Chapter 30: Don't call her an it, her name is Anne

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'Stop it!' I yelled.

"Oh, look how cute he is!" Nyx cried out looking at me, Katie tried to keep a straight expression but failed horribly.

'Just give me the vitamins already!' I complained.

'You could've seen this coming.' Hemera said casually while trying hard not to laugh. Seeing how I could hear her voice inside my head, I could clearly see her struggling to hide it.

Chaos, however, was just laughing out loud.

'I know you can hear me Nyx.' I yelled embarrassed.

"Oh, you're such a cute guinea pig!" Nyx exclaimed looking down on me from above.

Yes, Circe transformed me into a guinea pig, why? It seemed like a good idea to do the same thing as last time, especially Nyx thought it was a good idea. So I gave her and Katie the Multivitamin from Hermes. And pretended to fall for Circe's trap. Well, it went all good till the point Nyx saw me as a guinea pig and she forgot all about what was important and only focused on how cute I was. Which was not good.

Circe looked at us with utter confusion but Nyx and Katie ignored her.

"But…" Circe muttered. "How could you know?"

Nyx interrupted her with another loud burst of laughter.

'Just get me back to normal!' I shouted from the cage. The other guinea pigs inside the cage were squealing for help too.

"Nyx maybe we should go…" Katie began but Nyx waved her hand and a black iPhone appeared in her hand. I recognized it as an iPhone from the future. My original timeline again which confused me a bit as Nyx told me she was not the same from the future, but I guess she somehow got her hands on it.

She opened it and stood in front of the cage and yelled, "Katie, come, we're doing a selfie!"

"What's a selfie?" Katie asked, but Nyx already pulled Katie infor a hug and shouted, "Say cheese!"

'Fuck you.' I muttered.

Snap.

"Stop this." Circe shouted but Nyx ignored her and made more selfies with a confused Katie who never heard of the term selfie. Because it did not exist yet.

'Can you please let me out?" I sighed.

"Fine." Nyx muttered, and she summoned the Hermes multivitamins in her hand and opened it.

"What are you doing?" Circe shouted, but vines wrapped around her feet.

"Thanks Katie." Nyx said as she emptied the Multivitamins above the cage. Making it rain vitamins around me.

With slight emberassement, I hurried towards the first one and began to nab on it.

I silently promised myself to never become a guinea pig again.

"No!" Circe screamed. I might have been the first to get a vitamin, but all the other guinea pigs understood this would help them and began to eat too.

I grew back to my normal size and glared angrily at Katie and Nyx who looked innocently at me.

"Oh, you're gonna pay for that." I growled, but she just pointed at Circe, giving the witch an innocent look. "Don't we need to run?"

I looked at Circe who was struggling with the vines that grew around her feet and kept her from escaping. She tried to fire a spell at us, but we were protected by Hermes Multivitamins.

Then six other men appeared next to me, they all looked disoriented, blinking and shaking wood shavings out of their hair; Blackbeard and his crew. Luckily they were only focused on Circe.

"She's right we should leave." Katie said, and I saw she was sweating, trapping Circe must take a lot of energy from her.

We ran down the hillside, past the terrace and the resorts where people were screaming as pirates were breaking down the place.

I was so distracted I actually ran into someone, I got up and saw I was looking at Hylla. She wore a blue business suit and had her makeup perfectly done. The perfect outfit for a they-burn-down-my-home day.

She looked at me with shock.

"You escaped?" She asked.

"Yup." I took out two pears of the sea out of my backpack and put them in her hands while she was still awestruck with my amazing escape.

"One for you and one for your sisters, crush them under your feet and try to find the Wolfhouse in Fransisco, next time we meet, please be nice to me. Bye!" I said and I chased after Nyx who had already entered a three-mast ship that I recognized, Queen Anne's revenge.

Hylla fired a few questions at me, but I had better things to do. BlackBeard and his crew noticed that Nyx was on their ship and they were heading in our direction now.

Katie and I entered the ship, and I commanded it to leave immediately.

Behind us Nyx was yelling insults at Blackbeard. Flipping him the finger and calling him mean words. Better not repeat what she said.

