Everything went immediately wrong.
The giants vanished in twin puffs of smoke. They reappeared halfway across the room,each in a different spot. I sprinted toward Ephialtes, but slots in the floor opened under my feet, and metal walls shot up on either side, separating me from everyone else. Jasper who had been running behind me ran straight into them banging his head. He rubbed his forehead gingerly before pulling on the bars trying to get to me.
The walls started closing in on me like the sides of a vise grip. I jumped up and grabbed the bottom of the hydra's cage. I caught a brief glimpse of Piper leaping across a hopscotch pattern of fiery pits, making her way toward Nico, who was dazed and weaponless and being stalked by a pair of leopards.
Meanwhile Jason and Percy charged at Otis, who pulled his spear and heaved a great sigh, as if he would much rather dance Swan Lake than kill another demigod.I registered all this in a split second, but there wasn't much I could do about it. The hydra snapped at me. I swung and let go, landing in a grove of painted plywood trees that sprang up from nowhere. The trees changed positions as he tried to run through them, so I slashed down the whole forest with my dagger.
"Wonderful!" Ephialtes cried. He stood at his control panel about sixty feet to my left. "We'll consider this a dress rehearsal. Shall I unleash the hydra onto the Spanish Steps now?"
He pulled a lever, and I glanced behind me. The cage I had just been hanging from was now rising toward a hatch in the ceiling. In three seconds it would be gone. If I attacked the giant, the hydra would ravage the city.
Cursing, I shot an arrow. The Celestial bronze arrow sliced through the chains suspending the hydra. The cage tumbled sideways. The door broke open, and the monster spilled out—right in front of me.
"Oh, you are a spoilsport, Corbyn!" Ephialtes called. "Very well. Battle it here, if you must, but your death won't be nearly as good without the cheering crowds."
I stepped forward to confront the monster—then realized I'd never faced a hydra before and I didn't know how to defeat it. A bit of bad planning on my part.I rolled to one side as all eight hydra heads spit acid, turning the floor where I'd been standing into a steaming crater of melted stone. My gut instinct was to slash at the heads, but a hydra simply grew two new ones for each one it lost. The hydra lashed out. I shot an arrow at its leg causing it to stumble giving me time to hide. I ducked behind a giant hamster wheel and scanned the room, looking for the boxesI'd seen in my dream. I remembered something about rocket launchers.
At the dais, Piper stood guard over Nico as the leopards advanced. She aimed her cornucopia and shot a pot roast over the cats' heads. It must have smelled pretty good, because the leopards raced after it.
About eighty feet to Piper's right, Jason and Percy battled Otis, swords against spear. Otis had lost his diamond tiara and looked angry about it. He probably could have impaled them several times, but the giant insisted on doing a pirouette with every attack, which slowed him down.
Meanwhile Ephialtes laughed as he pushed buttons on his control board, cranking the conveyor belts into high gear and opening random animal cages. Jasper was the unfortunate victim of those random animal's as he tried to fight to his way through to the control panel.
The hydra charged around the hamster wheel. I swung behind a column, grabbed a garbage bag full of Wonder bread, and threw it at the monster. The hydra spit acid, which was a mistake. The bag and wrappers dissolved in midair. The Wonder bread absorbed the acid like fire extinguisher foam and splattered against the hydra, covering it in a sticky, steaming layer of high-calorie poisonous goo.
As the monster reeled, shaking its heads and blinking Wonder acid out of its eyes, I looked around desperately. I didn't see the rocket-launcher boxes, but tucked against the back wall was a strange contraption like an artist's easel, fitted with rows of missile launchers. I spotted a bazooka, a grenade launcher, a giant Roman candle, and a dozen other wicked-looking weapons. They all seemed to be wired together, pointing in the same direction and connected to a single bronze lever on the side. At the top of the easel, spelled in carnations, were the words: HAPPY DESTRUCTION, ROME!
I bolted toward the device. The hydra hissed and charged after me.
"I know!" Ephialtes cried out happily. "We can start with explosions along the Via Labicana! We can't keep our audience waiting forever."
