A Game of Capture the Flag

Sup? It's Annabeth here and it's 12:04 AM in the morning. It's still dark outside. Now I bet you're wondering what I'm doing up this late? I'm strategizing, that's what I'm doing. What? Perhaps the sun hasn't risen yet but the game starts at 5PM and we need to be ready. We need to win. Every member of Athena is awake except for our two youngest campers (ages seven and eight). The lights are off and it appears that we're asleep (there's even dummies in bed) but we're in our secret planning room. What's that? You thought only the Hephaestus Cabin has secret rooms? Wrong. We have three planning rooms and currently we're in the most secure one, Level Minus Three.

The Athena Cabin is always in charge of strategizing for our team (we're on the Red Team this time), and as Head Counselor of Athena, I'm pretty much the Captain of our entire team. It's Athena, Ares, Apollo, and Demeter vs. Poseidon, Zeus (IKR? Apparently Thalia's back), Hades, Dionysus, Hephaestus, Hermes, and Aphrodite. The minor gods and goddesses are split between us but there are only four or five campers that need to be divided.

Now I don't know whose genius's idea it was to make Percy captain of the Blue Team but we have to win.

"Okay so let's review weaknesses." I said, capturing the attention of my cabin, "Thalia's scared of heights so Division A should trap her somewhere where she needs to climb trees. Nico can't shadow travel if there aren't any shadows, so Division B will need to create a greatly lighted area. Preferably in Clearing 1-3, got it? Make sure Division C keeps Dionysus's campers away from the grape and strawberries fields because that's where they're the strongest. Make sure Division C is mostly Demeter campers, preferably led by Katie. Perhaps lead them towards the water? They're not very good swimmers." Each Division I created had three to six campers, depending on the job they needed to execute.

"Unlike a certain green-eyed boy." Malcolm said. I heard snickers from my cabin-mates and glared as my cheeks reddened slightly.

"Well…carrying on" I said, "Division D and E will need to work together to disable all Hephaestus traps and inventions. Their inventions are quite clever and pretty complex, but their campers are pretty bad fighters when exposed to hand-to-hand combat. Beckendorf was an exception to that rule." We took a moment to remember our deceased camper.

"Most of the Blue Team's force is made up by the Hermes's Cabin. While the Stolls and a few other older campers have some clever pranked traps, most of them are sword fighters. Division F, G, and H will need to take out the Hermes Cabin."

"Could we re-direct Divisions D through H to trap Hermes and Hephaestus together?" Malcolm asked.

I shook my head, "That's too risky…the Stolls plus explosives? Not a good combination." Malcolm nodded.

"Division I and J will guard the flag, which will be held in a currently undisclosed position. Any questions?"

"What about the Aphrodite cabin?" Chloe asked. She was a new camper and had only arrived a week ago. She was fifteen (way to go Athena, just break the pact that Percy forced the gods to comply to), but she was mad smart. I liked her. We started laughing, "What?"

"The Aphrodite Cabin doesn't really do anything." Malcolm smirked, "They just stand around and complain."

"But I heard them talking." Chloe said, her eyes widening, "And I'm pretty sure they're planning something. They said something about their head camper wanting to impress some Fish Kid." Why did everyone look at me?

"Who's their head camper?" George asked.

"Isn't it Drew?" Malcolm said.

"Yeah it is." I said, frowning slightly, "Chloe, what exactly did you hear?"

"Well apparently she wants to talk you into going somewhere and then ask you to tell us to change our plans." Chloe said slowly, "But that makes no sense, I mean, how could she just ask you to change your plans?"

"Charm-speak." I said. Chloe looked confused, "Some Aphrodite campers have the gift of speech. You do whatever they tell you to, Drew has it."

"What are we going to do?" Malcolm asked, "And who's going to take out Percy?"

"Chloe, did Drew mention me specifically?" I asked.

She nodded, "Yeah, apparently you're one of the few people who can resist her charm-speaking ability and she's not going to use it on anyone else."

I frowned, "Okay, we're going to redirect Division C (Chloe you'll be with them) to take out Aphrodite and Division D and E will be in charge of getting rid of both Dionysus and Hephaestus. Got it?"

