chapter twenty-five
─── maybe i should stay away from explosives
𝔐y motto for life is 'an existential life crisis a day keeps your brain in pain always'. Yes, I know that it doesn't rhyme, but that's not the point. The main reason for this is that my school is a 'progressive' school which basically means it's super chill, the teachers are cool but the kids aren't always the best or brightest of the lot.
I will say that I am not gifted at certain subject, but you know, at least I could take a hint. Most of these people couldn't.
Take Matt Sloan for example. He had yet to take a hint that I thought he was annoying, ugly, dumb, snobbish, horrific to look at and that I already had someone else.
Sloan wasn't big or strong, but he acted like he was. He had cruel eyes, and shaggy black hair, and he always dressed in expensive but sloppy clothes, like he wanted everybody to see how little he cared about his family's money. One of his front teeth was chipped from the time he'd taken his daddy's Porsche for a joyride and run into a PLEASE SLOW DOWN FOR CHILDREN sign, a story he'd boasted about at me for a while.
I'd then had to top that with how my boyfriend had an incredibly hot scar down the side of his face from getting into a fight with someone, along with scars along his chest. Apparently, he'd thought I'd said 'ex-boyfriend' and hadn't taken the hint.
Anyway, I thought (read: prayed) that he would give up, but instead he went to find my friend, Tyson, and tried to intimidate him so that I would go out with Sloan. Don't ask what logic that is, because I've got no clue either.
Tyson was the only homeless kid at Meriwether College Prep. As near as my mom and I could figure, he'd been abandoned by his parents when he was very young, probably because he was so...different.
He was six-foot-three and built like a wall, but he cried a lot and was scared of just about everything, including his own reflection. His face was kind of misshapen and brutal-looking. I couldn't tell you what colour his eyes were, because I could never make myself look higher than his jaw. His voice was deep, but he talked funny, like a much younger kid—I guess because he'd never gone to school before coming to Meriwether. He wore tattered jeans, grimy size-twenty sneakers, and a plaid flannel shirt with holes in it. He smelled like a New York City alleyway, because that's where he lived, in a cardboard refrigerator box off 72nd Street.
Meriwether Prep had adopted him as a community service project so all the students could feel good about themselves. Unfortunately, most of them couldn't stand Tyson. Once they discovered he was a big softie, despite his massive strength and his scary looks, they made themselves feel good by picking on him. I was pretty much his only friend, which meant he was my only friend in this place as well.
My mom had complained to the school a million times that they weren't doing enough to help him. She'd called social services, but nothing ever seemed to happen. The social workers claimed Tyson didn't exist. They swore up and down that they'd visited the alley we described and couldn't find him, though how you miss a giant kid living in a refrigerator box, I don't know.
Tyson was only in eighth grade and was trembling as five twelfth graders surrounded him, leering over him before I arrived.
"Sloan! Away," I yelled, like the boy was a dog.
Technically all men were (my boyfriend not included).
"Ah, Andromeda, darling," I glared at him, before reaching down to help Tyson to his feet. "Come on, we were only a having a nice little talk. Don't be like that, sweetheart."
"Come any closer to me, Sloan, and I'll stab you with a pencil. Clear?" His friends oohed, as Sloan chuckled.
"My girl's got a little fight in her!"
"I am not your girl, Sloan. I've already told you this multiple times before, what doesn't you thick head understand?" I asked. "Come on, Tyson."
The tall eighth grader, who was teary eyed, followed me through the twelfth graders and back over to my table in the library, where I was attempting to study before PE.
"You have to stand up for yourself, Tyson, especially against Sloan,"
"'m sorry, Romy," Tyson mumbled, wiping his eyes as I sighed.
"It's alright, Tyson," I smiled, before looking at the time. "I've got to go for PE but after school you can come and grab ice cream with me and mum, yeah?"
"Yeah," He nodded, as I grabbed my bag and began towards the locker room. Sloan was waiting for me, and I sighed.
"What do you want?"
