daylight | percy jackson

lukie pookie returns

˚₊‧꒰ა ☆ ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

BOOK TWO.

CHAPTER TWELVE

❝ how the fuck is this percy's fault? ❞

ARIA WOKE up to find a sleeping Percy nestled on her shoulder, his head slumped in an awkward position. Shifting as much as she could in order not to wake him, she looked at their surroundings.

In the distance, the sun was setting behind a city skyline, and she could make out a beachside highway lined with palm trees, storefronts glowing with red-and-blue neon, and a harbour filled with sailboats and cruise ships. If she had to make a guess, she would say that they were somewhere in the Florida coast.

"I see that Percy's got a bit comfortable there," Annabeth remarked beside her, sitting on her own hippocampi. "You're gonna need to wake him up. The hippocampi won't move any further."

Aria looked down to take a look at the sleeping boy, his features finally relaxed. She felt bad that she had to wake him.

Using her arm that wasn't being slept on, she tapped on his curls, the boy stirring and finally waking up, rubbing his eyes with his hand that wasn't on her waist.

"Where are we," he croaked, looking around at their surroundings with a confused expression.

"I think we're in Miami," Aria answered. She wasn't sure though. She was failing geography.

"The hippocampi are acting funny," Annabeth informed Percy, who nodded in response.

Sure enough, their fishy friends had now slowed down and were whinnying and swimming in circles, sniffing the water. They didn't look happy. One of them sneezed.

"This is as far as they'll take us," Percy said. "Too many humans. Too much pollution. We'll have to swim to shore on our own."

Great.

None of them were very psyched about that, but they thanked Rainbow and his friends for the ride. Tyson cried a little. He unfastened the makeshift saddle he'd made, which contained his tool kit and a couple of other things he'd salvaged from the Birmingham wreck. He hugged Rainbow on the neck, gave him a soggy mango he had picked up on the island and said goodbye.

Once the hippocampi's white manes disappeared into the sea, the group swam for shore. The wave's pushed them forward, and in no time they were back in the mortal world. They wandered along the cruise line docks, pushing through crowds of people arriving for vacations. Porters bustled around with carts of luggage. Taxi drivers yelled at each other in Spanish and tried to cut in line for customers. If anybody noticed five kids dripping wet and looking they had just had a fight with a monster, they didn't let on.

Now that they were back among mortals, Tyson's single eye had blurred from the mist. Grover had put on his cap and sneakers. Even the Fleece had transformed from a sheepskin to a red-and-gold high school letter jacket with a large glittery Omega on the pocket.

Annabeth ran to the nearest newspaper box and checked the date on the Miami Herald. "Fuck! It's June eighteenth! We've been away from camp ten days!"