"You kids have money to pay for it?" Grover's lower lip quivered. I was afraid he would start bleating, or worse, start eating the linoleum. Percy seemed to be on his last legs. Annabeth looked ready to pass out from hunger. I was about to guilt the waitress into paying for us when a rumble shook the whole building. A loud roar of a motorcycle vibrated down the street, and a massive motorbike the size of a small car pulled into the car park.
All conversation in the diner stopped. The motorcycle's headlight glared red. Its gas tank had flames painted on it, and a shotgun holster riveted to either side, complete with shotguns. The seat was leather —but leather that looked like . . . well, Caucasian human skin.
The guy on the bike would've made pro wrestlers run for Mama. He was dressed in a red muscle shirt and black jeans and a black leather duster, with a hunting knife strapped to his thigh. He wore red wraparound shades, and he had the cruellest, most brutal face I'd ever seen— handsome, I guess, but wicked—with an oily black crew cut and cheeks that were scarred from many, many fights. The weird thing was, I felt like I'd seen his face somewhere before.
As he walked into the diner, a hot, dry wind blew through the place. All the people rose, as if they were hypnotized, but the biker waved his hand dismissively and they all sat down again. Everybody went back to their conversations. The waitress blinked, as if somebody had just pressed the rewind button on her brain.
"You kids have money to pay for it?" She asked again.
"It's on me." The biker grunted. He slid into our booth, which was way too small for him, and crowded Annabeth against the window. He looked up at the waitress, who was gaping at him. "Are you still here?" He pointed at her, and she stiffened. She turned as if she'd been spun around, then marched back toward the kitchen.
The biker looked at me. I couldn't see his eyes behind the red shades, but weird feelings started to pool in my stomach. Anger, resentment, bitterness. I wanted to pick a fight with somebody. Which was NOT a good idea for a child of Hestia. I swallowed my thoughts, attempting to regain my composure.
He gave Percy a wicked grin. "So you're Seaweed's kid, huh?" He smirked.
Percy seemed to clench his fists on the table, gritting his teeth. "What's it to you?" Annabeth's eyes flashed him a warning.
"Percy, this is—" The biker raised his hand.
"S'okay," he said. "I don't mind a little attitude. Long as you remember who's the boss. You know who I am, little cousin?" Then it struck me why this guy looked familiar. He had the same vicious sneer as some of the kids at Camp Half-Blood, the ones from cabin five.
"You're Clarisse's dad," I said. "Ares, god of war." Ares grinned and took off his shades. Where his eyes should've been, there was only fire, empty sockets glowing with miniature nuclear explosions.
"That's right bud." He smirked. "And you must be Hestia's son, huh." He seemed surprised. "Gotta say, I was not expecting ol' Firewood to lose her cherry to a regular mortal."
"Her what?" I replied, confused.
He grinned, sliding his shades back on. "You'll understand when you're older, kid. Heard your little posse were in town. I got a little proposition for you." The waitress came back with heaping trays of food— cheeseburgers, fries, onion rings, and chocolate shakes. Ares handed her a few gold drachmas. She looked nervously at the coins.
"But, these aren't . . ." Ares pulled out his huge knife and started cleaning his fingernails.
"Problem, sweetheart?" The waitress swallowed, then left with the gold.
"You can't do that," Percy told Ares. "You can't just threaten people with a knife." Ares laughed.
"Are you kidding? I love this country. Best place since Sparta. Don't you carry a weapon, punk? You should. Dangerous world out there. Which brings me to my proposition. I need you to do me a favour."
"What favour could I do for a god?" I questioned.
"Something a god doesn't have time to do himself." Ares replied. "It's nothing much. I left my shield at an abandoned water park here in town. I was going on a little . . . date with my girlfriend. We were interrupted. I left my shield behind. I want you to fetch it for me."
"Why don't you go back and get it yourself?" Percy snapped. The fire in his eye sockets glowed a little hotter.
"Why don't I turn you into prairie dog and run you over with my Harley? Because I don't feel like it. A god is giving you an opportunity to prove yourself, Percy Jackson. Will you prove yourself a coward?" He leaned forward. "Or maybe you only fight when there's a river to dive into, so your daddy can protect you." Percy's face grew red, and his arms tensed harshly. Sensing a fight, I jumped up, lightly pushing the two apart.
