Theo's POV
I was hoping that we'd have the master brought back to Olympus three days BEFORE the solstice. Now, we have less than 24 hours left AND WE STILL DON'T HAVE THE MASTER BOLT!
Annabeth loaded us into the back of a Vegas taxi as if we actually had money.
Annabeth: (to the driver) Los Angeles, please.
The driver chewed his cigar and eyed us up.
Driver: That's three hundred miles. For that, you gotta pay upfront.
Annabeth: You accept casino debit cards?
Driver: (shrugs) Some of 'em. Same as credit cards. I gotta swipe 'em through first.
Annabeth gave him her LotusCash card, which he looked at skeptically.
Annabeth: Swipe it.
He did.
His meter machine started rattling. The lights flashed. Finally an infinity symbol came up next to the dollar sign.
The cigar fell out of the driver's mouth. He looked back at us, his eyes wide.
Driver: Where to in Los Angeles...uh, Your Highness?
Annabeth sat up a little straighter. I could tell she liked the "Your Highness" thing.
Annabeth: The Santa Monica Pier. Get us there fast, and you can keep the change.
It was probably a good thing she said that. The cab's speedometer never dipped below 95 the whole way through the Mojave Desert.
On the road, we had plenty of time to talk. Percy told us about a dream he had back on the truck, which had the same voice he heard after Medusa, but this time talking to an invisible servant. The servant had called the monster in the pit something other than "my lord."
Annabeth: The Silent One? The Rich One? Both of those are nicknames for Hades.
Percy: Maybe...
Grover: That throne room sounds like Hades's. That's the way it's usually described.
Percy: Something's wrong. The throne room wasn't the main part of the dream. And that voice from the pit...I don't know. It just didn't feel like a god's voice.
Annabeth's eyes widened.
Theo: What?
Annabeth: Oh...nothing. I was just—No, it has to be Hades. Maybe he sent this thief, this invisible person, to get the master bolt, and something went wrong—
Theo: Like what?
Annabeth: I—I don't know. But if he stole Zeus's symbol of power from Olympus, and the gods were hunting him, I mean, a lot of things could go wrong. So this thief had to hide the bolt, or he lost it somehow. Anyway, he failed to bring it to Hades. That's what the voice said in your dream, right? The guy failed. That would explain what the Furies were searching for when they came after us on the bus. Maybe they thought we had retrieved the bolt.
She looked pale, which concerned me.
Percy: But if I'd already retrieved the bolt, why would I be traveling to the Underworld?
Grover: To threaten Hades. To bribe or blackmail him into getting your mom back.
Theo: (whistles) You got some pretty dark thoughts for a half-goat.
Grover: Why, thank you.
Percy: But the thing in the pit said it was waiting for two items. If the master bolt is one, what's the other?
Grover shook his head, clearly mystified.
Annabeth was looking at Percy as if she knew his next question.
Theo: You know what's in that pit, don't you?
Annabeth: Theo...let's not talk about it. Because if it isn't Hades...No. It has to be Hades.
Wasteland rolled by. We passed a sign that said CALIFORNIA STATE LINE, 12 MILES.
Annabeth: The answer is in the Underworld. You saw spirits of the dead, Percy. There's only one place that could be. We're doing the right thing.
She tried to boost our morale by suggesting clever strategies for getting into the Land of the Dead, but my heart wasn't in it. There were just too many unknown factors. It was like cramming for a test without knowing the subject. And believe me, I'd done that enough times.
Timeskip
Los Angeles, California
At sunset, the taxi dropped us at the beach in Santa Monica. It looked exactly the way L.A. beaches do in the movies, only it smelled worse. There were carnival rides lining the Pier, palm trees lining the sidewalks, homeless guys sleeping in the sand dunes, and surfer dudes waiting for the perfect wave.
Grover, Annabeth, and I walked down to the edge of the surf.
Annabeth: What now?
Percy started walking towards the water.
Annabeth: Percy, what are you doing?
Percy kept walking until the water reached his chest.
Theo: You do realize how polluted the water is, right? I mean, the amount of trash and toxic shit floating around—
Percy's head went under, leaving Annabeth, Grover, and I standing on the surf.
Theo: If he comes back with an extra leg, don't blame me.
I looked over at Annabeth, who looked worried.
Theo: Drachma for your thoughts?
Annabeth: U-Um...
Grover and I looked at her expectedly, but she just shook her head.
