Off To Alcatraz We Go (CLOSED)

As I swam to the surface I was splashed by Luke, who had jumped into the water beside me. Something was dragging my feet down. I looked into the beautifully clear blue water and realized my red converse were still on. I laughed and managed to keep my head above the water as I reached down to untie them and throw them into a sunny patch of lush green grass. The Naiads giggled at me as I looked in their direction and I gave a smooth smile... Or at least I hoped it looked smooth. I let out a gasp as I felt something grab my feet and launch me into the air. I realized Luke had swam underneath me after he'd jumped in. He surfaced himself and watched me fly backwards into the water with a cheeky smile on his scarred face. I heard Roxy and Finn scream as they got splashed with my wave of water I'd created with impact. I laughed, they sat at the edge of the water soaking wet. Finn ripped off her wet shirt and left it in the sun as she jumped into the water. Roxy watched her with big hazel eyes, but seemed to snap out of whatever she was thinking and jumped in behind her, leaving her shirt on. Finn swam up to me, I held out my arms with a grin hoping for some Fletch lovin' like she'd given Luke, but instead she grabbed my head and dunked me under the water. I flailed my arms and took a large breath of air as she let me re-surface myself. Roxy giggled as she swam behind Finn. For a long while we swam around, dunking each other in the water and splashing each other. At one point I saw Luke's back was turned, so I quietly submersed myself into the water and swam over to his back, grabbing his sides and squeezing. I heard him yell so I swam up and he turned, only to push me back by my shoulders. I pushed him the same way and we started to water wrestle, bobbing up and down in the water. He had me in a headlock for a bit but I wriggled out of it easily as his arms were soaked. The Naiads watched and laughed at us as we played. After a while we all got tired and swam to shore pulling ourselves up to lay in the soft grass in the sun. Roxy laid beside Finn, who laid beside Luke, who I was laying beside. We panted for a while, trying to catch our breath through our laughter.
"This is great," I said with a smile. Luke looked at me and Roxy and Finn propped themselves onto their elbows to turn their attention to me. "Where is this?" I asked.
"Mount Nysa," said Roxy.
"Mount Nysa?" I asked.
"I think this is where Dionysus was raised," Roxy replied sounding unsure.
"Wait, Mr. D? He was raised HERE?" I asked propping myself up on my elbow and looking at her in disbelief. Luke did the same and Finn was also looking at her with shock in her face, she looked around with her black eyes, looking like she genuinely could not believe that someone as grumpy and annoying as Mr. D could have been raised here.
"I said I THINK," Roxy corrected.
"Dionysus?" Said a voice I didn't recognize. I looked behind me and Luke, Roxy and Finn looked past me at a satyr, the same one who had been sleeping against the tree.
"You know him?" Asked Luke.
"Know him? I helped raise him!" Said the satyr, who puffed out his chest in pride. Pride? Why would you be proud of raising a pessimistic lazy ass like Dionysus?
"How is he?" Asked the satyr."Last time I saw him he was still babysitting your camp for you,"
"Oh, you know, just a pessimistic lazy ass who does nothing but read magazines about wine and play pinocle all day," I said. I regretted it immediately as the satyr gave me a look of displeasure at the sound of me calling the God he raised a lazy ass. I covered my mouth with my hand. "Sorry." I said. He looked away from me slowly.
"Sorry," said Finn, "What's your name?" The satyr looked at her, she held his gaze. She was good at that.
"Silenus," he replied, "why are you four kiddies here?" He asked.
"We're looking for a demigod named Charlie," Luke said.
"Why?" He asked suspiciously. Before Luke could tell the satyr the truth, Roxy butted in.
"He's been causing some trouble at the camp, we need to find him," she said. The satyr stared at her and nodded slowly. Seeing as Charlie was Dionysus's son, and Silenus had raised Dionysus, I assumed Roxy was trying not to offend him in anyway.
"He came through this way a few weeks ago," said Silenus. The four of us looked at each other, mixed emotions showing on our faces. We turned our attention back to the old satyr.
"What did he want?" I asked.
"He didn't say, he was just playing around with the Nysiades. They seemed to enjoy his company so I let him be and stay a while. Now they're acting weird. They have these bursts of craziness and I can hardly keep them calm." I guess Silenus read the grave expressions that showed on our faces because he continued to ask, "what do you know about this?"
We all hesitated, until Roxy spoke up in her calm, soft voice.
"Charlie visited our camp one night without any of the campers or staff noticing, he had been talking and playing with the wood Nymphs Lin, Aloe and Jasmine." Silenus nodded and she continued. "They got stuck in their trees a while after and we got them out. But now it's like they've gone insane and they're giving everyone trouble." I looked at Luke and he was glancing down slightly. I patted him on the back gently and he looked up with a very slight nod to me before looking back at the satyr that stood in front of us. Silenus was silent. He stroked his goat beard and thought to himself.
"I'll tell you which way he went," he said finally. He pointed over to the left, "he left that way and came the same way you four did." He said. His attention turned to the sky, it was getting dark. The sun was starting to go down. "I'll let you stay here for the night, but you'll leave tomorrow morning when you've all gotten your rest."
The four of us looked gratefully up at the old satyr.
"Thank you sir!" Roxy said with a smile.
"I'm sorry again about what I said about Dionysus," I said.
"Don't worry about it, boy. He was always a bit lazy and irresponsible," replied Silenus. Finn and Luke smiled up at the satyr. Silenus started to walk away from us, leaving us in our spot to return to his tree.

