Set Sail

Percy smiled as he walked towards the location that his children had gone to after they passed the origin gate and were waiting for them with the members of Camp Jupiter. He had found it mildly amusing when he saw their reactions when Annabeth told them that they were in fact as mortal as humans. It had really come as a shock to them as they had once believed that they were above all else.

Ahead of him was a numbingly long and wide unsupported wooden bridge perched atop starry blackness. He eyed the bridge and cast his eyes to his wife beside him for a moment to try and read her emotions. When he realised that like always that he could not read her expressions with any certainty, he returned his eyes towards the bridge. At the end of the bridge was a glowing beacon of light that illuminated the other side. From their side of their side of the bridge, the other side that was illuminated by the light looked very much like a pier where a ship had been docked.

Percy and his wife stepped on the wooden bridge without stopping or even forcing their wary and hesitant companions to also tread on the bridge. The companions who followed Percy and Annabeth closely from behind stopped for a few moments before they bitterly shook their head and began to tread across the bridge.

The journey across the bridge persisted for more than three hours until they could make out Percy and Annabeth's children along with the roman legionnaires all of whom looked very disgruntled and irritant. Some of the Roman Legionnaires looked rather combative as though they were fixing for a fight while others looked rightfully wary.

Behind them like a towering wall reaching to heaven, was an utterly massive silvery blue ship that stretched hundreds of trillions of miles in length could be seen. The gods and demigods behind Percy and Annabeth gasped when they saw the ship at least what they assumed was a ship.

"Uhm…err…what's that?" Grover asked weakly garnering their attention.

"It's a ship G-man," Percy looked back at Grover with friendly smile.

"Why is it so large?" Athena asked.

"The first world is very dangerous, Athena," Annabeth said without looking back. "That ship is a shield, weapon, transportation and a place of refuge. You should never let down your guard. We won't come to your rescue you if you do."

Arriving before their children, Percy and Annabeth exchanged pleasantries for a few moments before they remembered that they were not alone and the pleasant little family reunion would need to be postponed for later when they were alone. Percy ran a hand through his black hair with a shallow smile.

It didn't take long before they were interrupted by Octavian who was alongside the Roman legion. "Legionnaire, why have you brought these Gra—" Octavian was flung aside just as he hissed at them.

"Be silent filthy dust speck," Annabeth flicked him out of her way. "You have no right to speak with us let alone voice your accusations."

"Let's just leave him behind," Percy suggested. "He is not very trustworthy. He would be more than willing to stab us in the back to further his own agenda or persona bias."

"No, I think we should keep him in the deathless sleep for the duration of the ascension war," Annabeth said. "Or we could just kill him once and for all and be done with it."

"Wait a minute," Apollo interjected in aghast. "Octavian may be a total tool but he is still my descendant. I can't just allow you to do whatever you want with him."

"We could always put you in the deathless sleep if you want to keep him company that much," Percy said. "It's not like it hurts or even uncomfortable. It is merely sleep that last a very long time perhaps even forever if you anger a very vindictive yet merciful person. If that's still too cruel for you, we can graduate from the deathless to something much more romantic how about that? You interested? I promise it will be fantastic."

Apollo paled and shut up.

"Perse, y—you're kidding right?" Grover stuttered out. "You wouldn't really do that would you?"

"Of course I would," Percy chuckled. "I can't trust Octavian. I will not allow a potential traitor walking around and potentially putting my children in even more danger than they already are. The deathless sleep is the least evil of the options or he can swear an eternal oath to never betray us."

Grover looked at Octavian.

"I am the auger of the gods," Octavian began. "Watch how talk to me, I—"

"—Merciful Pan, put him in the deathless sleep," Grover said very quickly. He couldn't imagine having to live with that for months or even years. And most importantly of all for a rather timid somebody like him, the thought of a potential traitor who may place his sweet Juniper is his enemy.

"What will you choose Octavian?" Annabeth looked at the centurion.

"Why would I listen to a Graecus?" Octavian hissed while puffing up his scrawny chest making his ribs very visible, this caused him to look like he was a fleshy xylophone almost making Percy look for a mullet to see if they would make a sound.

"Lets just climb aboard, we will decide later," Annabeth ignored him and instructed the others who nodded. "We still have a long way before we are safe enough to explain anything to you all."

Percy waved his hand and a black bridge appeared before them leading towards the ship, "Let's go," he said as he crossed the bridge towards the ship. "We have a fair bit ahead of us before we reach the surface of first world. As my wife said, we will explain everything once we're safely on our way."

