[act one; chapter nine - stand by me]
Thankfully, nothing was following them.
He steered the dragon toward the southwest. Eventually, the smoke from the burning department store faded in the distance, but Andromeda didn't relax until the suburbs of Chicago gave way to snowy fields, and the sun began to set.
"Good job, Festus." Leo patted the dragon's metal hide. "You did awesome."
The dragon shuddered. Gears popped and clicked in his neck. Even the redhead knew those noises weren't good.
"I'll give you a tune-up next time we land," Leo promised. "You've earned some motor oil and Tabasco sauce."
Festus whirled his teeth, but even that sounded weak. He flew at a steady pace, his great wings angling to catch the wind, but he was carrying a heavy load. Two cages in his claws plus three people on his back—the more she thought about it, the more worried she got. Metal dragons, just like living, breathing humans, had limits.
"Leo." Piper patted his shoulder. "You feeling okay?"
"Yeah...not bad for a brainwashed zombie." He hoped he didn't look as embarrassed as he felt. "Thanks for saving us back there, beauty queen. If you hadn't talked me out of that spell—"
"Don't worry about it," Piper said.
Andromeda could tell that Leo wasn't exactly focused. His mind wasn't in the present, he wasn't here with the rest of them. But then again, maybe all of them were somewhere else mentally.
"We're going to have to put down soon," Leo warned his friends. "Couple more hours, maybe, to make sure Medea's not following us. I don't think Festus can fly much longer than that."
"Yeah," Piper agreed. "Coach Hedge probably wants to get out of his canary cage, too. Question is—where are we going?"
"The Bay Area," Leo guessed. His memories of the department store were fuzzy, but he seemed to remember hearing that. "Didn't Medea say something about Oakland?"
"Piper's dad," Andromeda said. "Something's happened to your dad, right?"
Jason nodded. "He got lured into a trap or something."
Piper let out a shaky breath. "Look, Medea said you would all die in the Bay Area. And besides...even if we went there, the Bay Area is huge! First we need to find Aeolus and drop off the storm spirits. Boreas said Aeolus was the only one who could tell us exactly where to go."
Leo grunted. "So how do we find Aeolus?"
Jason leaned forward. "You mean you don't see it?" He pointed ahead of them, but Andromeda didn't see anything except clouds and the lights of a few towns glowing in the dusk.
"What?" Leo asked.
"That...whatever it is," Jason said. "In the air."
"Well," Andromeda grumbled. "There are a lot of things in the air, Jason. Like cats and dogs and blonde supermen who see things, and a metal dragon named Happy."
"Right," Leo said. "Could you be more specific on the 'whatever-it-is' part?"
"Like a vapour trail," Jason said. "Except it's glowing. Really faint, but it's definitely there. We've been following it since Chicago, so I figured you saw it."
Leo shook his head. "Maybe Festus can sense it. You think Aeolus made it?"
"Well, it's a magic trail in the wind," Jason said. "Aeolus is the wind god. I think he knows we've got prisoners for him. He's telling us where to fly."
"Or it's another trap," Piper said.
Andromeda nodded in agreement. "Probably. Actually, definitely another trap. It's a demigod thing, we walk into traps like a little kid at a toy store or something like that."
"Pipes, you all right?" he asked, noticing the edge in the daughter of Aphrodite's voice.
"Don't call me that."
"Okay, fine. You don't like any of the names I make up for you." He heard Andromeda let out a little 'woo' because she always called Piper the same name. "But if your dad's in trouble and we can help—"
"You can't," she said, her voice getting shakier. "Look, I'm tired. If you don't mind..."
She leaned back against Andromeda, who leaned back against Jason, and closed her eyes.
They flew in silence for a while. Festus seemed to know where he was going. He kept his course, gently curving toward the southwest and hopefully Aeolus's fortress. Another wind god to visit, a whole new flavour of crazy, it was going to be interesting.
Jason had gently wrapped his arms around Andromeda as she leaned her head back on his shoulder, shutting her eyes.
The boy leaned down and whispered, "Just close your eyes, I'll be right here when you wake up."
