I lay on my bunk. I could hear Mark above me, shuffling about. I didn't own anything except the shirt I had gotten from Annabeth, who said it was camp policy to wear them, although I didn't notice Dan wearing one.
I sat up when Percy walked in.
"Hey," he said casually. "Ready to train?"
"Train?"
"We're gonna try to find out who your godly parent is."
"Can I come?" That was Mark.
Percy shrugged. "I guess so."
Percy walked out, gesturing for us to follow. We did. He led us to the lake.
"I just want you to touch it. Just with your hand or whatever. Or you can jump in like some people."
I lay down on my stomach on the dock, and stuck my hand in. I turned to Percy. "What now?"
"That was it," he shrugged. "Unless you feel suddenly really powerful, you're not a Poseidon kid."
Mark lay down and touched the water too. Nothing happened.
I turned to Percy. "I thought the big three gods made a pact to never have kids."
Percy shrugged. "They did, for a while. But that didn't work out so great, and they decided to keep having kids again. We're starting to get more big three kids, but there is a lot less than the others."
Mark stood up and shook his hand. "That water is cold!"
Percy ignored him, and began to walk away. "Come on."
Me and Mark scrambled up to follow him.
I reached Percy long before Mark did. "Hey Percy, where are we going?"
Percy didn't respond. He led us to the training arena that I had seen the first day we got here. He walked to a pile of crates and began reading them.
"You know," he started, picking up a crowbar. "The other people in the camp who test the new recruits like to take their time, assess everybody's talents before giving them any monsters to fight."
He swung the crowbar, and one of the crates broke open with a crack.
"I like to jump right in."
A creature scrambled out of the crate. It appeared to be a crab, which under normal circumstances wouldn't be any trouble, except this one was as big as a recliner.
It made a weird hissing noise, and it's mouth foamed a bit.
Then it ran at us.
I don't know what force drove me, but I somehow knew to leap to the right, curling into a roll so I didn't hurt myself. I ran towards a rack of swords and heard the clicking noise of crab legs behind me.
I grabbed the first thing on the rack—a bronze two foot dagger with a black leather hilt. I immediately decided that it wasn't my style, and grabbed another weapon, a spear with a bronze tip, and leapt away just in time to avoid crabby, who smashed into the rack with the sound of wood splintering. I ran to Mark while the crab fought to regain it's balance, and handed him the dagger. He looked at it in his hand and smiled.
Almost in sync, we ran to the crab, who in turn ran at us. I couldn't help thinking that from Percy's angle this would be a really cool scene in a movie, or a book. (AN: we only have one fourth wall Sean. Don't break it)
I lifted my spear above my head and brought it down on the crab. It simply bounced off, but it left a dent in the thick orange shell. It foamed again.
Mark ran straight at it, holding his dagger in front of him like a javelin. Crabby hissed and rushed at him too. Mark tilted his sword at just the right moment and caught the crab by surprise. A beady eye on a stem fell onto the ground.
I took the crab's moment of surprise to run at it, I held my spear aloft and brought it down just as the crab regained it's strength to look at me.
A thunk sounded as the empty crab shell fell onto the ground.
Percy stood, but before he could come over, golden light washed over me.
I quickly realized the light was coming from above me, and looked up, to see a floating symbol that I think I have seen before. A golden, winged stick with two snakes winding around it.
The symbol of Hermes.