"THE DANGERS OF FLYING TOO CLOSE TO THE SUN"

Artemis assured them that dawn was coming, but it was colder and darker than ever, the snow blanketing all you could see.
Up on the hill, Westover Hall's windows were completely lightless. Percy wondered if the teachers had even noticed that Di Angelos and Dr. Thorn were missing yet. He didn't want to be around when they did.
With his luck, the only name Mrs. Gottschalk would remember was "Percy Jackson," and then he'd be the subject of a nationwide manhunt... again.

Vera nudged his side, this familiarity felt unwarranted but at the same time, comforting. He looked at her, and she gave him a questioning look, "What is troubling you Perseus?"

That smooth European accent always surprised him.
He looked towards Westover Hall and told her how his previous misfortunes led him to worry about another nationwide manhunt.
"And please call me Percy," he added at the end of his rant.
She nodded, listening, but also deep in thought.

She smirked, "So, Percy, you were that boy a few years ago who was on the news for jumping off a National Monument?"

Percy was a bit surprised. "You remember that?"

"Kind of hard to forget. I always wondered how that boy survived."

Percy blushed at the idea of this girl remembering and even worrying about him. She just had that effect on him when he looked into her purple eyes. Hopefully, the cold was a good excuse for his flushed cheeks and she wouldn't notice.

A commotion broke them out of their eye contact.
The Hunters were breaking camp. And they did it as quickly as they'd set it up.
Percy stood shivering in the snow (unlike the Hunters and Vera, who didn't seem to feel at all uncomfortable), and Artemis stared into the east like she was expecting something. Bianca sat off to one side, talking with Nico. Percy could tell from his gloomy face that she was explaining her decision to join the Hunt. He couldn't help thinking how selfish it was of her, to abandon her brother like that.

Thalia and Grover came up and huddled around Percy and Vera, anxious to hear what had happened in his audience with the goddess.
They glanced at Vera, a suspicious look on Thalia's face, but Percy didn't think much of it. He realized that Vera somehow managed to get a silver parka at some point. It made her look like a hunter, it made him shiver at the thought.

When Percy told them, Grover turned pale. "The last time the Hunters visited camp, it didn't go well."

"How'd they even show up here?" Percy wondered. "I mean, they just appeared out of nowhere."

"And Bianca joined them," Thalia said, disgusted. "It's all Zoe's fault. That stuck-up, no good—"

"Who can blame her?" Grover said. "Eternity with Artemis?"
He heaved a big sigh.

Thalia rolled her eyes. "You satyrs. You're all in love with Artemis. Don't you get that she'll never love you back?"

"But she's so... into nature," Grover swooned.

"You're nuts," said Thalia.

"Nuts and berries," Grover said dreamily. "Yeah."

Thalia turned to Vera, looking her up and down.
"Do I know you?"

Vera stared back at her defiantly, but Percy stopped her, "That's rude Thalia, it's Vera."
She stared at her dumbly, he was hoping the patronizing tone was enough to shut down Thalia.

Thalia sized Vera up one last time and stalked off, her heavy boots trudging in the snow.

Percy shrugged at Vera.

Oh, how little this boy knew. And how much Vera liked him for it all. All his charm and stubborn ability to remember Vera.
Thank the stars Vera found this silly parka, she looked like one of the little hunter girls. A good disguise.

✦ ✦ ✦

Finally, the sky began to lighten. Artemis muttered, "About time. He's so-o-o lazy during the winter."

"You're, um, waiting for sunrise?" Percy asked.

"For my brother. Yes."

Percy didn't want to be rude. He knew the legends about Apollo—or sometimes Helios—driving a big sun chariot across the sky.
But he also knew that the sun was a star about a zillion miles away. He'd gotten used to some of the Greek myths being true, but still... he didn't see how Apollo could drive the sun.

"It's not exactly as you think," Vera said next to him like she was reading his mind.

"Oh, okay." He started to relax.
"So, it's not like he'll be pulling up in a—"

There was a sudden burst of light on the horizon. A blast of warmth.
"Don't look," Artemis advised. "Not until he parks."

"Parks?"

Vera groaned and covered his eyes.
Artemis didn't notice that Vera hadn't even averted her eyes, but made sure that the other kids were doing the same. The light and warmth intensified until Percy's winter coat felt like it was melting off of him. Then suddenly the light died.