Finn Roxy and I all woke to the sound of Luke yell and thrash around. This was a surprise to me, I half expected to be cuddled by him again. I looked around frantically with sleepy eyes grabbing around for my violin instinctively. I heard a familiar sound, the sound of reed pipes being played. For a split second I thought I was back at camp and Casper was there playing a prank on me, but as my eyes started to get used to being open and my vision came back I saw Silenus sitting on a stump blowing in them. Vines were dancing around us, one was wrapped around Lukes waist and he was grabbing at it to get it off. One had my ankles, and I hadn't realized until I had looked down. Finn and Roxy were both struggling with vines that were tied around their wrists.
"What are you doing?" I asked, freaking out.
"Wake up call," Silenus said simply. He stopped blowing his reed pipes and the vines slowly descended back into the ground. "You kids are almost as lazy as Dionysus. It's past noon. I told you to leave in the morning." The four of us were panting, trying to slow our adrenalin.
"You couldn't have come with fresh pancakes and orange juice?" Asked Luke sounding breathless.
"What do you think I am, kid? Your babysitter?" Silenus asked. Finn got up and brushed herself off. Roxy knelt on her knees massaging her wrists.
"Bit of a tight grip, don't you think?" She asked under her breath. Silenus heard and grinned at her.
"Sorry about that, girly. You four sleep like the dead when you're tired, I thought scaring you might get you up quicker." I gave a huff and rolled over to grab a shirt. I grabbed my red baseball shirt and slipped it on. I scratched the back of my neck as I yawned. After we were all fully dressed Luke and I collected all of our stuff and packed up while the girls took down the tent. We had a pretty good system if I do say so myself. I stood up with my backpack over one shoulder and my violin case over another. Luke ran his fingers through his hair.
"You okay, man?" I asked.
"Yeah, just tired," he said.
"Same here," I replied. I hadn't gotten a lot of sleep last night. Last night was the only night that I had been home-sick on this trip. I kept thinking of Casper back at camp. I knew he'd be worried about me. He was always worried about me. I missed the blonde, green eyed, freckle-faced satyr. This was the longest time I'd been away from him in a really long time and it felt weird and unnatural to me. There was nothing I wanted more right then than to be sitting in the forest with him on our favourite log playing music laughing and joking around as we usually did when I wasn't attending activities, and he wasn't catering to Dionysus. I was enduring Cassy-withdrawal, and it wasn't fun. The sound of Finns voice jogged me from my thoughts and I looked up as she came to stand beside me.
"Alright, what have we got for breakfast? Er- lunch?" She said. We all stripped off our bags and unzipped them to reveal what food we had.
"I bought some Peanut butter at the flea market." I said, holding up a large jar of Jiff peanut butter.
"I bought bread." Finn said, bringing out a large loaf. She continued to dig through her bag and pulled out some tasty looking fruits like raspberry's, strawberry's and oranges.
"Looks good to me," Roxy said. We sat in a circle on the ground and began to dig in. We realized that we hadn't bought any forks or spoons, so we decided to problem solve and we used our knives and swords.
"Augh, ew, my sword is going to be sticky now," complained Luke as he tried to wipe off the peanut butter onto the grass.
"Suck it up, princess, you can wash it in the water when we're done," replied Finn through a mouthful of her peanut butter sandwich. I started spreading the peanut butter onto my piece of bread and we all sat in silence as we ate. I hadn't realized how hungry I'd been, I hadn't had anything to eat pretty much the whole day yesterday, which was a pretty big thing because I ate a lot. When we were done we packed up the food and went to the water to wash off our weapons. I was using the bottom of my shirt to clean the wet knife when Silenus came up behind us with his arms crossed.
"Well, heroes," he said in his old gruff voice, "I wish you the best of luck on the rest of your journey. Be safe... Well, as safe as you can be. When you get back tell Dionysus I said hi."
"Thank you again, Silenus." Roxy said sweetly. He smiled at her, accepting her gratitude.
"You can come back if you're ever in the area. I want you to find out how to get the Nysiads back to normal," he replied.
"We'll send you an Iris Message when we know how," Luke promised.
"I look forward to it, boy," Silenus said with a nod in Luke's direction.
"Sorry for the scare, kiddies," he said, although he didn't sound very sincere. None of us minded.
"Ah, you were probably right," Finn said. "I could have slept all day if you hadn't woken us up." She was playing with her knife, twirling it in her fingers like a drummer with a drum stick. I watched it for a while before breaking myself from the trance of Finn's pure awesomeness and looked up at Silenus again.
"We'll see you around." I said.
"Indeed you will."
The four of us got up from the spot we were sitting and sheathed our knifes and swords. Silenus watched us leave as we walked in the direction Charlie had taken. We entered into a pathway lined by beautifully healthy trees. As we got farther out towards the outside world the tree's began to look less healthy, as we moved on the tree's began to look more, sad, I guess you could say. They were wilted and dropping, and their green leaves were already falling off their branches, even though it was the middle of summer. Casper would have been upset to have seen the slow transformation. He was always into the planet, he revolved around the planet. It's a satyr thing I know, but when he talked about the earth or the environment with all of the passion in his forest green eyes I couldn't help but find him adorable. I remembered once we were eating a pizza on the street in New York City, and I had gotten up and forgotten to take the box. He gave me the complete lecture on why you should recycle and how you should recycle, and I let him go on about it, even though I knew everything he was saying, just to hear him talk about it. My heart started to plummet a bit thinking about him. Fletch, stop thinking about him. You'll be back soon, you'll be able to see him then. But you're only going to make yourself more depressed. I shook the thoughts from my head. We walked across a street and ended up in a used car lot. Not a nice looking one either, one of those stereotypically grungy looking ones, you know, like the one Sam got Bumblebee at in Transformers.
"So what now?" I asked looking at Finn, Roxy and Luke.
"I'm thinking we steal a car..." Said Finn, a grin plastered on her face and her hands on her hips.

