✦ ༉‧₊˚⋆˚( ⁿᵒᵗ ᶠʳⁱᵉⁿᵈˢ )˚⁺✧₊˚.*♡

🍪 — 013. isa meets her soulmate.

ISA HALF EXPECTED the sun dragons and the crazy sorceress to follow them, but nothing like that happened. She sat behind Leo as he steered the dragon toward the southwest. Eventually, the smoke from the burning department store faded in the distance, but none of them didn't relax until the suburbs of Chicago gave way to snowy fields, and the sun began to set.

"Good job, Festus." he patted the dragon's metal hide. "You did awesome."

The dragon shuddered. Gears popped and clicked in his neck.

"I'll give you a tune-up next time we land," Leo promised. "You've earned some motor oil and Tabasco sauce."

Festus whirled his teeth, but even that sounded weak.

"Leo." Piper said from behind Isa, "You feeling okay?"

"Yeah. . . not bad for a brainwashed zombie." Leo said, "Thanks for saving us back there, beauty queen. If you hadn't talked me out of that spell ─ "

"Don't worry about it," Piper said.

But Isa was the one to be worried. She felt mad at herself at how easily Medea manipulated her and charmspoke her. The girl wondered what the sorceress said about her patron having plans for Isa; that scared her, but she didn't want to say anything.

"We're going to have to put down soon," Leo warned his friends. "Couple more hours, maybe, to make sure Medea's not following us. I don't think Festus can fly much longer than that."

"Yeah," Isa agreed. "Gleeson probably wants to get out of his canary cage, too. Question is ─ where are we going?"

"The Bay Area," Leo guessed. "Didn't Medea say something about Oakland?"

Piper didn't respond.

"Piper's dad," Jason put in. "Something's happened to your dad, right? He got lured into some kind of trap."

Piper let out a shaky breath. "Look, Medea said you would both die in the Bay Area. And besides. . . even if we went there, the Bay Area is huge! First we need to find Aeolus and drop off the storm spirits. Boreas said Aeolus was the only one who could tell us exactly where to go."

Leo grunted. "So how do we find Aeolus?"

Jason leaned forward. "You mean you don't see it?"

He pointed ahead of them, but Isa didn't see anything except clouds and the lights of a few towns glowing in the dusk.

"What?" Leo asked.

"That. . . whatever it is," Jason said. "In the air."

Isa looked between Piper and Leo, who looked just as confused as she was.

"Right," Leo said. "Could you be more specific on the 'whatever-it-is' part?"

"Like a vapor trail," Jason said. "Except it's glowing. Really faint, but it's definitely there. We've been following it since Chicago, so I figured you saw it."

Leo shook his head. "Maybe Festus can sense it. You think Aeolus made it?"

"Well, it's a magic trail in the wind," Jason said. "Aeolus is the wind god. I think he knows we've got prisoners for him. He's telling us where to fly."

"Or it's another trap," Piper said. Her tone worried Isa. She didn't just sound nervous. She sounded broken with despair, like they'd already sealed their fate, and like it was her fault. 

"Pippy, you all right?" Isa asked, turning her head to look back towards the daughter of Aphrodite. 

Piper hummed at first, not meeting the girl's eye before she grumbled out, "I'm fine,"

"If your dad's in trouble and we can help ─ " Leo begun.

"You can't," she said, her voice getting shakier. "Look, I'm tired. If you don't mind. . . " she leaned back against Jason and closed her eyes. 

All right, it was pretty clear she didn't want to talk.

They flew in silence for a while. Festus seemed to know where he was going. He kept his course, gently curving toward the southwest and hopefully Aeolus's fortress. 

Leo's head started to nod.

"Leo," Isa shook his shoulder, "Get some sleep."

"What, oh, no, I'm fine." Leo said.

"Listen, elf boy," Isa said in somewhat of a stern voice, making the younger boy turn his head towards her, "You ain't a machine, which means you need some rest, Give me the rains. Jason is awake so he can tell me the directions."

Jason nodded from behind. "It's cool. Isa and I can handle it."

Leo's eyes started to close on their own. "All right. Maybe just. . ." he didn't finish the sentence before slumping forward against the dragon's warm neck.

"Right. . ."

