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It's funny how people reinterpret everything to fit their own version of reality. According to local news reports, a crazed kidnapper who fired a gun at a patrol car caused an explosion on Santa Monica beach. He had accidentally hit a gas pipe that had burst during the earthquake. This crazed kidnapper (also known as Ares) was also the one who had abducted Percy and three other teenagers from New York and dragged them across the country in a ten-day odyssey of terror.
Poor little Percy Jackson wasn't a world-class criminal, after all. He had caused the skirmish on the bus because he had tried to escape his kidnapper (and there were now witnesses who could swear to having seen the man in the leather suit on the bus - "Why am I only now remembering this?"). The madman was also responsible for the explosion in the St. Louis bridge arch. After all, no child could have done it. And in Los Angeles, the brave Percy Jackson (I was beginning to really like the boy) had finally taken a gun from his kidnapper and had a shoot-out with him on the beach. The police had arrived just in time. But a sensational explosion had caused five police cars to go up in flames, and the kidnapper had escaped. There were no casualties. Percy Jackson and his three friends were in the safe custody of the police. The press people told us all this. We nodded dutifully, cried and looked exhausted (which wasn't hard at all) and played the poor little victims for the cameras.
"All I want," Percy said, his voice choked with tears, "is to see my dear stepfather again. Whenever I saw him on TV calling me a criminal freak, I knew ... somehow ... that everything would be all right again. And I know he'll want to give every person in this beautiful city of Los Angeles some expensive gadget from his store as a reward. Here's his phone number." Well played Aquaman, well played The police and press were so moved that they passed around a hat and raised the money for four plane tickets to New York.
I had no problem flying, but I knew that Percy was very tense. I was sitting next to him and every little turbulence made him flinch. Percy didn't take his hands off the armrests until we landed safely at La Guardia Airport. The local press were waiting for us outside the security barrier, but we managed to avoid them because Annabeth distracted them with her camouflage cap on her head by shouting, "They're over there at the yogurt ice cream! Come on!", only to rejoin us at baggage reclaim.
We parted ways at the cab stand. Percy told Annabeth, Grover and I, to go to Half-Blood Hill and report back to Chiron. We protested, and it was hard for me to let him go after all we'd been through, but I knew Percy had to do the rest of his assignment alone.
The camp was deserted, of course it was 6am no one gets up at sunrise, at least no normal people. When I walked into my cabin, none of my siblings were still in their beds. The only ones in the cabin were Kayla and Austin, who immediately pounced on me. "You're alive, thank the gods. Micheal just said you were hurt." Kayla said, sniffling as she hugged me. "I mean you could have called and said you were alive" Austin said and OMG even he sounds worried, my little brother who is too cool to have emotions is worried. "I'm fine now, but I'm going to see Micheal straight away because I don't think I can avoid a check-up." "That's a good thing, how bad do you think it was living with those boys, nobody cleans up, the bathroom is dirty and there's laundry everywhere." I hugged them both again before finally taking a shower.