The children of both camps looked at Percy with hints of bemusement but they still followed him inside the truly massive ship if it could still be called that. It looked even larger by many times than even the largest solar systems. They weren't too sure about whether they wanted to see the insides or not, but they had to or be left behind.

They didn't dare to doubt that Percy and Annabeth were not kidding when they suggested leaving Octavian nor that they would not rescue them if they let down their guard. They didn't even show a wisp of emotion when they said it. They felt like they were very cruel beings though not malicious or malevolent but they were not quite good people at all. The most terrifying people were not the most evil ones but rather the most indifferent who would let blood spill ceaselessly without even a flicker of emotion.

They felt cold shivers running down their spines once they had boarded inside the ship and their jaws dropped at what they saw. The inside of the ship looked like a bustling heavenly city with stunning gardens and Palaces that resembled a myriad of architecture styles and not like ship cabins at all. There were even buildings that very much looked so majestic that the palaces of the gods looked like dilapidated garden sheds. They couldn't help but look outside the ship just to make sure they were really inside a ship and not on a sacred island somewhere.

"A bit too opulent if ask me," Percy said while he shook his head despondently, "But it's what Thesis wanted and I did not dare say no. As it is said, happy wife, happy life and all that jazz."

"A man is supposed to lead and not take orders from a woman," Zeus puffed his chest.

"Haha…no wonder you sorry bastards are so miserable. My wife is my equal and I hers," Percy curled his lips and laughed disdainfully at Zeus. "Hera, stop listening to this sorry husband of yours. Just leave this piece of shit behind, find someone who will see you as an equal and not a lifeless trophy on a display case. Maybe you will return to how you once were before this working boy came and ruined your life."

"I second that sister," Hestia said. "You should swallow your pride and find something real and worthwhile. You have languished for far too long in your shame and anger."

Annabeth looked at Hestia with an eyebrow raised. It was obvious that she was rather surprised that the always quiet and reserved Hestia would say such a thing. But she was also glad that she said it even if it came after a few thousand years had passed as Hera's heart had nearly turned completely into a sea of bitterness, humiliation and anger.

"What is everyone talking about?" Thalia and Jason asked feeling a bit offended by how disparaging they were of their father Zeus. "Why should Lady Hera divorce our dad?"

"The very fact that you were born in the first place is reason enough," Athena said coldly.

"And even if we spent an entire lifetime discussing all the reasons why she should divorce your father, it still would not even cover one percent of the reasons why," Aphrodite said for the first time.

"Alright children, let's leave Childe Hera's affairs to her and not paste our ugly faces where they don't belong," Percy said with his beautiful and vibrant eyes moving away from his companions and towards the space where the most majestic palace lay. "Lets continue."

But contrary to their expectations, Percy moved away from the direction of the most majestic Palace and went to the west of it. The location that they were was on the western edge of the central area. The central area and the western area were connected together by a very wide and long marble bridge that looked very elegant yet simple and without many adornments to it.

Percy quickly led his companions across the bridge and towards a series of narrow pathways towards an elegant yet simple looking temple of white stone with an arched red tiled roof. There was a smooth stone path leading towards the entrance of the temple that was simple and clean with a few primly trimmed trees as decorations. Before them were two statues holding a seemingly illusionary gate that shimmered like a mirage.

"There is where we will be going to arrange your accommodations," Percy pointed at the shimmering in front of him that led to the temple.

"We should stay in Palaces," Zeus said. "Not temples!"

"Why?" Annabeth raised an eyebrow.

"We're the gods," Zeus said exaggeratedly folding him arms with his head thrust up high like he was reaching for the stars with his head.

Percy rolled his eyes airily.

"You would be crushed into powder if you took even a single step into those palaces," he told Zeus with the barest hints of a smile though clearly he was rather bemused as he and his family continued to lead the gods and demigods to the temple ahead of them.

When they neared the gate, the statues moved causing the gate to become solid. They gazed at Percy and his companion with expressionless faces, "Greetings, Your Eternal Highnesses and little friends," the said the statues together as they opened the gate in the hands.

"Greetings gatekeepers," Percy said with a smile as he passed through the gate.

Once the gods and demigods passed through the gate, they were shocked to see that the temple was actually a spatial platform. The temple they saw outside of was as they began to a assume simply an illusion meant to beguile. They looked at Annabeth who they noticed that she had on her face a very satisfied look that radiantly illuminated her features even more. She looked back curiously for a moment as though she felt their eyes of her. She shook her head with a tender looking smile and her gaze returned towards the spatial platform.

The spatial platform before them consisted of four towering spires extending out from the ground going up as high as the eyes could make out. In the middle of the four spires was a platform that was a metre tall and a hundred metres in diameter with visible runic formations extending out towards the spires causing them to hum gently with the barest hint of a golden light.

