Trials of Artemis

4. How we become official friends

Since that was the first day of school, principal Hanson allowed me to switch class from design to biology. So, the next afternoon, I sat in the biology classroom with Percy.

Last night, I had another dream. It was about a younger Percy and a girl chatting about the Great Stirring, monsters and school dance. That girl looked thirteen, with auburn hair and silver eyes like me. She convinced another girl to join the hunt, while Percy argued but finally compromised. There's another girl beside the auburn hair girl, who I recognized as Zoe from my previous dreams.

Before I wanted to tell Percy about the dream, the teacher, Dr. Keszel walked in. He was a middle-aged man who always enjoyed coffee. For example, when he walked into the class today, he was holding a grand Expresso in his hand. He was very kind to us, always helping out when we had troubles.

'Um, Stella,' He said to me, 'what's your last name, principal Hanson didn't give me one.'

I paled. The truth is, when Paul, Percy's step dad enrolled me in Goode High, I didn't put a last name in the school system, how am I supposed to have a last name?

'Her last name's Johnson, sir, Stella Johnson.' Percy saved me.

'Okay,' Dr. Keszel put my last name in, and said, 'welcome to the biology family then.'

'Johnson?' I looked at Percy, questioning about his choice of my last name.

'My nickname from Mr. D, you remember the stories I told you in summer?'

I remembered. About his camp, about how the wine god Dionysus was there for his punishment after chasing a tree nymph that Zeus was fond of. That was quite a familiar story, but I couldn't find out where did I heard it, but definitely not from those mythology books in libraries.

Percy was a demigod son of Poseidon, I guess that's the reason why he's so into marine biology. During the summer time, he told me about some of his adventures, like how he, Annabeth and Grover retrieved Zeus's stolen lightning bolt, how they found Luke Castellan, a son of Hermes, was the actual lightning thief.

Anyway, back to the biology class. Today we dug deeper into the ecosystem. We learned about different biological societies. How ocean has different societies than land, how the whole ecosystem of the earth works.

This was kind of interesting, we got to know about all the different animals, their preys or predators, Dr. Keszel gave our first assignment by the end of the class. We need to visit an aquarium, or zoo or natural park, to investigate the ecosystem there, and write a report. We could do it either in group, or alone.

After the class, I told Percy about that dream.

'That was when I went to Westover Hall to help Grover to get two demigods he found.' Percy said. 'Nico and Bianca di Angelo, they were children of Hades. Bianca became a hunter of Artemis that night.'

'So, you mean, that girl with auburn hair was Artemis?'

Percy nodded.

'But she looked so young!'

'Gods can appear in different ages, Artemis prefer to be that age because that was about the age of her hunters.'

Hunters. That was another familiar name. It must have some meanings to me. Why I loved learning about animals; why I was perfect at bows and arrows.

'I think I had a connection to her.' I told Percy.

Percy looked at me closely, and then said, 'Indeed you may, especially those silver eyes, I mean, you look like an eighteen-year-old Artemis with black hair.'

Then, he paled, as if remembered something.

'No. It can't be!'

'What?' I was confused.

'You may be a daughter of Artemis, Stella, or a legacy, but that's not possible. Artemis was not supposed to have children.'

I frowned. Because judging from my look, I did look like a descendant of Artemis may look like, but as a goddess who swore off love, Artemis couldn't sire any children.'

'Then,' I spoke, 'Who am I?'

'I guess we could find out during winter solstice, we could visit the gods then.' Percy said, 'But I haven't been in contact with them for more than a year, I don't know what has changed.'

'Don't worry.' I assure him, putting a hand on his shoulder, 'we can figure this out slowly.'

'Yeah, you're right.' Percy smiled softly, 'We can figure out what to do about the biology assignment first.'

'Oh, right! What do you have in mind.' I asked.

His smiled grew, 'How about a date under the sea.'

And that's how we became actual friends, I mean, we sort of were already friends before that moment, but now it's official, and little did we know, this friendship changed the world eventually.