I was surprised that Finn actually drove pretty well. The dealer at the used car shop hadn't even noticed that Finn had stolen the car. To be completely honest he probably didn't even care, as all of the cars in his lot were pieces of crap anyway. Luke and I were sitting in the back seat and were both starting to fall asleep on each other, as much as we tried to stay awake. Finn and Roxy looked drowsy too. We all listened to the radio as they played The Rolling Stones.
Roxy was sitting with her feet up on the dashboard holding a map. She would put it against the window every so often to mark a spot for our route.
"Fuck. Your dad was right, guys," Finn said to Roxy and I. "Whoever invented traffic needs to be thrown into Tartarus." Traffic was starting to get slow and we were all exhausted. Every minute that passed seemed like an hour. Luke dug through his bag and pulled out a pack of Root Beer. He sighed and unwillingly handed each of us a can. I would have given it back knowing he loved it so much, but I was thirsty and I hadn't had Root Beer in ages. I popped the cap and began to drink. For a while we were all content sipping on our Root Beer, listening to Classic Rock on the radio and sitting in slow traffic. As we got to the end of the highway we were on traffic started to pick up and it felt like we started to move again. I rolled down the stiff window of our crappy car and let the wind brush my face. It sent my already messy, short hair in different directions.
"Hey," said Luke. I looked around at him. "Thanks for the pinata back there. It helped a lot."
"Man, you destroyed that thing," I said with a grin. "But you're welcome. I'm glad I can help."
"I gotta say," said Finn from the front as she kept her black-hole-eyes on the road ahead of us. "I thought you were insane giving him another lethal weapon like that, but that was pretty smart. Nice thinking, Fletch." I could feel the wide smile that had spread across my face. I wasn't completely sure why, but being complimented by Finn felt really good. I guess it had to do with the way I looked up to her. The tug of the car jogged me from my thoughts, my head bashed into the back of the car seat and I gripped the side of the car with my left hand. Luke was doing the same only with his right. Finn had two hands on the steering wheel and her usually lazy eyes squinted determinedly. Roxy's feet were no longer crossed on the dashboard of the car. Instead her back was arched and her shoulders were shrugged stress-fully. There were honks from a couple other cars as Finn drove through a red light.
"Finn!" Said Luke. "Green means go, red means STOP."
"Oh? I thought it was the other way 'round." Finn replied acting stupid. Finns attention then turned to the amount of gas she had left. "Shit, this thing wasn't fully filled," she muttered. We drove for a while longer until we could park in a gas station. The four of us got out of the car to stretch our legs. Finn started to fill the car up and Roxy stayed with her. Luke and I went to take a walk around the station. We stopped walking so Luke could tie his shoe, when he looked up his eyes got wide and his mouth fell. He looked like he's just seen a sign that said "FREE ROOT BEER, TAKE WHAT YOU WANT"
"Dude, what are you looking at?" I asked. He nodded his head forward and I looked in the direction. In front of Luke was a girl with sandy blonde hair, tan skin and light brown almost honey like eyes. She was smiling at him and waving at him. He slowly stood up. She looked at me and smiled too. I felt like I should find her attractive, but somehow I couldn't. Roxy and Finn came over in our direction to tell us that the car was ready.
"Alright guys, time to- Luke? What are you staring at?" Finn looked at the girl leaning against her car and took a step back, almost falling over herself, which was so unlike Finn.
"Woah." She said in a breathless whisper. Her cheeks were turning red. Luke's were already as red as they could be.
"Finn?" I asked. If Finn could have a boner, I swear in that moment she would have had a hard on. I looked at Roxy, who's hazel eyes were almost as wide as the time she'd seen Finn take her shirt off to jump in the water at Mount Nysa. Her ears were pink and she was rubbing the back of her neck nervously. The three of them didn't say a thing, just stared at the girl, who had finished pumping oil into her red convertible and was making her way over to us. Luke puffed out his chest and stood up straight, Finn and Roxy both seemed to throw flirty smiles towards the girl.
"Hi," she said in a sweet honey like voice. "I'm Lexi"
"Luke," Luke replied in a surprisingly cool fashion.
"I'm Finn," said Finn with a short nod.
"Roxy," Roxy greeted, seeming to bat her eyelashes a bit. The girl smiled, at the three of them. They all looked like they wanted to melt in the ground. The girl looked to me.
"And you are, pretty boy?" She said running her soft fingers underneath my chin. I jerked my head away. Being touched like that by someone I didn't know felt weird and I hated it.
"Fletch," I said through gritted teeth.
"Such a cool name!" Said Lexi in a flirty voice. She grabbed my wrist as she did, and I pulled away again. This chick was making me so uncomfortable, I wanted her to leave. She looked at me, a sort of sad, pouty look girls always gave when they were trying to act disappointed.
"Come on, Fletchy!" She said, "don't be such a party pooper, I'm only playing around!" Something in my mind snapped. Fletchy was what Casper would call me after I'd called him Cassy. No one called me it other than him. Before I could tell her off Luke grabbed her wrist and pulled her around. She exaggerated a twirl as he did and landed close to him putting her hands on his shoulders and letting out a bubbly giggle. For a second he didn't know what to do, and he hesitated before placing his hands on her hips.
"Don't worry about him." He said. Roxy and Finn looked slightly jealous over the girls attention to Luke and I. Why were they acting like this around her? Who was this girl? Finn was the first one out of the two of them to make the first move, naturally. She placed her hands above Lexi's hips and slowly caressed them down her body, looking down at the girls ass with a smirk as she did. She bumped Luke's hands out of the way with hers and turned Lexi around, pulling her close.
"Don't worry about either of them," she said in her smooth Australian voice. Lexi giggled.