Annabeth: It's probably nothing. What about you?
Theo: Nothing.
After a few minutes, Percy came out of the water, somehow completely dry, and walked back to us. He told us about his conversation with a Neriad, apparently the same one he met in the Mississippi River, and he showed out the four white pearls she gave him.
Annabeth: No gift comes without a price.
Percy: They were free.
Annabeth: (shakes her head) No. "'There is no such thing as a free lunch.' That's an ancient Greek saying that translated pretty well into American. There will be a price. You wait.
And on that note, we turned around and walked away from the ocean.
With some spare change from Ares's backpack, we took the bus into West Hollywood. Percy showed the driver the Underworld address slip he'd taken from Aunty Em's Garden Gnome Emporium, but he'd never heard of DOA Recording Studios.
Driver: You remind me of somebody I saw on TV. You a child actor or something?
Percy: Uh...I'm a stunt double...for a lot of child actors.
Driver: Oh! That explains it.
We thanked him and got off quickly at the next stop.
We wandered for miles on foot, looking for DOA. Nobody seemed to know where it was. It didn't appear in the phone book.
Percy froze in front of an appliance store window. Grover, Annabeth, and I looked at him and saw that he was looking at a television that was playing an interview with somebody. It was this bald, ugly, old-ass slacker that Percy seemed to recognize.
That's when I realized that this man was Smelly Gabe, Percy's stepdad. He looked even more of an asshole than I could ever imagine, and I have a pretty big imagination.
The reporter was interviewing him in an apartment, which I assume was Gabe's, in the middle of a poker game, and there was a young blond lady sitting next to him, patting his hand.
And he was fake crying as well.
Smelly Gabe: (on TV) Honest, Ms. Walters, if it wasn't for Sugar here, my grief counselor, I'd be a wreck. My stepson took everything I cared about. My wife...my Camaro...I—I'm sorry. I have trouble talking about it.
Barbara Walters: (on TV) (turns to the camera) There you have it, America. A man torn apart. An adolescent boy with serious issues. Let me show you, again, the last known photo of this troubled young fugitive, taken a week ago in Denver.
The screen cut to a grainy shot of me, Percy, Annabeth, and Grover standing outside the Colorado diner, talking to Ares.
Barbara Walters: (on TV) Who are the other children in this photo? Who is the man with them? Is Percy Jackson a delinquent, a terrorist, or perhaps the brainwashed victim of a frightening new cult? When we come back, we chat with a leading child psychologist. Stay tuned, America.
Grover and I had to drag Percy away before he could punch a hole in the appliance store window.
It got dark, and hungry-looking characters started coming out on the streets to play. Not only is LA big like New York, but it's also spread out, chaotic, and hard to move around. I didn't know how we were ever going to find the entrance to the Underworld by tomorrow, the summer solstice.
We walked past gangbangers, bums, and street hawkers, who looked at us like they were trying to figure out if we were worth the trouble of mugging.
As we hurried passed the entrance of an alley, a voice from the darkness was heard.
???: Hey, you!
Percy stopped, like the idiot he is, forcing us to stop as well.
Before I knew it, we were surrounded. A gang of kids had circled us. Six of them in all—white kids with expensive clothes and mean faces. They're basically like that one kid in every high school movie: rich brats playing at being bad boys, but they're all bark and no bite.
Percy reached for his pocket, but I stopped him.
Theo: (to the gang) It's your last chance to walk away.
The gang chuckled.
Leader: Are you kidding? It's 6 against 4
Theo: It's 2 against 4.
Leader: How do you figure?
Theo: Once I take out the leader, which I assume is you, we'll have to contend with one or two enthusiastic wingmen. Another one of the remaining bozos with try something sneaky, which I will see coming from a mile away. That last two...will always run.
Leader: You done this before?
I didn't answer. I looked back at Percy, Grover, and Annabeth, who looked concerned, then back at the leader.
Theo: It's getting late.
The leader stepped up.
Theo: Just remember...You wanted this.
The leader swung a right hook at me, but I ducked underneath it and elbowed him in the nose, sending him to the ground.
Two of the kids looked at each other as I picked the leader up by the collar of his shirt.
Theo: It's okay. You're okay. Get up.
The second the leader got up, I kicked him right in the crotch. He immediately fell down to the ground, holding his crotch.
I looked at the five remaining gangster-wannabes and saw two ready to attack, two who looked scared, and one with his hand hovering over one of his pockets.
