Hello Peoples! And right before I deal with all the death threats for not updating sooner, reason? No inspiration and this is a major exam year in school so my parents seriously cut time on the laptop.

And this probably wasn't going to come back at all if it wasn't for both 'House of Hades' and *drum roll please* The amazingly awesome TheSkySpiritsTalentShow! :D She's the one who wrote the majority of the chapter and gave me the kick up the backside I seriously needed XD

So once again, YOU ARE AWESOME AT! and thank you SOO MUCH!

P.S. No idea when I'll be able to write another chapter but I'll try to make it soon.

~Donakiko

The tiny gods stumbled over the dead leaves of the forest ground, following the sound of giggling.

"It getin lowda." Apollo said. He looked questioningly at the others.

"We´re close." His twin sister confirmed, earning a tongue pointed in her direction from her brother for pointing out something as if he didn't already know that. She pouted and grabbed his outstretched tongue between her first finger and thumb, holding it tight against Apollo's struggles.

"Look!" Hermes stopped suddenly and pointed. The other tiny olympian's stopping as well, Artemis releasing her brother's hostage tongue.

"Wat is it, Hemeez?" Athena asked, turning to face him from where she was scanning the forest for the source of the giggles.

"It´s Awes an Aphie!" Hermes announced to the other excited, pointing towards a large pile of rocks that strangely resembled a fist.

The Goddess of love and God of war were sitting on an old fallen tree by the rock pile, a patch of wild flowers surrounding them. Aphrodite was busy making a crown of daisies for Ares from the ones she had gathered while said miniature god of war carved into the tree´s bark with his dagger.

"Aphie! Awes!" Athena ran over to them, the others following her. "We wer lookin for you! Why did yu run a´way?"

The goddess of beauty finished the crown and placed it on Ares´ head with a giggle as she fixed the boy's black hair around it to hold the crown in place. She smiled down at the others. "Look, ´ere is so pwetty! Awes showed me these flowahs."

"Yu shtupid boy, Awes!" Artemis yelled. "It´s danjeros in da woods, yu two could´a been hu't by monstas!"

"There no monstas ´ere!" Ares said. "They ar a´faid of my nife." He held it up to show the huntress just how deadly his dagger was but only earning an eye roll from said huntress.

"Da olda kids awe worried and lookin fo yu!" Athena said, crossing her arms over her chest.

Aphrodite gasped and jumped off the tree. "Lacy said I should go to da daisies…and I found more daisies!" She smiled happily then frowned as she looked down at the flowers, "They not daisies…oh no! I went away from da daisies!"

"Don´ wowy, Aphie." Ares said, setting his hand on the panicking girl's shoulder to help calm her. "We´ll find a way back. Da othas no da way, rite?" He looked to his friends and they all looked away.
"Thena?"

"We kinda got lost lookin fo yu." The grey eyed goddess whispered out, not at all liking to admit that she did something wrong and that leading them out of the forest with confidence was something she couldn't do. The other two gasped as the full weight of the situation finally settled on them.

"Pewcy an Annie-beth awe lookin fo us!" Poseidon tried to comfort them with an unconvincing voice. "We just haf to wait till they find us."

"How much longer are we going to keep going? Some of us need our beauty sleep"

"Oh get over yourself princess, no amount of sleep is going to reverse that disaster you call a face"

"A disaster to the creation of ugly maybe"

"Ugh! I swear on every God and Goddess there is if you don't shut that lipstick covered noise hole-"

Percy wasn't in the slightest proud of the whimpering noise that sounded from his throat as he clamped his hands tighter over his ears. "How long have they been talking…"

"Five hours" Annabeth counted calmly, though her expression told the other demi-gods she was just as stressed as her boyfriend. "Five hours that I would rather spend in the deepest depths of a spider filled Tartarus pit"

The son of Poseidon let out a low whistle at the response of the grey eyed girl, "Okay, not that I can blame you but that might be a bit too much-"

"Percy…I love you, but have you honestly been listening to them? I swear on mom I'm throwing them both off the next cliff we pass"

"….You're hot when you're mad"

Annabeth rolled her eyes, mumbling under her breath as she seriously rethought why she was involved with such a complete and utter seaweed-brain. As soon as a tanned hand slipped into her paler one and their fingers intertwined, she had her answer.

