Victoria Dia: The Missing God

Chapter 2: I've Had a Really Weird Week

I arrived at camp on a Saturday. Sunday was rather uneventful, aside from some shenanigans involving the Ares cabin and a certain girl by the name of Emily. She'll be a topic for later though.

The next week however well, that was a rather eventful period. First, two more Apollo kids, otherwise known as my darling younger half-siblings, showed up.

The Apollo cabin is one of the larger cabins at Camp, tied with Hermes, with a total of ten kids tops. Will is the oldest, Kayla and I are the same age, Austin is a year younger than us, Jerry, Gracie, and Yan are 13,11 and 12 respectively and Mack and Elias are the youngest at 10 and 7. The point is, lots of kids, and most of us are only here for the summer.

I was sitting outside Cabin Seven, looking at the dying petals of the yellow flowers on the window sill. The purple Hyacinths seemed to be doing fine, but the yellow blooms from Delos were withering and dying. I wondered briefly if I could ask someone I knew from the Demeter Cabin if they could figure out what was going on with the plants.

"Vic!" I heard someone call my name and turned to find Mack, standing on the steps with a bright smile.

She had the orange camp shirt on and a green backpack, decorated with a yellow airport tag, with her name scribbled on it in Sharpie and adorned with a little sun drawing.

"Mack!" I opened my arms and got a tight hug. She was getting taller, soon I guessed she'd be as tall as me.

"I missed you!" I heard, though it was muffled as she said it directly into my shirt. She pulled away and excitedly dug her hands into one of her backpack pockets and pulled out a gold necklace, adorned with little white flower petals and a sun pendant. "I got you this at the airport, do you like it?"

"Oh, thanks Mack, it's beautiful," I told her, taking it into my hands and getting a closer look at it. 

She smiled before her eyes caught on something behind me, and I watched the smile fade off her face.

"Why are the flowers dying? What happened?" I heard her ask, I turned to look again at the withering yellow flowers and then turned back to Mack.

"It might be a blight or something, I was just going to pop over to the Demeter cabin to see if they can help me figure out what's going on," I explained, trying to sound hopeful so that it didn't scare or worry her. Mack then looked at the purple hyacinths on the window sill.

"Then, we should move that one, so that they don't catch it," she told me, astutely.

"You're right, I hadn't thought of that yet," I told her, putting the necklace she had gifted me into my shorts pockets briefly to pick up the red terracotta pot that the purple plants were sitting in with both of my hands.

I turned to Mack as I held the pot in my hands. "Why don't you put your stuff inside?"

She smiled at me again before pulling open the cabin door and heading in. I moved the plant to the other windowsill, where it could sit alone away from the infected ones.

"Since when did you become a Demeter kid?" I heard Axel ask behind me as I adjusted the Pot so it wasn't sitting on the edge of the window sill.

"I didn't and I think those guys are a pretty great testimony," I told Axel, pointing his attention to the right windowsill where the yellow withering flowers were sitting. "Speaking of Demeter kids, do you know if Aster's here yet? I need to consult her about how to fix that."

"Water might do it," Axel suggested, I shook my head.

"Already tried," I said, walking down the steps to join him in the grass. "Though I don't think any of us ever watered them before, they kind of just pop up and stay alive through magic."