Chapter 65: As expected, nothing goes as it should

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 I hope you guys like this chapter. It contains the final piece of backstory for Despina and I inserted a random joke.

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' Percy '

Curse you Apollo.

The moment the metal angel snatched me out of the air I blacked out, only to wake up in another dream.

I now really had the idea Apollo was sending me these dreams, the terrible timing and the fact that Apollo had a connection with Despina.

My previous guess that Despina didn't want to fight was right, however right after we took out the helicopters she wanted to fight me and this time Soul speak didn't work.

I had no idea why, on top of that she was holding back and fighting terribly.

In my dream I saw Despina sitting in front of an altar, her eyes were red and her hands were shaking.

I wanted to reach out but my dream self was stuck in his place.

Despina had a black dagger in her hand which I recognized as one of Nyx's.

She held it in her right hand and slammed it down on her left wrist.

I thought she would've died right on spot.

Nyx's dagger had the strange ability that they could kill and wound immortals permanently, I had no idea why Despina had one.

She must have stolen it because if Nyx knew someone stole her dagger she would've been dead.

To my surprise the void black dagger bounced of her wrist, Despina cursed and tried it again but the knife didn't hurt her.

Despina cursed, "Why isn't it working? These daggers are supposed to kill immortals."

Then it struck me. She was trying to kill herself.

Tears dropped down her face, she tried it again but for some reasons the daggers didn't hurt her.

Then 3 bright flashes appeared in front of her, she gasped and looked up.

Three old womans wearing clothes stood in front of her, looking down at the kneeling goddess.

The Fates.

Despina got up and dropped her dagger in surprise.

"You!" she said accusingly with anger in her eyes.

The Fates were not impressed by her anger, the middle one spoke with a dry voice, "You stole Nyx's dagger."

Despina huffed, "So?"

"We are here to retrieve it." the third one said.

"I need it," Despina said, and she sobbed.

"Those blades are not meant to be carried by anyone then Nyx herself."

"Well, I need it." Despina snapped.

"Those blades can't kill you." all three fates said in unison.

"Why not?" Despina said angrily, "Why can't I be harmed or die?"

"It's your fate." the middle one said.

Despina sobbed, "So my fate is to live forever alone?"

The three fates nodded, "That's how we wove your life string."

Despina stumbled back, "You made my life so cruel on purpose? Both my parents rejected me! Force me to live alone and unable to Fade?"

"Fate is not fair."

Despina's eyes filled with anger, within a flash she lunged forward, grabbed the middle fate by the neck and held Nyx's dagger against her throat.

None of the Fates seemed to be impressed, the hostage even chuckled.

"Cut my string." Despina demanded, "Or we'll see what the daggers of void can do."

The fate giggled, "Fine, we will cut your string."

Despina released the Fate but she wasn't done with her sentence,

"But only after you are slain by a great hero."

"What?!" Despina cried out, "You said-"

"We would cut your string." The fate on the left finished.

"But we mad your string to uncuttable." the one on the right finished.

"So you lied." Despina sobbed.

"We do not lie," The Fate in the middle said, "Only a great hero can weaken your string and kill you, and when that happens we will cut your string."

I woke up directly after that.

I was still clenched into the angel's fist.

Still shocked by what I've seen I tried to recall my dreams.

Despina wanted to die.

That realization made my heart skip a beat, my sister wanted to die, and I was the one destined to kill her.

I remembered how the Fates had told me how I could influence other fate strings. Which meant they had foreseen my birth and that I would become Chaos's champion eventually.

My headache began to get worse as I tried to understand what happened and what was about to happen.

Despina was bleeding when she fought alongside with me.

My presence made her mortal, that's why she fought me.

I was destined to kill her.

We landed close to the waterfront in San Fransisco. The angels dropped us and left to flirt with a few of the female marble statues in the museum near they had heard about.

I was still dazed from what I've seen, Zoë waved her hand in front of me to shake me up from my thought, "Percy we landed."

I snapped out of my train of thought, "Oh, yeah."