"For you to go on a date with me," He grinned, slicking back his hair further as I glared in disgust. "Come on, Andromeda, you know you want all of this."
"For your information, I already have someone who tops all of...whatever that is," I pulled a face as I gestured to Sloan. "He's intelligent, kind and hot. All of which, you aren't."
"Your imaginary boyfriend?" He laughed. "Look, I know you're just playing hard to get. You want me."
"The only thing that's imaginary are pleasant feelings from me to you. Move," I slammed past him, closing the door to the girl's locker room as I rubbed my temples to push past the migraine. Only a few more hours and then I was gone, home free.
I changed quickly. The gym uniform at Meriwether is sky blue shorts and tie-dyed T-shirts which could have been worse. I wished that I was able to avoid Sloan, but the school didn't want to help, so I was kind of stuck.
When we got into the gym, Coach Nunley was sitting at his little desk reading Sports Illustrated. Nunley was about a million years old, with bifocals and no teeth and a greasy wave of grey hair.
Matt Sloan said, "Coach, can I be captain?"
"Eh?" Coach Nunley looked up from his magazine. "Yeah," he mumbled. "Mm-hmm."
Sloan grinned and took charge of the picking. He made me the other team's captain, but it didn't matter who I picked, because all the jocks and the popular kids moved over to Sloan's side. So did the big group of visitors that I hadn't clocked before.
I took everyone else.
Matt Sloan spilled a cage full of balls in the middle of the gym and I loosened up my joints, knowing that Sloan and his entire friendship group were going to target me as if that would make me like him.
"Scared," Tyson mumbled, and I almost jumped in surprise when I turned and saw him behind me. "Smell funny."
"Tyson, you should be in science!" I murmured, "and who smells funny?"
"Them." Tyson pointed at Sloan's new friends, the visitors from the other school. "Smell funny."
The visitors were cracking their knuckles, eyeing us like it was slaughter time. I couldn't help wondering where they were from.
Sloan blew the coach's whistle and the game began. Sloan's team ran for the centre line. On my side, they cowered in fear and tried not to get hit.
"Tyson," I said. "Let's g—"
A ball slammed into my gut. I sat down hard in the middle of the gym floor. The other team exploded in laughter. My eyesight was fuzzy, my breath leaving my chest as the hellhound scars began to ache.
Tyson yelled, "Romy, duck!"
Some of my demigod training kicked in and I rolled as another dodgeball whistled past my ear at the speed of sound.
"Hey!" I yelled at Sloan's team. "You're gonna kill somebody! Sloan, get your lunatics under control!"
One of the visitor, named Joe Bob, grinned at me evilly. Somehow, he looked a lot bigger now...even taller than Tyson. His biceps bulged beneath his T-shirt. "I hope so, Andromeda Jackson! I hope so!"
The only people who said my name were those trying to kill me or yell at me for doing something stupid and I sighed. Why now? Why today? Why me?
Monsters.
All around Matt Sloan, the visitors were growing in size. They were no longer kids. They were eight-foot-tall giants with wild eyes, pointy teeth, and hairy arms tattooed with snakes and hula women and Valentine hearts.
Matt Sloan dropped his ball. "Whoa! You're not from Detroit! Who..."
The other kids on his team started screaming and backing toward the exit, but the giant named Marrow Sucker threw a ball with deadly accuracy. It streaked past one of the kids just as he was about to leave and hit the door, slamming it shut like magic. The kids banged on it desperately but it wouldn't budge.
"Let them go!" I yelled at the giants.
The one called Joe Bob growled at me. He had a tattoo on his biceps that said: JB luvs Babycakes.
"And lose our tasty morsels? No, Daughter of the Sea. We Laistrygonians aren't just playing for your death. We want lunch!"
He waved his hand and a new batch of dodgeballs appeared on the centre line—but these balls weren't made of red rubber. They were bronze, the size of cannon balls, with fire bubbling out the holes. They must've been searing hot, but the giants picked them up with their bare hands.
"Coach!" I yelled.