Theo: Okay. Now we know who's who. Let's get this done.
One of the kids lunged at me with a right hook, but I blocked his arm and elbowed him in the face, knocking him down. Another one lunged at me, but Percy uncapped Riptide and hit him square in the jaw with the butt of the sword.
The third kid ran at me and Percy, but Grover kicked him in the shin, knocking him over just as I hit him with a right uppercut, knocking him out cold.
The kids I elbowed in the face earlier got up and tried to kick me in the ribs, but I caught his leg and turned to the two other kids, who seemed hesitant.
I punched the guy whose leg I held in the balls, but the two kids didn't move.
Theo: Really?
I kicked him in the balls then threw him onto the ground. Then the two kids ran for dear life.
I heard a click from behind me, then a battle cry from the last kid left standing. I turned around just to see Annabeth grab the leader by the arm and throw him over her shoulder and onto the ground before kicking him in the face, knocking him out.
All four of us panted as we looked at each other. Then we heard police sirens in the distance.
Percy: We should probably get out of here.
Theo: Yeah, time to go.
We all speedwalked away from the scene. We then saw a store that looked open, its windows glaring with neon. The sign above the door said something like CRSTUY'S WATRE BDE ALPACE.
Grover: Crusty's Water Bed Palace?
Annabeth: Let's stop there for a minute.
We walked through the doors and stood near some of the water beds.
Annabeth: (to Theo) Really, Pinhead?
Theo: Hey, we kicked their asses, didn't we, Wise Girl?
???: Kicked whose asses?
We all jumped and looked behind us.
Standing there was a guy who looked like a raptor in a leisure suit. He was at least seven feet tall, with absolutely no hair. He had gray, leathery skin, thick-lidded eyes, and a cold, reptilian smile. He moved toward us slowly, but I got the feeling he could move fast if he needed to.
His suit might've come from the Lotus Casino. It belonged back in the seventies, big-time. The shirt was silk paisley, unbuttoned halfway down his hairless chest. The lapels on his velvet jacket were as wide as landing strips. The silver chains around his neck—I couldn't even count them.
Crusty: I'm Crusty.
Yeah, I can tell.
Percy: Sorry to barge in. We were just, um, browsing.
Crusty: You mean hiding from those no-good kids who you manhandled. They hang around every night. I get a lot of people in here, thanks to them. Say, you want to look at a water bed?
I was about to say No, thanks when he put a huge paw on my shoulder and steered me deeper into the showroom. There was every kind of water bed you could imagine: different kinds of wood, different patterns of sheets; queen-size, king-size, emperor-of-the-universe-size.
Crusty: This is my most popular model.
Crusty spread his hands proudly over a bed covered with black satin sheets, with built-in Lava Lamps on the headboard. The mattress vibrated, so it looked like oil-flavored Jell-O.
Crusty: Million-hand massage. Go on, try it out. Shoot, take a nap. I don't care. No business today, anyway.
Percy: Um...I don't think—
Grover: Million-hand massage!
He jumped onto the bed.
Grover: Oh, you guys! This is cool.
Crusty: (strokes his chin) Hmm...Almost, almost.
Theo: Almost what?
Crusty: (to Annabeth) Do me a favor and try this one over here, honey. Might fit.
Annabeth: But what—
He patted her reassuringly on the shoulder and led her over to the Safari Deluxe model with teakwood lions carved into the frame and a leopard-patterned comforter. When Annabeth didn't want to lie down, Crusty pushed her.
Annabeth: Hey!
Crusty: (snaps his fingers) Ergo!
Ropes sprang from the sides of the bed, lashing around Annabeth, holding her to the mattress. Grover tried to get up, but ropes sprang from his black-satin bed, too, and lashed him down.
Theo: What the hell?!
I immediately rushed towards Annabeth, but Crusty grabbed me by the back of my shirt and threw me onto one of the empty water beds.
Crusty: (snaps his fingers) Ergo!
The same ropes that held Annabeth and Grover wrapped around me and held me down as well.
Percy's POV
Grover: N-not c-c-cool! N-not c-cool a-at all!
Crusty looked at me and Annabeth and grinned.
Crusty: Almost, darn it.
I tried to step away, but his hand shot out and clamped around the back of my neck.
Crusty: Whoa, kid. Don't worry. We'll find you one in a sec.
Percy: Let my friends go.
Crusty: Oh, sure I will. But I got to make them fit, first.