I scrambled behind the easel and turned it toward Ephialtes. The one good thing about being the daughter of Apollo was that I have perfect aim with projectile weapons.
The hydra barreled toward me, blocking my view of the giant. I hoped this contraption would have enough firepower to take down two targets at once.
All eight hydra heads loomed over me, ready to melt me into a pool of sludge.
I tugged the lever. The easel shook and the weapons began to hiss.
"Duck and cover!" I yelled, hoping my friends got the message. I fired the easel, and rolled to one side avoiding a hydra head.
The sound was like a fiesta in the middle of an exploding gunpowderfactory. The hydra vaporized instantly. Unfortunately, the recoil knocked the easel sideways and sent more projectiles shooting all over the room. A chunk of ceiling collapsed and crushed a waterwheel. More cages snapped off their chains, unleashing two zebras and a pack of hyenas. A grenade exploded over Ephialtes's head, but it only blasted him off his feet. The control board didn't even look damaged.
Across the room, sandbags rained down around Piper and Nico. Piper tried to pull Nico to safety, but one of the bags caught her shoulder and knocked her down.
"Piper!" Jason cried. He ran toward her, completely forgetting about Otis, who aimed his spear at Jason's back.
"Look out!" Percy yelled.
Jason had fast reflexes. As Otis threw, Jason rolled. The point sailed over him and Jason flicked his hand, summoning a gust of wind that changed the spear's direction. It flew across the room and skewered Ephialtes through his side just as he was getting to his feet.
"Otis!" Ephialtes stumbled away from his control board, clutching the spear as he began to crumble into monster dust. "Will you please stop killing me!"
"Not my fault!"
Otis had barely finished speaking when my missile-launching contraption spit out one last sphere of Roman candle fire. The fiery pink ball of death (naturally it had to be pink) hit the ceiling above Otis and exploded in a beautiful shower of light. Colorful sparks pirouetted gracefully around the giant. Then a ten-foot section of roof collapsed and crushed him flat.
Jason ran to Piper's side. She yelped when he touched her arm. Her shoulder looked unnaturally bent, but she muttered, "Fine. I'm fine." Next to her, Nico sat up, looking around him in bewilderment as if just realizing he'd missed a battle.
Jasper ran to me and helped me out of the cage.
He cupped my face and ran his eyes over my body to check for any wounds.
"Are you okay?" He asked, a little panicked that I had been harmed.
"I'm fine." I assured him. He still looked worried but he seemed to relax slightly. I gently touched his forehead where a new cut was. The blood dripping down the side of his face, reversed back into his wound before it sealed itself.
He smiled at me as a thank you before grabbing my hand.
"We're sticking together from now, okay?" I nodded. "Don't let go."
Sadly, the giants weren't finished. Ephialtes was already re-forming, his head and shoulders rising from the mound of dust. He tugged his arms free and glowered at Percy.
Across the room, the pile of rubble shifted, and Otis busted out. His head was slightly caved in. All the firecrackers in his hair had popped, and his braids were smoking. His leotard was in tatters, which was just about the only way it could've looked less attractive on him.
"Percy!" Jason shouted. "The controls!"
Percy unfroze. He uncapped his sword, and lunged for the switchboard. He slashed his blade across the top, decapitating the controls in a shower of bronze sparks.
"No!" Ephialtes wailed. "You've ruined the spectacle!"
Percy turned too slowly. Ephialtes swung his spear like a bat and smacked him across the chest. He fell to his knees.
Jason ran to his side, but Otis lumbered after him. Over by the dais, Piper was still on the floor, unable to get up. Nico was barely conscious.
The giants were healing, getting stronger by the minute.
I glanced over at Jasper. He seemed to have the same idea as me. We were the last ones standing.
Jasper summoned his spear and shield and I loaded my bow. Without even voicing it we began to fight in sync with each other.
I shot celestial bronze arrows at Otis. Jasper took on Ephialtes.
"You're still here!" Otis said annoyed. He swung his spear at me and I rolled to the side shooting him in the face with an arrow. It didn't do much good. Any damage done by me was almost immediately healed.