"Such a flirt, Finn..." She said. Lexi pulled Finns face close to hers and they both stared at each others eyes for a bit. Finns hand started to slowly move from Lexi's hip to her chest, but Lexi pushed her away teasingly before she could reach them. Finn mouthed 'fuck' under her breath. For a split second it seemed like Lexi was just a hologram, something flashed and Lexi changed shape before she started making her way towards Roxy, who blushed like crazy and almost backed away.
"You're soo pretty," Coo'd Lexi who started playing with Roxy's black hair. Roxy looked down and back up with a smile. It seemed shy as much as she was probably trying to make it look flirty. Now it really seemed like she was a hologram. Lexi's form was starting to change. She flashed a normal girl, then to a weird looking creature with one bronze leg and another donkey leg. I knew she had to be a monster. She was running her hand down Roxy's neck. Roxy's breathing was quick and deep as she did. Luke and Roxy both looked incredibly jealous.
"GUYS!" I yelled finally, "Snap out of it!" To confirm my suspicions, she was a monster, because after I had yelled to my friends there was one more flash and Lexi turned to me to hiss into my face, long fangs grew from her mouth. The demon held Roxy in a tight grip with her hands as she did. I looked around at Finn and Luke for help.

We all piled into the car and Finn drove away. Nobody said a word. Finn kept her eyes on the road, Roxy and I were both looking down at our feet, and Luke was looking around, he had the most confused expression on his face. I felt like I should say something, but I could tell no one wanted to talk about it. I rested my forehead on the head of my violin and played with the top of the bow where the Pegasus hair wasn't touching. The silence was killing me. I couldn't just sit here and ignore what had happened. I was so confused. I closed my eyes, and without realizing it I slipped into unconsciousness. My dream started out with me in complete darkness, I walked around until I hit something that felt like a wall. It was old and made of stone. I held out my hands and squinted my eyes to try and get them used to the dark but no light was showing at all and it was impossible to see anything. There was an eerie silence, and then out of no where came a shrill screech, like one you'd hear from a hawk or an eagle. I fell to the ground and covered my ears, screaming as the screech cut through my brain like a sharp sword. I felt a wave of heat fly by me, and I was suddenly sweating. There was another moment of silence, and I went to reach for my violin but it wasn't on my back. I propped myself up on my knees and tried to slow my breathing. I listened carefully, but the darkness sounded didn't make a sound, everything was quiet. I started to slowly get up but stopped myself when I heard the dreadful sound of large wings beating behind me. With every beat a gust of smoldering hot air would engulf me in it's embrace. I woke up with a scream, as in my dream the feeling of long knives tore down my back in six different places. I panted, sitting up in my seat. I had broken out into cold sweats during my sleep and I looked around frantically. Luke was looking at me with a worried expression on his face. Finn looked at me questioningly through the rear-view mirror and Roxy had turned around in her chair and was looking at me with the urgent look she sometimes gave her patients.
"S-sorry," I stammered relaxing myself in my seat.
"You okay there, Fletch?" Asked Finn.
"Yeah, I... I just had a weird dream, that's all," I said. Roxy slowly turned back around in her seat and Luke relaxed next to me. I rubbed my forehead with my fingers and sighed, still trying to get my breathing under control. My back still felt like it had been slashed open with knives, and I couldn't shake the fear I had while I was sitting in the darkness alone.
"Where are we?" I asked, to break another silence. Roxy held up her map and looked at it, looking out the window at road signs.
"We've just crossed into Utah," she replied.
"Ahhh, Utah," sighed Luke, "where ideas connect," he quoted the state slogan.
"Maybe it'll help us connect all of our questions," I muttered.
"Let's hope," Finn sighed under her breath. Roxy was still looking out the window of the passengers seat. I thought for a minute, it only seemed like five minutes I had been dreaming.
"How long was I asleep?" I asked.
"A good 3 hours," replied Luke.
"Really?" I asked.
"Yeah, we tried to wake you, but you wouldn't wake up... Which reminds me!" He said looking like a light bulb had just gone off in his head. He dug through his bag and pulled out a package of McDonald's food and handed it to me. "We went through the Drive Thru. We figured we'd have to save some of the food we got at the flea market for when we really need it. Like if we got stuck in Alcatraz or something," Luke explained. I opened the package and took out a cheeseburger and unwrapped it. There was a bite taken out of it. I held it up and looked at Luke. He shrugged, "sorry, man, it just looked so good."I grinned.
"S'all good, man." I held up the burger with the bite taken out of it and chomped down on it. It tasted really good, despite being from MacDonald's. We drove onward for a long time, every time Finn got stuck in traffic she would curse like my dad, only she did it under her breath... Sometimes. I stared out the window at all of the people walking along the streets. All of the girls about my age looked the same. The same style clothes, the same hair, the same makeup, the same face structure or body weight.
"So... Does anybody else notice that all of the girls here look the same?" I asked, wondering if I was just having another gay moment like at the gas station.
"No, I'm definitely noticing it," said Luke as he stared out his window at a pack of girls who were all smiling and laughing while holding the same shopping bags. We looked at each other.
"Clones?" I asked.
"Cones," he confirmed.
Then together we said, "clones." With a nod looking forward. Finn snorted in the drivers seat and Roxy had a smile on her face.
"You two are idiots," she said jokingly.
"no, we're chemically inconvenienced," Luke quoted me from the gas station.
"Yes. That's fancy for high," I said with a nod, to remind them what I meant. Again, Finn gave a short laugh.
"I want what you're having then," she said, laying her black eyes on us through the rear view mirror.
"Man, you've got your own stash back at the Hermes cabin," I said. "You don't need any of ours."