Percy: What do you mean?
Crusty: All the beds are exactly six feet, see? Your friends are too short. Got to make them fit.
Annabeth, Theo, and Grover kept struggling.
Crusty: (mutters) Can't stand imperfect measurements. (snaps his fingers) Ergo!
A new set of ropes leaped out from the top and bottom of the beds, wrapping around Grover, Annabeth, and Theo's ankles, then around their armpits. The ropes started tightening, pulling my friends from both ends.
Crusty: Don't worry. These are stretching jobs. Maybe three extra inches on their spines. They might even live. Now why don't we find a bed you like, huh?
Grover: PERCY!
My mind was racing. I knew I couldn't take on this giant water-bed salesman alone. He would snap my neck before I ever got my sword out.
Percy: Your real name's not Crusty, is it?
Crusty: Legally, it's Procrustes.
Percy: The Stretcher.
I remembered the story: the giant who'd tried to kill Theseus with excess hospitality on his way to Athens.
Crusty: Yeah. But who can pronounce Procrustes? Bad for business. Now 'Crusty,' anybody can say that.
Percy: You're right. It's got a good ring to it.
Crusty: You think so?
Percy: Oh, absolutely. And the workmanship on these beds? Fabulous!
He grinned hugely, but his fingers didn't loosen on my neck.
Crusty: I tell my customers that. Every time. Nobody bothers to look at the workmanship. How many built-in Lava Lamp headboards have you seen?
Percy: Not too many.
Crusty: That's right!
Annabeth: PERCY! WHAT ARE DOING?!
Theo: STOP SWEET-TALKING THIS UGLY PRICK!
Percy: (to Crusty) Ignore them. They're impossible.
Crusty: (laughs) All my customers are. Never six feet exactly. So inconsiderate. And then they complain about the fitting.
Percy: What do you do if they're longer than six feet?
Crusty: Oh, that happens all the time. It's a simple fix.
He let go of my neck, but before I could react, he reached behind a nearby sales desk and brought out a huge double-bladed brass axe.
Crusty: I just center the subject as best I can and lop off whatever hangs over on either end.
Percy: Ah. Sensible.
Crusty: I'm so glad to come across an intelligent customer!
The ropes were really stretching my friends now. Annabeth was turning pale. Theo looked like he was about to pass out. Grover made gurgling sounds, like a strangled goose.
Percy: So, Crusty...
I glanced at the sales tag on the Valentine-shaped Honeymoon Special and got an idea.
Percy: Does this one really have dynamic stabilizers to stop wave motion?
Crusty: Absolutely. Try it out.
Percy: Yeah, maybe I will. But would it work even for a big guy like you? No waves at all?
Crusty: Guaranteed.
Percy: No way.
Crusty: Way.
Percy: Show me.
He sat down eagerly on the bed and patted the mattress.
Crusty: No waves. See?
Percy: (snaps his fingers) Ergo!
Ropes lashed around Crusty and flattened him against the mattress.
Crusty: HEY!
Percy: Center him just right.
The ropes readjusted themselves at my command. Crusty's whole head stuck out the top. His feet stuck out the bottom.
Crusty: No! Wait! This is just a demo.
I uncapped Riptide.
Percy: A few simple adjustments...
I had no qualms about what I was about to do. If Crusty were human, I couldn't hurt him anyway. If he was a monster, he deserved to turn into dust for a while.
Crusty: You drive a hard bargain. I'll give you thirty percent off on selected floor models!
Percy: I think I'll start with the top.
I raised my sword.
Crusty: No money down! No interest for six months!
I swung the sword. Crusty stopped making offers.
I cut the ropes on the other beds. Annabeth, Theo, and Grover got to their feet, groaning and wincing and cursing me a lot. Theo just punched me in the back of the head. I guess I had that coming after I did that to him in Las Vegas.
Percy: (to Theo) You look taller.
Theo: Fuck you, Jackson.
I looked at the bulletin board behind Crusty's sales desk. There was an advertisement for Hermes Delivery Service, and another for the All-New Compendium of L.A. Area Monsters— "The only Monstrous Yellow Pages you'll ever need!" Under that, a bright orange flier for DOA Recording Studios, offering commissions for heroes' souls. "We are always looking for new talent!" DOA's address was right underneath with a map.
Percy: Come on.
Grover: Give us a minute. We were almost stretched to death!
Percy: Then you're ready for the Underworld. It's only a block from here.