Nunley looked up sleepily, but if he saw anything abnormal about the dodgeball game, he didn't let on.
That's the problem with humans. At any rate, I was pretty sure nobody else realized we were dealing with genuine man-eating bloodthirsty monsters.
"Yeah. Mm-hmm," Coach muttered. "Play nice."
And he went back to his magazine.
The giant named Skull Eater threw his ball. I dove aside as the fiery bronze comet sailed past my shoulder.
"Tyson!" I screamed.
Tyson pulled a kid out from behind the exercise mat just as the ball exploded against it, blasting the mat to smoking shreds.
"Run!" I told my teammates. "The other exit!"
They ran for the locker room, but with another wave of Joe Bob's hand, that door also slammed shut.
"No one leaves unless you're out!" Joe Bob roared. "And you're not out until we eat you!"
He launched his own fireball. My teammates scattered as it blasted a crater in the gym floor.
I reached for Riptide, which I always kept in my pocket, but then I realized I was wearing gym shorts. I had no pockets. Riptide was tucked in my jeans inside my gym locker. And the locker room door was sealed. I was completely defenceless.
Another fireball came streaking toward me. Tyson pushed me out of the way, but the explosion still blew me head over heels. I found myself sprawled on the gym floor, dazed from smoke, my tie-dyed T-shirt peppered with sizzling holes. Just across the centre line, two hungry giants were glaring down at me.
"Flesh!" they bellowed. "Hero flesh for lunch!" They both took aim.
"Romy needs help!" Tyson yelled, and he jumped in front of me just as they threw their balls.
"Tyson!" I screamed, but it was too late.
Both balls slammed into him...but no...he'd caught them. Somehow Tyson, who was so clumsy he knocked over lab equipment and broke playground structures on a regular basis, had caught two fiery metal balls speeding toward him at a zillion miles an hour. He sent them hurtling back toward their surprised owners, who screamed, "BAAAAAD!" as the bronze spheres exploded against their chests.
The giants disintegrated in twin columns of flame—a sure sign they were monsters, all right. Monsters don't die. They just dissipate into smoke and dust, which saves heroes a lot of trouble cleaning up after a fight.
"My brothers!" Joe Bob wailed. He flexed his muscles and his Babycakes tattoo rippled. "You will pay for their destruction!"
"Tyson!" I said. "Look out!"
Another comet hurtled toward us. Tyson just had time to swat it aside. It flew straight over Coach Nunley's head and landed in the bleachers with a huge KA-BOOM!
Kids were running around screaming, trying to avoid the sizzling craters in the floor. Others were banging on the door, calling for help. Sloan himself stood petrified in the middle of the court, watching in disbelief as balls of death flew around him.
Coach Nunley still wasn't seeing anything. He tapped his hearing aid like the explosions were giving him interference, but he kept his eyes on his magazine. Surely the whole school could hear the noise. The headmaster, the police, somebody would come help us.
"Victory will be ours!" roared Joe Bob the Cannibal. "We will feast on your bones!"
I wanted to tell him he was taking the dodgeball game way too seriously, but before I could, he hefted another ball. The other three giants followed his lead.
I knew we were dead. Tyson couldn't deflect all those balls at once. His hands had to be seriously burned from blocking the first volley. Without my sword...I had a crazy idea.
I ran toward the locker room.
"Move!" I told my teammates. "Get away from the door. I'm gonna open them and then you run!"
Explosions behind me. Tyson had batted two of the balls back toward their owners and blasted them to ashes.
That left two giants still standing.
A third ball hurtled straight at me. I forced myself to wait—one Mississippi, two Mississippi—then dove aside as the fiery sphere demolished the locker room door.
Now, I figured that the built-up gas in most boys' locker rooms was enough to cause an explosion, so I wasn't surprised when the flaming dodgeball ignited a huge WHOOOOOOOM!
The wall blew apart. Locker doors, socks, athletic supporters, and other various nasty personal belongings rained all over the gym.