Was it awkward between Jason and Isa? It was, there was no lying. For the first solid ten minutes, the pair sat in silence, except when Jason told her when to take a turn or something, but after that, it was complete silence. Isa wanted to strike a conversation with the blonde, but she didn't know what to talk about as he doesn't remember anything about himself. She could go on for hours about her own life ─ about her life at the Camp, about the battles she's been in ( one, but that one was intense ), gossips around the Camp, training and many for stuff, but she didn't want to be annoying to Jason.

With Leo, Isa could easily start something random because of him personality. They shared similar personalities and she quite enjoyed his presence even with a few days of knowing him. He seemed like a fun guy to be around ─ the crazy one at the parties.

With Piper, well, that was different. While she could strike a conversation with the daughter of Aphrodite, Isa would start to feel nervous, which meant her eyes would change and she didn't want to scare anyone with them ( it happened, so she tries to keep her emotions in check ). But, Piper had that calm yet striking personality that Isa was drawn to. Even if she knew the girl for just a few days, Isa doesn't want to leave her side.

Isa looked at the starry sky around her. It had been good half an hour since the two fell asleep, and yet she and Jason haven't spoken at all.

"Right. . . so, I feel very awkward," Isa said, "Shot some questions."

"Um," Jason said behind her, "How long have you been at the Camp?"

Of course that would be his first question.

"Truth to be told, I don't remember."

"You don't?"

"Nope," Isa said with click of her tongue, "I was maybe six or seven when I ran from home, and I'm fifteen, almost sixteen. You do the Math."

"Do you mind me asking. . . why did you run away?"

"You would have found out eventually cause of Aphrodite kids." the girl sighed, her head falling a bit forward, "Well, my father is a big homophobe who wouldn't let me go out of the house because his daughter likes the same gender. . . He pretended I didn't exist, telling the neighbors I was sick that's why I wasn't going out and shit like that. So, I ran away. Gleeson found me on the borders of Pennsylvania and brought me to the Camp. The rest is the history."

The girl turned around to look at the blonde. Jason nodded his head, and looked up at the sky, "I'm sorry about that."

"It's alright," Isa said, "At least, I'm starting to love myself now. Hope you're not against us 'weirdos'."

Jason laughed, "Then we are both weirdos."

"Yes! To the weirdos club!"

"Hera really did that?" Jason asked.

"It's Hera we're talking about. Vivi couldn't get feathers out of her hair for good fifteen minutes," Isa said telling the boy stories from the Camp and before he arrived, "It was chaotic, but I still loved that cabin. I mean, I've spent almost all my childhood years there, making friends and getting used to demigod life. That's where I met Freya, my best friend."

Isa looked back at the blonde to see him looking down, his cheeks dusted a bit of pink. The girl chuckled and Jason looked up.

"She's been asking about you," Isa said, "After the campfire. She's a good person, kind heart, monster at archery ─ don't basketball with her or you'll lose, trust me, I know from experience. When this shit is over, I'm expecting you to be doing some moves, okay mister." she pointed finger at him.

"If we survive," the blonde mumbled softly.

"Oh, stop with the negative energy!" the dark haired girl huffed, "From just these few days on the quest, I can tell this is not your first one. It's all Hera's fault. You were pulled from your life and thrown into one you didn't know, expected to be the leader. I get the pressure the children of the Big Three are put on, but it isn't fair to you all. I admire the way you took on this role even without remembering anything. It's pretty cool."

Jason watched her for a few second, before he started to smile, "Thanks, Isa," he said and the girl smiled too, "And you should be proud of yourself too. Look where you've came. It's impressive seeing your growth after all the years at the Camp. You should be proud who you became."

Isa let the words sink. "Thank you, Jay," she said, "You're a good friend."

"Back at you."

As Leo and Piper slept, Isa and Jason chatted; they talked about everything and anything, things that people if they heard them would thing ─ how did they think of that. They joked, they laughed and Isa was starting to feel her friendship with the blonde son of Zeus was only getting stronger.

And she was having great time talking with Jason, when all of a sudden Festus dropped out of the sky.

The girl screamed, trying to pull the rains, but no avid; she was starting to experience deja vu to the moment they fell first time. Jason shook Piper awake and Isa did the same to Leo.

"What, what?. . . Not again!" Leo yelled. "You can't fall again!" 

Leo managed to pull open the panel on the dragon's neck. He toggled the switches. He tugged the wires. The dragon's wings flapped once, but Leo caught a whiff of burning bronze. The drive system was overloaded. Festus didn't have the strength to keep flying, and Leo couldn't get to the main control panel on the dragon's head ─ not in midair. 

