Celestial Flames (Percy Jackson Universe)

The Orientation Film

Something I've gotten used to at Camp is Chiron or Argus or someone always being there. But for a few days, it was just the campers. Chiron had gotten a distress call from a satyr in Indiana who had gotten cornered by monsters and needed help getting two half-bloods to camp. The centaur had gone along with Argus, who would be driving.

Percy and Annabeth were on the weekend from their high school so they were able to come and help supervise (well, more like Annabeth supervised. Percy kept challenging Owen to canoe races).

The day went along pretty smoothly. It was dinner where things took a sharp right turn. With no one to supervise, everyone started sitting with their friends. Malcolm was with Nyssa, Valentina, Paolo from Hebe Cabin, Sherman Yang, Connor Stoll and and Butch. Will dragged me to sit with Nico and since Nico was sitting with Percy and Annabeth, I sat with them too. Except they weren't at Percy's table, they were at Cabin Eleven's table. Eventually, Harley got lonely at Cabin Nine's table and joined his sister at our table.

"Beth, your turn," Annabeth said.

I paused to think for a second. "Well if I were running things, I'd make it so we didn't have to go in order of cabins to burn part of our food. It was okay when we just had twelve but now it's getting ridiculous when we've gotten to the amount of cabins we do have."

Everyone seemed to understand but Malcolm snorted. "You just don't wanna have to wait to eat," he stated.

"I get hungry in the morning," I protested. "What's so wrong with that?"

"I'm with Parrish on this one," Percy said, pointing his fork at me.

Annabeth rolled her eyes.

"Will?" I asked.

He paused while he was chewing. "I'm gonna go with making a place to relax and just take some time to rest when you need to just be alone for a bit," he said.

Me and Nico shared a look behind Will's back.

"First thing I'd do is make sure the poor newbie demigods don't have to suffer through the orientation film," Nico said.

Me and everyone else at the table looked at the boy confused. "What orientation film?" Will asked.

Nico repeated the confused expression. "You know..." He cleared his throat and started to sing in a shaky voice the tune of the Hokey Pokey. "It lets the demigods in, it shuts the monsters out, it keeps the half-bloods safe but turns mortals all about! It's Misty and it's magic and it makes me want to shout: the border is what it's all about!" He ended it with a few half hearted claps.

I dropped my fork in a mix of shock and horror.

Will patted his boyfriend's arm. "Nico, you're scaring the other campers," he informed.

"More than usual," Julia Feingold muttered into her soup. If her leg accidentally got kicked, it was none of my business.

"Oh come on," Nico protested. "You've all heard that annoying song, right? It's from Welcome to Camp Half-Blood."

"Neeks," I began.

"Don't call me Neeks, Lizzie," Nico said.

"Don't calls me Lizzie, Neeks," I countered. "I think I speak for everyone here when I say that none of us have ever heard of camp having an orientation film."

There was a round of agreement between the group.

Nico groaned. "You mean I just sang in public and I'm the only one who's ever seen that stupid film?"

"So far anyway," Connor said. "Where exactly did you see this cinematic masterpiece?"

I quickly ate the last of my food. I knew by Connor's tone he was going to get the movie and we would watch it.