Percy looked as Vera removed her warm hands.
(He missed her warmth immediately.)
And he couldn't believe it. It was his car.
Well, the car he wanted, anyway.

A red convertible Maserati Spyder. It was so awesome that it glowed.
Then he realized it was glowing because the metal was hot.
The snow had melted around the Maserati in a perfect circle, which explained why he was now standing on green grass and his shoes were wet.

The driver got out, smiling. He looked about seventeen or eighteen, and for a second, Percy had the uneasy feeling it was Luke, his old f̶r̶i̶e̶n̶d̶ enemy.

This guy had the same sandy hair and outdoorsy good looks. But it wasn't Luke. This guy was taller, with no scar on his face like Luke's. His smile was brighter and more playful. (Luke didn't do much more than scowl and sneer these days.)

The Maserati driver wore jeans loafers and a sleeveless T-shirt.

"Wow," Thalia muttered. "Apollo is hot."

"He's the sun god," Percy said.

"That's not what I meant."

"Little sister!" Apollo called.
If his teeth were any whiter he could've blinded them without the sun car.
"What's up? You never call. You never write. I was getting worried!"

Artemis sighed. "I'm fine, Apollo. And I am not your little sister."

"I was born first."

"We are twins. How many millennia do we have to argue—"

"So what's up?" he interrupted.
"Got the girls with you, I see. You all need some archery tips?"

Artemis grit her teeth. "I need a favor. I have some hunting to do, alone. I need you to take my companions to Camp Half-Blood."

"Sure, sis!"

Then he raised his hands in a stop-everything gesture.
"I feel a haiku coming on."

The Hunters and Vera standing next to him, all groaned. They'd met Apollo before. He cleared his throat and held up one hand dramatically.

"Green grass breaks through snow.
Artemis pleads for my help.
I am so cool."

He grinned at them, waiting for applause.

"That last line was only four syllables," Artemis said.

Apollo frowned. "Was it?"

"Yes. What about I am so big-headed?"

"No, no, that's six syllables. Hmm." He started muttering to himself.

Zoe Nightshade turned to them.
"Lord Apollo has been going through this haiku phase ever since he visited Japan. 'Tis not as bad as the time he visited Limerick. If I'd had to hear one more poem that started with, There once was a goddess from Sparta—"

"I've got it!" Apollo announced. "I am so awesome. That's five syllables!"
He bowed, looking very pleased with himself.

"And now, sis. Transportation for the Hunters, you say? Good timing. I was just about ready to roll."

"These demigods will also need a ride," Artemis said, pointing to Percy, Grover, Thalia, Vera, and Nico.
"Some of Chiron's campers."

"No problem!" Apollo checked them out.

"Let's see... Thalia, right? I've heard all about you."
Thalia blushed. "Hi, Lord Apollo.

"Zeus's girl, yes? Makes you my half-sister. Used to be a tree, didn't you? Glad you're back. I hate it when pretty girls turn into trees. Man, I remember one time—"

"Brother," Artemis said. "You should get going."

"Oh, right." Then he looked at Percy, and his eyes narrowed at the girl to his right. "Percy Jackson?"

"Yeah. I mean... yes, sir."

It seemed weird calling a teenager "sir," but Percy'd learned to be careful with immortals.
They tended to get offended easily. Then they blew stuff up. He wasn't feeling very impertinent at the moment anyway.

Apollo studied Vera too, his eyes trained on her purple eyes, but he didn't say anything, which Percy found a little creepy. He wanted to step in front of her. He didn't trust this god.

"Well!" he said at last. "We'd better load up, huh? The ride only goes one way—west. And if you miss it, you miss it."

Percy looked at the Maserati, which would seat two people max. There were about twenty of them.

"Cool car," Nico said.

"Thanks, kid," Apollo said.

"But how will we all fit?"

"Oh." Apollo seemed to notice the problem for the first time. "Well, yeah. I hate to change out of sports car mode, but I suppose..."

He took out his car keys and beeped the security alarm button.
For a moment, the car glowed brightly again. When the glare died, the Maserati had been replaced by one of those shuttle buses.

"Right," he said. "Everybody in."

Zoe ordered the Hunters to start loading and everyone started moving towards their things.

When Vera picked up her bag, Apollo said, "Here, sweetheart. Let me get that."

Vera recoiled. Her purple eyes flashed murderously.