"Cmon Percy, just hear him out." I said. Percy seemed to relax, and Ares sat back in his seat, smiling wickedly.
"We're not interested," Percy said. "We've already got a quest." Ares's fiery eyes showed things I didn't want to see—blood and smoke and corpses on the battlefield.
"I know all about your quest, punk. When that item was first stolen, Zeus sent his best out looking for it: Apollo, Athena, Artemis, and me, naturally. If I couldn't sniff out a weapon that powerful . . ." He licked his lips, as if the very thought of the master bolt made him hungry. "Well . . . if I couldn't find it, you got no hope. Nevertheless, I'm trying to give you the benefit of the doubt. Your dad and I go way back. After all, I'm the one who told him my suspicions about old Corpse Breath."
"You told him Hades stole the bolt?" Percy questioned.
"Sure. Framing somebody to start a war. Oldest trick in the book. I recognized it immediately. In a way, you got me to thank for your little quest." Ares yawned, checking his refection in his knife.
"Thanks," Percy grumbled.
"Hey, I'm a generous guy. Just do my little job, and I'll help you on your way. I'll arrange a ride west for you and your friends."
"We're doing fine on our own." Percy muttered.
"Yeah, right. No money. No wheels. No clue what you're up against. Help me out, and maybe I'll tell you something you need to know. Something about your mom." Ares raised an eyebrow at him. I sighed internally. Of course he HAD to play that card.
"My mom?" Percy perked up. Ares grinned.
"That got your attention. The water park is a mile west on Delancy. You can't miss it. Look for the Tunnel of Love ride."
"What interrupted your date?" Percy asked. "Something scare you off?" Ares bared his teeth, but I knew what kind of emotion he was hiding. There was something false about it, almost like he was nervous.
"You're lucky you got Y/N here to keep you in check. I'll meet you back here when you're done. Don't disappoint me." After that I must have fainted, or fallen into a trance, because when I opened my eyes again, Ares was gone. I might've thought the conversation had been a dream, but Annabeth and Grover's expressions told me otherwise.
"Not good," Grover said, turning to Percy. "Ares sought you out, Percy. This is not good." Percy stared out the window. I could tell from his expression that he was deep in thought.
"It's probably some kind of trick," He said. "Forget Ares. Let's just go."
"We can't," Annabeth said. "Look, I hate Ares as much as anybody, but you don't ignore the gods unless you want serious bad fortune. He wasn't kidding about turning you into a rodent." I looked down at my cheeseburger, which suddenly didn't seem so appetizing.
"Why does he need us?" Percy replied.
"Maybe it's a problem that requires brains," Annabeth said. "Ares has strength. That's all he has. Even strength has to bow to wisdom sometimes."
"But this water park . . . he acted almost scared." I added. "What would make a war god run away like that?" Annabeth and Grover glanced nervously at each other.
"I'm afraid we'll have to find out." Annabeth said.
...
The sun was sinking behind the mountains by the time we found the water park. Judging from the sign, it once had been called WATERLAND, but now some of the letters were smashed out, so it read WATRAD. The main gate was padlocked and topped with barbed wire. Inside, huge dry waterslides and tubes and pipes curled everywhere, leading to empty pools. Old tickets and advertisements fluttered around the asphalt. With night coming on, the place looked sad and creepy. Nothing like the Hestia cabin.
"If Ares brings his girlfriend here for a date," Percy said, staring up at the barbed wire, "I'd hate to see what she looks like." I cringed at his words. He really was clueless.
"Percy," I warned. "Be more respectful."
"Why? Don't you hate Ares as well." Percy raised an eyebrow, before rolling his eyes. "Oh wait, I forgot. You can't hate anyone." I blushed, a little embarrassed.
"Shut up." I muttered. "Besides, his girlfriend is very temperamental. You don't want to insult her looks."
"Who is she? Echidna?" Percy joked.
"No, Aphrodite," Grover said, a little dreamily. "Goddess of love."
"I thought she was married to somebody," Percy said. "Hephaestus." I facepalmed at that. Even my Greek lessons with Annabeth and Percy had proved ineffective.
"What's your point?" I added, exasperated.
"Oh." If it wasn't for the dark, I could have sworn he was blushing. "So how do we get in?"
