Percy Jackson: The Eternal Wanderer

| Chapter 2 || Dog Problems |

Percy wasn't sure how long he had been standing there for, but it took another hellhound to snap him out of his thoughts. It didn't take him much to remove the monster from the land of the living. A flick of his wrist was all that he needed to do.

He had not heard those names in a long time. Luke Castellan. Thalia Grace. Grover Underwood.

Annabeth Chase.

Just hearing those names again after so many years did...something to Percy. During the heat of the moment, he didn't know what to feel. Surprised? Definitely. Completely taken off guard? Absolutely.

Percy wanted to run up to them and crush them all in a hug. They wouldn't mind, right? Some random guy that had appeared out of nowhere sporting a glowing bronze sword hugging them? Sure, why not.

'Thalia?' Percy asked with a broken voice.

His eyes scanned through the rest of the group. It was as if their faces were being imprinted into his brain again. Every memory with them, both good and bad, came rushing back to him all at once.

'Yeah,' Thalia replied as she looked at Percy questioningly. 'Now, if you're done staring, we need to go.'

She turned to Grover, 'Where to?'

'We need to get to camp as soon as possible,' he said nervously. 'We need to head north. Do you guys have a safe house on the way?'

'Yeah,' Luke replied. 'It's about an hour away from here, I think.'

Percy was pretty uncomfortable around Luke. For one, the latest memory with Luke was when he was trying to kill him in the throne room of the gods. Another memory where Luke had tried to kill him on the Princess Andromeda. And in the woods after Percy's first quest.

Luke really tried to kill him a lot.

On the other hand, Luke had been the one to eventually defeat Kronos. Although Kronos did end up cursing Percy, Olympus would have been destroyed if not for Luke. Percy did, genuinely did hope that Luke had gotten into Elysium but he feared that all of Luke's wrongdoings outweighed the things he did right in the end.

It wasn't even a minute before the five of them were off. Thalia didn't question Percy much, just letting him tag along. Maybe she thought he was a lone demigod and just sort of let him attach onto the group.

Luke, on the other hand, was glaring at Percy almost the whole time. Percy didn't know why he was doing that but he had a feeling he knew what it was.

The trip to the safe house wasn't easy in the slightest. A monster would come out of nowhere every other minute. Hellhounds leapt out of the shadows every time the group thought they were even remotely safe.

It was not a fun time.

'Over here!' Thalia whisper-shouted as she lifted a well-made cover woven from a few bramble branches to reveal an entrance to an underground area.

'You made this?' Percy asked impressed.

'We did,' Thalia nodded as Annabeth crawled into the hole. 'We have many other safe houses around the country. You know, in case we need a place to rest or something.'

A growl sounded off just as Grover disappeared into the hole. Percy, Luke and Thalia instinctively stood back to back, all holding their own respective weapons.

Except for Luke. He had a big stick.

Thalia let the cover to the safe house close slowly. Taking out a mace canister, she willed it to transform into her spear as she scanned the trees for the source of the sound.