فصل 03

3 My Last Performance

Some old lady drops the mic

And kills everyone

I WAS ABOUT TO INITIATE Defense Plan Omega—falling to my knees and begging for mercy—when Leo saved me from that embarrassment.

“Bulldozer,” he whispered.

“Is that a code word?” I asked.

“No. I’m going to sneak over to the bulldozer. You two distract the metalheads.”

He shifted Calypso’s weight to me.

“Are you crazy?” she hissed.

Leo shot her an urgent look, like Trust me! Distract them!

Then he took a careful step sideways.

“Oh!” Nanette beamed. “Are you volunteering to die first, short demigod? You did hit me with fire, so that makes sense.”

Whatever Leo had in mind, I imagined his plan would fail if he began arguing with Nanette about his height. (Leo was a bit sensitive about being called short.) Fortunately, I have a natural talent for focusing everyone’s attention on me.

“I volunteer for death!” I shouted.

The entire mob turned to look at me. I silently cursed my choice of words. I should have volunteered for something easier, like baking a pie or post-execution clean-up duty.

I often speak without the benefit of forethought. Usually it works out. Sometimes it leads to improvisational masterpieces, like the Renaissance or the Beat movement. I had to hope this would be one of those times.

“But first,” I said, “hear my plea, O, merciful blemmyae!”

The policeman whom Leo had torched lowered his gun. A few green embers of Greek fire still smoldered in his belly beard. “What do you mean, hear my plea?”

“Well,” I said, “it’s customary to hear the last words of a dying man…or god or demigod or…what would you consider yourself, Calypso? A Titan? A demi-Titan?”

Calypso cleared her throat with a noise that sounded suspiciously like idiot. “What Apollo is trying to say, O, merciful blemmyae, is that etiquette demands you grant us a few last words before you kill us. I’m sure you wouldn’t want to be impolite.”

The blemmyae looked aghast. They lost their pleasant smiles and shook their mechanical heads. Nanette shuffled forward, her hands raised in a placating manner. “No, indeed! We are very polite.”

“Extremely polite,” the policeman agreed.

“Thank you,” said Nanette.

“You’re welcome,” said the policeman.

“Listen, then!” I cried. “Friends, frenemies, blemmyae…open your armpits and hear my sad tale!”

Leo shuffled back another step, his hands in the pockets of his tool belt. Another fifty-seven, fifty-eight steps, and he would arrive at the bulldozer. Fantastic.

“I am Apollo!” I began. “Formerly a god! I fell from Olympus, cast down by Zeus, unfairly blamed for starting a war with the giants!”

“I’m going to be sick,” Calypso muttered. “Let me sit down.”

“You’re breaking my rhythm.”

“You’re breaking my eardrums. Let me sit!”

I eased Calypso onto the fountain’s retaining wall.

Nanette raised her street sign. “Is that it? May I kill you now?”

“No, no!” I said. “I am just, ah, letting Calypso sit so…so she can act as my chorus. A good Greek performance always needs a chorus.”

Calypso’s hand looked like a crushed eggplant. Her ankle had swollen around the top of her sneaker. I didn’t see how she could stay conscious, much less act as a chorus, but she took a shaky breath and nodded. “Ready.”

“Lo!” I said. “I arrived at Camp Half-Blood as Lester Papadopoulos!”

“A pathetic mortal!” Calypso chorused. “Most worthless of teens!”

I glared at her, but I didn’t dare stop my performance again. “I overcame many challenges with my companion, Meg McCaffrey!”

“He means his master!” Calypso added. “A twelve-year-old girl! Behold her pathetic slave, Lester, most worthless of teens!”

The policeman huffed impatiently. “We know all this. The emperor told us.”

“Shh,” said Nanette. “Be polite.”

I put my hand over my heart. “We secured the Grove of Dodona, an ancient Oracle, and thwarted the plans of Nero! But alas, Meg McCaffrey fled from me. Her evil stepfather had poisoned her mind!”

“Poison!” Calypso cried. “Like the breath of Lester Papadopoulos, most worthless of teens!”

I resisted the urge to push Calypso into the flower bed.

