After a confusing dream concerning one of his quest-mates, Percy could confidently say that he was appropriately disoriented. The cold from standing outside in the blistering cold didn't make it any easier, either.

He paid a glance to his right, where Kia stood.

He couldn't get it out of his mind, the image of Kia jolting up from the driver's seat, eyes wide with terror. He'd asked if anything were wrong and she'd profusely denied it, even though her sweating forehead and palpitating chest said otherwise. Percy let it go and settled for keeping a close eye on her.

It was so odd, as soon as the others had come up in front of her, it was like she just wore a whole new costume. She was back to normal entirely, except for the odd sense of distance she'd emanated after her sleep.

Thalia had brought up her concerns to Percy earlier, "Is Kia okay?"

"I don't know," Percy had answered truthfully.

They left it at that.

Percy could sense the others could feel the odd coldness Kia had suddenly started to give off, but wisely kept quiet about it. Truthfully, Percy was somewhat disappointed. It wasn't like they'd been friends since forever, but there was a feeling like he'd suddenly backtracked on all the recent progress they'd made. He could admit he felt a bit silly for feeling that way, but Percy was a kid, okay?

Either way, he elected within his internal debate to give her the space she seemed to carve out for herself.

Currently, he was beating himself up over that decision, because the awkwardness that hung in the air was quite literally suffocating him. Awkwardness had always been something Percy detested, barely being able to stand even a moment of its unwanted company; and here, it was being employed in heaps.

Percy and Bianca stood next to each other, both clearly feeling the uncomfortable tension in the air. He paid a glance to Kia's direction, who was standing a little ways away from them. He'd never noticed before just how much of a delinquent she looked like; her black jacket was wrapped snuggly around her and her legs fearlessly took in the cold that pricked her skin from the torn material of her jeans. Her arms her crossed in front of her while she leaned her back against the railing, her hair draping over the left side of her face, not enough to hide her wrinkled eyebrows and almost frustrated expression. She looked so pensive, yet so angry, that Percy couldn't muster up the courage to ask her if anything was up.

The only other option was to talk to Bianca, which was a whole other obstacle altogether. Percy had always been bad at conversing with the girl species one-on-one (unless you counted that one guinea pig he petted in one of his school's classrooms, but that memory was ruined by the time he got turned into one at a psycho goddesses' island), and adding to the fact was that this particular girl wasn't one he had the best trail off with.

Finally, she relented, "Nice rat."

Percy arrogantly set it on the porch railing, half-expecting people to flock to the store at the fabulous promotion he enacted.

"So... how do you like being a Hunter?" he asked, feeling inclined to.

She pursed her lips. "You're not still mad at me for joining, are you?"

Salty, sure; mad, not really.

They had a well-needed conversation and cleared the air between themselves about certain topics: Nico, Percy's worth as Annabeth's friend, him knocking her down in capture the flag—all of it. Even if they hadn't, it was nice to feel the recede of the unwanted tension just by talking—Percy had the suspicion that even if they hadn't ventured into such topics, just talking it out and making sure they were both good was enough.

There was a lull in the conversation and all that was left was Kia, who was still sort of glaring at the sidewalk as if it'd stolen her week old puppy. Percy's gaze swept to Bianca, who looked similarly troubled by the older girl's aloofness.

Bianca caught his eye and asked concernedly, "You think she's okay?"

Percy wanted to say yes, that she was completely fine and it was just a mood she was in, but the problem was that he didn't know. He'd only met her like three days ago, and even then, he'd spoken to her for like twenty minutes in total at best of those days. Percy hated that he had no way of telling whether she was alright.

He wouldn't admit it, but it did sting a bit that she wouldn't tell him. Don't get him wrong, it wasn't like he expected her to open up with a snap of his fingers, but he's just saying: he would've been there for whatever she needed.

Okay, it wasn't supposed to sound this creepy. He promises he doesn't stalk all the girls around him.

