La Vie en Rose // Percy Jackson

viii. percy has the worst family reunion ever

Annabeth volunteered to go alone since she had the cap of invisibility, but Percy and I convinced her it was too dangerous. Either we all went together, or nobody went.

"Nobody!" Tyson voted. "Please?"

But in the end he came along, nervously chewing on his huge fingernails. We stopped at our cabin long enough to gather our stuff. We figured whatever happened, we would not be staying another night aboard the zombie cruise ship, even if they did have million-dollar bingo. Percy made sure Riptide was in his pocket, and the vitamins and thermos from Hermes were at the top of Percy's bag. Percy didn't want Tyson to carry everything, but he insisted, and Annabeth and I told him not to worry about it. Tyson could carry three full duffel bags over his shoulder as easily as Percy could carry a backpack.

We sneaked through the corridors, following the ship's YOU ARE HERE signs toward the admiralty suite. Annabeth scouted ahead invisibly. We hid whenever someone passed by, but most of the people we saw were just glassy-eyed zombie passengers.

As we came up the stairs to deck thirteen, where the admiralty suite was supposed to be, Annabeth hissed, "Hide!" and shoved us into a supply closet.

Percy and I heard a couple of guys coming down the hall.

"You see that Aethiopian drakon in the cargo hold?" one of them said.

The other laughed. "Yeah, it's awesome."

Annabeth was still invisible, but she squeezed my arm hard. Percy and I shared a look and got a feeling we should know that second guy's voice.

"I hear they got two more coming," the familiar voice said. "They keep arriving at this rate, oh, man—no contest!"

The voices faded down the corridor.

"That was Chris Rodriguez!" Annabeth took off her cap and turned visible. "You remember —from Cabin Eleven."

I sort of recalled Chris from the summer before. He was one of those undetermined campers who got stuck in the Hermes cabin because his Olympian dad or mom never claimed him. Now that I thought about it, I realized I hadn't seen Chris at camp this summer. "What's another half-blood doing here?"

Annabeth shook her head, clearly troubled.

We kept going down the corridor. Percy didn't seem to need maps anymore to know we were getting close to Luke. Percy sensed something cold and unpleasant—the presence of evil.

"Percy." Annabeth and I stopped suddenly. "Look."

We stood in front of a glass wall looking down into the multistory canyon that ran through the middle of the ship. At the bottom was the Promenade—a mall full of shops—but that's not what had caught Annabeth and my attention.

A group of monsters had assembled in front of the candy store: a dozen Laistrygonian giants like the ones who'd attacked Percy with dodge balls, two hellhounds, and a few even stranger creatures—humanoid females with twin serpent tails instead of legs.

"Scythian Dracaenae," Annabeth and I whispered. "Dragon women."

The monsters made a semicircle around a young guy in Greek armor who was hacking on a straw dummy. A lump formed in my throat when I realized the dummy was wearing an orange Camp Half-Blood T-shirt. As we watched, the guy in armor stabbed the dummy through its belly and ripped upward. Straw flew everywhere. The monsters cheered and howled.

Annabeth and I stepped away from the window. Annabeth's face was ashen and I was relatively sure mine was the same.

"Come on," Percy told us, trying to sound braver than he probably felt. "The sooner we find Luke the better."