"Fair enough," Finn said. Roxy sat in the passenger seat shaking her head as she looked at the map pretending to ignore our conversation about the fake drugs Luke and I were on, but there was still that sweet smile plastered on her face. I finished chewing on the last bit of my cheeseburger and started on my fries, which I shared around with everybody. We kept driving, not knowing where to stop, until we came to a spot on the highway that had an exit at a rocky path. Finn took the exit and drove off of the path onto a hill. There was nothing but grassy fields and a couple mountains in the distance. I guessed we had crossed into the country part of Utah.
"Right," said Finn. "I've been driving all day and I'm tired. Shall we call it a day and just chill?"
"I'm okay with that." I said.
"Where are we gonna sleep?" Asked Roxy.
"We can pull the seats up and put all of our sleeping bags and blankets in the back to make it comfortable and sleep there?" Luke suggested.
"Like a car fort!" I said. Luke looked at me with a beaming face and we jumped up and down in our seats flapping our hands at each other and doing our best girly screams.
"You two get way too excited when the word fort is uttered," Finn said with a grin on her face.
"Aww, I think it's cute." Roxy said reaching over to ruffle my hair with her palm. "Aren't you little brother?" She said in a baby voice.
"Hey... Aren't I older than you?" I asked, squinting my eyes at her. She held up one finger to her mouth, shushing me, and continued to ruffle my hair. Luke looked at me, and at Roxy's hand.
"... Your hair looks soft, man." He said, as if he was holding himself back from touching the sweet, god like locks that make up what I call my hair.
"Go ahead, dude." I said. Luke looked like he's just been blessed with something great, like Tallahassee from ZombieLand when Little Rock had thrown him the twinkie. He ruffled my hair and a goofy smile formed on his face. Roxy stopped to let him have his moment and Finn motioned her to follow her out of the car and help her set up the back.
"It's so fluffy!" He exclaimed. I pretended to do a Beyonce hair flip."What do you use?" Luke asked.
"The blood of my enemies," I replied with a serious dark look on my face. Luke slowly stopped ruffling my hair and jokingly wiped his hand on his shirt.
"...Oh," he said. We started at each other with straight faces and both turned away and opened our doors at the same time. We made our way around the corner to Finn and Roxy.
"Alright, dorks." Finn said with her hands on her hips. "Your car fort."

Soon after Luke had fallen asleep, Roxy and Finn drifted off as well. I stayed awake, looking up at the stars and thinking. Sleep seemed nearly impossible to me. Luke was laying on my lap. I looked down at him with a small grin. The moon had set a light to his face, and for the first time in a long time I'd seen him seemingly completely at peace. I looked over at Roxy and Finn. I guess they hadn't realized but they'd fallen asleep on top of each other. They were slouched in a comfy looking corner of the trunk, Roxy's head was propped up on Finns shoulder, and Finns head was resting on Roxy's. They breathed in unison, looking so happy with where they were at that moment. I noticed that Roxy's hand was resting in Finns lap, unintentional or not, Finn's hand was placed on top of it. I could feel my grin slip into a smile. I sighed. Luke made a small grunt as he turned over in his sleep, not realizing he was still sleeping on my legs. He was now facing me instead of the outside. As he moved I realized my legs had gone to sleep. It felt weird, but I didn't care. I let him stay there. I leaned my head back and closed my eyes. I wrapped the blanket I had tightly around my shoulders as a chilly midnight summers breeze blew through the car. Luke, Finn and Roxy all altered their faces into drowsy confusion as they slept soundly, but started shivering. I reached over to the blankets that were beside me from when I wrecked the fort and separated one, placing it over Luke, who snuggled up to both the blanket and me as I did. Godsdamnit, Luke. You're such a cuddler. I thought to myself. The blanket covered my feet as well as him, so it worked out well. I then took another big blanket and draped it over Finn and Roxy's shoulders. a slight smile formed on Finns face, she moved her head, as if she were trying to nuzzle Roxy. Roxy burrowed her face into Finns neck. The three of them were silent once more, the only sound that could be heard was their breathing. I placed a hand on Luke's shoulder, and closed my eyes again. I started nodding off, but I definitely wasn't sleeping. I was thinking. I thought about the general things that go through my mind, but slowly my mind slipped to the earlier events of the gas station. I thought about what the Empousa had said earlier, about none of us, or at least most of us not having any of our sexualities straight. (No pun intended.) It was true, I didn't and I never really had. I didn't label myself. That's stupid, what's the point? But not labeling myself didn't make me any less confused. Ah well, it wasn't important. I brushed the thoughts from my mind, and tried to calm my ADHD mind down so I could focus on sleeping, but my brain insisted on bringing up every little detail of my day. After much private soul searching and life chats with myself about many different pointless topics I got to sleep. That night I wasn't bombarded with the same nightmare. That would be cliche. I was having my usual dreams about Casper and food. But I was kept slightly awake by the paranoia of having that same dream again. I would wake up ever-so-often to look around at my friends, who were all asleep soundly. Luke continued to cuddle my legs, Roxy and Finn continued to cuddle each other hand in hand. I fell asleep once more, and again it didn't feel like it was a long sleep. I was woken up by the loud and shrill honk of the car horn. Luke almost rolled out of the car he was so scared. I jumped and hit my head on the roof.
"Fucking hell!" I yelled. I heard Finns laugh and Roxy's giggle from the front of the car.
"Wakey wakey, sleeping beauties!" Finn called.
Luke sat up and looked at me with tired green eyes. I rubbed the back of my head and got up, grabbing my shirt and pants as I did. I also grabbed my ducky boxers, which had been laying on the edge of the trunk since the fort had been wrecked. I put on my clothes and wrestled with my red converse, hopping around on one foot. I bumped into Luke who had been bending over to tie his shoes and I knocked him over. I lost my balance and we both fell with a crash on top of each other. Luke propped himself up with his elbows and I had caught myself, I was kneeling over him on my hands and knees.