—🌩—
"So darlin', darlin' stand, by me, oh-oh stand by me, oh stand, stand by me, stand by me." The lyrics left her lips softly as they swayed gently, back and forth, back and forth. They were wrapped in a hug—something that had once been. A moment frozen in time. "If the sky, that we look upon, should tumble and fall, or the mountains, should crumble, to the sea, I won't cry, I won't cry, no, no, no I won't shed a tear, Just as long, as you stand, by me."
Andromeda Storm enjoyed thinking of the past, back when things had been so much more simple. Back when she had been just a girl who had gone on a few quests...back when Adonis Storm was still alive.
"You can't keep doing this to yourself, Ro."
His voice was like a breath of fresh air, it was her relief. He was her relief. Her breath of fresh air. Her happy pill. He was one of the reasons she was staying sane, why she had her sanity still. But he was right; she knew that. She knew she couldn't keep dreaming him up, because everytime she did he was there. He was really there—dead or not. She could feel his skin beneath her fingers, the beat of his heart in his chest, the sound of his voice in her ears, the feeling of his breath against her skin. He was really there, although she didn't always understand how, but he was there. He was with her, and even though it did give her some relief, it also left her with more pain afterwards.
Andromeda shook her head as she dropped it down onto Donnie's shoulder. A heavy sigh left her lips as his hands rubbed up and down her back.
She whispered, "I love you."
"I know."
"And I have to let you go, I know that. But I don't want to."
Donnie nodded as he held her tighter to him. He could feel the gentle shake of her shoulders and the slight heave of her chest. It broke his heart to see her like this, breaking apart, barely holding on. He knew his sister like he knew his own mind. He knew how she blamed herself for not saving him, he knew she had done it after Castor, after their mother, after Bianca di Angelo. Her fatal flaw was a saviour complex after all. She felt major guilt whenever something went wrong, and even more when it resulted in a death. And on top of that all, she had survivor's guilt. Andromeda Storm had seen so much in her life, and now with everything new going on, she was realising there was a lot more to it than what she originally thought.
With that in mind, she pulled away from her brother as Stand By Me played in the background. She looked her brother in the eyes, and spoke, "Are you going to tell me what's going on, or am I going to have to force it out of you?"
His head dropped forward with a heavy sigh. "I wanted you to find out on your own."
"When, Donnie? Huh? When someone got hurt because of something I didn't know? When, Adonis?"
"I couldn't, okay? I was told not to."
"By who?"
"Apollo. And dad. I remembered just before New York, and they told me that I couldn't say anything, that you would have to find out in your own time."
Andromeda pulled away from him as if he had burned her. Her face scrunched up and shrunk into herself. Tears welled up in her amethyst eyes as they darted away from Donnie. "You knew." Her voice was full of hurt, and betrayal. "You knew. You knew what was going on, and you didn't tell me."
"I couldn't."
"There are thousands of things we shouldn't do because we're told, but we still do it!" She yelled, her face red. "You lied to me. Please, Donnie, please just tell me. I can't—I can't keep doing this. Just...please. You don't have to tell me everything, just something, something that helps, that makes sense."
He could tell that she was desperate—the fall of her voice and the repetition in her words. "We weren't born in Luis—"
Donnie never got the chance to finish his words, because suddenly Andromeda found herself startled awake as she and her friends all spiralled in a free fall, still on the dragon's back, but Festus's hide was cold. His ruby eyes were dim.
"Not again!" Leo yelled. "You can't fall again!"
Andromeda could barely hold on. The wind stung her eyes, but she somehow managed to keep hold. The dragon's wings flapped once, but she caught a whiff of burning bronze. They were seconds away from crashing, that much was obvious, and there were the blurred lights of a city below them.
"Jason!" Leo screamed. "Take the girls and fly out of here!"
"What?"
"We need to lighten the load! I might be able to reboot Festus, but he's carrying too much weight!"
"What about you?" Piper cried. "If you can't reboot him—"
"I'll be fine," Leo yelled. "Just follow me to the ground. Go!"