"Jason!" he screamed. "Take Piper and Isa and fly out of here!"

"What?"

"We need to lighten the load! I might be able to reboot Festus, but he's carrying too much weight!"

"What about you?" Piper cried. "If you can't reboot him ─ "

"I'll be fine," Leo yelled. "Just follow me to the ground. Go!"

Jason grabbed Piper and Isa around the waist. They both unbuckled their harnesses, but, of course, something had to go wrong. She didn't know how, no one actually did, but Isa felt the hold Jason had on her was loosening, and, without warning, he dropped her. Piper screamed, trying to catch her hand but she wasn't fast enough.

Isa let out a shriek, kicking her arms around in the sky, but she couldn't do anything about it. She saw Jason trying his best to get to her, but she was falling faster then he could reach her. Is this really how she was going to die? Falling from the sky. Mum, please, if you are listening, and you are, help me.

And then it happened.

Underneath her a white glow appeared and Isa turned her body to see what it was. Dumb idea as she would fall face first then, but her curiosity got the best out of her. Her eyes widened and she landed on the back of the most beautiful pegasus she had ever seen. Its fur was soft to the touch, pure white coat and mane got in Isa's vision. The pegasus turned it's head and with its red eyes regarded the girl and she instantly recognized them.

"Red?" she asked softly.

Yes! Good thing I caught you before the fall. Red said in her mind and Isa laughed in disbelief.

"But, you're. . . you're. . . how is this possible?"

This is my true form, Red said as the girl sat correctly on its back, I really couldn't be a pegasus while your dad was around now, could I?

Isa had her mouth agape.

So, I took form of a cat. Much smaller then this but I didn't mind. Can't say I didn't enjoy the back scratches from everyone. But now, it is the time I show who I truly am.

"Wait, hold up." Isa shook her head as Red flew in the sky, "Is this my mum's doing or something."

I'm a free spirit without a owner. I liked your energy so I choose you to take care of me. Now, I'm yours and you are mine. You're the one who can bring my true potential, and I like you just in general, so you're stuck with me from now on.

"Okay. . . let me process everything."

Take your time! Oh, and I like the name, it matches my eyes; and those treats you give are good too, but I much prefer something sweeter, like sugar cubes that Poseidon boy keeps for Blackjack.

"I. . . holy shit. . . yeah, we can get you something new. . . my brain is not functionating."

Now that's what I'm talking about.

Red landed them where the crash happened. He pawed at the snow and, with his snout, nudged Leo's body that was covered in ash, his army jacket burnt and a little shredded, but he himself looked fine, just unmoving. Isa jumped from Red's back and onto the snow covered ground. She knelt beside the boy, getting ambrosia from her bag quickly and giving a bit to him. The girl heard Piper and Jason running towards them.

"Leo!" Jason yelled and then his eyes landed on the pegasus, "Holy shit! What is pegasus doing here?. . . How did you survive?"

"Isa!" Piper threw herself onto the girl.

"Thank Red for that, Jay," Isa said, hugging daughter of Aphrodite, pointing back to the creature, "He saved my life."

"That's Red, as in, your cat?"

"He's a free spirit that found me when I was young," said Isa and she put one of her hands over Leo's heart and other on his forehead, "But apparently, he didn't show true colors because of my dad. Now, he can."

Leo groaned slightly, "Where ─ "

"Lie still."

Leo looked around; he pointed at Red behind Isa, "I'm not hallucinating, am I?"

"No, that's Red, in his true form." Isa said.

The boy nodded, still looking dazed.

Piper sighed in relief, wiping tears as she said, "You rolled pretty hard when-when Festus ─ "

"Where is he?" Leo sat up, making Isa pull her hand away from his body.

"Seriously, Leo," Jason said. "Isa still hasn't done her healing. You could be hurt. You shouldn't ─ "

Leo pushed himself to his feet. Then he saw the wreckage. Festus must have dropped the big canary cages as he came over the fence, because they'd rolled in different directions and landed on their sides, perfectly undamaged. Festus hadn't been so lucky. The dragon had disintegrated. His limbs were scattered across the lawn. His tail hung on the fence. The main section of his body had plowed a trench twenty feet wide and fifty feetlong across the mansion's yard before breaking apart. What remained of his hide was a charred, smoking pile of scraps. Only his neck and head were somewhat intact, resting across a row of frozen rosebushes like a pillow.