"Maia!" Grover's shoes sprouted wings. He flew over the fence, did an unintended somersault in midair, then stumbled to a landing on the opposite side. He dusted off his jeans, as if he'd planned the whole thing. "You guys coming?"
Annabeth, Percy and I had to climb the old-fashioned way, holding down the barbed wire for each other as we crawled over the top. The shadows grew long as we walked through the park, checking out the attractions. There was Ankle Biter Island, Head Over Wedgie, and Dude, Where's My Swimsuit? No monsters came to get us. Nothing made the slightest noise. We found a souvenir shop that had been left open. Merchandise still lined the shelves: snow globes, pencils, postcards, and racks of—
"Clothes," Annabeth said.
"Fresh clothes." Percy added, wistfully.
"Yeah," I said, a little annoyed. "But you can't just—"
"Watch us." Grover murmured. They strolled around the store, snatching an entire row of stuff off the racks and disappeared into the changing room. A few minutes later they all waltzed out of the changing rooms, decked out like walking advertisements for the defunct theme park.
"Don't be such a goody two shoes Y/N." Percy rolled his eyes. I sighed, before putting on my own WATERLAND getup.
We continued searching for the Tunnel of Love. I got the feeling that the whole park was holding its breath.
"So Ares and Aphrodite," Percy said, "they have a thing going?"
"That's old gossip, Percy," I replied.
"Three-thousand-year-old gossip." Annabeth added.
"What about Aphrodite's husband?" Percy continued.
"Well, you know," Annabeth said. "Hephaestus. The blacksmith. He was crippled when he was a baby, thrown off Mount Olympus by Zeus. So he isn't exactly handsome. Clever with his hands, and all, but Aphrodite isn't into brains and talent, you know?"
"Hephaestus knows?" Percy asked.
"Oh sure," Annabeth said. "He caught them together once. I mean, literally caught them, in a golden net, and invited all the gods to come and laugh at them. Hephaestus is always trying to embarrass them. That's why they meet in out-of-the-way places, like . . ." She stopped, looking straight ahead. "Like that."
In front of us was an empty pool that would've been awesome for skateboarding. It was at least fifty yards across and shaped like a bowl. Around the rim, a dozen bronze statues of Cupid stood guard with wings spread and bows ready to fire. On the opposite side from us, a tunnel opened, probably where the water flowed into when the pool was full. The sign above it read, THRILL RIDE O' LOVE: THIS IS NOT YOUR PARENTS' TUNNEL OF LOVE! Grover crept toward the edge.
"Guys, look." Marooned at the bottom of the pool was a pink and-white two-seater boat with a canopy over the top and little hearts painted all over it. In the left seat, glinting in the fading light, was Ares's shield, a polished circle of bronze.
"This is too easy," Percy said. "So we just walk down there and get it?" I weird feeling grew in my stomach, like we weren't supposed to be here. Annabeth ran her fingers along the base of the nearest Cupid statue.
"There's a Greek letter carved here," she said. "Eta. I wonder . . ."
"Grover," I said, "you smell any monsters?"
He sniffed the wind. "Nothing"
"Nothing—like, in-the-Arch-and-you-didn't-smell-Echidna nothing, or really nothing?" Percy raised an eyebrow.
Grover looked hurt. "I told you, that was underground."
"Okay, I'm sorry." Percy replied. "But I'm not going down there." He grimaced.
"I got it." I stated.
"I'll go with you." Grover didn't sound too enthusiastic, but I got the feeling he was trying to make up for what had happened in St. Louis.
"No," I told him. "I want you to stay up top with the flying shoes. You're the Red Baron, a flying ace, remember? I'll be counting on you for backup, in case something goes wrong." Grover puffed up his chest a little
"Sure. But what could go wrong?" He questioned.
"I don't know. Just a feeling." I turned to Annabeth, who was still examining the Greek symbol curiously. "Annabeth, you wanna come with me?"
She whipped her head around, her cheeks bright red. "Are you kidding?" She looked at me as if I'd just dropped from the moon.
"What?" I asked.
"Me, go with you to the . . . the 'Thrill Ride of Love'? How embarrassing is that? What if somebody saw me?" She whispered furiously.
I smirked playfully. "Well . . . we can just say it's a date." Her eyes widened even more. "Besides, who's going to see you?" I added. She seemed to be frozen up, breathing heavily. "Fine," I told her. "I'll do it myself." But when I started down the side of the pool, she followed me, muttering about how I always made everything awkward.
