“Wake up Xander,” said Chance again swatting me awake. Has she not heard of shaking shoulders? I groaned at that and opened my eyes as well as made the mistake of breathing through my nose only to be sucker punched by revolting smell coming from the dumpster. It was Mikey's cooking, rotten eggs and my basketball shorts all rollled into one.

“Morning sunshine.” I grumbled rubbing my stinging cheek and breathing through my mouth to help stop the nausea. “Please just shake my shoulder instead of slapping me," I requested. Chance shrugged and handed me a sandwich which I took a bite of noting the soggy bread and tough peanut butter that reminded me of Alexa. That felt like a lifetime ago.

“Thanks,” I muttered thickly passed the food and wishing it wasn't stale, but I counted my very few lucky stars that this didn't have mold on it yet.

“Don’t mention it,” she said uncapping a water bottle and holding it out to me. “Don’t drink too much okay? It has to hold us over for a while.”

  I nodded and took a swing of water to wash down the peanut butter. “Where are we going now?"

“Into Ares’s truck, he didn’t care enough to come back and get it.” Chance said tossing me a keychain. “You can drive alright? I’ll read the map.”

“Okay…” I said climbing hesitantly into the cab of the very nice truck, but I was still hesitant. This belonged to my older brother who just last night had nearly succeeded in murdering Chance. What if he bugged it or something? Why would he leave something this nice behind? Was it a trap?

As if she was reading my thoughts Chance spoke up, “Don’t worry about any trackers and shit. I already checked every nook and cranny of this place. Besides, Ares is just brute strength, no brains at all. Athena would’ve tried to tell him about, it but he wouldn’t have listened to her. We’re safe, don’t worry."

“I wasn’t,” I lied adjusting the driver’s seat to my body. I buckled in and drove away adjusting my mirrors as I did. “So now what? What happens now?"

“Get ready for some easy riding," she said flicking the map open with a pop. "We are going to Detroit.”

  “What road?” I asked as I scanned the road ahead of me, adjusting the pressure on the gas pedal as I found out I was going over the speed limit. Guess being on the run gave me a lead foot, but it looked like it didn't take away my stickler-ness for following the speed limit.

  “Interstate seventy-five, get in the turn lane,” she instructed not looking up from the map.

“Okay,” I said doing what I was told, SMOG-ing in the way that would have my driver’s education teacher cry with pride. All of his harping had paid off. I drove down the interstate as the sun rolled up from the horizon.

  “Xander?” Chance asked after a few minutes. “How did you escape?”     

“The story is nowhere near as cool as yours." I joked as I bit my lip and tried to remember the details of that day. "See, I’d pissed off Chiron for sneezing so I had to feed the hellhounds.” I paused as I waited to see if she had any questions. But she just looked out the window. Guess she doesn’t interrupt.  “So the biggest one had a collar on him with a key attached to it. So I got this really weird feeling and guessed at what it was. I thought it would undo my shackles and my cell, the place was so huge having one key for everything would've made no sense, but a skeleton key?" I nodded my head as I spoke, recalling that scary event with clairity.  "That would work, so I  dumped raw meat all over the dog and while his buddies were jumping on him to get some grub I took the key. And when lights out came I lost the chains and opened my cell.”

“And nothing went wrong?” she asked surprise coloring her voice.

 “Nooo," I said drawing out the "o" sound and shaking my head so hard I  was sure it might fall off.  "Things went wrong the second I had my feet out of my cell. This alarm thing went off that sounded like a rusty brass band, alley cats, elephants, opera music and car crashes all rolled into one. It was awful. And that of course altered the ever wonderful Furies. She tried to strangle me so I stabbed her in her eye with the key. I fell and started running ran into a pack of hellhounds, escaped by some stupid luck started climbing the wall, jumped from it and fell into a garbage truck. The rest you pretty much know.”

Chance nodded and when I risked glancing over at her I saw she looked mildly impressed. “You don’t plan things very well do you?”

“Not at all,” I admitted with a grin. “I just sort of go in the moment and hope it works out.”

“It’s a bad habit," she remarked.  "If you can’t lose it just follow my lead alright?"

“Will do,” I said with a mock salute and she actually laughed/snorted and I laughed too, the sound echoing around the cab of the truck.

"Yes," she said with an exaperated tone, "I snort when I laugh and I have to hand it you, you acted like an idiot with the escape, but you have got some balls dude."

 "Thanks," I said with a shrug a bit confused. I was a guy, I had balls no matter what, but it was one of the first times she'd given me a compliment. I was going to take it without messing it up by asking stupid questions. "So how’d you meet Thantos?” I asked curious at how Chance managed to meet the inspiration for the Grim Reaper and wanting to make conversation.

“At Elis Island, I’ll tell the story but I will only do it once so listen up."

“Yes ma’am.”

“Don’t do that ever again.” She told me with a half amused smile, “I was looking for the Fates and I thought they’d be at Elis Island. I figured it went through so many domains that it’d be a great place to hide them. So I stole away on a tourist ferry, jumped ship a few feet before they docked and swam to shore.”

“Didn’t run into a sea monster did you?” I teased and she laugh-snorted again.

“Not that time,” she said taking her hair down again. “So when I got there I started exploring the museum. And I ran into a banshee.”

“Bless you," I said wishing I had a Kleenex to offer her.

“That wasn’t a sneeze, that’s the name of the monster you heard when you stepped out of your cell. A banshee is a horrible wailing spirit. As you saw, their cry makes focusing incredibly hard. So while I battled her and lost most of the hearing in my right ear, I cut her throat and ran. Right into your dear older brother.”

