ROSE

A group of guards, including our dear boy Thomas, hurried up the stage and encircled Geneva. The crowd watched in awe, holding their breaths as none of them could make sense of what was going on. The judges were very confused, except for Aphrodite, who looked like she was smiling. There was something seriously strange about that woman, even beyond being a beauty goddess in the realm of ancient Greek mythos.

Thomas lifted his gun up to Geneva, having reached the stage and being a few yards away from her. "Hands up!"

His posse followed suit, lifting their guns up to her face as a collective gasp emerged from the crowd.

Geneva slowly lifted her hands up, but then she suddenly vanished. The crowd and the judges bar Aphrodite looked around curiously, and murmured amongst themselves. Geneva then popped up behind a guard and hit him in the temple with the backside of her dagger, the guard hitting the deck rather quickly.

"There! Get her!" one of the guards shouted.

A few shots came at Geneva, but again she vanished as the people looked around once more. Then, another guard was taken down, Geneva popping up for a brief second before disappearing. Thomas fired a stray shot that hit the ceiling, freaking out everyone in the crowd as some of the viewers began flocking to the exits, which, realistically, should've happened earlier, whether it was by virtue of guards escorting them out or the judges. A game was clearly afoot inside the stage room, one far too potentially dangerous for the average citizen.

The judges that sat to the left and right of Aphrodite tried getting up to say something, but Aphrodite said something and they sat back down. Why was Aphrodite so adamant to make them watch what was about to become a horror show?

A few more guards went down, Geneva appearing and vanishing like some magician performing stunts for a small circus crowd. Thomas and the other guards were helpless to stop it as their group gradually grew smaller and smaller. They tried to combat this by getting more compact and narrow, but this just made it easier for Geneva to take them down in pairs, sometimes triplets before inevitably disappearing again.

I was really impressed with how good Geneva had gotten at shapeshifting. She had been practicing a lot with the ability since the Pillars of Hercules, but she insisted that she hadn't really gotten anywhere with it. With what was being displayed here, I had to disagree. She was taking the guards down so skillfully and precisely that she seemed like a natural.

Aphrodite was also seemingly enjoying the show, getting comfy in her chair as she smiled big and wide. The other judges seemed horrified, but every time they tried to do something, Aphrodite would talk them out of it, presumably using her charmspeak to get them to stay around.

Personally, charmspeak was really annoying to me. Aphrodite campers did it so often to get whatever they wanted, and you were helpless to stop it unless you were really strong. The only person to date I've seen resist charmspeak was Kai, and even then, he likely couldn't resist the wishes of a whole mob of campers.

Things soon took a turn for the worse for Geneva though. Thomas whispered something into a walkie talkie, and more guards burst into the room, weapons and all, and joined up with the others on the stage. For a good thirty seconds, Geneva was just gone, no movements being made or anything.

Then a dagger hurled through the air and cut through one of the guards leggings. Geneva popped out of nowhere and roundhouse kicked him, promptly fainting him. The other guards turned and began shooting, but Geneva disappeared once again. Then a massive elephant popped up behind the guards and smacked some of them aside with one large swipe of her trunk. Geneva then morphed into a squirrel and bounded away, shots narrowly missing her as she faded from sight.

Then a tiger emerged from the air, pouncing on two guards simultaneously and knocking them down, but being halted in her tracks by a Taser shot. Geneva transformed back to normal, down on the ground and exhausted from her efforts. The guards progressed forward, encircling Geneva once more as they spoke more words into their radios.

While at first a fear of only worsening the issue and being found out by the guards had stopped me from helping Geneva out, this time I was ready to assist her. I got out of my seat, thought of the two incantations needed, and cast them into reality. A wave of water knocked down the guards and their weapons, followed by vines binding them to the ground. I summoned another spout of water to take down the remaining guards, who looked very perplexed with what was happening.

The few people sitting around, mainly the participants who had to be there, looked at me in shock. I tried putting myself in their shoes, and I can say without a doubt that their reaction was valid. In one day, they had seen a bunch of feds get involved in a beauty competition, a teenage girl capable of turning into animals to battle said feds, and another teenager using magic to defend the strange shapeshifting girl.

