He told me he wouldn't hurt... Charlie. He lied to me.

Nico started to crawl away, groaning. Percy wanted him to move faster and groan less. He considered throwing his wonder bread at him.

Even little Herley, who couldn't have been more than eight, looked like he could go six rounds with Chuck Norris without breaking a sweat.

The other thing that troubled me: Dad was clutching his workbag. Usually when he does that, it means we're in danger. Like the time gunmen stormed into our hotel in Cairo. I heard shots coming from the lobby and ran downstairs to check on my dad. By the time I got there, he was just calmly zipping up his workbag while three unconscious gunmen hung by their feet from the chandelier, their robes falling over their heads so you could see their boxer shorts. Dad claimed not to have witnessed anything, and in the end the police blamed a freak chandelier malfunction.

Listen, Frank Zhang has moves. He's probably gonna turn into a kangaroo and do some marsupial jujitsu on their ugly faces.

Why does it have to be so hard? Why can't it be a happily-ever-after ride-into-the-sunset feeling all the time?

But Annabeth just smiled and put us in jail. As she was heading back to the front line, she turned and winked. "See you at the fireworks?" She didn't even wait for my answer before darting off into the woods. I looked at Beckendorf. "Did she just...ask me out?" He shrugged, completely disgusted. "Who knows with girls? Give me a haywire dragon, any day." So we sat together and waited while the girls won the game.