"You are okay?" he asked. "Not eaten by monsters?" "Not even a little bit." I showed him that I still had both arms and both legs, and Tyson clapped happily. "Yay!" he said. "Now we can eat peanut butter sandwiches and ride fish ponies! We can fight monsters and see Annabeth and make things go BOOM!" I hoped he didn't mean all at the same time, but I told him absolutely, we'd have a lot of fun this summer.

Percy imagined what that would be like: getting an apartment in this tiny replica of Rome, protected by the legion and Terminus the OCD border god. He imagined holding hands with Annabeth at a cafe. Maybe when they were older, watching their own kid chase seagulls across the forum.

She had to go on this quest. The fate of the world might depend on it. But part of him wanted to say: Forget the world. He didn’t want to be without her.

Um," Grover said. "Percy?" "Yeah?" "I thought you'd want to know." "Yeah?" "Cerberus? He's saying we've got ten seconds to pray to the god of our choice.After that...well...he's hungry.

Piper patted his shoulder. “Trust me, Valdez. Beautiful people never lie.

I hadn't seen my dad get violent since the Great Spatula Incident, and I wasn't anxious to see a repeat of that.

Mugged by my own mother.