Immortals (Completed and Unedited)

12

“Wake up Xander,” said Chance again swatting me awake. Has she not heard of shaking shoulders? I groaned at that and opened my eyes as well as made the mistake of breathing through my nose only to be sucker punched by revolting smell coming from the dumpster. It was Mikey's cooking, rotten eggs and my basketball shorts all rollled into one.

“Morning sunshine.” I grumbled rubbing my stinging cheek and breathing through my mouth to help stop the nausea. “Please just shake my shoulder instead of slapping me," I requested. Chance shrugged and handed me a sandwich which I took a bite of noting the soggy bread and tough peanut butter that reminded me of Alexa. That felt like a lifetime ago.

“Thanks,” I muttered thickly passed the food and wishing it wasn't stale, but I counted my very few lucky stars that this didn't have mold on it yet.

“Don’t mention it,” she said uncapping a water bottle and holding it out to me. “Don’t drink too much okay? It has to hold us over for a while.”

  I nodded and took a swing of water to wash down the peanut butter. “Where are we going now?"

“Into Ares’s truck, he didn’t care enough to come back and get it.” Chance said tossing me a keychain. “You can drive alright? I’ll read the map.”

“Okay…” I said climbing hesitantly into the cab of the very nice truck, but I was still hesitant. This belonged to my older brother who just last night had nearly succeeded in murdering Chance. What if he bugged it or something? Why would he leave something this nice behind? Was it a trap?

As if she was reading my thoughts Chance spoke up, “Don’t worry about any trackers and shit. I already checked every nook and cranny of this place. Besides, Ares is just brute strength, no brains at all. Athena would’ve tried to tell him about, it but he wouldn’t have listened to her. We’re safe, don’t worry."

“I wasn’t,” I lied adjusting the driver’s seat to my body. I buckled in and drove away adjusting my mirrors as I did. “So now what? What happens now?"

“Get ready for some easy riding," she said flicking the map open with a pop. "We are going to Detroit.”

  “What road?” I asked as I scanned the road ahead of me, adjusting the pressure on the gas pedal as I found out I was going over the speed limit. Guess being on the run gave me a lead foot, but it looked like it didn't take away my stickler-ness for following the speed limit.

  “Interstate seventy-five, get in the turn lane,” she instructed not looking up from the map.

“Okay,” I said doing what I was told, SMOG-ing in the way that would have my driver’s education teacher cry with pride. All of his harping had paid off. I drove down the interstate as the sun rolled up from the horizon.

  “Xander?” Chance asked after a few minutes. “How did you escape?”     

“The story is nowhere near as cool as yours." I joked as I bit my lip and tried to remember the details of that day. "See, I’d pissed off Chiron for sneezing so I had to feed the hellhounds.” I paused as I waited to see if she had any questions. But she just looked out the window. Guess she doesn’t interrupt.  “So the biggest one had a collar on him with a key attached to it. So I got this really weird feeling and guessed at what it was. I thought it would undo my shackles and my cell, the place was so huge having one key for everything would've made no sense, but a skeleton key?" I nodded my head as I spoke, recalling that scary event with clairity.  "That would work, so I  dumped raw meat all over the dog and while his buddies were jumping on him to get some grub I took the key. And when lights out came I lost the chains and opened my cell.”