The woods had gone completely dark except for the dull moon glow somewhere above the Olympian's heads. The small immortals found a huge tree that had been hollowed out by burrowing animals, perfect for shelter against rain and beasts. Now they huddled together in their cold cave, sitting on dead leaves and dirt, sleepy and anxious.

"Wat if no one evah finds us an we´ll die out here?" Apollo asked in a small voice, thin arms wrapped around himself in an effort to stay warm as he huddled against his sister.

"Don wowwy Pollo, Pewcy and Annie-beth awe smawt, they will find us." Poseidon comforted the god next to him.

"I´m cold!" Hera piped up. She sat in the middle of the group squeezed between Zeus and Artemis and nuzzled down tighter between them.

"I'm not" Hades blinked around at them all, seeming perfectly at ease with the cold as he felt no body change in temperature at all and unlike the other immortals, wasn't shivering.

"I am too." Apollo agreed with Athena, ignoring Hade's confusion. His sun-like eyes suddenly brightened with an idea, "I know how to make da cold go away."

"How?" Artemis asked. "We have no blankies to keep us wawm."

"No we awe not! We´ll rub owah hands weally fast and then we will have wawm hands!" The sun god started rubbing his palms together, feeling heat flowing through them. "See?"

Interested now, the other gods took out their hands from their pockets and sleeves and followed his example.

"It wowks!" Hera smiled happily as the heat in her palms began to drive away the numbness from her hands.

"Good job, Pollo! Finalee a good ´dea." Artemis praised. The other beamed, about to start bragging when suddenly Hephaestus let out a panicked shriek. He held up his hands. Tiny flames danced across his palms and fingers, rapidly growing bigger. "My hands awe on fiwah!"

Hermes leaned over and tried to blow the flames out, which resulted the fire to grow stronger.

"Stop tat!" Athena pushed him away and took off her newly bought jacket Annabeth had given her and wrapped it around Hephaestus´ hands, trying to smother the flames.

"Doesn't help!" The blacksmith waved his arms around frantically and shoved the jacket off from them, not wanting to damage it anymore.

"Wait, I know!" Poseidon jumped to his feet and ran outside.

The others gathered around Hephaestus, trying to figure out what to do with his hand. "Does it sting?" Hera said, staring frightfully at the fire.

"No, but it´s scawy! I don´t wan my hands to be like dis!" Hephaestus sniffled. Athena put her hand on his shoulder.

"Stop being panicky, we can figuwe something out."

"Shoud we cut his hands off?" Ares suggested, holding up his dagger as he made ready to act upon the suggestion, seeming a little too excited about the idea than he should have been.

"NO!" Everyone else shouted in horror, causing the god of war to pout as he lowered the dagger.

"May-be it will go away if we wait." Aphrodite offered, chewing nervously on her nails then deciding she didn't like the taste of the pink stuff Lacy had put on them earlier.

"But wat if his hands burn off?" Hades returned.

"Oh," the goddess of beauty said quietly. "Dat woud be bad." She whispered, cringing a little at Hephaestus' look of horror as he stared down at his hands.

Just then, Poseidon came running back in through a gap between the trees, his hands behind him as if he were dragging something invisible behind him.

"Po´see!" Athena scolded. "Yu left da shel-" She never got to finish her sentence as a wave of cold water washed over them. Her black hair stuck to her face as she slowly spit out a small stream of water from the corner of her mouth.

