Hi! Last week I put a tumblr update that I couldn't put a chapter up because I was gone to girl guide camp nearly straight after school. And I'm glad I didn't because I came to the conclusion that I was tired of making you guys wait for chapters as long as I was. So instead of scrambling to review and make the story believable and realistic after the horrid first draft, I decided to end the story sooner than expected. There was going to be a plot line about Reyna jumping in on a quest and the pirates escaping from jail and going after her- but I decided that I wanted to end this story well instead of ending it with more plot and less happy readers. Makes sense?

Speaking of readers, thank you so much for sticking with this story that wasn't easy to stick with at times, I assume. I love you all, your input was amazing and helpful and your reviews made my day that much brighter. Rock on, guys.

Disclaimer: I don't own the characters shown below.

25

Jason Grace

And in reality, I don't think it's a real documentary. It's more a story of her life. It's a story of survival. It's a story of the time in which she lived. The story of success and failure.
-Maximilian Schell

"Well this is great," Bobby said. "Super. Love this. We're like boy scouts. Go wilderness. I suggest a sing-along."

"Shut up Bobby, we're not lost." Dakota told him.

"I know that we figured out how to read that freaky talking map ages ago- I'm just saying I hate this."

"This is a forest- a very tame forest at that. You're supposed to be able to handle this. What kind of legionnaire are you?" I asked.

"The kind that hasn't been raised in a cave," he told me.

"Watch it with the Jungle Book jokes." I told him. It was Bobby's all-time favorite thing to tease me with. Calling me Mowgli, telling me to watch out for tigers… Lame, but so were most of Bobby's jokes. Well, make that all of Bobby's jokes.

I slashed a plant out of my way with my sword- the new, fancy gold toy Jupiter had delivered at the foot of my bed the morning I'd left for the quest. I was hoping for some fatherly advice when I'd prayed to Jupiter for help, but I'd learned to take what you can get in life. Especially from a god. Particularly if that god is my father.

We'd been walking for three days in the forest, and so far there was no sign of Salem where our next stop was. Supposedly if we talked to Trivia, she'd be able to help us out. Which made sense since we were looking for a highly dangerous magical creature and she was the magic goddess… Besides, I trusted the praetors.

It was supposedly an eight day trek unless we got a ride- since the dragon had destroyed the gliders Dakota and Bobby had used to keep up with me in the air. Ground was more dangerous to move around since there were more monsters there, but the other two couldn't fly and I wasn't strong enough to carry them. Not yet, anyways. I had hopes.

"Stop moving," I called out suddenly.

"What is it, Jason?" Bobby asked.

"I heard something." I said. I'd gotten good at distinguishing the sounds of a forest from the sounds of an intruder in the forest thanks to Lupa.

My friends didn't move and I heard it again. Very muffled; barely audible, but it was definitely there. Something that hid its steps well… My first thought was a monster because hikers wouldn't try to hide.

"There's someone else out here." I breathed out. It was human.

"Gladus," Dakota said. We raised our swords and stood back to back with each other. Then for a while I didn't hear a single sound. I was jittery and we'd just ran into a god not long ago. A non-friendly minor god, that is. I was just nervous about keeping Bobby and Dakota safe and hearing things.

All of a sudden I saw two sets of ruby red eyes in the bush. I moved quickly to avoid the dogs, but they jumped on Dakota who was taken down as if they were specially trained K9 unit dogs.

I sprang back up, sword raised and a girl jumped out from the trees, and landed in front of me. She grabbed Bobby from behind, an arm around his neck and brought her knee up to his tail bone. He yelled, and she used some kind of pressure point to have him on the ground whining and crippled.

Then she charged me.

I met her blade with mine, but she was scarily fast. Within two seconds I was terrified of her, whatever she was. If she was a her- it was hard to tell in the magic world.

She set up your sword to be where she wanted it to be, and knocked it out from there. If I'd trained for a day less in my life she'd have gotten me. I fought one on one for what seemed like hours, battling her like I'd never battled a half-blood before; not in training, not when the praetors rained down their worst to test the kid who'd been raised with Lupa for eight years, not ever. Her dark eyes were screaming at me to drop dead and run in the opposite direction.

"Whoa- who are you- we're not enemies of half-bloods, stop!" I said.

She fought quickly and suddenly, with strong blows. Her style was odd- stuck between legion fighting and something freestyle, unruly and more single as if she'd never fought in a cohort. Something that looked like she'd created. Where did demigods learn to fight outside of the legion?

I twisted my gladus and my hand closed over the spear it turned into. That magic trick was the only thing that got me out of that fight.

I turned it around and stabbed her in the side with the wooden tip, blue static crackling at the other end giving her a shock, to back her off. She stayed where she was, but I was pretty sure that was because she didn't think we'd go for her.

"Who are you?" I asked again.

"Reyna Sabourin," she said, not even panting. "Daughter of Bellona and Scourge of the seven seas."

"Scourge of the seven what?" Bobby asked. "Isn't that Captain Hook?"

"Blackbeard," Reyna said. "And it was."

"Was?" I asked her. I was confused. Blackbeard was dead. Were we too far out to send this girl to Lupa to sort her out? Because she was obviously very confused, but obviously also a demigod. Or maybe we could just point her to the right direction because although she was pretty, she scared the Styx out of me.

She turned to look at me, and her eyes were so strict and stable, harsh and calm, I knew she was mentally fine.

"Not everyone stays the way they are forever," she said calmly.

And looking at her; with her filthy clothes like she'd been on the run forever, the scars and dried blood on her face and hands, the harsh light in her eye that said 'I will survive even if you won't'… I believed she was the scourge of something.

I just didn't think it'd be the scourge, and then later the love, of my life.

The End

12:09, 18/12/2011

5:20, 22/2/2013

Forever scripting,

HecateA