Zoë noticed my pale face, "What's wrong with you?"

I shook my head, trying to shake my worries away, "Demigod dreams."

Zoë nodded, "Anything helpful?"

"No, though I know what we need to do now." I said.

Nyx approached me and put a sheet of paper in my hand, "I made a drawing!"

I frowned, "You made this while you were flying with a metal angel?" I asked and Nyx nodded.

I wondered if I should tell her about my dreams, though I had no idea what Nyx would do if she finds out Despina managed to steal one of her daggers.

I glanced at the drawing. It was a stick figure with black messy hair and 2 green dots for eyes. It had a curve what could be taken for a smile and rakes as fingers.

Right under it there was a few couple V's stitched together which were supposed to represent waves.

A speech bubble was attached to the stick-figure, in it was written.

My name is Percy Jackson, I can breath underwater.

I wonder who my godly father is.

I glanced at Nyx who looked proudly at me like she made the best drawing ever, "Seriously?"

"That's you!" she pointed at the stick-figure.

Thalia took the sheet of paper, "Oh, this is amazing. It looks exactly like Kelphead."

"No it doesn't." I protested.

Bianca took the sheet of paper and studied it, "I don't get it."

"Back to the quest." Zoë snapped her fingers, and I send her grateful look, then she took the sheet of paper out of Bianca's hand and put it in her own pocket, maybe to blackmail me later.

"What are we going to do now?" Bianca asked, "We are west."

"We should seek out Nereus." Zoë said.

"Who's Nereus?" Bianca asked.

"He's some kind of Sea god who knows a lot of things, I need to ask him something." Zoë said.

I chuckled, "We can skip that, I already know the monster that Artemis was hunting."

Zoë's eyes lit up, "You know?"

I pointed at the water and mentally commanded Bessie to show up.

"Mooooo"

My cow serpent friend had shown up on the edge of the pier and was swimming in circles, like he was excited to see me.

"What's that?" Bianca asked.

"We could sacrifice him." Nyx said and she licked her lips, "I could use him."

Zoë face-palmed, "Oh...how could I be this stupid?"

"I don't get it. How is this a monster." Thalia asked as she knelt down and petted Bessie on the head.

"It's the Ophiotaurus." Zoë said.

"The what-o saurus?" Thalia said confused.

I chuckled and explained the myth of how his entrails gave someone the power to take down Olympus.

"But how do you know him, and why haven't you told me?" Zoë asked angrily.

I sighed and explained how I met him, then I explained why I decided not to tell anyone, "First of, I don't want this creature to be killed because of his potential. Second, I don't want Kronos and Luke to find out. The moment Olympus knows things, well, Kronos has his way of finding information."

Zoë nodded, "That's a good reason, though I want you to share these kinds of things with me from now."

I nodded, "That's fair."

"So what are we going to do with him?" Bianca asked.

"Thalia is going to sacrifice him." A french voice behind us said.

We turned around and I face-palmed for letting my defense down.

Then I cursed myself again, for being so stupid.

Standing behind us, his two-color eyes gleaming wickedly, was Dr. Thorn, the manticore himself.

But he was not alone.

Next to him stood Lycaon who was baring his fangs, he had brought with him around 15 wolves.

Mortal mercenaries send by Commodus, were surrounding the us. Pointing automatic rifles at us, in one eye-sight I could see there were at least 15 of them, all heavily armed.

But the Gods really hate me because this wasn't enough.

Two helicopters flew over the coast line towards us, followed by a swarm of Stymphalian birds.

The chopping noise was getting louder and louder, the same for the sounds of bird wings clashing against each other.

The two helicopters flew above our heads, making it clear there was no way we could escape without them seeing us.

The birds landed on the rooftops, cars, docks and boats. Anywhere they could sit.

I silently cursed the god of horrible timing.

"This is just pairrr-fect," the manticore gloated.

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So, a good old cliffie. Aren't they nice. I hope this chapter was not over the top. Anyway, see you guys later.