The CSS Birmingham blows up

Alexander didn't sleep that night. He was too preoccupied with his thoughts of revenge. Percy could wound a god after a few months of training, surely, Alex could rise to Luke's level soon. The system was the ultimate cheat, with it he learned far faster than normal, way faster and the gap between them -assuming Luke didn't get any better- was only four ranks. A big difference but not impossibly big. So, he trained the entire night, swinging his sword and creating wind. Now, waves were often created by the wind currents, so, with Alexander pushing the wind towards the direction they needed to be heading, the waves came and pushed them along. It was just at the moment of dawnbreak that the Captain spotted something.

"All hands on deck! Find Lady Clarisse! Where is that girl?", the captain shouted and there was motion in the ship.

It took a good ten minutes before the three demigods -plus Tyson- came onto the deck. Clarisse came later than the other three, a worried expression on her face. She grabbed a pair of binoculars from a zombie officer and peered toward the horizon. "At last. Captain, full steam ahead!"

The engines roared as they were forced to push them faster. 

Tyson muttered nervously, "Too much strain on the pistons. Not meant for deep water." 

As a cyclops, Tyson had a natural know-how of machinery, so Alexander believed what he said. It made him nervous. Clarisse's back up plan was for him to fly them to safety but now, there were four to rescue and he could only carry one at a time. His eyes flickered to the lifeboats, that seemed much safer.

After a few more minutes, the things they had seen came into focus. To the north, a huge mass of rock rose out of the sea—an island with cliffs at least a hundred feet tall. About half a mile south of that, the other patch of darkness was a storm brewing. The sky and sea boiled together in a roaring mass.

 "A Hurricane?" Annabeth asked. 

"No," Clarisse said, gripping the sword by her side "Charybdis"

Annabeth paled, her eyes widened in terror, "Are you crazy?" 

"Only way into the Sea of Monsters. Straight between Charybdis and her sister Scylla", Clarisse pointed to the top of the cliffs, where Scylla presumably was, though none of them could see her from this far away.

"What do you mean the only way?" Percy asked "The sea is wide open! Just sail around them!"

Clarisse rolled her eyes, "Don't you know anything? If I tried to sail around them, they would just appear in my path again. If you want to get into the Sea of Monsters, you have to sail through them" 

"What about the Clashing Rocks?" Annabeth said, "That's another gateway. Jason used it"

"I can't blow apart rocks with my cannons," Clarisse said, a wicked gleam in her eyes, though there was something else… fear? Anxiety? No matter, "Monsters, on the other hand…"

"You are crazy," Annabeth decided.

"Watch and learn, Wise Girl" Clarisse turned to the captain, "Set course for Charybdis!" 

"Aye, m'lady" The engine groaned, the iron plating rattled, and the ship began to pick up speed.

"Clarisse," Percy said, "Charybdis sucks up the sea. Isn't that the story?" 

"And spits it back out again, yeah"

"What about Scylla?" 

"She lives in a cave, up on those cliffs. If we get too close, her snaky heads will come down and start plucking sailors off the ship"

"Choose Scylla then," Percy said, "Everybody goes below deck and we chug right past." 

"No!" Clarisse insisted. "If Scylla doesn't get her easy meat, she might pick up the whole ship. Besides, she's too high to make a good target. My cannons can't shoot straight up. Charybdis just sits there at the center of her whirlwind. We're going to steam straight toward her, train our guns on her, and blow her to Tartarus!"

She said it with vigor and determination. They almost believed it could work… almost.

The engine hummed. The entire ship was radiated with heat from the boilers. The smokestacks billowed. The red Ares flag whipped in the wind, the boar looking as angry as ever, ready to smash whoever was in front of it with its tusks. How a mere picture could convey that, he didn't know but it did so beautifully.

As they neared the whirlpool, if got louder and louder, a horrible wet roar like the galaxy's biggest toilet being flushed. Every time Charybdis inhaled, the ship shuddered and lurched forward. Every time she exhaled, we rose in the water and were buffeted by ten-foot waves. 

Undead sailors calmly went about their business on the spar deck. They already died once, he guessed, so impending doom shouldn't sound so bad. They probably longed to be freed from their after-deathly servitude. Though the sailors looked calm, their captain's hands were trembling. He clearly feared what was to come more than the others. A quick few uses of observe revealed why. This man was a half blood, so the fear was deeper ingrained in his soul, whereas the other soldiers simply looked towards another death.

"You still have that thermos full of wind?" asked Annabeth, whose hands were trembling as she gripped the rail.

"I do… but it's too dangerous to use with a whirlpool like that. More wind might just make things worse"

"What about controlling the water?" she asked, "You're Poseidon's son. You've done it before"

Percy concentrated for a moment before shaking his head, "I- I can't"

"We need a backup plan," Annabeth said, "This isn't going to work" 

"Annabeth is right," Tyson said. "Engine's no good" 

"What do you mean?" she asked. 

"Pressure. Pistons need fixing" 

Fear crept into Alexander's heart, they are right, this wouldn't work, not in a million years. If it were so easy to destroy her, others would've done so.

"Clarisse… I'll fly above us. When this fails, I'll try and get you out of there", he decided. This ship was going down and he wouldn't go down with it. If Clarisse and the others were smart, they would set sail in the safety boats and use that thermos to propel themselves. He could feel his father's power resting in a fourth of it, it had to contain a powerful wind, maybe like that, they could escape the whirlpool, maybe they could make it to the cyclops' lair but he wasn't about to gamble on that. Even if they made it out, there was no guarantee that they would survive the journey across the water. Alexander couldn't grow tired, if all else failed, he would fly to the lair and steal the fleece, bring it back to camp and save the tree. The prophecy said that Clarisse would fly back to camp alone… maybe that meant that he would carry her from the island. 'Alone' may be more symbolic in this case.

"Whatever-", Clarisse didn't even hear him, her focus was on the gigantic sea monster swallowing up the ocean.

"Anemo", wings sprouted from his back as the magic took effect and he flew higher and higher, looking down. He saw them like little ants, they fired into the maw but then, it closed and within seconds, the ship was thrown to the side, up against Scylla's lair. He paled, they were about to get devoured. Scylla picked them up one by one. He couldn't see who was being picked up but one of them fought back, letting her drop him or her… It was most likely one of the demigods but from this distance, he couldn't see who it was. The two lifeboats were thrown into the ocean as the ship exploded and then, the winds were unleashed. He was thrown aside by the powerful gale of wind and, when he regained balance, they were gone, their ship sinking beneath the waves.