The Saviors of Olympus: The Lightning Thief

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THIS CHAPTER WAS A COLLAB WITH  GeronimoEeemy1 

Third person POV

The two half-bloods climbed up the stairs leading towards the attic. Both were immediately greeted by a musty smell.

Alex's POV

I was presented with the smell of dust and reptiles which reminded me of the myth of Python and the Oracle. Crowded around the attic were trophies and spoils of war. A jar filled with sickly green liquid sat on a low table. Inside was a dragon head. It was labeled HYDRA HEAD. Turning to the right was just about one of the worst ideas ever. Percy gagged. On a tripod stool was a mummy. Not just any old one, though. She was wearing old, colorful clothes like a hippie at the mall. I turned to to see Percy holding his stomach, looking almost as green as the Hydra head.

Looking at her sent chills up my back. And that was before she sat up on her stool and opened her mouth. A green mist poured from the mummy's mouth, coiling over the floor in thick tendrils, hissing like ten thousand snakes. I stumbled over myself trying to get to the trapdoor, but it slammed shut. Inside my head, I heard a voice, slithering into one ear and coiling around my brain: I am the spirit of Delphi, speaker of the prophecies of Phoebus Apollo, slayer of the mighty Python. Approach, seeker, and face your destiny.

"What is our destiny?" Percy and I asked in sync. More green mist poured from the mummy's mouth it spoke:

Four shall go west and face the god who has turned

They shall find what was stolen and see it restored

One shall be left behind in the land of the dead

All shall be betrayed by one who calls them friend

And sea will fail to save what matters most in the end

Percy POV

At first I was too stunned to say anything, but as the mist retreated, coiling into a huge green serpent and slithering back into the mouth of the mummy, I cried, "Wait! What do you mean? What friend? What will I fail to save?"

The tail of the mist snake disappeared into the mummy's mouth. She reclined back against the wall. Her mouth closed tight, as if it hadn't been open in a hundred years. The attic was silent again, abandoned, nothing but a room full of mementos. I got the feeling that I could stand here until I had cobwebs, too, and I wouldn't learn anything else.

My audience with the Oracle was over.

Alex and I slumped in a chair at the pinochile table

"Well?" Chiron asked me.

I slumped into a chair at the pinochle table. "She said I would retrieve what was stolen."

Grover sat forward, chewing excitedly on the remains of a Diet Coke can. "That's great!"

"What did the Oracle say exactly?" Chiron pressed. "This is important."

My ears were still tingling from the reptilian voice. "She . .. she said we would go west and face a god who had turned. We would retrieve what was stolen and see it safely returned."

"I knew it," Grover said.

Chiron didn't look satisfied. "Anything else?"

I didn't want to tell him.

What friend would betray me? I didn't have that many. Alex might help her father kill me, but she was a friend so far.

And the last line-I would fail to save what mattered most. What kind of Oracle would send me on a quest and tell me, Oh, by the way, you'll fail.