I turned just in time to see Tyson punch Skull Eater in the face. The giant crumpled. But the last giant, Joe Bob, had wisely held on to his own ball, waiting for an opportunity. He threw just as Tyson was turning to face him.
"No!" I yelled.
The ball caught Tyson square in the chest. He slid the length of the court and slammed into the back wall, which cracked and partially crumbled on top of him, making a hole right onto Church Street. I didn't see how Tyson could still be alive, but he only looked dazed. The bronze ball was smoking at his feet.
Tyson tried to pick it up, but he fell back, stunned, into a pile of cinder blocks.
"Well!" Joe Bob gloated. "I'm the last one standing! I'll have enough meat to bring Babycakes a doggie bag!"
He picked up another ball and aimed it at Tyson.
"Stop!" I yelled. "It's me you want!"
The giant grinned. "You wish to die first, young hero?"
I had to do something. Riptide had to be around here somewhere.
Then I spotted my jeans in a smoking heap of clothes right by the giant's feet. If I could only get there...I knew it was hopeless, but I charged.
The giant laughed. "My lunch approaches." He raised his arm to throw. I braced myself to die.
Suddenly the giant's body went rigid. His expression changed from gloating to surprise. Right where his belly button should've been, his T-shirt ripped open and he grew something like a horn—no, not a horn—the glowing tip of a blade.
The ball dropped out of his hand. The monster stared down at the knife that had just run him through from behind.
He muttered, "Ow," and burst into a cloud of green flame, which I figured was going to make Babycakes pretty upset.
Standing in the smoke was Annabeth. Her face was grimy and scratched. She had a ragged backpack slung over her shoulder, her baseball cap tucked in her pocket, a bronze knife in her hand, and a wild look in her storm-grey eyes, like she'd just been chased a thousand miles by ghosts.
"You are a sight for sore eyes," I told her, picking my jeans up as another appeared in the hall. There was a chuckle, before I saw Luke emerging. He was dressed in his usual dark jeans and long sleeved shirt, a grin on his face when he saw me.
"I thought I told you not to blow up the school..."
"Shut up," He snickered, as Sloan approached us with wide eyes.
"You...You're..." Luke nodded, smirking again, before Sloan turned back towards me and collapsed into a heap upon the floor.
"Beautiful. That was utterly beautiful," I replied, grinning. "But we should probably go."
"I knew you were in trouble as soon as I saw you this morning." Annabeth told me, nodding her head.
"Annabeth, now's not the time to admit to stalking me. Later, please."
The gym was in flames. Kids were still running around screaming. I heard sirens wailing and a garbled voice over the intercom. Through the glass windows of the exit doors, I could see the headmaster, Mr. Bonsai, wrestling with the lock, a crowd of teachers piling up behind him.
"There!" a woman screamed. The doors burst open and the adults came pouring in.
"Yeah, definitely time to go," Luke replied. "Annabeth, go back to the car. Andi, grab your friend and let's go."
"What?"
"No time!" he said. "Hurry!"
Annabeth put on her Yankees baseball cap, which was a magic gift from her mom, and instantly vanished. Luke sprinted away quickly, blending into the crowd until even I couldn't find him.
That left me standing alone in the middle of the burning gymnasium when the headmaster came charging in with half the faculty and a couple of police officers.
"Andromeda Jackson?" Mr. Bonsai said. "What...how...?"
I did the one thing that I knew would get them on my side. I burst into tears.
"They were...they were just chucking these matches around..." I pointed at Matt Sloan and his friends as the principal patted my back sympathetically. "and they wouldn't let us go! They wouldn't let us leave...and I was so scared Mr. Bonsai...so scared."
"Of course, let's get you to the paramedics," He replied, having brought my story as he led me and Tyson from the burning school, me still crying crocodile tears.
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Hiya,
Have a chaotic chapter for Andi, and I just love her bursting into tears as soon as she's questioned. I'm quite excited for this now because we get Luke and Andi back.
Let me know what you think,
Love Li xx