One of the judges began speaking French wildly, while the rest of the crowd began yelling at me, but then Aphrodite said, "Stop the whining, will you? Let's finish the pageant up already. Nothing even happened, right?"

She then said some French hobo-jobo and waved her hands around, and suddenly everyone just stopped, turning back to the stage and applauding wildly for Geneva. The judges did so too, as the people that had left earlier popped back in and applauded as well. The knocked out guards disappeared from sight, as if nothing had ever happened.

Geneva was as equally confused as I, giving me a shocked look from across the room.

"Go on sweetie," Aphrodite said, motioning her to get off the stage with a wink following.

Geneva slowly did as she instructed, making her way backstage as the crowd loudly applauded her performance. The rest of the event was, and don't get me wrong, pretty cool with the amazing talents on display, but I don't think you can blame me if I told you I was far too taken aback by what happened to really get invested.

When the girls were dismissed and Geneva headed towards me, we shared a little glance before speaking.

"What the hell just happened up there?" Geneva asked.

"It's beyond me," I said. "But somehow you got away with it. I can only think Aphrodite had something to do with it."

Geneva scowled. "Well, I knew that already. Why is no one leaving?"

I looked to see what was going on exactly and saw the judges conferring with each other like some football team huddled before returning back to their stands. This lasted a whole five minutes, with the judges sporadically saying something to the audience to get them to stay. Then they started calling numbers, as they did for the very first event, and asked the girls to go on the stage.

After everyone was on stage, one of the judges began instructing the girls in French, with Geneva looking around rather confusedly. The judge then returned back to his chair. After he said a few more things, Aphrodite stood up and then began speaking.

The first bits of her speech I had no idea what they meant, but then I heard her call the name "Adele Swanson" and presumed it was awards time.

A fairly tall, dark skinned girl walked out of the bunch of participants to the judge's stand and was handed some kind of plaque which she proudly showed off to the crowd, displaying the number five.

Camille Jenkins was then called up to the stage and received a plate displaying the number four, and despite placing rather high in such a prestigious competition like this, she looked very disappointed, stomping her foot when she arrived back on stage.

Aimee Bouvier was then called up and in contrast to Camille, couldn't believe she had done so well, a big smile on her face as she walked away, receiving loud cheers from what I could only assume were her parents. She deserved it too. I remember she had one of the more entertaining performances out of the girls, playing the piano fantastically but not getting too much appraise.

Second place was Lindie Bernard, a girl who looked ten years beyond her age and had a pretty decent singing voice. A large portion of the crowd seemed to be in disbelief, as a few chants, one in English, seemed to question how she didn't win. Lindie didn't seem to care all that much, just shrugging as she got her award and getting back on the stage.

Aphrodite took the reins of announcing first place, seemingly hyping it up quite a lot with a riveting speech that had the audience laughing, crying, one guy even screamed as he bounded off the ground like a chimpanzee, all kinds of emotions as she took a breath and spoke once more.

And at the end of the announcement, she called for… Geneva Rose?

Wait, what?

Geneva walked down from the stage, her face confused as the room seemed to hold its breath. Geneva's slow steps were the only audible sound as it felt like a whole year had passed in the time since Aphrodite spoke. When Geneva arrived at the judge's stand, Aphrodite handed her a massive golden trophy, the one that had been advertised all over Paris in reference to the event and the applause and cheers came. I loudly whooped as Geneva gave a small grin.

The other judges shook her hand as they shushed the audience. I didn't know what was said, but at the end of it, all the girls walked off the stage, their parents escorting them out of the room as Geneva and I left, her receiving some pats on the back as she walked.

"You did it!" I said excitedly. "I don't know how, but you did it! Congrats!"

Geneva nodded, clearly in shock about what happened. "Thanks. I don't know how either, but that's not what matters."

"Yeah, we still gotta find a way to talk to Aphrodite," I noted.

