This Dark Night ― Percy Jackson & Annabeth Chase¹

―xv. percy harrasses a homeless guy

Thalia nodded. "Must be nice to be a regular mortal."

She said it like she'd given it a lot of thought.

❊

"Where do you guys want to land?" Hank asked, waking Naomi and her companions from a night of fitful sleep.

Naomi looked down.

"Whoa," Percy breathed.

She'd seen San Francisco in pictures before, but never in real life. It was gorgeous, surrounded by green hills and dense fog. There was a huge bay and ships, islands and sailboats, and the Golden Gate bridge sticking up out of the clouds of fog.

"There," Zoë suggested. "By Embarcadero Building."

"Good thinking," Chuck said. "Me and Hank can blend in with the pigeons."

Everyone just looked at him.

"Kidding," he said. "Sheesh, can't statues have a sense of humor?"

As it turned out, there wasn't much need to blend in. It was early morning and not many people were around. They freaked out a homeless guy on the ferry dock when they landed. He screamed when he saw Hank and Chuck and ran off, yelling something about metal angels from Mars.

Naomi and her friends said goodbye to the angels, who flew off to party with their statue friends.

They'd made it to the West Coast. Artemis was here somewhere. Annabeth, too, Naomi hoped. But they had no idea how to find them, and tomorrow was the winter solstice. Now they were stuck on the ferry dock with very little money, no friends, and no luck.

After a brief discussion, they agreed they needed to find out just what the mystery 'bane of Olympus' monster was that the prophecy had talked about.

"But how?" Percy asked.

"Nereus," Grover said.

Percy looked at him. "What?"

"Isn't that what Apollo told you to do? Find Nereus?"

Percy nodded. "The old man of the sea," he remembered. "I'm supposed to find him and force him to tell us what he knows. But how do I find him?"

Zoë made a face. "Old Nereus, eh?"

"You know him?" Thalia asked.

"My mother was a sea goddess. Yes, I know him. Unfortunately, he is never very hard to find. Just follow the smell."

"What do you mean?" Percy asked. 

"Come," she said without enthusiasm. "I will show thee."

❊

Naomi wasn't sure Zoë's plan for helping Percy meet Nereus wasn't just a petty moment of revenge. She'd outfitted him in a ragged flannel shirt and jeans three sizes too big, bright red trainers, and a floppy rainbow hat.

"Oh, yeah," Grover said, trying not to burst out laughing, "you look completely inconspicuous now."

Naomi tried to cover her laugh with her hand, but judging by the glare Percy shot at her, she didn't do a very good job.

Zoë nodded with satisfaction. "A typical male vagrant."

"Thanks a lot," Percy grumbled. "Why am I doing this again?"

"I told thee. To blend in."

She led the way down to the waterfront. After a long time spent searching the docks, Zoë finally stopped in her tracks. She pointed down a pier where a bunch of homeless guys were huddled together in blankets, waiting for the soup kitchen to open for lunch.