After sixteen years, I did not expect to be chased by two metal cows with my aunt sally, little cousin Percy Jackson, and Percy's best friend- Grover Underwood.
but the one thing I never saw coming,
Was Luke castellan.
And the war, duh.
along with t...
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The next afternoon, June 14, seven days before the solstice, our train rolled into Denver. We hadn't eaten since the night before in the dining car, somewhere in Kansas. We hadn't taken a shower since Half-Blood Hill, and I was sure that was obvious.
'Let's try to contact Chiron,' Annabeth said. 'I want to tell him about your talk with the river spirit.'
'We can't use phones, right?'
'I'm not talking about phones.'
We wandered through downtown for about half an hour, though I wasn't sure what Annabeth was looking for. The air was dry and hot, which felt weird after the humidity of St Louis. Everywhere we turned, the Rocky Mountains seemed to be staring at me, like a tidal wave about to crash into the city.
Finally we found an empty do-it-yourself car wash. We veered towards the stall furthest from the street, keeping our eyes open for patrol cars. We were three adolescents hanging out at a car wash without a car; any cop worth his doughnuts would figure we were up to no good.
'What exactly are we doing?' I asked, as Grover took out the spray gun.
'It's seventy-five cents,' he grumbled. 'I've only got two quarters left. Annabeth?'
'Don't look at me,' she said. 'The dining car wiped me out.'
"Luke?" Luke shook his head.
I fished out my last bit of change and passed Grover a quarter, which left me two nickels and one drachma from Medusa's place.
'Excellent,' Grover said. 'We could do it with a spray bottle, of course, but the connection isn't as good, and my arm gets tired of pumping.'
" Pumping, why are they pumping?" Percy turns to Luke.
Luke smiled amused, "you'll see."
grover fed in the quarters and set the knob to fine mist 'I-M'ing.'
'Instant messaging?'
'Iris-messaging,' Annabeth corrected. 'The rainbow goddess Iris carries messages for the gods. If you know how to ask, and she's not too busy, she'll do the same for half-bloods.'
'You summon the goddess with a spray gun?'
Grover pointed the nozzle in the air and water hissed out in a thick white mist. 'Unless you know an easier way to make a rainbow.'
Sure enough, late afternoon light filtered through the vapor and broke into colors.
Annabeth held her palm out to me. 'Drachma, please.'
