The Heroes of Camp Half-Blood • Book 1: The Missing Demigod

⚡ 16. Christian • "A Journey's End"

Their final destination was right there. The temple of Gaia. What they'd come so far for. And Christian...felt like he was in a movie. He felt like the main character.

He readied Turbo, tightening his grip on it as the seven half-bloods stepped inside.

🔱

Christian was expecting a lot of things, but he didn't expect the entire room to be empty. And it wasn't just empty in terms of people, or monsters, it was completely bare. Nothing but the dirty concrete walls.

"Did Hermes trick us?" Christian asked.

Evan quickly argued back, "He can't have - we ran into Gaia's disciples, they'd have to be here." Christian looked around again, opening and closing his eyes, expecting something to magically appear, but nothing.

Suddenly, the room went dark for a few seconds. Once the lights came on again, everyone was surrounded by titans.

Christian's eyes widened, and so did everyone else's. They were about fifteen feet tall, and they looked...ugly. Straight ugly. Christian could spend all day making fun of them, but they had a job to do.

"They knew," Adrian realized.

It clicked for Christian as well, "If Gaia is the Earth, that means she's been watching us this entire time-she expected this." Evan looked extremely distraught and annoyed. "If only you'd realized that earlier, thunder brain."

The Titan in the middle laughed, "Give up, demigods! We've planned your every move, mapped out every plan you could make." Christian batted right back, "Yeah here're some funny things, one, who asked, and two, we don't really do 'plans,'"

"MAIA!" Evan yelled, and his wing shoes sprouted, he began flying. "For Olympus!" With that, Christian, along with the others, charged forward. Christian slid under one titan's legs, and turned around, quickly crane kicking it in the face, ducking under a swing, and stabbing it in the forearm with Turbo.

"You're screwed," he said, as electricity radiated from him, to Turbo, to the titan, burning it to a crisp. He turned just in time to get sucked punched in the face. He tripped over his shoelace, and barrel rolled back up on his feet, wiping the quickly flowing blood from his nose.

He ran and slid on the ground to avoid another giant fist, bending backwards while sliding, and flying kicked another titan in the chest. It, of course, didn't kill it.

And eventually, Christian couldn't think fast enough, and was tackled by one of the Titans, and was repeatedly beaten. He curled into a ball, and his entire body erupted in electricity, and he screamed.

He managed to get up, and realized his shock wave had killed about two of the six titans. Three more, he assured himself, three more. Him and Evan began tag teaming one, Adrian and Percy, the other, yet there were still two others.

One had horns, and charged at Christian like a bull. He turned just in time to be impaled in the chest into the wall with a horn. The horn was suspending Christian in the air. He kicked his legs frantically and cried out in pain, and ended up kicking it in the face.

He landed, and a lot of blood was leaking through his shirt. Too much blood. The titan grabbed Christian by the neck, and was about to smash his head in, when he saw a familiar sea-green trident impale through its stomach.

Adrian dived through the hole he had stabbed out in the titan. "That was disgusting," he said, and proceeded to stab the titan in the eyes, and helped Christian up. He was clearly very worried.

The others were dealing with the other titans. Christian turned and saw Annabeth slam into a wall and fall unconscious, and Percy went ham on the titan that did so, Suba spawned an army of undead warriors to help while doing her own thing.

But this last titan was stronger than the rest. It rallied them out one by one. At one point, Christian and Suba were cornered. Adrian jumped into the way, and held out his Trident. The titan pushed the trident, even if his hand was being slowly stabbed. Adrian tried to hold it back, but the back of his trident started digging into his flesh. He eventually pushed it from his chest, and quickly grabbed it off the ground.

The titan shot a beam of light from its hands at Suba and Christian, but with no seconds to spare, Adrian purposefully ran into the way and took the hit.

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"ADRIAN!" Christian and Suba yelled in unison. Adrian looked pretty hurt. Christian looked up at the titan who'd hurt his best friend. He had hate in his eyes. He stood up and ran towards it.

He ducked under its punch, and ripped its arm off with Turbo, slashed at its body, climbed onto it, and stabbed it in the head, and produced a giant electric shock. Dead as a doornail.

He was so full of adrenaline, the gaping hole in his chest didn't bother him.

Everyone quickly ran over to Adrian. Out of his pocket, Evan pulled out a plastic bag with what looked like blocks of butter. Ambrosia.

Adrian ate about three pieces before he could get up again. Evan gave some to the others as well. It didn't fully heal Christian, but he'd be fine. Suba hugged Adrian, and Christian smiled. But what nobody expected was for Suba to cup Adrian's face in her hands, and kiss him on the lips.

Literally - not metaphorically or rhetorically or poetically or theoretically or in any other fancy way. Adrian kissed back, and they dispersed after about three seconds of kissing. Christian started clapping, shaking his head. "Bravo, sir, bravo."

Suddenly, Christian heard a voice in his head, and he could tell by everyone's expressions, they could hear it, too. It was the same voice from his dreams; Gaia.

"You've gotten in my way for now, pathetic scum, but next time, I will not be so merciful." Christian spat at the ground. "Shut up, Earth Girl!"

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Christian couldn't believe it. They were finally going back to Camp Half-Blood-Evan and Glo would be introduced, the quest would finally be over.

They'd beaten Gaia - for now.