"Have a good sleep, Morning Wood?" I asked with a cheeky grin, as if I'd meant to do that and it wasn't on accident. Luke made a 'psht' noise and pushed me off of him. I rolled onto the soft green grass and laughed. Luke started to walk away,
"You're such a good cuddler, Lukey!" I called after him. He turned.
"Again?" He asked. I nodded with a smirk.
"Godsdamnit." he said.
"Hey, you're the one that fell asleep in my lap." I joked.
"You're the one who tempted me with your seductive leg touching!" He said.
"Ah, well, I guess my calves are pretty fantastic," I said.
"Excuse you?" Luke said, raising one eyebrow. He stuck out his leg and acted like one of the girls on game shows when they show the prize you could win. "I have the greatest calves you'll ever see." I pretended to look hypnotized and crawled over to his leg, and kissed his feet.
"You are a god," I said. Luke fanned himself with his hand to try and make his hair blow in the wind.
"I know, I know," he said.
"Alright, you two," Finn said from the back of the car. Her and Roxy were sitting beside each other, both grinning ear to ear. "Enough with the sexual tension, get in, we need to keep moving." Luke helped me up from the ground and we both walked to the back seats. We crawled in and buckled ourselves in for another long day of driving, assuming no monster would get in our way this time. It was smooth driving throughout the morning. We had stopped at a doughnut shop and gotten some coffee, water, doughnuts and in my case tea. Yes, I drink tea. I had lived with old people my whole life, how could I not drink tea? We drove for a couple hours, until it was about lunch time. Finn decided she needed to stretch her legs, so we pulled over in the parking lot of a variety store filled with junk food and pop. We all got out of the car and stretched.
"Should we make another call to Chiron?" I asked, suddenly thinking about Camp and how everything was going back there. Luke looked reluctant. He may have still been feeling kind of guilty about the last time we called.
"That would probably be a good idea," he said carefully. Finn and Roxy nodded.
"Alright then," said Finn. "Fletch, you go and buy some water from the store." She threw a couple dollar bills at me which I fumbled. Money was hard to catch, even if you were a son of Apollo.
"Luke, you still have that spray bottle?" She asked him. He took his bag off from his shoulder and dug threw it, pulling out a beat up looking spray bottle.
"That'll do." Finn said taking it from him. I rushed into the variety store. I walked in, it was quiet and it was only me and the store owner, a big guy who had a bag of chips next to him and was reading a magazine, I didn't know what magazine it was because the cover was face down on the counter. I walked down an aisle towards the water bottle, whistling a happy tune and adjusting my violin over my shoulder. I stopped mid whistle as I heard something giggle like a child on helium and the pitter patter of feet behind me, I turned to see a small blur run to the aisle beside me. I froze in my spot. I had seen way too many horror movies to know what came next. I'd be jumped by a doll that had come to life and was out to kill everyone so he could have a body. I listened again for Chucky and looked over at the store owner. He was too fixed into his magazine to notice anything. What is that? Playboy? I asked myself sarcastically. After waiting a while and not hearing anything I started to carefully move closer to the freezer that held the water bottles. As I got close to a stand full of chip bags, I saw the little gnome like face of the creature I was dealing with. It let out another squeaky laugh and looked at me. It put it's hands on the stand. I saw what it was going to do.
"No," I said. "Please." The gnome thing grinned and pushed over the stand. I jumped out of the way, back into the isle and the stand crashed to the ground. chip bags flew everywhere, some exploded open with the impact of the stand on them and some of them were crushed, never to be eaten again.
"HEY." Thundered a voice from the counter.
"Shit shit shit shit." I muttered. Things like this were always happening to me. I was going to get blamed for this, and I was going to get in shit for it. What was I gonna say? The gnome did it? I heard the footsteps of the owner coming towards me, and I decided to run, I tried to get up but slid on some chips before I did. I finally got up and dashed into the next isle, only to be met by the same fucking gnome person. I scowled at it.
"I'll destroy you, you fucking elf." I threatened under my breath, which probably wasn't the best idea because it danced around and laughed loudly.
"SHHH!" I told it, holding my finger up to my mouth desperately. I heard the door ring as my friends entered the store, they probably heard the crash. They looked around wildly until they saw me. They waited until the owner had his back turned and they dived beside me.
"Fletch, what's wrong?" Roxy asked. I pointed to the elf, who looked delighted to have more Demigods to torment. Finn glared at the elf.
"Kobalos," she spoke through her teeth.
"What?" Asked Luke.
"They're companions of Dionysus, always getting demigods in trouble. Always messing up Hermes kids plans when they're trying to steal or do something else." Finn replied. The elf danced around, and I heard the footsteps of the manager getting closer.
"Run," I said. We ducked into the next Isle. Luke, Roxy and I looked at Finn and waited for her plan. Over our heads on the shelf the Kobalos stood and waited to fuck more shit up.

