The gang arrived outside the throne room on the second floor a few minutes later, and found Annabeth and Piper guarding the doors. When the girls saw them, they rushed over to meet their friends. "We took out all the ones up above, thanks to Annie's judo moves and my chloroform." She said. Frank raised an eyebrow. "Why do you have chloroform?"

"Anyway, here are your guns. Let's do this fast, not give them any time to get to cover and pull out their own weapons." Jason said, saving Piper from Frank's question. The girls somehow managed to lift their weapons, and the nine of them prepared to breach. Piper, Annabeth Frank, Hazel and Leo would go one way, while Jason, Percy, Artemis and Apollo would go the other.

As he made sure his weapon was loaded, Percy looked at Apollo. "You ready?" He asked, and the music god nodded. "Let's go." He said, before humming the tune to a song Percy vaguely knew.

Jason, who was leading their group, nodded to Annabeth, and the two simultaneously opened the doors. Immediately they could hear a tidal wave of arguing coming from the room.

"Ares is not right!" One exclaimed. "We should get him with his back turned, otherwise he's only gonna kill us all when there's no one else left." The same person preached. His rants were then met with cries of anger.

"You're talking about treason! Our own father! Not only that, but you're suggesting we shoot him in the back? What are you, a pussy?" A girl said. Once again there was an outcry, but this time of agreement. "No, I'm being smart. Dad's not gonna need us anymore at some point, and he'll easily take us all out. He's the god of war, you can't beat him." The same guy rebutted.

"Since when have you ever been smart Javier? You're starting to sound like those dorks from the Athena cabin." Another person spoke.

Peecy managed to peek his head in next to Jason's, and they watched the scene in front of him.

There was a crowd, composed of all the Mars and Ares children. Two of them were in front of the crowd, between Poseidon and Demeter's thrones, and they appeared to be arguing. One was a skinny Latino-looking kid in scrappy clothing, and the other was a buff girl with a bandana on and wielding a heavy pistol.

"You guys are making a mistake," The guy said, pointing a finger at the crowd. "Dad won't need you once Heracles is out. Then he'll exterminate you like rats. I'm warning you." He said. The girl scoffed. "Yeah, okay. You go and play with your little thoughts. If dad turned on us, we could easily take him out. There's thirty of us and only one of him." She boasted.

The Latino shook his head. "Fine, you guys stay. I'm leaving. I'll do better on my own." He said, turning to abandon his siblings. Before he could make it ten feet, the girl had trained her gun on him and shot him in the back. The boy hadn't time to cry out before his body hit the ground.

"If you're not with us, you're against us." She said, putting her gun in its holster and crossing her arms.

"Ares isn't there." Apollo noted from behind them, and Percy nodded. "We should strike now while they're relaxed." He advised. Jason studied the crowd for a moment, then nodded. Artemis gave the thumbs-up to the other group, and together they all stood up.