Meanwhile, Leo was making his way toward the bulldozer under the guise of an interpretive dance routine, spinning and gasping and pantomiming my words. He looked like a hallucinating ballerina in boxer shorts, but the blemmyae politely got out of his way.

“Lo!” I shouted. “From the Oracle of Dodona we received a prophecy—a limerick most terrible!”

“Terrible!” Calypso chorused. “Like the skills of Lester, most worthless of teens.”

“Vary your adjectives,” I grumbled, then continued for my audience: “We traveled west in search of another Oracle, along the way fighting many fearsome foes! The Cyclopes we brought low!”

Leo jumped onto the running board of the bulldozer. He raised his staple gun dramatically, then stapled the bulldozer operator twice in the pectorals—right where his actual eyes would be. That could not have felt good—even for a tough species such as the blemmyae. The operator screamed and grabbed his chest. Leo kicked him out of the driver’s seat.

The police officer yelled, “Hey!”

“Wait!” I implored them. “Our friend is only giving you a dramatic interpretation of how we beat the Cyclopes. That’s totally allowed while telling a story!”

The crowd shifted uncertainly.

“These are very long last words,” Nanette complained. “When will I get to smash your head in?”

“Soon,” I promised. “Now, as I was saying…we traveled west!”

I hauled Calypso to her feet again with much whimpering on her part (and a little bit on mine).

“What are you doing?” she muttered.

“Work with me,” I said. “Lo, frenemies! Behold how we traveled!”

The two of us staggered toward the bulldozer. Leo’s hands flew over the controls. The engine roared to life.

“This isn’t a story!” the police officer protested. “They’re getting away!”

“No, not at all!” I pushed Calypso onto the bulldozer and climbed up after her. “You see, we traveled for many weeks like this….”

Leo started backing up. Beep. Beep. Beep. The bulldozer’s shovel began to rise.

“Imagine you are Camp Half-Blood,” I shouted to the crowd, “and we are traveling away from you.”

I realized my mistake. I had asked the blemmyae to imagine. They simply weren’t capable of that.

“Stop them!” The police officer raised his gun. His first shot ricocheted off the dozer’s metal scoop.

“Listen, my friends!” I implored. “Open your armpits!”

But we had exhausted their politeness. A trash can sailed over our heads. A businessman picked up a decorative stone urn from the corner of the fountain and tossed it in our direction, annihilating the hotel’s front window.

“Faster!” I told Leo.

“Trying, man,” he muttered. “This thing wasn’t built for speed.”

The blemmyae closed in.

“Look out!” Calypso yelled.

Leo swerved just in time to deflect a wrought-iron bench off our dozer blade. Unfortunately, that opened us up to a different attack. Nanette threw her street sign like a harpoon. The metal pole pierced the bulldozer’s chassis in a burst of steam and grease, and our getaway ride shuddered to a halt.

“Great,” Calypso said. “Now what?”

This would have been an excellent time for my godly strength to return. I could have waded into battle, tossing my enemies aside like rag dolls. Instead, my bones seemed to liquefy and pool in my shoes. My hands shook so badly I doubted I could unwrap my bow even if I tried. Oh, that my glorious life should end this way—crushed by polite headless people in the American Midwest!

Nanette leaped onto the hood of our bulldozer, giving me a ghastly view straight up her nostrils. Leo tried to blast her with flames, but this time Nanette was prepared. She opened her mouth and swallowed the fireball, showing no sign of distress except for a small burp.

“Don’t feel too bad, dears,” she told us. “You never would have gained access to the blue cave. The emperor has it too well guarded! A shame you have to die, though. The naming celebration is in three days, and you and the girl were supposed to be the main attractions in his slave procession!”

I was too terrified to fully process her words. The girl…Did she mean Meg? Otherwise I heard only blue—die—slave, which at the moment seemed an accurate summary of my existence.

I knew it was hopeless, but I slipped my bow from my shoulder and began to unwrap it. Suddenly an arrow sprouted between Nanette’s eyes. She went cross-eyed trying to see it, then tumbled backward and crumbled to dust.

I stared at my blanketed weapon. I was a fast archer, yes. But I was fairly sure I hadn’t fired that shot.