"You're crazy!" Andromeda yelled. "We're not leaving you!"
Apparently Jason had other ideas because he wrapped one of his arms around her waist, while the other was around Piper. They unbuckled their harnesses—Andromeda reluctantly—and in a flash they were gone, shooting into the air.
—🌩—
Somehow, when they landed, Andromeda was separated from her friends. She had landed a few feet away—nothing major—but it was how she landed that was the problem. She had, with all of the luck in the world (see the sarcasm?), on her right knee, smack dab on the hard, cold ground. She had cried out as she felt the crunch—bone against bone—and she swore she nearly passed out from the pain. Within moments, Jason had come to her aid, helping her to her feet.
"You definitely did something." He had told her. "Can you figure it out?"
She pressed her hands over her knee, trying her best to figure it out. Nothing. She couldn't feel it, she couldn't heal it. Nothing at all. She shook her head frantically, "I can't. I can't fix it, it's like—gods, it's like I can't fix it."
Piper looked at her curiously, then down at her knee. "Maybe some ambrosia and nectar will help."
"No, it will help with the pain, but it won't heal anything. It never does with me, I've never understood it."
They had decided to worry about it later, so they went to go find Leo.
When they found him, he was lying in the snow, covered in mud and grease. He spit a clump of frozen grass out of his mouth.
"Where—"
"Lie still." Piper had tears in her eyes. "You rolled pretty hard when—when Festus—"
"Where is he?" Leo sat up, but his head felt like it was floating. They'd landed inside the compound. Something had happened on the way in—gunfire?
"Seriously, Leo," Jason said. "You could be hurt. You shouldn't—"
Leo pushed himself to his feet. Then he saw the wreckage. Festus must have dropped the big canary cages as he came over the fence, because they'd rolled in different directions and landed on their sides, perfectly undamaged.
Festus hadn't been so lucky.
The dragon had disintegrated. His limbs were scattered across the lawn. His tail hung on the fence. The main section of his body had ploughed a trench twenty feet wide and fifty feet long across the mansion's yard before breaking apart. What remained of his hide was a charred, smoking pile of scraps. Only his neck and head were somewhat intact, resting across a row of frozen rose bushes like a pillow.
"No," Leo sobbed. He ran to the dragon's head and stroked its snout. The dragon's eyes flickered weakly. Oil leaked out of his ear. "You can't go," the boy pleaded. "You're the best thing I ever fixed."
The dragon's head whirred its gears, as if it were purring. Jason, Andromeda, and Piper stood next to him, but Leo kept his eyes fixed on the dragon.
He remembered what Hephaestus had said: That isn't your fault, Leo. Nothing lasts forever, not even the best machines.
His dad had been trying to warn him. "It's not fair," he said.
The dragon clicked. Long creak. Two short clicks. Creak. Creak. Almost like a pattern...triggering an old memory in Leo's mind. He realised Festus was trying to say something. He was using Morse code—just like his mom had taught him years ago. He listened more intently, translating the clicks into letters: a simple message repeating over and over.
Leo, however, wasn't the only person who understood. A teary eyed, redheaded daughter of Dionysus understood Morse Code as well.
"Yeah," Leo said. "I understand. I will. I promise."
The dragon's eyes went dark. Festus was gone.
Leo cried. He wasn't even embarrassed. His friends stood on either side, patting his shoulders, saying comforting things; but the buzzing in Leo's ears drowned out their words.
Finally Jason said, "I'm so sorry, man. What did you promise Festus?"
Leo sniffled. He opened the dragon's head panel, just to be sure, but the control disk was cracked and burned beyond repair.
"Something my dad told me," Leo said. "Everything can be reused."
"Your dad talked to you?" Andromeda asked. "When did that happen?"
Leo didn't answer. He worked at the dragon's neck hinges until the head was detached. It weighed about a hundred pounds, but he managed to hold it in his arms. He looked up at the starry sky and said, "Take him back to the bunker, Dad. Please, until I can reuse him. I've never asked you for anything. "
The wind picked up, and the dragon's head floated out of Leo's arms like it weighed nothing. It flew into the sky and disappeared.