We reached the boat. The shield was propped on one seat, and next to it was a lady's silk scarf. I tried to imagine Ares and Aphrodite here, a couple of gods meeting in a junked-out amusement-park ride. Why? Then I noticed something I hadn't seen from up top: mirrors all the way around the rim of the pool, facing this spot. We could see ourselves no matter which direction we looked. That must be it. While Ares and Aphrodite were smooching with each other they could look at their favourite people: themselves.
I picked up the scarf. It shimmered pink, and the perfume was indescribable—rose, or mountain laurel. Something good. I felt almost like a motherly feel, but with a strange tug, something more like, love. I smiled, a little dreamy, and was about to rub the scarf against my cheek when Annabeth ripped it out of my hand and stuffed it in her pocket.
"Oh, no you don't. Stay away from that love magic." She crossed her arms. "I don't need you to fall for that love crap just yet."
"Yet?" I raised an eyebrow. She blushed heavily, before facepalming.
"Just get the shield, Firecracker, and let's get out of here." She groaned. The moment I touched the shield, I knew we were in trouble. My hand broke through something that had been connecting it to the dashboard. A cobweb, I thought, but then I looked at a strand of it on my palm and saw it was some kind of metal filament, so fine it was almost invisible. A trip wire.
"Wait," Annabeth said. "There's another Greek letter on the side of the boat, another Eta. This is a trap." Noise erupted all around us, of a million gears grinding, as if the whole pool were turning into one giant machine.
"Guys!" Grove yelled out. Up on the rim, the Cupid statues were drawing their bows into firing position. Before I could suggest taking cover, they shot, but not at us. They fired at each other, across the rim of the pool. Silky cables trailed from the arrows, arcing over the pool and anchoring where they landed to form a huge golden asterisk. Then smaller metallic threads started weaving together magically between the main strands, making a net.
"We have to get out," I said.
"Duh!" Annabeth said. I grabbed the shield, and we ran, but going up the slope of the pool was not as easy as going down.
"Come on!" Grover shouted. Percy and Grover were trying to hold open a section of the net for us, but wherever they touched it, the golden threads started to wrap around their hands. The Cupids' heads popped open.
Out came video cameras. Spotlights rose up all around the pool, blinding us with illumination, and a loudspeaker voice boomed: "Live to Olympus in one minute . . . Fifty-nine seconds, fifty-eight . . ."
"Hephaestus!" Annabeth screamed. "I'm so stupid! Eta is 'H.' He made this trap to catch his wife with Ares. Now we're going to be broadcast live to Olympus and look like absolute fools!" We'd almost made it to the rim when the row of mirrors opened like hatches and thousands of tiny metallic . . . things poured out. Annabeth screamed. It was an army of wind-up creepy-crawlies: bronze-gear bodies, spindly legs, little pincer mouths, all scuttling toward us in a wave of clacking, whirring metal.
"Spiders!" Annabeth said. "Sp—sp—aaaah!" I'd never seen her like this before. She fell backward in terror and almost got overwhelmed by the spider robots before I pulled her up and dragged her back toward the boat.
The things were coming out from all around the rim now, millions of them, flooding toward the centre of the pool, completely surrounding us. I told myself they probably weren't programmed to kill, just corral us and bite us and make us look stupid. Then again, this was a trap meant for gods. And we weren't gods. Annabeth and I climbed into the boat. I started kicking away the spiders as they swarmed aboard. I yelled at Annabeth to help me, but she was too paralysed to do much more than scream.
"Thirty, twenty-nine," called the loudspeaker. The spiders started spitting out strands of metal thread, trying to tie us down. The strands were easy enough to break at first, but there were so many of them, and the spiders just kept coming. I kicked one away from Annabeth's leg and its pincers took a chunk out of my new surf shoe. Grover hovered above the pool in his flying sneakers, trying to pull the net loose, but it wouldn't budge. Think, I told myself. Think. The Tunnel of Love entrance was under the net. We could use it as an exit, except that it was blocked by a million robot spiders.
"Fifteen, fourteen," the loudspeaker called. Water, I thought. Where does the ride's water come from? Then I saw them: huge water pipes behind the mirrors, where the spiders had come from. And up above the net, next to one of the Cupids, a glass-windowed booth that must be the controller's station.