I heard a shout and turned to see Jasper flung across the room. He landed on the ground with a thud, hitting his head against the hard ground. He tried to get up but stumble back and fell down.
In my distraction Otis had recovered from my attacks fully and launched at me. He smacked me hard in the chest with his spear and I flew back, landing on the ground near Jasper. The pain in my chest felt like boiling lava.
I gasped, as the wind was knocked out of me and I tried to sit up.
Percy managed to rise and stood shoulder to shoulder with Jason.
Ephialtes smiled apologetically. "Tired, Percy Jackson? As I said, you cannot kill us. So I guess we're at an impasse. Oh, wait...no we're not! Because we can kill you!"
"That," Otis grumbled, picking up his fallen spear, "is the first thing sensible thing you've said all day, brother."
The giants pointed their weapons, ready to turn Percy and Jason into a demigod-kabob.
"We won't give up," Jason growled. "We'll cut you into pieces like Jupiter did to Saturn."
"That's right," Percy said. "You're both dead. I don't care if we have a god on our side or not."
"Well, that's a shame," said a new voice.
To my right, another platform lowered from the ceiling. Leaning casually on a pinecone-topped staff was a man in a purple camp shirt, khaki shorts, and sandals with white socks. He raised his broad-brimmed hat, and purple fire flickered in his eyes.
"I'd hate to think I made a special trip for nothing."
I'd never thought Mr.D as a calming influence, but suddenly everything got quiet. The machines ground to a halt. The wild animals stopped growling.
The two leopards paced over—still licking their lips from Piper's pot roast—and butted their heads affectionately against the god's legs. Mr. D scratched their ears.
"Really, Ephialtes," he chided. "Killing demigods is one thing. But using leopards for your spectacle? That's over the line."
The giant made a squeaking sound. "This—this is impossible. D-D—"
"It's Bacchus, actually, my old friend," said the god. "And of course it's possible. Someone told me there was a party going on."
He looked the same as he had in Kansas, but I still couldn't get over the differences between Bacchus and my old not-so-much-of-a-friend Mr. D.
Bacchus was meaner and leaner, with less of a potbelly. He had longer hair, more spring in his step, and a lot more anger in his eyes. He even managed to make a pinecone on a stick look intimidating.
Ephialtes's spear quivered. "You—you gods are doomed! Be gone, in the name of Gaea!"
"Hmm." Bacchus sounded unimpressed. He strolled through the ruined props, platforms, and special effects.
"Tacky." He waved his hand at a painted wooden gladiator, then turned to a machine that looked like an oversized rolling pin studded with knives. "Cheap. Boring. And this..." He inspected the rocket-launching contraption, which was still smoking. "Tacky, cheap, and boring. Honestly, Ephialtes. You have no sense of style."
"STYLE?" The giant's face flushed. "I have mountains of style. I define style. I—I—"
"My brother oozes style," Otis suggested.
"Thank you!" Ephialtes cried.
Bacchus stepped forward, and the giants stumbled back. "Have you two gotten shorter?" asked the god.
"Oh, that's low," Ephialtes growled. "I'm quite tall enough to destroy you, Bacchus! You gods, always hiding behind your mortal heroes, trusting the fate of Olympus to the likes of these."
He sneered at Percy.
Jason hefted his sword. "Lord Bacchus, are we going to kill these giants or what?"
"Well, I certainly hope so," Bacchus said. "Please, carry on."
Percy stared at him. "Didn't you come here to help?"
Bacchus shrugged. "Oh, I appreciated the sacrifice at sea. A whole ship full of Diet Coke. Very nice. Although I would've preferred Diet Pepsi."
"And six million in gold and jewels," Percy muttered.
"Yes," Bacchus said, "although with demigod parties of five or more the gratuity is included, so that wasn't necessary."
"What?"
"Never mind," Bacchus said. "At any rate, you got my attention. I'm here. Now I need to see if you're worthy of my help. Go ahead. Battle. If I'm impressed, I'll jump in for the grand finale."
"We speared one," Percy said. "Dropped the roof on the other. What do you consider impressive?"