Piper looked at him in amazement. "He answered you?"
"I had a dream," Leo managed. "Tell you later."
He knew he owed his friends a better explanation, but Leo could barely speak. He felt like a broken machine himself—like someone had removed one little part of him, and now he'd never be complete. He might move, he might talk, he might keep going and do his job. But he'd always be off balance, never calibrated exactly right.
Still, he couldn't afford to break down completely. Otherwise, Festus had died for nothing. He had to finish this quest—for his friends, for his mom, for his dragon.
He looked around. The large white mansion glowed in the centre of the grounds. Tall brick walls with lights and security cameras surrounded the perimeter, but now he could see—or rather sense—just how well those walls were defended.
"Where are we?" he asked. "I mean, what city?"
"Omaha, Nebraska," Piper said. "I saw a billboard as we flew in. But I don't know what this mansion is. We came in right behind you, but as you were landing, Leo, I swear it looked like —I don't know—"
"Lasers," Leo said. He picked up a piece of dragon wreckage and threw it toward the top of the fence. Immediately a turret popped up from the brick wall and a beam of pure heat incinerated the bronze plating to ashes.
Jason whistled. "Some defence system. How are we even alive?"
"Pure luck." Andromeda grumbled, staring at the building in front of them. "And Happy the Dragon. It's like something out of a movie, or a fantasy book series."
"Festus," Leo said miserably. "He took the fire. The lasers sliced him to bits as he came in so they didn't focus on you. I led him into a death trap."
"You couldn't have known," Piper said. "He saved our lives again."
"Yeah." The redhead laid one of her hands on his shoulder. "This isn't your fault, Val. And you didn't lead him into a death trap, none of us could have controlled this"
"But what now?" Jason said. "The main gates are locked, and I'm guessing I can't fly us out of here without getting shot down."
The son of Hephaestus looked up the walkway at the big white mansion. "Since we can't go out, we'll have to go in."
—🌩—
Leo had luckily been able to get a knee brace from his belt, one that would keep Andromeda's knee stable enough until they were able to figure out what was actually wrong.
Honestly, Jason would have died about five times on the way to the front door if not for Leo.
First it was the motion-activated trapdoor on the sidewalk, then the lasers on the steps, then the nerve gas dispenser on the porch railing, the pressure-sensitive poison spikes in the welcome mat, and of course the exploding doorbell.
Leo deactivated all of them. It was like he could smell the traps, and he picked just the right tool out of his belt to disable them.
"You're amazing, man," Jason said.
Leo scowled as he examined the front door lock. "Yeah, amazing," he said. "Can't fix a dragon right, but I'm amazing."
"Hey, that wasn't your—"
"Front door's already unlocked," Leo announced.
Piper stared at the door in disbelief. "It is? All those traps, and the door's unlocked?"
Leo turned the knob. The door swung open easily. He stepped inside without hesitation.
Piper squeezed Andromeda's hand gently as she passed the redhead, giving her a small smile.
The daughter of Dionysus looked at Jason as he slowly walked the two of them to the door. "You just have to take it slow with him. Just because he's quiet doesn't mean he's mad at you or anything like that."
"Yeah," Jason said. "Yeah, okay."
But still he felt terrible, and he wasn't the only one. Back in Medea's store, he'd said some pretty harsh stuff to Leo—stuff a friend shouldn't say, not to mention the fact he'd almost skewered him with a sword. If it hadn't been for Piper and Andromeda (thank the gods that they were there), they'd both be dead. And neither of the girls had gotten out of that encounter easily, either.
"Andromeda," he said, "I know I was in a daze back in Chicago, whatever is going on with your memories, or whatever it is, I want to help."
She shrugged. "We just have to do this together. All of this."
Her amethyst eyes, he had realised, were speckled with a multitude of different colours. There was a light blue ring around her irises and there were little specks of pink amongst the different shades of purple. He had a feeling that the blue ring around her irises came from being a legacy of Apollo.
Looking away from him, she ducked inside.
"Together," Jason said to himself. "Yeah, we're doing great with that."
