The Demigods Adventures at Goode High School {DISCONTINUED}

Chapter Eleven: LEO

Leo hated his classes. Being a son of Hephaestus, he didn't need to take a lot of the traditional courses. He automatically had impeccable math, engineering and even a lot of science skills and knowledge. Because of this, Chiron had signed him up for everything that was the opposite. Which meant humanities, AP biology and worst of all ecology. The first few days had been rough enough, sitting through biology covering the inner workings of enzymes. Then in ecology they had been studying rabbits and other creatures and what they do for the environment. Leo spent his class time, tinkering in his pockets with small screws and scraps of metal, heading up the metal and soldering pieces together. He thought of Calypso, and longed for her touch. He hadn't since shed left to travel the world, trying to figure out a way to spread her gardening techniques throughout agriculturally challenged places to help the satyrs preserve the wild. Leo had thought it was noble, but he still wished she would stay. She called him when she could. But she rarely could make rainbows, and when she did, the connection was poor.

Today in ecology, Leos table mate, Taft had urged him to pay attention today for fear of a pop quiz. Today was what the teacher, Mr. Paterinsky, had called an open discussion day. Where students sat in a circle and asked questions about certain animals and how they fit into the eco system. Then Mr. Paterinsky would compile, on the spot, a quiz based on the topics they discussed. The class laughed as they talked about cicadas, which made Leo want to pull his ear drums out.

"How about cicadas?" One girl inquired.

"Whats a cicada?" Another asked.

Then a blonde hair guy, stood up. "Like the little things that buzz, fly up from the ground just to DIE within days and leave their rotting caucuses everywhere." He curled into a ball, mumming annoyingly, pretending to be a cicada. The class roared.

Leo recalled the familiar drone of the cicadas from back home in Texas. He thought of the hot sticky air that turned your thoughts to mush. The golden sunsets and the jagged cliffs of big bend national park, where his mom would take him camping as a young mijo.

Mr. Paterinsky, took a moment and then projected a diagram of a cicada on the SMARTboard.

"Cicadas actually help trees thrive. When they emerge from the ground after years and years. They lay their eggs in the weak branches of trees. In return the weak branches wither and die."

"So, they kill the trees." One girl asked.

"Well, yes, but only the weak parts. After the branches fall off. The tree can stop wasting its nutrients on branches that don't provide anything for the tree. Then their nitrate filled shells, are either eaten by other animals or absorbed into the soil for more nutrients."

Leo grimaced and had a hard time picturing cicadas as being helpful. He remembered picking ups empty cicada shells as a kid and throwing them at his mother. She would shriek in terror but eventually she would laugh.

"Take a look at the structure of the cicada." Mr. Paterinsky pointed from his desk. "The front legs are bulky and are meant for digging through soil, similar to how moles or other animals burrow. They didn't used to look this way, but as cicadas evolved, their legs, though small, became stronger. They cling to the roots of the trees feeding off of it and then come up and kill its bad branches."

Leo rolled his eyes.

"No pop-quiz today. Instead, you will get a head start on your new project." Mr. Paterinsky shuffled through some papers as Leos mood hit all time low. "Your project is to find out a solution to a world problem, relating an animal that we've talked about, both in normal classes and in open discussion. It can be as realistic or not if you want. As long as it doesn't involve birds building homes for the homeless I'm okay with it. you don't need to go through with the solution, just create a presentation and maybe some diagrams. This is a long term project, due before Christmas break, I will give you class time here and there but overall we will continue lessons as normal. Your partners are you table mates. Get to work."