"Well, that's what I was about to say. Aphrodite wants to talk to the two of us outside."

So that's what the whisper and the winks were about.

"Great," I replied. "Let's get our stuff from the hotel room and meet up with her."

The two of us made our way up to the sixth floor. As we entered the first available elevator, a guard patted Geneva on the back and congratulated her on the victory before promptly exiting. Was this seriously how powerful Aphrodite's charmspeak was?

I took the trip up to remark on how good the view was, interrupted by Geneva.

"I'm still in shock that I won that. I thought that I would at most finish fifth runner up, and that was being optimistic."

"This is what Amethyst and I have been telling you, y'know," I said. "You definitely should consider being some model or fashion designer when you grow up. You really do have the potential to be good at it. There'd be no other reason for Aphrodite to pay so much attention to you if you didn't have potential."

Geneva leaned back against the elevator wall. "Maybe. I don't really know what's in stock for me, future wise. I've always considered fashion, especially because Arthur always told me I was good at it, but I don't want to think about leaving camp. The three months I've been there have been incredible, even despite Arthur dying."

"Yeah, I haven't really put that much thought into leaving either. It feels like I've been here for years, when in reality, I've only been here as long as you have. Camp really has that effect on people, huh?"

Geneva nodded in agreement as the elevator beeped, signaling our arrival on the sixth floor. We nabbed our stuff and cleaned up a few crumbs and whatnot as a courtesy to the hotel staff, who had been pretty nice over the course of the visit, before leaving, paying a goodbye to the room as we took an elevator down. We checked out, handing our hotel card back to the receptionist as we made our leave.

As we walked down the front steps, noticing how dark it was outside, I took another look back at the hotel, which was now illuminated by orange lights. Even though I hated the pageant and how constantly anxious I felt being there, the hotel was still a sight to behold. I would definitely remember going here when I got older.

"So, where did Aphrodite say she'd meet us?" I asked.

Geneva scratched the side of her head. "She said that she'd meet us at some coffee shop she owns, uh, Boissons Sucrées."

"Of course she owns a coffee shop," I groaned. "What else do you do when you're so mind bogglingly rich?"

We looked directly across the street from the hotel and saw a block of shops and mini stores, including Boissons Sucrées. We waited for the signal on the traffic post and then took the crosswalk to the other side of the road.

The store was about as big as your typical New York Starbucks, and embroidered in big, bold blue letters near the entrance was the name of the coffee shop, 'Boissons Sucrées'. There were several small, circular tables outside, each with white umbrellas and a blue cloth covering it. On the inside there were more blue clothed tables and near the back was a white counter where there was a huge menu of what you get behind it as well as several baristas walking around, making drinks, and delivering food. The air smelled of coffee and chocolate, and it was somewhat crowded with more than half of the tables at the store filled up.

When we entered, the lady at the front said some stuff in French I didn't comprehend in the slightest, but from one of the tables Aphrodite called something out in French and gestured for us to come to her, shaking off the receptionist as we sat down.

Sat next to Aphrodite was a young woman, maybe 20 years of age, who's black hair was styled in a bowl cut-esque fashion. She wore a brown overcoat and black trousers with black heels on her feet. She had brown eyes and tan skin, with white earbuds in her ears. I could faintly hear her listening to some opera music whilst head jamming, making her one of a hopeful small group of people, including Chiron, that liked that stuff.

"Glad you guys could come," Aphrodite said casually, as if she was some close friend of ours and this was a typical thing. "Uh, Janet, could you please go get us some beverages?"

Janet remained unresponsive, just listening to her music and staring off into the distance.

"JANET!" Aphrodite yelled.

This time Janet heard her, kind of jumping out of her seat. Aphrodite repeated what she said earlier, and Janet nodded, embarrassingly leaving the table to fulfill Aphrodite's request.

"Holy Zeus, that child is so difficult," Aphrodite muttered. "Knew I shouldn't have hired an American as an intern. Anyways, I invited you here to chat, brush up on some things and just be classy women."