Circling back to the topic, it concerned him how sudden it was for her to distance herself from the others and himself—even Thalia, who had supposedly claimed a sort of protective bodyguard role in her life—wherever that came from.

As Percy opened his mouth to reply with something that would likely disappoint Bianca's interest and concern for her... friend?—whatever they were, he noticed Zoë and Grover were coming back.

He was slightly disappointed—he liked talking to Bianca, he realised. She was great company, much easier to talk with than Zoë, that was for sure.

He'd made small conversation again, waiting for Zoë and Grover to approach them, missing one tiny detail.

"Zoë seems to trust you," Percy had said. "What were you guys talking about, anyway—something dangerous about the quest?"

"When?"

"Yesterday morning on the pavilion," he said, before he could stop himself. "Something about the General."

Her face darkened. "How did you... The invisibility hat. Were you eavesdropping?"

"No! I mean, not really. I just—"

Like his dad was finally listening to his prayers or Apollo took a distinct liking to him, Grover and Zoë trotted over with bags of pastries, coffee along with other goodies and a simply heavenly blueberry muffin that had Percy so transfixed, he could almost ignore the angry red Bianca's face was turning.

Even Kia, who looked nothing short of an angst-filled teenager, bounded over to greedily snatch her delightful looking brownie. Percy watched the scene with amused eyes as Kia scarfed down the treat, her eyes gradually brightening the tiniest bit from her stony look.

A few crumbs were sprawled across her face, nothing a napkin couldn't fix—which was handed to her by Zoë, taking it with red cheeks.

Percy passed her a coffee, which she shot him a grateful look for.

They all munched on their treats happily and earnestly, nearly forgetting they were on a heavily time-sensitive mission at the moment.

"We should do the tracking spell," Zoë said, ever the vigilant one, breaking the peaceful silence. "Grover, do you have any acorns left."

"Umm," Grover mumbled, scratching his cheek. The saytr was chewing tastefully on a bran muffin, the wrapper and all. "I think so. I just need to—"

He went still, freezing.

Percy cocked his head confusedly, seconds away from asking what was wrong when a warm breeze rustled past, like a gust of springtime had gotten lost in the middle of winter. Fresh air seasoned with wildflowers and sunshine. And something else—almost like a voice, trying to say something. A warning.

Zoë gasped. "Grover, thy cup."

The cup fell to the floor, the object suddenly being dotted with patterns of birds; the birds peeled off the surface, fluttering away with the breeze. Percy jumped slightly as he heard a squeak, whipping his head to see the rubber rat he'd set on the railing scampering off in the woods—with real fur and whiskers, Percy realised with a start.

Grover collapsed next to his coffee, which steamed against the snow. They gathered around him and tried to wake him up. He groaned, his eyes fluttering.

"Hey!" Thalia said, running up from the street. "I just... What's wrong with Grover?"

"I don't know," Percy said, his eyes darting nervously. "He collapsed."

"Uuuuuhhhh," Grover groaned.

"Well, get him up!" Thalia said, her spear in her hand, trapped with a vice-like looking grip. She glanced behind herself, looking paranoid as if she were being followed. "We have to get out of here."

They lugged the moaning saytr until they reached the edge of town—where they saw the first two unfriendly skeleton dudes. You'd think that if they'd been raised from the dead, they'd be a bit more merry about the human side of things, but unfortunately for the questers, these ones in particular didn't seem to be looking for happy family reunions.

They came out from the trees, trapping them in the middle of the road, wearing New Mexico State Police uniforms in alternative to their previous brilliant costume of gray camouflage but still carrying the same yellow eyes and transparent grey skin. Percy thought the new digs were slightly overkill, but elected to ignore the ADHD part of his head to focus on getting rid of these guys.

Percy could admit that there was a time when he thought shotguns were cool, interested in learning how to use one, but that was thrown out the window when he stood on the other side of one, the skeleton warriors drawing the little weapons out of their surprisingly handy uniform.