"Ah, a good question..." Bacchus tapped his thyrsus. Then he smiled in a way that made me think, Uh-oh.
"Perhaps you need inspiration! The stage hasn't been properly set. You call this a spectacle, Ephialtes? Let me show you how it's done."
The god dissolved into purple mist. Jasper, Piper and Nico disappeared.
"Jasper?" My eyes went wide as I touched the place where he had been just seconds ago.
"Pipes!" Jason yelled. "Bacchus, where did you—?"The entire floor rumbled and began to rise. The ceiling opened in a series of panels. Sunlight poured in. The air shimmered like a mirage, and I heard the roar of a crowd above me.
The hypogeum ascended through a forest of weathered stone columns, into the middle of a ruined coliseum. My heart did a somersault. This wasn't just any coliseum. It was the Colosseum.
"You've got to be kidding me." I groaned.
The giants' special effects machines had gone into overtime, laying planks across ruined support beams so the arena had a proper floor again.
The bleachers repaired themselves until they were gleaming white. A giant red-and-gold canopy extended overhead to provide shade from the afternoon sun. The emperor's box was draped with silk, flanked by banners and golden eagles. The roar of applause came from thousands of shimmering purple ghosts, the Lares of Rome brought back for an encore performance.
Vents opened in the floor and sprayed sand across the arena. Huge props sprang up—garage-size mountains of plaster, stone columns, and (for some reason) life-size plastic barnyard animals. A small lake appeared to one side. Ditches crisscrossed the arena floor in case anyone was in the mood for trench warfare.
Percy, Jason and I stood together facing the twin giants.
"This is a proper show!" boomed the voice of Bacchus.
He sat in the emperor's box wearing purple robes and golden laurels. At his left sat Nico and Piper, her shoulder being tended by a nymph in a nurse's uniform. Next to them sat Jasper, he looked dazed. But he had his familiar scowl on his face. He was slapping the hands of the nurses away from him. I'm sure he'd be much more happy fighting in the Colosseum then watching.
At Bacchus's right crouched a satyr, offering up Doritos and grapes. The god raised a can of Diet Pepsi and the crowd went respectfully quiet.
Percy glared up at him. "You're just going to sit there?"
"The demigod is right!" Ephialtes bellowed. "Fight us yourself, coward! Um, without the demigods."
Bacchus smiled lazily. "Juno says she's assembled a worthy crew of demigods. Show me. Entertain me, heroes of Olympus. Give me a reason to do more. Being a god has its privileges."
He popped his soda can top, and the crowd cheered.
Anger boiled inside me. Fighting giants was one thing. Bacchus making it into a game was something else.
It was at this moment I realized how Luke Castellan had felt. I could understand how Luke became so spiteful. In the past year, I had become a pawn to the gods. The Olympians seemed to enjoy taking turns using demigods for their schemes.
Maybe the gods were better than the Titans, or the giants, or Gaea, but that didn't make them good or wise. It didn't make me like this stupid arena battle.
Unfortunately, I didn't have much choice. If I was going to save my friends, I had to beat these giants. I had to survive. For Jasper.
Ephialtes and Otis made his decision easier by attacking. Together, the giants picked up a fake mountain as big as a New York apartment and hurled it at us demigods.
We bolted. We dove together into the nearest trench and the mountain shattered above them,spraying us with plaster shrapnel. It wasn't deadly, but it stung like crazy.
The crowd jeered and shouted for blood. "Fight! Fight!"
"I'll take Otis again?" Jason called over the noise. "Or do you want him this time?"I tried to think. Dividing was the natural course—fighting the giants one-on-one, but that hadn't worked so well last time. It dawned on me that we needed a different strategy. Hera had made them a team of nine for a reason. The few times Percy and Jason hadworked together—summoning the storm at Fort Sumter, helping the Argo II escape the Pillars of Hercules, even filling the nymphaeum—
"We attack together," I said. "Otis first, because he's weaker. Take him out quickly and move to Ephialtes. Bronze and gold together—maybe that'll keep them from re-forming a little longer."
Jason smiled dryly, like he'd just found out he would die in an embarrassing way.