"That does sound nice, but the real reason we went to the pageant was to get some info from you regarding our quest," I said, immediately shooting down Aphrodite's invitation to just 'chat'.

Aphrodite scoffed. "Wow, you're one to jump the gun, aren't you? No wonder you have hots for the hothead, uh, what's his name, Kai? Yeah, him."

I felt my face get very red as I defensively replied, "What are you even talking about?"

What was she even talking about?

"Oh don't try and play that card with me, sweetie," Aphrodite said, chuckling. "I'm a love goddess, aren't I? I know these things."

I crossed my arms and sunk back into my seat, feeling really flustered.

"Well, look, what I wanted to call you guys here was just a friendly chat, but things seem to have gotten out of hand, so I'll ask now why you guys accepted the invitation to come here," Aphrodite said. "And let me hear from the pageant winner instead of Miss Hothead."

Geneva gulped. "Well, what Rose said earlier. We came to compete in the pageant because we were told by Epimetheus that you had some info for us that would help on the quest."

"Ugh, Epimetheus? I far prefer his brother," Aphrodite muttered. "Now where is Janet with the drinks? Is she on a call with her smelly girlfriend again?"

After a few moments of silence, I tried to push away my embarrassment and said in a firm tone, "Uh, hello? You didn't even answer the question."

"Pardon me, what was the question again?" Aphrodite asked.

I wanted to bang my face on the table, but I needed to keep my cool with her. "The question was what info you had that would help us on our quest. So, what's your info?"

"You know, what shocks me is that you, Geneva, someone who's so clearly made for fashion, only chose to go to the pageant to get some information," Aphrodite said, turning her attention to Geneva and ignoring me. "You were fantastic out there. You're telling me legitimately that you didn't try out the pageant to see if you'd make a good fit in modeling?"

Geneva bit her lip. "Well, maybe a little…"

"Ah, I knew it," Aphrodite said, giddy with joy.

What was this woman's problem? She was just completely ignoring me, kept talking to herself, and just targeted Geneva with questions, not bothering to answer any of mine, or even Geneva's queries.

"I know you're on this dumb quest thing, but if you really wanted to, I could make you my assistant," Aphrodite offered. "My current assistant, Janet, doesn't really have a bright future and considering your performance in the pageant, you'd make one excellent apprentice."

"Well, uh, that sounds nice, but..but, the quest seems more important," Geneva stuttered.

I was getting more frustrated by the second. I couldn't add any input as Aphrodite would just ignore me, and Geneva seemed to be losing her voice, with Aphrodite just charmspeaking her into abandoning the quest.

Aphrodite rubbed her chin. "Is that so? Why did you even join this quest?"

"Well, erm, to help my friends, of course," Geneva answered.

"Really? Or did you do it for something else?" Aphrodite questioned.

"What exactly are you insinuating?" I asked.

"Well being a love goddess and all, I hear rumors around the grapevine, and heard that your boyfriend died, which I'm terribly sorry about, my condolences, of course," Aphrodite said, with no emotion in her voice at all no matter how she feigned it. "I've lost many lovers before, and I have to say, it's a very traumatic experience. Anyways, my point is that you didn't do this quest to help your poor friends, but that you did so you could forget about him entirely."

Geneva's face, which had been very confused before, turned angry in a matter of seconds. "Where are you even getting that from? I would never try and forget who Arthur was or go on a quest without the intention of helping my friends! And stop ignoring the purpose for our meeting here! I went and won the pageant and went through hell to talk to you, and you're trying to manipulate me into becoming a brainwashed assistant of yours! Just give us the info so we can leave."

This shook not only Aphrodite, but also the people around us, who found themselves looking at us curiously. They didn't understand what we were saying, but they definitely knew what a shouting match was.

"Alright, fine, you win this one," Aphrodite said, now very cross. "The info you're dying to hear is that your poor mother Hecate is located beneath the Athens Tower, where Erebos and his worshippers await your arrival. Is that good enough for you?"

I nodded. "Yeah, thanks for finally answering the question. Let's get a move on, Geneva."