Before long the island turned into a small blip on the horizon. And the danger had passed.

So far, so good.

I was glad to find out that I still could control the ship, it would be a pain in the ass to control the ship manually with a crew of three.

I yelled a few commands at the ship, and it obeyed, Katie however looked worried.

"What's wrong?" I asked, but she just shook her head, "this ship is too old to sail."

I fully turned my attention to Katie.

"What? This ship is perfectly fine." Last time I traveled to the island of Polyphemus without much trouble on this ship. Since when did Katie know anything about ships?

"SHIP!" Nyx yelled suddenly, breaking me up from my thoughts and the conversation I had with Katie.

"Yes, we're on a ship." I said.

"No, enemy ship!" She yelled and pointed at something behind us.

I turned around to see a ship appeared at the horizon, clearly sailing towards us.

A Greek warship.

As it slid through the sea I could see it more clearly. And I began to wonder how I could have missed it before.

The ship had golden sails that shone brightly in the sunlight. Actually, the entire ship seemed to be painted gold. It was too far to see who was controlling it, but I could clearly see a golden statue on the front of the deck.

Only when the ship got closer I could make out it was not a statue but a person.

On the front deck stood someone dressed entirely gold, even with a golden mask.

"Did Apollo get a new ship?" I wondered out loud trying to figure out the identity of the ship's owner.

'You are dumb.' Chaos said.

Nyx narrowed her eyes, "Oh, shit this is bad news." She muttered.

"Who is it?" I asked.

"Well, say hi to your brother." Nyx said way too cheerful.

"Chrysaor." I said and I immediately knew I was right.

The golden boy was his nickname. Now I focused on the crew running around on his ship. I could make out dolphin heads and that they were not shouting insults at us but just used their strange dolphin language.

"Can we take him?" Katie asked.

"No." I simply stated and it was the truth, the first time I met him I had the entire crew of the Argo II and we could only escape by tricking them. Sadly we did not have a Cornucopia this time.

Nor did I have the full crew or my powers. I wish Leo was here. Or maybe Jason.

"Faster!" I commanded the ship, however we couldn't go any faster. The ship had reached its limit. Any faster and it would tear itself apart.

"Can you go faster?" Nyx complained looking at the ship in the distance who was closing in on us.

"We can't." Katie said to my surprise.

"Hey, what are they doing?" Nyx wondered, pointing at the deck of the enemy ship. I followed her finger and I looked at the golden ship. Dolphin men were running around like crazy, moving something large over the ship.

"Oh...shit." I mumbled as I recognized the thing he had on his ship.

An Onager.

In case you don't know what these huge, Roman, long range weapons are. Count yourself lucky.

'Well, this is getting interesting.' Chaos said, brimming with excitement.

'Just remember the fall doesn't kill you. It's the landing.' Hemera said.

'What has that do with it?' I asked, slightly annoyed how no one was taking this serious.

"Steer left!" Katie suddenly yelled but the Onager already fired at us. An iron ball came flying at us and hit the back of the ship. Tearing through the wood as it did.

The entire ship shook when it hit us. Katie and I fell to the ground, but I saw Nyx had shadows wrapped around her legs.

Cheater.

I got up and ran over to the back and looked at the gaping hole in the back. I estimated we had at least 4 minutes before we would sink to the bottom, assuming Chryasosr has not captured us beforehand.

"Another one incoming." Nyx yelled, and I commanded the ship to move left while trying to come up for a solution.

Another ball crashed to the right of our ship but it narrowly missed us.

"Percy!" Katie yelled, "put me in charge!"

"What?" I asked, I was hardly able to keep up with the conversation. I was trying to juggle the ship, avoiding flying objects, keeping up speed to outer space my golden brother and having to hold the ship together.

Katie furrowed her eyebrows. "The ship it's dead, we need to repair it."

"Of course it's dead, It's made of fucking dead trees" Nyx yelled as she looked at the onager.

Dead trees, without Demeter's daughter you shall fail.

No way.

"Can you repair this ship?" I asked Katie hesitantly. The enemy was already charing the onager with more ammunition.

