Traitor To The Gods; Hero To The Halfbloods [Percy Jackson]

20

It had taken more than a day for the group of four–erm, five, if you counted the scorpion–to navigate the confusing tunnels that made up the labyrinth.

The scorpion, which Jason insisted on naming 'Clawless', like 'Toothless' from that dragon movie except...clawless, moved along the tunnel, its eight legs making clicking noises every time they made contact with the dusty ground.

Jason, Piper and Grover sat on its back while Blackjack, who, due to his bigger size, was unable to lie on the scorpion's back, walked beside it, his legs aching from walking for hours non-stop. 

Boy, did Blackjack wish they had the Ariadne's string. They would have been out of the labyrinth before an ant could take its next step.

Okay, maybe that was an exaggeration, but it definitely would have felt that way compared to how long it was taking without the string.

After walking for a few more hours, then more, then just a teensy bit more, Grover stopped the group with a "Hey, wait!"

Jason tugged lightly on the horns on the side of Clawless's head, bringing the creature to an abrupt stop.

Grover hopped off of his eight-legged ride, bleating a little as his hooves hit the ground. His hooves clopped as he made his way towards the wall on their left side, the sound echoing in the tunnel.

He reached his hand out to brush against the wall, gasped, and then pressed hard on it. He let his hand drop, a blue triangle left where it had been.

The rocky ceiling above them opened up, rumbling as it did, revealing a sun that seemed intent on burning Blackjack's eyeballs.

Piper and Jason stood up on Clawless's back and climbed out, soon followed by Grover, who made excited goat noises.

Blackjack, after being stared at by Clawless for a few seconds, climbed up onto its back with difficulty, but finally managed to get onto the surface with help from Piper and Jason, collapsing on the ground next to the big pile of rocks that looked like poop. The campers called it Zeus's Fist, but since nobody except the boss and a handful of other people understood him, he figured the old man wouldn't zap him if he called it 'The Poop Pile'.

Grover was currently making dirt angels on the ground. He turned onto his stomach and started kissing the ground like a madman–or, in this case, mad satyr.

"Oh, sweet, sweet nature! I never thought I'd see you again!" he said between kisses.

Clawless climbed up behind them with little effort, staring at Grover as though he, too, was weirded out by the satyr's behaviour.

"There you guys are! You've been gone for weeks! We were starting to worry." Leo walked towards them from the direction of camp.
Before anyone could respond, the son of Hephaestus painfully slapped a weird-looking metal collar on Blackjack's neck.

"Hey! What was that for?!" the pegasus whined, before he realised the others, minus Clawless, were all staring at him with wide eyes.

"What?" he whinnied, before he noticed...he didn't whinny. He talked! He could talk! Or maybe he wasn't talking, but the others were staring at him for no reason.

Just to be sure, he yelled at the top of his lungs: "I ONCE ATE A DONUT WITH DIRT ON IT BECAUSE OF A BET!"

As soon as his friends' jaws dropped, he knew that they understood him.

He also knew that they had just heard him say that he'd eaten dirt for a bet. Maybe he should have thought of something less embarrassing to yell.

This is like, the longest chapter in this story. Holy shoe strings!

-Destiny