"No," Leo sobbed.

He ran to the dragon's head and stroked its snout. The dragon's eyes flickered weakly. Oil leaked out of his ear. "You can't go," Leo pleaded. "You're the best thing I ever fixed."

The dragon's head whirred its gears, as if it were purring. Isa, Jason and Piper stood next to him, but Leo kept his eyes fixed on the dragon. 

"It's not fair," he said.

The dragon clicked. Long creak. Two short clicks. Creak. Creak. Almost like a pattern, but Isa didn't understand it. But Leo did.

"Yeah," Leo said. "I understand. I will. I promise."

The dragon's eyes went dark. Festus was gone. Leo cried. Isa felt her vision blurred and hugged the boy, Piper and Jason following her, saying comforting things.

Finally Jason said, "I'm so sorry, man. What did you promise Festus?"

Leo sniffled. He opened the dragon's head panel. The control disk was cracked and burned beyond repair.

"Something my dad told me," Leo said. "Everything can be reused."

"Your dad talked to you?" Isa asked. "When was this?"

Leo didn't answer. He worked at the dragon's neck hinges until the head was detached. It weighed about a hundred pounds, but Leo somehow managed to hold it in his arms. He looked up at the starry sky and said, "Take him back to the bunker, Dad. Please, until I can reuse him. I've never asked you for anything."

The wind picked up, and the dragon's head floated out of Leo's arms like it weighed nothing. It flew into the sky and disappeared.

Piper looked at him in amazement. "He answered you?"

"I had a dream," Leo managed. "Tell you later." 

Isa looked around for the first time. The large white mansion glowed in the center of the grounds. Tall brick walls with lights and security cameras surrounded the perimeter.

"Where are we?" Leo asked. "I mean, what city?"

"Omaha, Nebraska," Piper said. "I saw a billboard as we flew in. But I don't know what this mansion is. We came in right behind you, but as you were landing, Leo, I swear it looked like ─ I don't know ─ "

"Lasers," Leo said. He picked up a piece of dragon wreckage and threw it toward the top of the fence. Immediately a turret popped up from the brick wall and a beam of pure heat incinerated the bronze plating to ashes.

Jason whistled. "Some defense system. How are we even alive?"

"Festus," Leo said miserably. "He took the fire. The lasers sliced him to bits as he came in so they didn't focus on you. I led him into a death trap."

"You couldn't have known," Piper said. "He saved our lives again."

"But what now?" Jason said. "The main gates are locked, and I'm guessing I can't fly us out of here without getting shot down."

Leo looked up the walkway at the big white mansion.  "Since we can't go out, we'll have to go in."

Isa, Piper and Jason would have died at least five times on the way to the front door if not for Leo. First it was the motion-activated trapdoor on the sidewalk, then the lasers on the steps, then the nerve gas dispenser on the porch railing, the pressure-sensitive poison spikes in the welcome mat, and of course the exploding doorbell. Leo deactivated all of them. It was like he could smell the traps, and he picked just the right tool out of his belt to disable them.

"You're amazing, man," Jason said.

Leo scowled as he examined the front door lock. "Yeah, amazing," he said. "Can't fix a dragon right, but I'm amazing."

"Hey, that wasn't your ─ "

"Front door's already unlocked," Leo announced.

Piper stared at the door in disbelief. "It is? All those traps, and the door's unlocked?"

Leo turned the knob. The door swung open easily. He stepped inside without hesitation with Isa following him with Red back in his cat form, peaking his head from her bag and Jason and Piper behind them.

The house is not a place where Isa would like to live. It screamed dark; not something a child of Iris was used to. From the echo of their footsteps, Isa could tell the entry hall was enormous, but the only illumination came from the yard lights outside. A faint glow peeked through the breaks in the thick velvet curtains. The windows rose about ten feet tall. Spaced between them along the walls were life-size metal statues. There were sofas arranged in a U in the middle of the room, with a central coffee table and one large chair at the far end. A massive chandelier glinted overhead. Along the backwall stood a row of closed doors.

"Where's the light switch?" Jason's voice echoed alarmingly through the room.

"Don't see one," Leo said.

"Fire?" Piper suggested.

Leo held out his hand, but nothing happened. "It's notworking."

"How are your powers not working?" Piper asked.

"Well, if we knew that ─ "

"Okay, okay," she said. "Isa, something."

"No sun, no rainbow." Isa said simply.