"Brother," Artemis chided. "You do not help my Hunters. You do not look at, talk to, or
flirt with my Hunters. And you do not call them sweetheart."

Percy thought it odd that she thought Vera was a hunter. She'd said she wouldn't. But she shot him a look, almost pleading. "I'll tell you later" echoed in his head.

Apollo spread his hands. "Sorry. I forgot. Hey, sis, where are you off to, anyway?"
"Hunting," Artemis said. "It's none of your business."

"I'll find out. I see all. Know all."

Artemis snorted. "Just drop them off, Apollo. And no messing around!"

"No, no! I never mess around."

Artemis rolled her eyes, then looked at them. "I will see you by the winter solstice. Zoe, you are in charge of the Hunters. Do well. Do as I would do."

Zoe straightened. "Yes, my lady."

Artemis knelt and touched the ground as if looking for tracks. When she rose, she looked troubled. "So much danger. The beast must be found."

She sprinted toward the woods and melted into the snow and shadows.
Apollo turned and grinned, jangling the car keys on his finger. "So," he said. "Who wants to drive?"

✦ ✦ ✦

The Hunters piled into the van. They all crammed into the back so they'd be as far away as possible from Apollo.
Bianca sat with them, leaving her little brother to hang in the front with Percy, which seemed cold to him, but Nico didn't seem to mind.

"This is so cool!" Nico said, jumping up and down in the driver's seat.
"Is this the sun? I thought Helios and Selene were the sun and moon gods. How come sometimes it's them and sometimes it's you and Artemis?"

"Downsizing," Apollo said. "The Romans started it. They couldn't afford all those temple sacrifices, so they laid off Helios and Selene and folded their duties into our job descriptions. My sis got the moon. I got the sun. It was pretty annoying at first, but at least I got this cool car."

"But how does it work?" Nico asked. "I thought the sun was a big fiery ball of gas!"

Apollo chuckled and ruffled Nico's hair. "That rumor probably got started because Artemis used to call me a big fiery ball of gas."

Vera interjected, "It depends on whether you're talking astronomy or philosophy. Do you want to talk about astronomy? Well, what fun is that? You want to talk about how humans think about the sun? They've got a lot riding on the sun... so to speak. It keeps them warm, grows their crops, powers engines, and makes everything look, well, sunnier. This chariot is built out of human dreams about the sun."
She nodded at Apollo, now closely listening and observing Vera.
"It's as old as Western Civilization. Every day, it drives across the sky from east to west, lighting up all those puny little mortal lives. The chariot is a manifestation of the sun's power, the way mortals perceive it. Make sense?"

Nico shook his head. "No."

Vera's little lesson had piqued Apollo's interest. Which was dangerous enough, but the god could tell the girl was hiding something. Whatever it was, she did it somewhat well, other than her tendency to not consider herself a mortal when she spoke. And this girl seemed to know too much, as well as have pretty distracting purple eyes. Apollo knew that pretty eyes like that often held ugly secrets.

Apollo moved on and chuckled, "Well then, just think of it as a really powerful, really dangerous solar car."

"Can I drive?"

"No. Too young."

"Oo! Oo!" Grover raised his hand.

"Mm, no," Apollo said. "Too furry."

He looked past Percy and Vera and focused on Thalia.
"Daughter of Zeus!" he said. "Lord of the sky. Perfect."

"Oh, no." Thalia shook her head. "No, thanks."

"C'mon," Apollo said. "How old are you?"

Thalia hesitated. "I don't know."

It was sad but true. She'd been turned into a tree when she was twelve, but that had been seven years ago. So she should be nineteen if you went by years. But she still felt like she was twelve, and if you looked at her, she seemed somewhere in between. The best Chiron could figure, she had kept aging while in tree form, but much more slowly.

Apollo tapped his finger to his lips. "You're fifteen, almost sixteen."

"How do you know that?"

"Hey, I'm the god of prophecy. I know stuff. You'll turn sixteen in about a week."

"That's my birthday! December twenty-second."

"Which means you're old enough now to drive with a learner's permit!"

Thalia shifted her feet nervously. "Uh—"

"I know what you're going to say," Apollo said. "You don't deserve an honor like driving the sun chariot."

"That's not what I was going to say."

"Don't sweat it! Maine to Long Island is a really short trip, and don't worry about what happened to the last kid I trained. You're Zeus's daughter. He's not going to blast you out of the sky."