"Percy!" I yelled. "Get into that booth! Find the 'on' switch!"
"But—"
"Do it!" I screamed. It was a crazy hope, but it was our only chance. The spiders were all over the prow of the boat now. Annabeth was screaming her head off. I had to get us out of there. Percy was in the controller's booth now, slamming away at the buttons.
"Fifteen, fourteen—" Percy looked up at me hopelessly, raising his hands. He was letting me know that he'd pushed every button, but still nothing was happening.
"You're the son of Poseidon!" I screamed. "Surely you can do something!" Percy closed his eyes, concentrating.
"Two!"
"One!"
"Zero!"
Water exploded out of the pipes. It roared into the pool, sweeping away the spiders. I pulled Annabeth into the seat next to me and fastened her seat belt just as the tidal wave slammed into our boat, over the top, whisking the spiders away and dousing us completely, but not capsizing us. The boat turned, lifted in the flood, and spun in circles around the whirlpool. The water was full of short-circuiting spiders, some of them smashing against the pool's concrete wall with such force they burst. Spotlights glared down at us. The Cupid-cams were rolling, live to Olympus. But I could only concentrate on controlling the boat. I attempted to lean right and left, steering the boat left to right.
We spun around one last time, the water level now almost high enough to shred us against the metal net. Then the boat's nose turned toward the tunnel and we rocketed through into the darkness. Annabeth and I held tight, both of us screaming as the boat shot curls and hugged corners and took forty-five degree plunges past pictures of Romeo and Juliet and a bunch of other Valentine's Day stuff.
Then we were out of the tunnel, the night air whistling through our hair as the boat barrelled straight toward the exit. If the ride had been in working order, we would've sailed off a ramp between the golden Gates of Love and splashed down safely in the exit pool. But there was a problem. The Gates of Love were chained. Two boats that had been washed out of the tunnel before us were now piled against the barricade—one submerged, the other cracked in half.
"Unfasten your seat belt," I yelled to Annabeth.
"Are you crazy?" She screamed.
"Unless you want to get smashed to death." I strapped Ares's shield to my arm. "We're going to have to jump for it." My idea was simple and insane. As the boat struck, we would use its force like a springboard to jump the gate. I'd heard of people surviving car crashes that way, getting thrown thirty or forty feet away from an accident. With luck, we would land in the pool. Annabeth seemed to understand. She gripped my hand as the gates got closer.
"On your mark," I said.
"You got that right, Firecracker!" She hesitated . . . hesitated . . . then yelled, "Now!" Crack! We both jumped high. She got us maximum lift. Unfortunately, that was a little more than we needed. Our boat smashed into the pileup and we were thrown into the air, straight over the gates, over the pool, and down toward solid asphalt. Something grabbed me from behind.
Grover! In midair, he had grabbed me by the shirt, and Annabeth by the arm, and was trying to pull us out of a crash landing, but Annabeth and I had all the momentum.
"You're too heavy!" Grover said. "We're going down!" We spiralled toward the ground, Grover doing his best to slow the fall. We smashed into a photo-board, Grover's head going straight into the hole where tourists would put their faces, pretending to be Noo-Noo the Friendly Whale.
Annabeth and I tumbled to the ground, before stopping. I opened my eyes slightly, to see Annabeth on top of me, hugging my arm and trembling.
"Ummm . . . Annabeth . . ." She opened one eye, before blushing furiously and scrambling off me.
"Holy crap!" Percy exclaimed, running up to us. "You guys ok?" I nodded hastily, still shocked.
"Good work on controlling that water, Bubble boy." I grinned, high fiving him.
I looked back at the Thrill Ride of Love. The water was subsiding. Our boat had been smashed to pieces against the gates. A hundred yards away, at the entrance pool, the Cupids were still filming. The statues had swivelled so that their cameras were trained straight on us, the spotlights in our faces.
"Show's over!" Percy yelled. "Thank you! Good night!" The Cupids turned back to their original positions. The lights shut off. The park went quiet and dark again, except for the gentle trickle of water into the Thrill Ride of Love's exit pool. I wondered if Olympus had gone to a commercial break, or if our ratings had been any good.
Percy growled angrily, before glancing down to the shield on my arm. "We need to have a little talk with Ares.