"What do we do ─ explore?" Piper asked.

Leo shook his head. "After all those traps outside? Bad idea."

"Leo's right," Jason said. "We're not separating again ─ not like in Detroit."

"Oh, thank you for reminding me of the Cyclopes." Piper's voice quavered. "I needed that."

"It's a few hours until dawn," Jason guessed. "Too cold to wait outside. Let's bring the cages in and make camp in this room. Wait for daylight; then we can decide what to do."

Isa doesn't know when she fell asleep, much more how she found herself on top of Piper, their legs tangled and the Piper's arms wrapped around her waist tightly. It made daughter of Iris blush slightly, hiding her burning face in the girl's neck. And then, a sound of screaming satyr woke all of them. Isa fell down on the floor as Piper sat up suddenly.

"Ahhhggggggh!"

"Coach is awake," Leo said, swearing at the old satyr as he rubbed his eyes.

Gleeson Hedge was capering around on his furry hindquarters, swinging his club and yelling, "Die!" as he smashed the tea set, whacked the sofas, and charged at the throne.

"Coach!" Jason yelled.

Hedge turned, breathing hard. His eyes were so wild, Isa was afraid he might attack. The satyr was still wearing his orange polo shirt and his coach's whistle, but his horns were clearly visible above his curly hair, and his beefy hindquarters were definitely all goat.

"You're the new kid," Hedge said, lowering his club. "Jason."

He looked at Leo, then Piper, who'd apparently also just woken up, then at Isa.

"Isa what are you doing here? Valdez. . . McLean. . ." the coach said. "What's going on? We were at the Grand Canyon. The anemoi thuellai were attacking and ─ "

He zeroed in on the storm spirit cage, and his eyes went back to DEFCON 1. "Die!"

"Whoa, Coach!" Leo stepped in his path, which was pretty brave, even though Hedge was six inches shorter. "It's okay. They're locked up. We just sprang you from the other cage."

"Cage? Cage? What's going on? Just because I'm a satyr doesn't mean I can't have you doing plank push-ups, Valdez!"

Jason cleared his throat. "Coach ─ Gleeson ─ um, whatever you want us to call you. You saved us at the Grand Canyon. You were totally brave."

"Of course I was!"

"The extraction team came and took us to Camp Half-Blood, Isa was one of them. We thought we'd lost you. Then we got word the storm spirits had taken you back to their ─ um, operator, Medea."

"That witch! Wait ─ that's impossible. She's mortal. She's dead."

"Yeah, well," Leo said, "somehow she got not dead anymore."

Hedge nodded, his eyes narrowing. "So! You were sent on a dangerous quest to rescue me. Excellent!"

"Um." Piper got to her feet, holding out her hands so Coach Hedge wouldn't attack her. "Actually, Glee ─ can I still call you Coach Hedge? Gleeson seems wrong. We're on a quest for something else. We kind of found you by accident."

"Oh." The coach's spirits seemed to deflate, but only for a second. Then his eyes lit up again. "But there are no accidents! Not on quests. This was meant to happen! So, this is the witch's lair, eh? Why is everything gold?"

"Gold?" Isa and Jason said at the same time and both of them looked around.

The room was full of gold ─ the statues, the tea set Hedge had smashed, the chair that was definitely a throne. Even the curtains ─ which seemed to have opened by themselves at daybreak ─ appeared to be woven of gold fiber.

"Nice," Leo said. "No wonder they got so much security."

"This isn't ─ " Piper stammered. "This isn't Medea's place, Coach. It's some rich person's mansion in Omaha. We got away from Medea and crash-landed here."

"It's destiny, cupcakes!" Hedge insisted. "I'm meant to protect you. What's the quest?"

Before anyone could explain ( or just shove Coach Hedge back into his cage ), a door opened at the far end of the room. A pudgy man in a white bathrobe stepped out with a golden toothbrush in his mouth. He had a white beard and one of those long, old-fashioned sleeping caps pressed down over his white hair. He froze when he saw them, and the toothbrush fell out of his mouth. He glanced into the room behind him and called, "Son? Lit, come out here, please. There are strange people in the throne room."

Coach Hedge did the obvious thing. He raised his club and shouted, "Die!"

niki speaks!
what do we think about
the small plot twist?
red being a free spirit that attached
itself to isa since she was a child??
i love him
he helped her get to camp
and find gleeson

have a nice day/night!
bye!