"What is this place?" Athena asked.

"It's a spatial platform," Annabeth answered without looking back.

"I thought we were going to stay here," Athena said.

"We never said anything about us staying here," Annabeth said. "You just assumed we would."

"Where are we going?" Enyo asked.

"We are going to our ship," Percy smiled.

"This isn't your ship then?" asked Athena.

"It is very much our ship," Percy said. "But it's far too large and slow so we will be taking a much smaller one though only relatively so."

"Is there really a temple here or is it really just an illusion?" Hades asked.

"There really is a temple here," Percy said. "But what use is a temple to us. We aren't exactly going to lay garlands in worship to each other."

"Who than built these temples?" Athena asked.

"The denizens of course," Percy answered her.

The spatial platform buzzed the moment Percy along with his companions stepped onto the centre of it. The four spires pulsed gently with golden light. Percy took out a sword from nowhere and plunged it into the centre of the spatial platform. The four spires began to move slightly and then the pulsing golden light dimmed causing the world to fade for a moment before the light grew brighter again and the spire moved back to where they were before.

Percy pulled out his sword from the spatial platform and began to descend from it. His companions followed behind him and what they saw was even more shocking than what they saw before. They blinked once or twice drawing in the sight. Before them was a white twenty mile long triple mast warship with a hull that was six miles high and three miles wide and the widest. The warship before them very much looked like it was much like a Galleass with starry black sails that pulsed with power even when rolled up.

Percy looked at his companions for a moment before walking towards the ship without saying so much as a single word to them which further drew their bemusement. As he and his companions drew closer, the ship released a beam of black star speckled light in the form of a bridge to which he climbed and went aboard the vessel. His companions followed him aboard the ship.

Aboard the deck of the ship stood Gaea and the other Primordials who stared at each other with rather unfriendly gazes. Percy sighed deeply and expectantly at the scene while Annabeth besides him snorted derisively as she looked at them. He inhaled a deep breath while they walked towards the Primordials. It took a bit of time since the ship was so large. Had he been human and on Earth, they would have been too far to see clearly or perhaps at all.

On the ship besides the glaring Primordials were the sailors scurrying about busily trying not to get drawn into the squabble of superpowers. Percy could imagine the sheer terror that those poor sailors must have been feeling in that moment. But yet still they performed their jobs with precision and efficiency that could and would make any manager feel their face turn rosy red with sheer joy upon seeing.

The most eye catching things on the ship were the three massive masts and sails that towered out for a little over fifteen miles. The top of the three masts were drawn out flags with their family's crest. An ethereal light surrounded the flag atop the glossy black main mast in the centre that towered over the occupants of the ship.

"Stop your staring at each other like television sets," Percy said as he and the other had arrived before Gaea and the other of his family. "You look like daft blithering fools happily embarrassing yourselves in front of others."

Gaea and the others heard his words and finally noticed the people beside Percy with red stained faces awash with the heat of embarrassment. Percy looked at them without any sympathy. His eyes cast a light that hinted, 'serves them right, let them burn and stew in their shame.'

Percy looked at the sailors.

"Get ready to set sail," he ordered.

The Sailors bowed silently before rushing towards the rolled up sails and released them. The ship groaned quietly for a moment as the starry sails hummed with power. Gaea and the other Primordials stopped what they had been doing and promptly went over to the masts to assist the sailors do their job. Percy walked over towards the Captain's wheel.

Magical lines lit up the moment Percy touched the Captain's wheel. A phantom wind erupted from nowhere shaking the ship removing it from port to the open. Suddenly the ship began to slowly descend. The Olympians and their children were already led below deck by Annabeth for their safety. What was below the ship was a sombre dim radiance before an all consuming darkness that beheld a terrifying silence that could very easily drive mortals to insanity. The ship continued to slowly descend then it suddenly dropped into the dim radiance.

BOOOM!

The ship shook greatly as it touched the dim radiance. The dim radiance like water splashed atop the deck of the ship. But unlike water, the dim radiance seemed to want to devour the ship and its occupants. The stars of the masts flared and the dim radiance retreated back leaving the ship. Percy spoke a few words in a very obscure language then another phantom wind blew upon the sails. Annabeth returned from the cabins and also spoke a few words in the same language that Percy used while she held in her hand a golden bell.

DONG! DONG! DONG…! The bell chimed so loudly that a mortal's bones would be ground to dust by the vibrations. With the chime of the bell, the dim radiance all around them seemed to become drawn to the bell.

Chapter 10 done!

ADDIO!