In all honesty, I didn't actually think playing for these little fuckers would have worked, but something had been tugging me inside to get my violin out. Thanks to the big Hawaiian store owner I was able to get my bow free. I played a sweet melody, a calming string of notes. It was a lullaby my grandmother would play for me before bed when I was a young kid. I had seen Casper do this with things like plants and vines with his reed pipes before. When he played things just sprouted to life and danced with him. Everyone was still as I played, no one dare move, in fear they'd break the spell. As I kept playing I seemed to get more control over them. I could feel their energy being sucked out by the music, it felt like they were glued to the ground, like they were tiny garden gnomes sitting outside on a porch. I looked up from the strings of the violin and looked at Finn, who returned my gaze with black pools. Kobalai attacking Roxy had let go of her hair, and were sitting on the ground beside her staring at me. The one taunting Luke with his wrist band had let go of it and was standing with a blank expression. Finn still held the one that had gone down her shirt in her hands, but it had stopped biting her. I nodded at her, as if to say 'You can move. Quickly, before they get bored.' Finn dove after a couple other of the elf like trouble makers, Roxy and Luke decided to pick up as many as they could. My Hawaiian brother helped us. I figured through the mist they probably looked like big rats or something. I continued to play, and the Kobalai only fought slightly when they were first touched, but melted back into the clutch of my music. There were rat cages in the back, the store owner nodded towards them and Finn, Luke, Roxy and himself took the gnomes to the cages and locked them up. I followed them, playing the same sweet melody as they had before. When all of the Kobalai were safely locked up in cages I ended the song with a soft note and took a large breath, letting my arms fall beside me.
"Another job well done, Fletch. You're a beast with that violin." Finn remarked. The Kobalai seemed to be realizing they were in a cage, because they were starting to let out unhappy noises and were banging on the cage doors. I felt myself blush at her comment. Why I was blushing? I don't know. I felt a large hand clap my shoulder. I turned to the store owner behind me, who had a wide smile on his face.
"Brah, that was awesome!" He said, making the shaka hand sign, which I returned with a grin.
"Hey, thanks man. I wouldn't have been able to do it if you hadn't shaken that thing from my bow." I said with a smile up at him.
"Hey, just glad I could help another dude from the homeland, Brother." He said with a grin on his face.
"Mahalo, bro," I thanked again. The guy nodded. I looked at Luke and Roxy. Roxy looked amazed.
"You have no idea how glad I am you know how to play that thing, Fletch," she said with a smile.
"I didn't know you could do that!" Luke said.
"Hey, now you know how I felt when I first saw your... Special... Talent," I said, remembering that my new Hawaiian friend was a mortal. Luke seemed to understand, because he laughed.
"So, you four," our store owner said. "I'm willing to let you off the hook if you guys help me clean up this mess. I'll even throw in a few candy bars if you want." I looked at the other three, who were nodding in agreement. I then realized that I didn't know the store owners name, I looked at his tag that he wore on his shirt. The tag read "Hello, my name is Tito."
"Yeah, Tito, we'll totally help," I replied.
"Sweet, little brah." He replied. It took us a little while to clean up the store after the mess the Kobalai had made. I had talked to Tito a lot, he was telling me about how long he'd lived in Hawaii, and he was asking about my experiences there. I had gone there with my grandparents many years in a row before, and seeing as my grandparents liked the traditional Hawaiian ways, I was pretty much raised on the whole Hawaiian lifestyle. The dude even had a Ukulele in his shop, which I played for a while for background music. After we had finished, Tito payed us in candy bars and any soda pop of our choice and we said our goodbyes. It was nearly 5:00 when we finally got back into the car and on the road and we drove for a while longer. I guess Utah wasn't such a bad place after all. I snacked on a bounce chocolate bar. Again, I was basically raised on all things stereo-typically Hawaiian. I was made to love coconut.
"Man, I didn't know you were THAT Hawaiian," Luke said.
"Man, if you ever meet my grandparents you'll know why." I said with a small laugh.
"I've seen you eating Hawaiian dishes for dinner," he replied. "But I didn't know you could speak it."
"Back home we spoke it like a second language." I replied as I remembered my time with my grandparents. Luke thought for a minute.
"Why do you guys call each other bra's?" He asked, meaning the things chicks wore over their tits. I laughed.
"No, not bra's, we say brah, like with an 'h' on the end, it's like saying 'dude'" I replied. I could see Finns smirk through the rear-view mirror, and Roxy's small smile.
"Ohh..." Luke said, nodding slowly. "That makes a lot more sense." He sipped his root beer.
"What was that song you played, Fletch?" Asked Roxy. "It was pretty."
"Just something my grandmother used to play me on her violin when I was a kid." I replied. Roxy smiled, as if she was picturing a little Fletch being tucked in by his grandmother as she played soft lullaby's to him to help him get to sleep. Good. She should have been. I was an adorable kid.
"Well, guys, we're almost out of Utah," Finn said, almost relieved.
"Great," Luke said. "How much farther?"
"We just need to pass through Nevada," replied Roxy, bringing out her map.
"Seems like we've been on this quest forever," I said, mostly to myself, but the others heard.
"Yeah, it does," agreed Finn.
"Hey, what were we gonna do back at the store?" I asked. I remembered suggesting something to the three of them and going into the shop for something important. Everyone was quiet as they thought for a moment.
"Oh yeah, that's right, we were gonna make a call to Chiron," Roxy remembered.
"Right!" I said.
"Are we still going to?" Asked Luke, he seemed slightly nervous, but I could barely tell.
"We got any water?" I asked, remembering that water is what Finn had asked me to get before. Finn coughed from the front and lifted a bag from the front seat. It was filled with water bottles from the store.
"Wait. Did you pay for those?" I asked. The guilty expression on Finns face was enough of an answer for me, she shrugged innocently as she drove. I sighed and shook my head.
"FIINNN," Luke said. "THAT'S NOT GOOOD."
"Man, he was cool." I said.
"Yeah, only because you guys touched each other on a "brah" like level." Finn said, trying to imitate a Hawaiian accent, but not doing very good at it, as her thick Australian accent didn't help the cause. I smirked and rolled my eyes.
"Let's find a place to stop and call Chiron," Roxy said.
