's alright Percy. We will find your mom. You no longer need to worry about the camp."

As she consoled me, I felt at peace but then a voice interrupted me, "Oi boss, stop getting too cosy, we are nearly there." Blackjack neighed. "Thanks, Blackjack for ruining the mood," I said in a monotone. Artemis chuckled.
We landed at the airport, I got the pegasi the promised doughnuts and then rented a car with the leftover money. I gave an annoyed look at Annabeth and the useless lump next to her, for they hadn't spent a single cent since we started. Annabeth looked away like nothing happened and Zack didn't even realise he was the subject of the annoyance.
We took off the road with me on the wheel and Artemis called shotgun. Annabeth and Zack were stuck together in the back stuffed with whatever stuff was left.

Zack kept complaining about the small car but shut up when Artemis shot him a look. He kept grumbling when we saw the town of Cody.
It was when we got inside the town did we realise that the town was in upheaval, but this commotion was caused not by the Enemy but the people on our side.

See you guys soon, sorry for the delay.