Percy Jackson and The Sands Of Time

| Chapter 10 || The Garden of Gold |

Hello, Readers! I know we haven't touched this since February, but it's just been so hard getting it back off the ground. Dylan has been awesome - he comes up with the ideas - but I've just been having trouble finding the time to write. Anyway, please enjoy! It's nice and long for you today!

~CSP2708~

*Dylan_Walts*

| Chapter 10 |

| The Garden of Gold |

Maybe I should've been used it to by now, but it seemed that every time I fell through that portal, I wasn't prepared to hit the hard dirt below. And so, as I popped out into another unknown timeline, the ground came up at me, striking me with jaws of stone like an alligator, I let out a loud groan. I was a tumbleweed, though less graceful, and not crossing the road of an old Western town.

No.

Instead, I was in the middle of nowhere, a tall mountain range on one side and endless plains on the other. It looked kind of familiar, but then again, all mountains seemed to look the same. It could've been anywhere, anytime. The brilliant night sky stretched out above me - millions of stars blazing so bright that I could hardly bear to look at them.

I was just about on a breakthrough about figuring out where I was - I was on the brink, I swear - when a dark-haired man came charging out of nowhere with a large club. He wore an old fashioned Greek tunic. A cape of lion skin billowed behind him as he ran directly to the tallest mountain. He hadn't even noticed me.

My jaw dropped. It was Hercules! (or Heracles, for the Greeks)

Gods, he was so muscular - like, it was kind of weird, but I guess that came with the super strength. Then, it all clicked. It was kind of hard to tell without the mountain overshadowing San Francisco, but I realized where I was - mount Othrys. It was one in Greece, obviously, and from the appearance of Hercules, I must've been in ancient times again - just... more recent ancient times.

Was I to witness the twelve trials of Hercules? Or, at least, a few of them? He was on his way to collect a golden apple, to be sure, and would meet Zoe Nightshade if my memory held. I growled at the thought. Hercules may have been labelled a hero in the myths but I knew the truth., In fact, I'd seen it with my own eyes - in a dream, before, but now, I would see it again, and I would stop him from tricking Zoe as he had. Maybe that was why Kronos sent me back. He wanted me to change things - for the better or worse, I didn't know, but if the former, he probably wanted me to fail. However, who was I to say what was going on in a Titan's mind?

I quickly and quietly followed behind Hercules, up to the top of the mountain - the place where the earth met the sky. Atlas, as always, was imprisoned under the sky, holding the harsh black tempest upon his shoulders. Thoug, he was higher up the mountain it seemed, and I could not see him, only the weight upon his shoulders. His daughters - Zoe included - were nowhere to be found, but I saw Hercules up ahead at the gates to the garden.

He seemed to be contemplating how to get in without being noticed by Ladon - the dragon guardian - but it seemed impossible to my eyes.

If I'd thought that Ladon was scary before, now, centuries prior, he was at his prime. He was a massive creature, a hundred heads, all tangled around - alert and watching - as the rest of his body curled around the base of the tree of immortality - Hera's wedding gift to Zeus. Why she decided to put it here was still a mystery to me, but maybe I'd go to that time, too, and find out.

Sneaking forward, I stood behind some trees just to his left, and watched as Zoe approached, curious, from his right. She would've seen me - if she hadn't been so focused on Hercules. I couldn't really blame her awe - she must've never seen a man other than her father, and objectively, I guess hercules was rather handsome, if you liked the tall, rugged, hero type. You'd only ever learn that he was a jerk after meeting him.