Thalia tapped her bracelet, her shield, Aegis (that was totally sick, might he add!), springing to life on her arm. That wasn't enough to even make the grumpy skeleton dudes flinch, however. Their glowing yellow eyes bored into Percy.

Why did the evil guys always get cool eyes?

Percy was, quite literally, the idiot who brought a knife to a gun fight—the knife manifesting as a shimmering bronze sword with a double-edged blade, a leather-wrapped grip and a flat hilt riveted with gold studs.

Kia looked antsy, but weirdly straightened up as soon as Zoë handed her a spare bow that came from, again, nowhere. She stood tall and looked confident and Percy wouldn't have even guessed, if he hadn't known, that she was new to the whole demigod shenanigans.

Zoë and Bianca has their bows drawn, faces stern. Bianca had a bit of trouble, though—Grover kept swooning and leaning onto her, making her stumble and fumble about with her movements.

"Back up," Thalia said.

They all inched backwards—but then, Percy heard the rustling of nearby branches. Like blood diffusing through a partially permeable membrane (he wanted to sound like he learnt something at school), two more skeleton warriors, who, might he add, looked just as unfriendly as his buddies, emerged from the woods and blocked the road from behind them. They were surrounded.

Percy wondered where the other warriors of bone were; he'd remembered seeing a dozen back at the Smithsonian. One of the skeleton dudes raised a cell phone to his ear and spoke into it.

Except it wasn't really speaking. It was a clattering, clicking sound, the sound of dry teeth hitting bone, surprisingly (note the sarcasm). Percy saw Kia's face scrunch up before her eyes widened, seeming to have an epiphany of sorts. His eyes sliding open the slightest bit more, Percy realised, they were calling for their brethren.

"It's near," Grover moaned mournfully.

Percy had learnt long ago not to make 'who died' jokes. Don't ask.

"It's here," Percy said, pressing his lips into a line, hefting him up slightly with a strangled grunt.

"No," Grover insisted. "The gift. The gift from the Wild."

Must be some gift, in that case—all Percy could see were the cobwebs that Annabeth would have detested on the joints of skeleton warriors who were about to obliterate them.

Sarcasm and bitterness aside, Percy was getting worried. Grover was in no shape to walk, let alone fight.

"We can take them," Thalia said, sounding more hopeful than convinced. "Five of us against four of them. They'll probably ignore Grover that way."

"Agreed," said Zoë firmly.

"Hopefully," Kia muttered beside Percy. He shot her a glare over her shoulder which she smiled sheepishly at.

"The Wild!" Grover moaned insistently.

A warm wind blew through the canyon, like the start of one of those Western cowboy fights you'd see on television. Percy found himself subconsciously adhering to the role, keeping his eyes on the skeleton warriors. He summoned all the rage he could—from the General Asshole who gloated about Annabeth's fate, the way Luke's laugh reverberated against the stone of the cave as he betrayed her—all of it.

And with that, he charged.

From that fight came a few major breakthroughs: Bianca could kill these things and somehow made them burst into flames, Kia could magically become really good at archery which he made a mental note to ask about later, and Grover was so opposed to hurting wild creatures that he was adamant, even in his less-than-top shape, about not killing a psycho squealing pig that seemed to want to put the questers in a doggy bag.

"That's the Erymanthian Boar," Zoe said, trying to keep her voice calm. "I don't think we can kill it."

"It's a gift," Grover said. "A blessing from the Wild!"

The boar let out a mighty 'REEEEET!' and swung its tusk. Zoe and Bianca dove out of the way as Percy had to push Grover so he wouldn't get launched into the mountain on accord of the Boar Tusk Express.

"Yeah, I feel blessed!" Percy said, finding time to be sarcastic even as he was a moment away from being a tasty demigod meal for a pissed boar. "Scatter!"

They ran in different directions, and the boar fuddled as if it were confused.