"Maybe after we get out of Utah," Finn replied. Roxy nodded and we drove for a couple hours. We skipped dinner, which was like torture for me, and we drove for a good half of the night, ignoring how tired we were. Finally we crossed over to Nevada and Finn found an empty car park we could use to call Chiron. We positioned ourselves under a street light so that maybe we could get a rainbow, but it wouldn't work. The light wasn't bright enough.
"Let's try again in the morning," Finn decided.
"In the mean time," Luke said looking at me with a cheeky smile. "Who wants another car fort?" I almost jumped so high in the air, Lukes dad zeus would have mistaken me for a bird. Luke and I had another one of those girly moments and we helped the girls with the fort this time. Again, my underwear was a popular material, not that I cared. We all crawled into the back and snacked on some more of the junk food Luke had left over in his backpack.

I could only think of one thing to do, the thought seemed natural to me, the only thing I could think of. When I had first been claimed by my dad at camp, I had asked Casper about Apollo. Something he had said stuck to me. He'd said that Apollo children could sing to heal wounds in desperate situations. Roxy's desperate gaze broke my heart. I knew she would be too shy to sing on her own, I needed to help my little sister. I moved and grabbed my violin, unclipped the hinges and took it out carefully, making sure that the horse hair in the bow was clean and ready to use. Gonna need to tune that up, later, I thought, although it was still perfectly usable. Roxy and Luke looked at me with confused expressions while fin lay on the floor, wheezing with a pained expression on her face.
"Roxy, you need to sing. You can heal her with your voice." I said. Roxy's expression turned from a worried desperate look, to a nervous, scared, distressed look.
"But-" She started to argue, but I cut her off. I kneeled down beside her and held my violin up to my chin, resting it on my shoulder.
"Roxy, I'll play for you, but you need to save her with your voice. You're an Apollo kid. Music is in your blood." Roxy looked at me, and I knew she understood it was the only possible way at that moment.
"What songs do you know?" Asked Roxy.
"...Only love songs," I replied.
"What a lie!" She exclaimed.
"Just sing what I play." I urged. She glared at me, her Hazel eyes could be as deadly as they could be sweet and caring. I started playing a song from my favourite song writer/violinist, Alexander Rybak. Roxy looked like she knew the song. She looked up at me.
"Really? Fletch!" She yelled.
"Sing, Roxy!" I plucked the strings and nodded encouragingly. She mumbled the first line, obviously shy. I felt bad about doing this to her, but even I, Fletch Kealoha, the guy who could barely pick up on anything could see that they had something.
"Roxy, she's dying," I pleaded. Roxy looked at Finn, and a look of determination formed on her face.
"I've got a thousand girls just waiting, and therefore it's a shame," she sang louder. I knew it had to be stronger to heal Finn. But I guess Roxy knew too, because at the next lyric, her voice was strong and not at all as shaky as it was. She kept her eyes on Finn, stroking her dirty blonde hair with her hand. "That my heart has been captured by your funny little smile," she sang. I'd never heard anything like her voice before. It was so sweet and pure. I played on, knowing that if she kept it up, she'd be able to heal Finn.
"And finally, I'm happy, if only for a while. People call me stupid, for treating you like a queen. But I don't even worry, because you're my unforeseen." Finns eyes moved, and her head jerked slightly. I knew she heard the music, I knew she was trying to respond to it. With Finn fighting, Roxy singing and me playing, I thought that it would work in no time. Roxy continued to sing in her sweet voice.
"And I hope that you'll be with me, if only in my dreams.
But here you are next to me, and you're glad or so it seems." The chorus came, and I played harder than I had in a really long time.
"And I don't know for sure where this is going, still I hope for more, and more. 'Cause who would know that you would treat me like a boy, and I'd treat you like a girl, in this funny little world." Finns hand moved slightly, and I could tell she was trying to get to Roxy's. Roxy noticed too, and she sang louder. As she took a pause I stopped plucking the strings and used my bow, as Alexander Rybak did in the song.
"Don't promise me forever, just love me day by day." Roxy sang. Finn finally had enough strength to move her hand to Roxy's. Roxy grabbed it and held it tightly. Tears of relief were welling up in her beautiful eyes, but as she sang she didn't so much as crack or lose a beat as she cried.
"no one knows the future, but we're young and that's okay. 'Cause you'll always be a part of me, whatever life will bring.
And people have to bear with you this silly song I sing." Finns eyes were begining to flutter open and closed, her wounds were closing up slowly, but all bleeding had stopped, and it looked like the rabies was beginning to escape her body.
"your boyfriends might be angry, my girlfriends might be blue.
But no one can deny it, from now on, I love you." Finn cracked a smile and opened her lazy eyes a bit to try and look at Roxy, who smiled back, tears of happiness rolled down her red, embarrassed cheeks. I continued playing, with more passion than I'd ever put into anything before in my life.
"And I have to say it's new to me, this feeling in my heart. Guess I've been kind of lonely, and you've been kind of smart." Again, she sang the chorus so sweetly. Finns breathing turned back to normal, and her wounds were becoming scars. She put her other hand over Roxy's hand and lay there, here black eyes opening more. After the chorus, was the violin solo. I played sweetly and softly. Finn and Roxy never took their eyes off each others for a second. I wasn't sure what Luke had been doing this whole time, but I didn't look, because I didn't want to break the concentration. Again, Roxy sung the chorus after her cue.
"And who could know that you would treat me like a boy, and I'd treat you like a girl, in this Funny little world...
This funny little world." She dragged out the last word softly, until it was noting but a whisper, I held the note for just as long. Finn and Roxy stared at each other. Finns scars had healed, and she let go of Roxy's hand to wipe wet tears from her eyes with her thumb. I lowered my violin, letting a soft breath slowly exhale from my chest, making it barely audible. I looked around at Luke, who was sitting there, open mouthed.