"But what about Percy?" Malcolm persisted.

"Leave that to me." I said mysteriously.

Fifteen minutes after the meeting we had gone to bed after I dispatched a few messengers to go to our allied cabins to explain the plan. The only negative feedback we got was from Clarisse who wanted to know if it was really necessary to send an entire Division to take out those 'airheaded-ninnies'. I wasn't going to take any chances on our win.

-line break, at this point you should be planning out the review that you're going to be writing, right? ;) -

Around noon, I met Percy at the Mess Hall where he undoubtedly was going to try to get the Red Team's strategy out of me.

"So Annabeth." He said, "What's up? Are you excited for Capture the Flag?"

"Of course I am. I can't wait for the Red Team to claim victory." I smirked.

He rolled his eyes, "Do you honestly think you can beat us? We have three Big Three children."

"So?" I asked back, "You have three campers with heightened powers. Big deal. Your powers aren't everything, especially when strategy conquers all." I began to chow down into my hamburger.

"Aw, Annabeth. I hope you realized Athena campers are the only ones who put importance into strategizing. Everyone else goes by their instincts." Percy said, relaxing back into his chair.

"We'll see about that. Strategizing is instinctive to Athena campers. I mean, sure it'd be cool to make a mini-hurricane on will like you, but if there's no way to control its actions or path, then there's no point in having that power." I said triumphantly.

"Whatever floats your boat." Percy said.

"Hey there!" Drew sauntered over, "Sup my captain?" she asked sweetly. Grr.

"Oh, hey Drew." Percy said smiling, "Ready for Capture the flag?"

"Haha! You know it!" she cheered. Then she noticed me, "Hanging with the enemy's captain? Ooo Percy, you're so brave." She sat down next to him. I mentally remembered never to sit in that chair again. She probably contaminated it with her stupid-germs. Or that awful smelling perfume she was wearing.

"It's just Annabeth." Percy said evenly, "She doesn't scare me." I gave him the dirtiest look I could muster. Ha! I distinctly remembered him cowering in fear during my last time of month because I was in a bad mood that day and the camp store had run out of chocolate. Damn Stolls.

"Whatever." I said, getting up, "I'll see you later, Percy. Prepare to lose." And then I walked away. I passed the Athena table and muttered in Malcolm's ear, "Make sure all Athenians are in the cabin by 3:30." He nodded and I went off to practice my dagger throwing, imagining that the dummy was Drew.

Whomp! How dare that little Thump! airheaded slut Fomp! talk to my Smack! Percy Pop! like she freaking Rip! owned him! Then I paused. My Percy? When did I ever refer to him as mine? My? As in, possessive pronoun?

Pull yourself together! I instructed myself, you have a game of Capture the flag to win!

I looked at my watch, 3:20. I went back to my cabin and went to planning room Level Minus One and waited for my cabin mates to arrive.

Once they had assembled and everyone settled down I said, "Reports? What have you heard?"

"Percy's going to be the only one guarding the flag. They're hiding it in Water Nymph's Creek." Malcolm piped up. Water Nymph's Creek was a tiny stream hidden deep within the forest and a very pretty but grumpy nymph lived there. However it was common knowledge that she had a soft spot for children of Poseidon, especially Percy.

My eyes widened, "Seriously? How do you know?"

"Katie…erm…may have seduced it out of Travis?" Chloe smirked. Nice, I was going to have to remember to thank her.

Then a brilliant idea came to me, "If Percy's going to be the only one there then…Chloe you're being reassigned."

"Huh?" she asked, looking slightly confused.

"You can wear my cap of invisibility. I'll distract Percy and you grab the flag. All other divisions stick to their jobs, got it?"

My fellow Athenians nodded. I looked at my watch again, 4PM. One hour till the games began. This was going to be fun.

So this is going to be a Two-Shot because the Capture the Flag games were never explicitly covered in the books and when there's a game of CtF on a fanfic story, it's usually really brief because writing all the details of it can interfere with a story, therefore this story is dedicated to anyone who wanted Percabeth+Capture the Flag fic. Review! :)