Andromeda's first impression of the house: Dark.
From the echo of his footsteps he could tell the entry hall was enormous, even bigger than Boreas's penthouse; but the only illumination came from the yard lights outside. A faint glow peeked through the breaks in the thick velvet curtains. The windows rose about ten feet tall. Spaced between them along the walls were life-size metal statues. As her eyes adjusted, she saw sofas arranged in a U in the middle of the room, with a central coffee table and one large chair at the far end. A massive chandelier glinted overhead. Along the back wall stood a row of closed doors.
"Where's the light switch?" Jason's voice echoed alarmingly through the room.
"Don't see one," Leo said.
"Fire?" Piper suggested.
Leo held out his hand, but nothing happened. "It's not working."
"Your fire is out? Why?" Piper asked.
"Well, if I knew that—"
"Okay, okay," she said. "Andy, any light?"
The redhead rubbed her hands together, but nothing worked. "Not working. Sorry guys."
"What do we do—explore?"
Leo shook his head. "After all those traps outside? Bad idea."
Looking around, Andromeda didn't see a comfortable room to hang out in. She figured there was something in this place that they couldn't see, just under the surface of it all.
"Leo's right," Jason said. "We're not separating again—not like in Detroit."
"Oh, thank you for reminding me of the Cyclopes." Piper's voice quavered. "I needed that."
"It's a few hours until dawn," Jason guessed. "Too cold to wait outside. Let's bring the cages in and make camp in this room. Wait for daylight; then we can decide what to do."
Nobody offered a better idea, so they rolled in the cages with Coach Hedge and the storm spirits, then settled in.
Andromeda had luckily packed her ipod shuffle with a pair of earbuds. Without music she would probably lose her mind for real. She plugged it in, and the soft voice of Mazzy Star flooded her ears. She closed her eyes and thought of a time when she had been living a simpler life. She remembered living with Sally and Percy, going to school, making friends, doing homework for god's sake.
Homework. Here that? Fucking homework.
She would wake up at six in the morning every weekday, go for a run, come home and get ready, eat, school, come home, homework, dinner, sleep; start over. Those were her days, that was her life for three months and those were some of the best (and worst) months of her life. She and percy would spend their days doing homework together—struggling with maths (because it sucks) and Andromeda helping her boyfriend with English and the art class he chose to take for some reason—it was really so he had another class with her, and even though he never said it, she knew.
With a sigh, she pulled a photo from the pocket of her pants, and unfolded it. It was a photo Percy had taken of her (he had found a new hobby in photography; he loved it and had found his muse in Andromeda). She was fast asleep in his bed, the sheets pulled up under her chin. Her fiery curls were a frizzy, knotted mess and it was splayed out all over the pillow. Her lips were in a pout, her bottom lip jutted out. There was a bandaid above one of her eyebrows—from a fight in school earlier that week. She had gotten into an argument with a random girl after she had told Andromeda that she was just a stupid carrothead—and let her make one thing clear, no one but Tyson calls Andromeda Storm carrot. For that, the girl had been punched in the face—nearly with a broken nose—all while the redhead in question was thrown against the lockers by the girl's friends. For this, she had a small cut on her head, one that Percy had decided to put a Strawberry Shortcake bandaid on.
Percy had claimed that it was his favourite photo, and had made a copy of it, one for her because he claimed she needed to know how beautiful she was, and the original copy for himself because...well, isn't it obvious?
Puffing out a sigh, Andromeda dropped her head back onto the couch behind her. She was sitting on the floor, leaning against the couch. The tension in her body began to go away, but it didn't go away either.
Gods, she was so, so tired. She felt like every bit of energy in her body had been sucked right out of her.
Suddenly, a stinging pain hit the base of her skull, ringing in her ears. Open your eyes Andromeda Storm, open them and let the chaos explode. My hero, let go and you shall claim the power of the gods that you so deserve.
She brought a hand up and rubbed at her temple until the pain went away. She could feel Jason's eyes on her from where he sat a few feet away, but she ignored it. For a few seconds, the world around her went fuzzy, until it went away and she was back in the strange house in Omaha.