A shrill whistle caught my attention. In the middle of the plaza, standing atop the fountain, a woman crouched in faded jeans and a silvery winter coat. A white birch bow gleamed in her hand. On her back, a quiver bristled with arrows. My heart leaped, thinking that my sister Artemis had come to help me at last! But no…this woman was at least sixty years old, her gray hair tied back in a bun. Artemis would never appear in such a form.

For reasons she had never shared with me, Artemis had an aversion to looking any older than, say, twenty. I’d told her countless times that beauty was ageless. All the Olympian fashion magazines will tell you that four thousand is the new one thousand, but she simply wouldn’t listen.

The gray-haired woman shouted, “Hit the pavement!”

All around the plaza, manhole-size circles appeared in the asphalt. Each one scissored open like the iris of a camera and turrets sprang up—mechanical crossbows swiveling and sweeping red targeting lasers in every direction.

The blemmyae didn’t try to take cover. Perhaps they didn’t understand. Perhaps they were waiting for the gray-haired woman to say please.

I, however, didn’t need to be an archery god to know what would happen next. I tackled my friends for the second time that day. (Which, in retrospect, I have to admit felt a wee bit satisfying.) We tumbled off the bulldozer as the crossbows fired in a flurry of sharp hisses.

When I dared to raise my head, nothing was left of the blemmyae but piles of dust and clothing.

The gray-haired woman jumped from the top of the fountain. Given her age, I was afraid she might break her ankles, but she landed gracefully and strolled toward us, her bow at her side.

Wrinkles were etched across her face. The skin under her chin had begun to sag. Liver spots dotted the backs of her hands. Nevertheless, she held herself with the regal confidence of a woman who had nothing left to prove to anyone. Her eyes flashed like moonlight on water. Something about those eyes was very familiar to me.

She studied me for a count of five, then shook her head in amazement. “So it’s true. You’re Apollo.”

Her tone was not the general Oh, wow, Apollo! sort of attitude I was used to. She said my name as if she knew me personally.

“H-have we met?”

“You don’t remember me,” she said. “No, I don’t suppose you would. Call me Emmie. And the ghost you saw—that was Agamethus. He led you to our doorstep.”

The name Agamethus definitely sounded familiar, but as usual, I couldn’t place it. My human brain just kept giving that annoying memory full message, asking me to delete a few centuries of experiences before I could continue.

Emmie glanced at Leo. “Why are you in your underwear?”

Leo sighed. “Been a long morning, abuela, but thanks for the assist. Those crossbow turrets are the bomb-diggity.”

“Thank you….I think.”

“Yeah, so maybe you could help us with Cal here?” Leo continued. “She’s not doing so well.”

Emmie crouched next to Calypso, whose complexion had turned the color of cement. The sorceress’s eyes were shut, her breathing ragged.

“She’s badly hurt.” Emmie frowned as she studied Calypso’s face. “You said her name was Cal?”

“Calypso,” Leo said.

“Ah.” Emmie’s worry lines deepened. “That explains it. She looks so much like Zoë.”

A knife twisted inside me. “Zoë Nightshade?”

In her feverish state, Calypso muttered something I couldn’t make out…perhaps the name Nightshade.

For centuries, Zoë had been Artemis’s lieutenant, the leader of her Hunters. She’d died in battle just a few years ago. I didn’t know if Calypso and Zoë had ever met, but they were half sisters—both daughters of the Titan Atlas. I’d never considered how much they looked alike.

I regarded Emmie. “If you knew Zoë, then you must be one of my sister’s Hunters. But you can’t be. You’re…”

I stopped myself before I could say old and dying. Hunters neither aged nor died, unless they were killed in combat. This woman was quite obviously mortal. I could sense her fading life energy…so depressingly like mine; not at all like an immortal being’s. It’s hard to explain how I could tell, but it was perfectly clear to me—like hearing the difference between a perfect fifth and a diminished fifth.

In the distance, emergency sirens wailed. I realized we were having this conversation in the middle of a small disaster zone. Mortals, or more blemmyae, would soon be arriving.

Emmie snapped her fingers. All around the plaza, the crossbow turrets retracted. The portals closed as if they’d never existed.

“We need to get off the street,” Emmie said. “Come, I’ll take you into the Waystation.”