At this distance I don't think we could dodge in time.

"I think I can." Katie answered. She looked me in the eyes with resolve. "Trust me."

'Trust the one who talks to plants.' Nyx said sarcastically.

However, there were not a lot of options, it was either getting captured by Chrysaor or sinking to the bottom of the sea of monsters.

"Okay go ahead!" I said, and she stepped forward to the steering wheel and touched it. I wanted to tell that it was useless since the back was gone but to my surprise she only touched it.

She suddenly fell to the ground but pulled herself up using the steering wheel, and I heard the entire ship crack loudly. It was followed by more cracks and crunches, like the ship came to life.

Or maybe it was just the sound of the ship sinking.

Katie got up and placed her hand on the steering wheel, "The ship!" she yelled exhausted, "it speaks to me!"

'Now we know she is crazy.' Nyx commented dryly.

However, Katie must have done something right because I could feel the ship moving faster than before. I moved towards the back, and I saw the hole was fixing itself. The planks began to grow branches that intertwined with each other and began to form a solid wooden surface that blocked out the water.

"Great, now get us out of here." Nyx suggested as she noticed that the ship began to slow down.

The entire ship was now looking more alive. The sails were waving in the wind like they were brand new. The wooden planks under our feet seem to look less worn out and for some reason the entire ship smelled like a forest.

Katie whispered something and the ship began to slow down.

Slow down?

"Katie faster!" I said but she grimaced. "She wants revenge."

'Amazing to see a child of Demeter beat a child of Poseidon on his own territory.' Aether said.

"Who is she?" I wondered, and Katie pointed down at the floor of the ship.

As Chrysaor came closer, I saw the Dolphin crew cheering, thinking they were victorious and that we gave up. Chrysaor yelled at us to surrender but Katie only grinned.

When we were 100 feet away the ship of Chrysaor suddenly collapsed on itself.

Like someone decided to snap it in half or better yet, Katie decided to snap it in half.

She had an angry look on her face and glared at the enemy ship and suddenly I felt pity for Chrysaor.

The planks of the ship began to tear itself apart, leaving the ship and falling down the sea. The planks on the main deck began to grow branches with thorns that trapped the dolphins and began crushing them like dolls. Suddenly the entire ship had turned into one wooden nightmare.

I saw Chrysaor trying to fight off the branches that approached him from the floor underneath him, but he was surrounded.

Like tentacles they lashed out at anything that moved. The ones not busy with the offensive were tearing the ship and the foundation apart. Shredding through wood like it was a wood chipper.

Multiple dolphin dudes called it a day and jumped into the sea, deciding that was better then dying on a suicidal ship. I heard a loud hiss coming from the ship and I saw Greek Fire engulfing the ships.

'Fire?' I wondered.

"They must have been carrying Greek Fire bombs or something.' Chaos guessed.

We suddenly jolted forward away from the ruined ship and I saw Katie had a massive grin on her face.

"You did that?" I asked flabbergasted, Never have I've seen a child of Demeter cause this much damage within a minute.

"We did it." She said and first I thought she was complimenting me and Nyx for teamwork but then I realised she meant the ship.

"That was...AWESOME" Nyx yelled and she hugged Katie who just smiled warrily.

"The ship," Katie said softly. "She was hurt by Blackbeard, she responded to my call." Katie tried to explain. She was looking for more words but I smiled back at her. Telling her it was okay.

I looked down at the ship, "Hi Queen Anne." I said.

The ship cracked under my feet like it responded,

"Did it say something?" I asked.

Katie nodded, "Yes, she said she likes to be called Anne instead of the ship or an it."

"So it's sentient?" Nyx wondered.

Suddenly a rope sprung to life and wrapped itself around Nyx's feet and made her fall to the ground.

"Yes." Katie and I said in unison.

"So was it always alive or did it just become alive?" I asked, Katie seemed to think for a moment before answering. "I guess it was sleeping but I managed to wake it up."

She shrugged, as if that was the best answer she could come up with.

Nyx got up and glared at the planks underneath her.

"Percy, do you still have some ambrosia in your backpack? We might need your fire powers again." Nyx asked innocently.

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