The Missing Gods

Chapter 12 - I Guess I'll Have the Salmon

Annabeth and I quickly seated ourselves at the table, heaping food onto our plates like it was Christmas dinner. I resigned myself to the fact that if this was still a trap, at least I'd go down with a full stomach.

She glanced at me while spooning some mashed potatoes. "Do you know where we are yet Percy?" She asked sadly.

I looked at her and swallowed a hunk of blue donut before thickly replying "no, but I feel like it's right on the edge of my brain." She nodded and started eating, the gears still turning behind her eyes after our conversation with the Dioscuri.

It took us quite a long time to finish eating, but when we finally pushed our plates away and stood up, the entire table disappeared. I looked uneasily at Annabeth, wondering for the hundredth time where we were.

Annabeth grabbed my hand, whispering "have you noticed the light hasn't changed at all? It should be dark by now, I've counted at least 15 hours since we woke up." I nodded, choosing not to speak since I didn't have any words of comfort or knowledge.

We continued walking, probably in circles, fighting the shifting air and struggling to move under the enormous weight on our shoulders for at least another hour. The bright mist reflected off itself and glared into our eyes, making it almost impossible to see. Finally, Annabeth put a hand on my chest and suggested we should rest. She took first watch this time, which made me think guiltily about when I fell asleep earlier. As I closed my eyes, I prayed to my dad, wondering if he could hear me and if he was okay.

I had a frustrating dream, as demigods tend to have. I was swimming through the thick air, trying to run but my feet wouldn't move. I heard a booming laugh and turned to see an enormous man that looked like he was enveloped in a black cloak and covered in twinkling lights.

"Perseus Jackson," he said, "finally we meet." I wanted to scream as I watched his towering form turn to face me directly, as big as Olympus, holding an entire planet in his enormous hands. He laughed again as he started crushing the blue planet with his fingernails, digging in until there was nothing left but dust.

I woke suddenly, and realized Annabeth had shaken me awake again. "There's something close," she whispered, frightened, her hand on her bronze knife. I quickly drew Riptide, pulling myself up into a crouching position and trying to peer through the still oddly bright mist.

Something was slowly approaching us—that much I could see through the fog. I heard Annabeth sharply inhale beside me as the mist shifted and the creature was revealed.

"Perseus Jackson. Annabeth Chase. I have heard tell of your arrival," he said. I tried to pay attention to what he was saying, but my brain decided to zero in on his enormous and super weird backside. Annabeth elbowed me hard in the ribs, which made me realize they had healed almost completely now, so I shifted my attention from this new guy's butt to the rest of him.

He looked like someone took a clay model of a goat, a human, and a fish and mashed it together. His upper half was human, with enormous goat horns crowning his head, while his legs were shaggy with cloven hooves. He would've looked exactly like a satyr, if not for the giant fish-butt sticking out of him. Where his shaggy legs ended, small fish scales began, roping their way down a long fishtail trailing behind him, floating on the mist as if he were submerged in water.

As I was wondering how he sits down to eat dinner, and whether or not his tail had to be pinned up for it, Annabeth took a small step forward and asked "do you know who guided us here?" I was a bit startled, seeing as I didn't even know where here was, but Annabeth was putting the pieces together.

"Child of Athena, don't you have an inkling? She would not have appeared to Perseus if she did not already have a plan. The gods are manipulative, and information is not freely given, as you know," the fish-satyr added with a bitter edge in his voice. I gripped Riptide harder, my knuckles turning white, trying to figure out what his discontent with the gods would mean for us.

"The Dioscuri... Where are they?" Annabeth asked, her hand inching toward her knife.

"My brothers are detained at the moment," the fish-satyr said, pawing at the ground with his hooves, "but they are a troublesome sort. You will be glad of their absence."

Annabeth snuck a look at me and mouthed something that looked like "Caprisun," which I knew had to be wrong since this was an odd time to want Hawaiian Punch. I turned my attention back to fish-satyr, and watched his fishtail flit back and forth like a cat about to pounce.

"I did a favor for the gods," Fishy said. "In their battle with Typhon, I ensured their victory. I restored Zeus to glory, but was he grateful? Oh, he said he was. Grateful enough to banish me amongst the stars." He stopped and sneered at us, the information coming together in my head. "I have spent a millennia plotting against him—he told me he would memorialize me! Instead he placed me where he could watch me every night, in a prison, sure that I would trick him as the Titans did."

Still watching the aggravated fishtail, I understood what he was saying, or what he wasn't saying. Annabeth had figured it out before me all right—she was trying to say Capricorn. He was a constellation, but I didn't have time to figure out how he got out of his starry prison, because he suddenly lunged at us, horns, hooves, fishtail, and all.