Geneva nodded and the two of us got up from our seats. As we walked to the door, we saw Janet arrive back at the table with a cup holder containing some coffee, then Aphrodite yelling at her and causing all of the drinks to fall on the floor.

"If you hadn't shut her up, that'd be you," I told Geneva, pointing to Janet who now had to pick up the drinks and clean the floor of all the coffee.

Geneva stayed quiet, still very mad about what happened. I, personally, was very mad too. Not just because Aphrodite tried manipulating Geneva or ignoring our questions, but because she had to bring up Kai and humiliate me in front of Geneva.

Geneva finally spoke after a solid thirty seconds of walking in silence. "Don't worry, I already knew about the Kai thing. You don't have to be embarrassed about it."

"Wait, you knew?" I asked, surprised.

"Well, being a daughter of a beauty goddess, I think I've picked up on some things," Geneva replied. "It was still a really trashy thing to do though, to expose your feelings like that."

"Me? She was full on trying to manipulate you into becoming Janet," I replied.

Geneva shrugged. "Yeah, she really tried. Let's put that stuff aside for now. At least we got our info, and we're not going to have to deal with her any longer."

I nodded in agreement. Though we had all already known Hecate was in Athens, we didn't know specifically where, so this was a pretty big help. Additionally, it also helped elaborate on the last line of the prophecy, with Athens Tower being referred to as 'Athen's spire' and darkness, which likely represents Erebos, rising through it.

We made the long trek all the way back to the ship, making a quick stop to change back into our normal clothes so we could stay out of sight of the authorities. We had gotten lucky at the pageant with Aphrodite, but now that we were outside the competition, we wouldn't be so lucky.

When we arrived at the spot where Oman had parked the ship, we were left rather surprised. The ship was nowhere to be seen.

Then we saw the BBB flying through the air uncontrollably, heading down towards the ground. I heard lots of screaming as the ship thankfully stabilized itself before landing, shooting a huge gust of wind into our faces as it parked on the ground.

We were greeted by Kai and Alexander, the former clutching his chest where his heart was, and the latter who was breathing heavily and whose hair was all over the place.

"Uh, what happened to you guys?" I asked.

Kai took a deep breath. "Amethyst happened. Long story short, Oman allowed Amethyst to fly a little bit, and we almost wound up dead. Timmy almost flew off the ship for god's sake. What about you guys?"

"Well, we spent approximately 8 hours at the pageant, Geneva won it, we got our info, and now we're here," I summarized. "Pretty good day overall."

"Wait, Geneva won the pageant?" Alexander asked.

Geneva nodded. "Somehow I did."

"Okay, well, hop on board the ship and tell Oman, Timmy, and Amethyst the info," Kai said.

We made our way on board and entered Oman's cabin, where Timmy was just laying dead on the couch and Oman was whispering stuff to Amethyst.

"Oh hey, you guys are back," Amethyst said, standing at the monitor. "What happened?"

Geneva explained to her what went down, leaving out the part about Aphrodite embarrassing me and bringing up Arthur.

"Well, that's great!" Amethyst said excitedly. "What was the info?"

"That Hecate was being kept under the Athens Tower," I answered.

"Well, that's nice to hear," Amethyst said. "Given how late it is, I recommend that we all sleep. Tomorrow, hoping all goes well, we should be able to get close to Athens."

We all nodded, said our goodnights, and headed up to our rooms, except for Timmy who was sleeping on the couch in Oman's cabin now.

As I crashed on my bed, I took a heavy breath, processing everything that went down today. We got some valuable info now, which was nice, but we still couldn't make anything of it. Even though we now knew where Erebos' lair was, we couldn't do a thing about it because the GHOSTs and Erebos' army were waiting for us to make our move. Going to Athens now would just be suicide.

Well, I guess we'll figure it out tomorrow. We'd have to, after all. I rested my head against my pillows, tucked myself into the covers, and closed my eyes.

