The Cursed Ones

"What the heck is that thing!" Vahl yelled. I branch scratched my face as I ran through the brush.

"Uh, some kind of monster? I don't know! I've never heard of anything like it before!" Jazz answered almost getting swiped with it's giant claw.

"We'd better find out what it is quick! Before we all get killed!" I screamed as it's six legs almost trampled me.

Okay okay okay. I guess you want to know what's going on. Well. We've already left on our quest, destination, San Antonio, Texas. So I'll just start from when we woke up....


Once again, I woke up to Jazz screaming. This time, Percy hit his head on the bunk. I grimaced, feeling his pain.

"Same nightmare?" I asked.

"Y-ya. That's never happened before. It's was more vivid this time. But still just as scary." She said.

"Well, it's almost time for breakfast anyways, so let's just get dressed, and try not to think about it. We don't need anything else happening now that we're going on a quest." I said climbing down from my bunk. I grabbed a regular t-shirt and some shorts that I had gotten from the Hermes cabin last night, and put them on.

When we sat down for breakfast, I could feel everyone staring at us. It was unnerving. I could feel the expectations being stacked up on me. It was like holding the weight of the sky. Actually, no. Just kidding. But not about the expectations. That was real.

I tried to to enjoy my gluten free breakfast taco, but it just didn't taste right. Great. The perfect way to start out a quest. A bad taco. I tried to hide the queasiness I was feeling, but I didn't do a very good job. Jazz gave me a look.

"Are you okay?" She asked.

"Ya. Ya I'm fine. Just nervous." I said, or kind of lied.

She didnt believe me, I could tell. Well, breakfast was officially over and when all the other campers went to do their activities, me Jazz and Vahl all went to Chiron's office. I seriously needed a trash can. Now. The taco was really bad. Or maybe it was just the nerves. I couldn't tell.


Every step have me a new sense of dread. I was kinda out of it when we were in Chiron's office. When I came out my haze, I heard, "You must go to San Antonio. There you will go to the Alamo. (If you don't know what it is, you aren't a Texan) I cannot help you any further."

We left his office and grabbed our bags. Yikes! I almost forgot my dagger. Oops. That would not have ended well. When we got to the edge of the border, I looked back, trying to ignore the feeling that I wouldn't be back. I cleared my head, and took a few steps. I was no longer in Camp.

It was thrilling, and terrifying. Thrilling, because of the thrills, terrifying because of the danger. Duh. So I had no clue what we were supposed to do, untill Vahl took charge and hailed a cab. I don't know where it came from, but it was a normal New York city cab.

So we were driving along, perfectly safe, and nothing suspicious. So that's when stuff started going wrong. Of course. Why not?

So we were almost to the airport, I wasn't looking forward to flying, when Vahl reached up, and pulled the emergency brake. We skidded along the road and when we came to a stop she shoved the driver out. He ran for the edge of the street, saying some not so very nice things.

"Get out. NOW!!!" She yelled, opening the doors and jumping out. I shoved open the door and grabbed Jazz's hand, slinging my backpack onto my back, and ran into the woods.

"What was that all about?" I asked. Suddenly, I heard a very loud crunching noise. I slowly turned around, and stifled a scream. The once decent yellow cab, now looked like it had gone through one of those car mashers. I turned around and started pushing Jazz, not taking my eyes off the monster.

It turned around and started chasing us. We ran for our lives. Literally.

The monster was a weird mix of human, and crab. The top half of it was an extremely ugly human, and the bottom half was brown crab. It had six pointy legs, and one human arm. The other arm was the crab arm with a giant pincher.

And now, back to the present.

"I am the Fleshpincher. The only one of my kind, and I am hungry." His voice was raspy and dry, but deep. It wasn't very pleasant. I looked at Jazz.

"Have you ever heard of that?" I asked. She shook her head, unable to speak from fear. The Fleshpincher thing cornered us in a circle of trees. Weird, the trees were in a circle. I ran up to one of its legs and lashed out with my dagger, cutting off one of its legs.

It yelled and fell, getting back up almost instantly, and lashing out with it's claw. I ducked just in time. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Vahl sneaking around to the back of it. In an attempt to distract it, I rolled underneath it and stabbed it in the belly, only then realizing that it had a shell underneath it too. My blade scraped its shell, and did nothing to it but annoy it.

I rolled out the other end, sliced its back leg, and ran around to it's front. It laughed.

"Your futile attempts amuse me. The sky father will pay me well for your deaths." It said as it's claw lashed out. I saw Vahl jump up on its back, and Jazz run towards it's left legs. I ran for the right legs. I sliced both its remaining legs, and ran to its back.

I climbed up its back and joined Vahl in slicing its body in half. Its turned to dust, and we fell to the ground in a heap. I stood up and shook myself off and helped up Vahl up.

"Hey Jazz, we totally just killed out first monster." I said smiling. I looked at Jazz and all the oxygen left my lungs. I ran over to her broken form, and cried. I searched through my back pack, grabbed the nectar, and poured some in her bloody mouth. Nothing happened, and I cried over her.

I felt a hand on my shoulder, and when I looked up, I saw Vahl pointing to Jazz. I looked at Jazz and saw her eyes flutter open. Her cuts were healing, and the blood on her lip was gone. I hugged her until she asked me to get off so I wouldn't crush her lungs.

"Well, now that everyone is fine, what are we going to do? We have to get to San Antonio before January 6th and its December 30th. We have one week, and no transportation." Vahl said solemnly.

I smiled. "We'll just asked Dad."

Notes