And with that, she let herself fall asleep, her body still riddled with tension.
—🌩—
Andromeda woke when the yelling started.
"Ahhhggggggh!"
She leapt to her feet. She wasn't sure what was more jarring—the full sunlight that now bathed the room, or the screaming satyr.
"Coach is awake," Leo said, which was kind of unnecessary. Gleeson Hedge was capering around on his furry hindquarters, swinging his club and yelling, "Die!" as he smashed the tea set, whacked the sofas, and charged at the throne.
"Coach!" Jason yelled.
Hedge turned, breathing hard. His eyes were so wild, Andromeda was almost afraid he might attack. The satyr was still wearing his orange polo shirt and his coach's whistle, but his horns were clearly visible above his curly hair, and his beefy hindquarters were definitely all goat. Could you call a goat beefy? She put the thought aside.
"You're the new kid," Hedge said, lowering his club. "Jason." Then his eyes darted toward Andromeda and he looked about ready to pass out. "Storm. Your Andromeda Storm, the girl who helped lead the fight in New York. Your—you're a legend!" He looked at Leo, then Piper, who'd apparently also just woken up. Her hair looked like it had become a nest for a friendly hamster. "Valdez, McLean," the coach said. "What's going on? We were at the Grand Canyon. The anemoi thuellai were attacking and—" He zeroed in on the storm spirit cage, and his eyes went back to DEFCON 1. "Die!"
"Whoa, Coach!" Leo stepped in his path, which was pretty brave, even though Hedge was six inches shorter. "It's okay. They're locked up. We just sprang you from the other cage."
"Cage? Cage? What's going on? Just because I'm a satyr doesn't mean I can't have you doing plank push-ups, Valdez! And what is Andromeda Storm doing here!? Do you even know who she is?"
Jason cleared his throat and Andromeda looked down at her hands, twisting Mania on her finger. "Coach—Gleeson—um, whatever you want us to call you. You saved us at the Grand Canyon. You were totally brave."
"Of course I was!"
"The extraction team and Andromeda came and took us to Camp Half- Blood. We thought we'd lost you. Then we got word the storm spirits had taken you back to their—um, operator, Medea."
"That witch! Wait—that's impossible. She's mortal. She's dead."
"Yeah, well," Leo said, "somehow she got not dead anymore."
Hedge nodded, his eyes narrowing. "So! You were sent on a dangerous quest to rescue me. Excellent!"
"Um." Piper got to her feet, holding out her hands so Coach Hedge wouldn't attack her. "Actually, Glee—can I still call you Coach Hedge? Gleeson seems wrong. We're on a quest for something else. We kind of found you by accident."
"Oh." The coach's spirits seemed to deflate, but only for a second. Then his eyes lit up again. "But there are no accidents! Not on quests. This was meant to happen! So, this is the witch's lair, eh? Why is everything gold?"
"Gold?" Andromeda looked around. From the way Jason, Leo, and Piper caught their breath, she guessed they hadn't noticed yet either.
The room was full of gold—the statues, the tea set Hedge had smashed, the chair that was definitely a throne. Even the curtains—which seemed to have opened by themselves at daybreak—appeared to be woven of gold fibre.
"Nice," Leo said. "No wonder they got so much security."
"This isn't—" Piper stammered. "This isn't Medea's place, Coach. It's some rich person's mansion in Omaha. We got away from Medea and crash-landed here."
"It's destiny, cupcakes!" Hedge insisted. "I'm meant to protect you. What's the quest?"
Before Andromeda could decide if he wanted to explain or just shove Coach Hedge back into his cage, a door opened at the far end of the room.
A pudgy man in a white bathrobe stepped out with a golden toothbrush in his mouth. He had a white beard and one of those long, old-fashioned sleeping caps pressed down over his white hair. He froze when he saw them, and the toothbrush fell out of his mouth.
He glanced into the room behind him and called, "Son? Lit, come out here, please. There are strange people in the throne room."
Coach Hedge did the obvious thing. He raised his club and shouted, "Die!"