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𝙏𝙝𝙚 𝙧𝙚𝙨𝙩 𝙤𝙛 𝙩𝙝𝙚𝙞𝙧 𝙨𝙩𝙖𝙮 𝙞𝙣 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙡𝙖𝙗𝙮𝙧𝙞𝙣𝙩𝙝 𝙬𝙖𝙨 uneventful. It was only a couple day of outrunning monsters and other demigods—only Luke's minions, unfortunately.
They managed to bandage Clarisse wounds as best as they could. They would scar, but she didn't seem to mind.
"Scars are badass," Clarisse had said. "The more I have, the more people will be intimidated by me."
"You're already plenty intimidating," Andy had grumbled back, peeling away the piece of cloth form her upper arm. "Your, what, six feet? Not to mention the fact that you're still growing. It's annoying, stop."
"Why?" Clarisse smirked, only wincing slightly as Andy prodded at her wound—not as gently as she should have. "You're just bitter because you have to work harder to be scary. Don't worry, once people get to know you, they'll be terrified."
Andy just whacked the back of her head. Clarisse didn't comment on how she had to stretch to even come close to reaching.
Clarisse had managed to keep her bag, even after being taken hostage by one of Luke's scouting groups. She'd tried to play that off, but wouldn't say what happened.
Andy didn't push.
Only what seemed like two days after entering the Labyrinth, they found a door—light streaming in from the crack between the floor and the door.
Clarisse and Andy had exchanged a nervous look at pushing it open slowly. It opened up into the outside world—air hot and dry, sun bright overhead.
"No way," Clarisse breathed out.
"What is it?"
"We're back in Pheonix."
Andy gaped at her. "That's impossible."
It turns out they were a mere twenty minutes from Clarisse's mom's house. Chris must've used the same exit.
They were walking up her driveway when Ms. La Rue burst out of the house, and sprinted to Clarisse, wrapping her up in a hug.
"I thought you died!" She said. "You told us you'd Iris-Message in a week."
"We've only been gone a couple days," Clarisse said.
Her mom took a step back and shook her head. "It's been nearly a month."
Andy glanced at Clarisse. The daughter of Ares was looking back at her, nervous.
"Well," Andy began, "that's not exactly what I expected."
𝙏𝙝𝙚𝙮 𝙩𝙧𝙞𝙚𝙙 𝙚𝙫𝙚𝙧𝙮𝙩𝙝𝙞𝙣𝙜.
They tried to seal up the edges of the door, and they even brought out Brad and tried to weld the edges closed, but the door didn't have edges until a demigod touched the key. Their final resort: Clarisse borrowing a wrecking ball from the city of Arizona. This was the most successful destruction attempt, but it only moved the entrance to the Labyrinth to a different outcropping of rock.