I dreamt I was in an art studio of some kind. The scene I was in had to be around the 20th century as the art studio was rather modernized. Viewing a hung up portrait was the ginger haired woman, Philyra, from my last few dreams. She looked a little older, and her face told a story of someone who was clearly very exhausted and tired of her predicament.

She carried a pastel in her left hand, a paintbrush in the other as she looked over a portrait which was of some church in the night. The art was fantastic. She really was good at it.

She got up from her chair and began carefully dabbing the brush into the red color and applying it to the church. As she was painting, a faint voice spoke, one that sounded heavily of Erebos.

Philyra seemed to have heard it too, as she put down her art supplies and looked around, asking, "Hello? Is someone here?"

Pure silence. Not a sound was made. Philyra went back to painting the church, now a little off edge. The voice spoke again, this time far clearer than before.

"Hello."

Philyra responded, "Hello? Who is this?"

"Erebos."

"Erebos? The Protogenoi of Darkness and the Mist that was said to be in a deep, permanent slumber?"

"Yes. I've come here with a proposition. I know that since the loss of Kronos and the mass disappointment of your child, Chiron, you have disappeared from the face of the world."

Wait, Chiron? The activities director of camp was this woman's child? No wonder I had never heard of Philyra before! Chiron never spoke about his parents, and when he did, he didn't name names, just speaking with utter disdain about them. From what he had told me, his parents abandoned him at birth and then just vanished, at least in the case of his mother, who he strongly believed had faded, or passed away. Did this quest somehow involve Chiron or Philyra, or maybe even Kronos?

"Yes, this is all true. What is the proposition exactly?" Philyra asked, still stroking the portrait with her brush.

"The proposition is that you join me and my army in getting revenge against Olympus. Your former lover failed to do so, as did my sister, but I believe I can fix their mistakes and achieve the goals they set out to do. With your help, this could likely be achieved."

Philyra's mouth moved slightly, as if she was going to say something, but then the dream shifted. I was back in Hecate's cage, alone with her.

"Hello again, Rose," Hecate greeted.

"Mom," I said, nodding my head.

"Look, I know we kind of got on the wrong foot last time, but I needed to tell you this," she said, jumping straight to the point.

"What? What was it that you need to tell me?" I asked.

Hecate said, "Remember last time we talked, how I brought up how Erebos was raising his army from the depths of Tartarus?"

"Yes?"

"Well, I discovered recently that he's been sacrificing some of the GHOSTs and monsters in a ritual to raise his army," Hecate explained. "Just recently, he did the ritual to four or five of his troops and raised Nyx from Tartarus."

"Wait, he's been using the GHOSTs as sacrifices to raise his army? And he raised Nyx?"

Hecate nodded. "Yes to all of them. I felt the need to warn you additionally because Nyx is planning on sending some kind of surprise your way."

"How can he raise someone like Nyx from Tartarus without there being repercussions of some kind? From what Amethyst told me, the transition from Tartarus to the real world is very dangerous. For example, Percy Jackson went to Tartarus for only a few days yet came back with a decent sum of struggle. How does that translate for someone who's been in Tartarus for a long time?"

"Your friend is right. From what I overheard, Erebos had a supplier of his make mechanical armor so as to help Nyx adjust to the real world. Whoever this supplier is, they've been doing a lot for Erebos."

"Seems that way," I muttered.

The two of us sort of stared off, not much to say. I was thankful she was sharing this info with me, but I was still mad at her. How could I not be mad at her? She had literally admitted last time to being the cause of Marianne's death and it didn't change the fact she just left me and my family for good when I was born. That list of grievances I had against her heavily outweighed total forgiveness.

"I'm really glad you decided to listen to what I had to say," Hecate said, breaking the silence momentarily.

"Well, it's not like I had much choice. My dream just made me teleport here without my consent."

"I know that, but you could've just left or stopped listening. I know you haven't forgiven me for all of the stuff I did to you, and I can accept that, but I still want you to be careful, whatever you end up doing. I'll see you again, Rose."

The dream shifted to black, ending before I could fully think about what I had learned.