I grimaced now certain of how Chance met Death. “He broke my arms and threw me into the water. I would have drowned if Thantos hadn’t tossed me a floaty and pulled me back to shore."

“So Death saved you from drowning?” I asked feeling like an idiot just for saying it. It was so weird, like jalapenos smeared with peanut butter kind of weird.

“That’s correct,” she said putting her hair back up.

“World’s strangest contradiction."

“Tell me about it, and as I dried off he told me where the Fates really were, I was on my way there when you dumped you acid covered shoe on me."

 “That shit was acid? Acid is not that fast!” I said, okay I know I wasn’t very good at Chemistry but I knew acid’s did not act that fast! But if it was some kind of acid maybe I should try and find way to carry a sort of base with us...They canceled each other out, I remembered that from Chemistry class. Mainly because of the gross story we heard about a pair of students where one accidentally drank acid and his pal gave him a base to cancel it out and he ended up loosing his the part of his throat that made him swallow. It was so horrifying that I remembered that lesson as well as never ever to bring drinks into the lab.

“Did you forget it was a monster?" she asked witha click of her tonuge. "Things that are dangerous get worse with them. So I guess in case I do almost die again or really do kick the bucket you should know what what’s going on.”

“Please,” I said holding back the excitement in my voice. I’d really been curious about who it was that was going to “help” us.

“I don’t know how to overthrow the gods," she said grabbing a fistful of hair.  "But I know that it can be done because they overthrew the Titans. And the only people aside from the Council old enough to remember are the Fates.”

  “Fates?" I asked clips from the movie Hercules flashing through my mind. "Aren’t those the three old ladies who sew people’s lives and share one eye?"

“Weave, but yeah pretty much.  Don't know about the eye, but there's the deal. They control the fate of the world and everyone in it. Part of Fate is change and the gods fear that. They feared the Fates would find out about what they were doing with demigods and change that. So they locked them up in a place where so many gods territories cross.”

“To make escape impossible?” I guessed as the peices fell together in my head. “All that combined power…”

“Exactly,” Chance said. “But that also hinders their vision on the Fates themselves. They can be our biggest allies in this crazy campaign Xander.”

“You admit this is crazy?” I said surprised. “I thought you thought it was a good idea.”

“Gods no!” Chance said rolling her eyes. “This is a suicide mission at its best! But we are the only ones who can try. And we have to. If we win, we can free all those people, gods, demigods and anyone who is oppressed by the Council.”

  I’m sure I heard part of that sentence wrong. “Gods?” I asked choking back a laugh. “I think your jokes need work.”

“Not joking, the Fates," she said seriously. "Hestia, Thantos. They all suffer under the Council. The Fates are prisoners like the demigods, Hestia has been fighting to be mortal for seventeen years, and Thantos has been for six. The Council keeps turning them down because no one wants to take over for a minor god. Their forbidden from living the lives they want. It's cruel."

“Okay that was weirdest thing I’ve heard all day,” I said as a car passed us. “Why do they want to be human?” I was confused and even that was an understand, so many people I knew, so many humans they'd love to be gods, but they wanted to give that up? Why?

Chance shook her head, “I’m not sure I’m the one to tell you that story. I don’t know all of it anyways. But enough about this; let’s see if Ares left anything worthwhile in his truck.” And she started exploring the glove compartment.

 “Let me know if you find anything worthwhile,” I told her as I adjusted my mirrors a little. The right one I never got right the first time. No idea why. Just always happened.

“Found something,” Chance said, “His wallet, fully stocked with three different credit cards and oh-Benjamin bills!” A grin spilt her face and I allowed myself to thank Hestia and Death-the only two gods I knew of thus far that were not jackasses- that we caught a break.

I grinned; looks like money didn’t matter to gods. “Looks like we caught a pretty good break,” I said as I noticed a sliver minivan tailgating us.  Jeez pal, if you wreck your bumper it’s not my fault. I thought as I rolled my eyes. Did they not know they were tailgating?

“Chance how long a drive do we have?"

“I’d say a while even without traffic so we can drive on and off if you want.”

“Don’t need to,” I said pointing to the GPS, “this thing is that thingy Google made. You know, where the car drives itself? Didn’t you hear about that?"

“No,” said Chance, “I didn’t but from what you’re saying it sounds pretty state of the art.”

“It is, though when they test drove it, they got into an accident. But it was the other driver’s fault. Fender Bender ya know?”

“No, not really, if this was in the last four years I probably didn’t hear about it. There aren’t many newscasters when you’re running from the most powerful beings on Earth you know.”

“True,” I agreed, “So what were things like before you….got arrested by our parents. I guess.”

 “I had a good life. Mom was a well know lawyer up in New York so we were well off with or without Morpheus. I lived in a nice apartment, went to a good school, got along well with my mom, a great best friend and enough money to do whatever the hell I wanted so long as it was legal.”

“Wow,” I said, Chance never struck me as a privileged kid. Well, I had only seen her in jeans stained with everything from ketchup to monster blood. “I didn’t think….”

“With how I act that I was a pretty well off kid? Don’t worry, you are not the first.”

“Good,” I sighed, “I didn’t want to offend you or anything.”

“No worries dude,” Chance said, “Turn here.”

I did what she ordered and we really didn’t talk much after that. We just drove down the interstate and when I started getting tired I programed the GPS and woke Chance up to make sure nothing happened. While this thing was reliable, it didn’t have the sudden action-reaction humans did.

“Sleep tight you idiot.” She’s not yelling this time; guess “idiot” is now my affectionate nickname. I yawned loudly and drifted off to sleep just like she told me to do.