"It wants to kill us!" Thalia said.

"Of course," Grover said, way too enthusiastically for Percy's taste. "It's wild!"

"I thought this was supposed to be a blessing!" Kia said, manoeuvring out of the way when the boar kicked a decent-sized rock her way.

It seemed fair to Percy, but the boar seemed to take offence and spun around to charge her which she rudely avoided, consequently having the boar utterly decimate the WELCOME TO CLOUDCROFT sign. That was probably major public property damage.

The whole ordeal had gone by less-than smoothly, all ending (more or less) with Percy and Thalia at the bottom of a seventy-foot drop from the edge of the bridge, still alive, somehow. Thalia had pine-needles in her hair, looking like she lost a fight with an angry Christmas tree while Percy had cuts and bruises all over him like a paper-shredder had attacked him as opposed to an exhaustingly cross boar. Percy looked back and saw the boar completely wedged in the snow, not being able to move.

"You're afraid of heights," he said to Thalia, after feeling enough satisfaction of seeing the annoying boar stuck.

Thalia's eyes reverted back to their usual angry look. "Don't be stupid."

"That's why you freaked out on Apollo's bus. Why you didn't want to talk about it."

She took a deep breath. Then she brushed the pine needles out of her hair. "If you tell anyone, I swear—"

"No, no," Percy said, a grin on the climax of breaking out on his face. "That's cool. It's just... the daughter of Zeus, the Lord of the Sky, afraid of heights?"

She was about to knock him into the snow when, above us, Grover's dreamy voice called in a drawl, "Helloooooo?"

"Down here!"

A few minutes and echoing curses that sounded suspiciously like Kia, the rest of them had joined them. They all had an unspoken agreement to watch the irritating boar struggle in the snow.

"A blessing of the Wild," Grover said finally, although he sounded much more appropriately agitated.

"I agree," Zoë nodded. "We must use it."

"Hold up," Thalia said, still disgruntled. "Explain to me why you're sure this pig is a blessing."

For a second Percy thought she was talking about his stepfather and was confused. First, how did she know him? Second, he was kind of incapacitated at the moment. Then he realised, oh, right—the giant pig that decided tag would be fun to play with tired demigods and saytrs.

Grover looked over, distracted. "It's our ride west. Do you have any idea how fast this boar can travel?"

"Fun," Percy said, looking over the creature. "Like... pig cowboys."

Kia hummed, staring at it with judgemental eyes. "Pig-boys?"

Percy snapped his fingers, opening his mouth to agree with her when Thalia shot them a glare that felt a lot like when she would say 'shut up.'

Grover said, "We need to get aboard. I wish... I wish I had more time to look around. But it's gone now."

"What's gone?"

He didn't seem to hear Percy. He walked over to the boar and hopped onto its back. Already the boar was starting to make some headway through the drift. Once it broke free, there'd be no stopping it. Grover took out his pipes. He started playing a snappy tune and tossed an apple in front of the boar. The apple floated and spun right above the boar's nose, and the boar went nuts, straining to get it.

"Automatic steering," Thalia murmured. "Great."

She grumpily trudged over and jumped on behind Grover, which still left plenty of room for the rest of them.

Kia put her hands on her hips and huffed, following behind Thalia begrudgingly. Percy could tell she was bitter about needing help from this thing.

"Wait a second," Percy said, holding up a hand. "Do you two know what Grover is talking about—this wild blessing?"

"Of course," Zoe said. "Did you not feel it in the wind? It was so strong... I never thought I would sense that presence again."

"What presence?"

She stared at him like he was an idiot. "The Lord of the Wild, of course. Just for a moment, in the arrival of the boar, I felt the presence of Pan."

I think I'm going to keep this thing going, of Percy's chapters being more light and Kia's being more dark. As the book progresses, though, it will change, because he experiences more and more and I want it to influence his thoughts. Extra long chapter because I took so long!