The sea god grinned, proud he had solved the problem by remembering what he had done at the fountain in the mall. The water would definitely put out the fire. The water quickly drained away, seeping into the soft dirt, leaving behind very cold, very wet and very angry looking children.

Poseidon´s triumph smile quickly faded when he saw his plan didn´t work. Hephaestus' hands were still burning, plus now he had to deal with some angry, wet gods, demanding why he drenched them in cold water. "I tied to help Heph with his hands!" He defended himself.

"But it didn´t wowk!" Athena yelled. She was tired, cold and very frustrated with the current situation. She just wanted to be in her warm, soft bed and not in this scary dark forest.

Poseidon lowered his head, knowing he had done more harm than good. "I´m sowwy."

Athena sighed, seeing from his expression he hadn't meant any harm. "It´s okay."

They all sat down again to regain the warmth lost by the cold wave, Hephaestus sat in the middle and warmed shivering gods with his flaming hands and soon everyone except Athena, Zeus and Hephaestus had fallen asleep, leaning against each other for support.

The god of fire started playing with the flames, now that the shock had worn off, curiosity kicked in as he drifted flames of fire like water by passing them between his hands.

Athena sat silently, listening for any signs of danger or frantic calls of the older demi gods while Zeus leaned against her, watching Hephaestus with fascination. All of the sudden he sat straight up and looked around, any sign of drowsiness gone.

"Zoos? What´s wong?" Athena asked, the sudden movement of the smallest Olympian waking her up from the state of almost drifting off.

When the lightning god didn´t respond, she grabbed Ares´ dagger from his limp clutch and readied herself for any monsters. Zeus stood up and stumbled over to the entrance of their tree shelter.

"Zoos?"

The small god looked back at Athena and replied in a small voice, "I hea someting."

Athena joined him. "Wat is it?" She stared out into the darkness. Monsters growled and something inhuman screamed in the distance, but nothing seemed close enough for worrying.

"Zoos, thewe is notin-"

"Shhhhh!"

The wisdom goddess rolled her eyes and was just about to tell him he´s imagining things when suddenly she heard it too. Far away voices arguing.

"I´m telling you, there´s a monster out there. I saw glowing eyes!"

"Then let´s hope it jumps out and snatches you for a midnight snack, then everyone can be happy."

"Guys, we have Greek fire and our weapons, I doubt many monsters would attack us now."

"Don´t bother, Percy. They won´t stop fighting until we get back to camp."

"Pewcy! Annie-beth!" Zeus shouted and took off running towards the voices.

"Zoos! Not so fast!" Athena called as she raced after him. Up ahead, they could make out a green glow of Greek fire and a cluster of tall, dark silhouettes.

"Athena!" Annabeth put her jar of fire on the ground and rushed forward to meet her mother, embracing her in a tight hug.

Clarisse shoved her jar of fire into nearby arms and took off running in the direction the two had come from.

The yells had woken up the rest of the Olympians, who had now gathered outside to greet the teenagers. As soon as Poseidon spotted Percy, he threw himself into his son´s arms and buried his face in Percy´s chest.

Clarisse grabbed the war god and picked him up by the scruff of his jacket, death glaring at him. "What the hell, dad? Do you have any idea what I went through to find you?! I had spent five freakin hours searching through this hell hole with her." She jerked her head in the direction of Drew, who was fussing over Aphrodite´s wet dress and messy hair, now soiled with earth and withered daisies. The daughter of war sighed and once she was sure everyone was busy with their own parent, pulled Ares into a hug and helped wrap the lapels of her jacket around him.

"Next time you don't want to eat vegetables, just tell me instead of running away alright?" Nico smiled weakly out of pure relief, shrugging his aviator's jacket off and wrapping it around his father for the second time that day as he lifted him up from the ground.

"Come on, guys." Malcolm picked up Hera and Zeus in his arms and turned to the others. Handing Zeus to a fussing Thalia, "Let´s get them back to camp before they catch a cold."