"Why not?" he agreed. "But Ephialtes isn't going to stand there and wait while we kill his brother. Unless—"
"Good wind today," Percy offered. "And there're some water pipes running under the arena." Percy looked up. "There's some nice sunlight today, not a cloud in the sky."
We understood immediately. Jason laughed, and gave a small smile. It was comical how much Jason and Percy thought alike and didn't know it.
"On three?" Jason said.
"Why wait?"
We charged out of the trench. As I suspected, the twins had lifted another plaster mountain and were waiting for a clear shot. The giants raised it above their heads, preparing to throw, and Percy caused a water pipe to burst at their feet, shaking the floor. Jason sent a blast of wind against Ephialtes's chest. The purple-haired giant toppled backward and Otis lost his grip on the mountain, which promptly collapsed on top of his brother. Only Ephialtes's snake feet stuck out, darting their heads around, as if wondering where the rest of their body had gone.
The crowd roared with approval, but I suspected Ephialtes was only stunned. They had a few seconds at best.
"Hey, Otis!" he shouted. "The Nutcracker bites!"
"Ahhhhh!" Otis snatched up his spear. I raised my hands and summoned sunlight. It shined directly into his eyes causing his aim to be off and for it to land into the lake. The sunlight shined so brightly even Percy and Jason had to cover their eyes.
We backed toward the water, shouting insults about ballet—which was ironically something I knew a lot about since Apollo was the god of dances (actually he was a god of a lot of things).
Otis barreled toward us empty-handed, before apparently realizing that a) he was empty-handed, and b) charging toward a large body of water to fight a son of Poseidon was maybe not a good idea.
Too late, he tried to stop. The demigods rolled to either side, and Jason summoned the wind, using the giant's own momentum to shove him into the water. As Otis struggled to rise, we attacked as one. We launched ourselves at the giant and brought our blades down on Otis's head.
The poor guy didn't even have a chance to pirouette. He exploded into powder on the lake's surface like a huge packet of drink mix.
Percy churned the lake into a whirlpool. Otis's essence tried to re-form, but as his head appeared from the water,
Jason called lightning and blasted him to dust again
So far so good, but we couldn't keep Otis down forever. I was already tired from my fight underground. My chest still ached from getting smacked with a spear shaft. I could feel my strength waning, and we still had another giant to deal with.
As if on cue, the plaster mountain exploded behind them. Ephialtes rose, bellowing with anger.We waited as he lumbered toward us, his spear in hand. Apparently, getting flattened under a plaster mountain had only energized him. His eyes danced with murderous light. The afternoon sun glinted in his coin-braided hair. Even his snake feet looked angry, baring their fangs and hissing.
Jason called down another lightning strike, but Ephialtes caught it on his spear and deflected the blast, melting a life-size plastic cow. He slammed a stone column out of his way like a stack of building blocks.
Percy swallowed nervously. "Hey, Eliana. Can you do that thing with your voice? The one that Kayla does?"
"Um..I.." I stuttered. "I mean, she tried to teach me but I've never done it very successfully...but I could try." I tried to sound hopeful at the end.
"Do what?" Jason asked.
"She's going to buy us time while we think of another plan for this big guy." Percy said with complete confidence in me.
"She's—what?" Jason said still confused.
"I'd cover your ears if I were you." Percy suggested, as he took his hands and placed them over his ears.
I really hoped this worked because if it didn't I was about to embarrass myself in front of everyone, including a god.
Jason gave me a confused look but covered his ears.
I cleared my throat and opened my mouth. I was going to be very disappointed and embarrassed if this failed. But I thought back to what my sister Kayla had told me. Deep breath in — destructive scream out
I sucked in a deep breath and screamed.
It was like a giant sound wave came from my lungs. The giant was blasted 100 ft backward off his feet and the scenery was sent flying backward with him.
My scream wasn't as big or destructive as Kayla who was greatly gifted in sound manipulation but it was big enough to hurt my throat afterward. I would definitely not be able to sing at the campfire when we got back to Camp Half-Blood...well if we did.
"Never doubted you for a second!" Percy said, sounding like he definitely doubted me for a second.