Apollo laughed good-naturedly. The rest of them didn't join him.

Thalia tried to protest, but Apollo was not going to take "no" for an answer. He hit a button on the dashboard, and a sign popped up along the top of the windshield.
Percy had to read it backward (which, for a dyslexic, really isn't that different than reading forward).
He was pretty sure it said WARNING: STUDENT DRIVER.
"Take it away!" Apollo told Thalia. "You're gonna be a natural!"

"Speed equals heat," Apollo advised. "So start slowly, and make sure you've got good altitude before you really open her up."

Thalia gripped the wheel so tight her knuckles turned white. She looked like she was going to be sick.

"What's wrong?" Percy asked her.

"Nothing," she said shakily. "N-nothing is wrong."

She pulled back on the wheel. It tilted, and the bus lurched upward so fast that Percy fell back and crashed against something soft.

"Are you okay?" Vera worried, holding his body in place.

"Yes. Sorry."

"Slower!" Apollo said.

"Sorry!" Thalia said. "I've got it under control!"

Percy managed to get to his feet. Looking out the window, he saw a smoking ring of trees from the clearing where they'd taken off.

"Thalia," Percy said, "maybe lighten up on the accelerator."

"I've got it, Percy," she said, gritting her teeth. But she kept it floored.

"Loosen up," he told her.

"I'm loose!" Thalia said.
She was so stiff she looked like she was made out of plywood.

"We need to veer south for Long Island," Apollo said. "Hang a left."

Thalia jerked the wheel and again, threw Percy. Vera had moved, so he fell into Grover this time, who yelped.

"The other left," Apollo suggested.

Percy made the mistake of looking out the window again. They were at airplane height now— so high the sky was starting to look black.

"Ah..." Apollo said, and Percy got the feeling he was forcing himself to sound calm. "A little lower, sweetheart. Cape Cod is freezing over."

Thalia tilted the wheel. Her face was chalk white, her forehead beaded with sweat. Something was wrong. Percy had never seen her like this.

The bus pitched down and somebody screamed. Maybe it was Percy. Then they were heading straight toward the Atlantic Ocean at a thousand miles an hour, the New England coastline off to their right. And it was getting hot on the bus.

Apollo had been thrown somewhere in the back of the bus, but he started climbing up the rows of seats.

"Take the wheel!" Grover begged him.

"No worries," Apollo said. He looked plenty worried. "She just has to learn to— WHOA!"

They all saw what he was seeing. Down below them was a little snow-covered New England town.
At least, it used to be snow-covered.
As Percy watched, the snow melted off the trees and the roofs, and the lawns. The white steeple of a church turned brown and started to smolder. Little plumes of smoke, like birthday candles, were popping up all over the town. Trees and rooftops were catching fire.

"Pull up!" Percy yelled.

There was a wild light in Thalia's eyes. She yanked back on the wheel, and he knew to hold on this time. This time he grabbed Vera's hand. He was less frightened when she squeezed his hand to comfort him.
As they zoomed up, he could see through the back window that the fires in the town were being snuffed out by the sudden blast of cold.

"There!" Apollo pointed. "Long Island, dead ahead. Let's slow down, dear. 'Dead' is only an expression."

Thalia was thundering toward the coastline of northern Long Island.
There was Camp Half-Blood: the valley, the woods, the beach. Percy could see the dining pavilion and cabins and the amphitheater.

"I'm under control," Thalia muttered. "I'm under control." They were only a few hundred yards away now.

"Brake," Apollo said.
"I can do this."
"BRAKE!"

Thalia slammed her foot on the brake, and the sun bus pitched forward at a forty-five-degree angle, slamming into the Camp Half-Blood canoe lake. Steam billowed up, sending several frightened naiads scrambling out of the water with half-woven wicker baskets.
The bus bobbed to the surface, along with a couple of capsized, half-melted canoes.

"Well," said Apollo with a brave smile.
"You were right, my dear. You had everything under control! Let's go see if we boiled anyone important, shall we?"

As everyone clambered out of the bus, Percy sat there, his heart still racing. Vera smiled, and squeezed his hand one more time before leading him out of the bus.

Percy hoped she'd never let go.
But Vera would never let Percy go.

author's note
happy new years!! here's a SUPER LONG CHAPTER to thank you for all the support and love on this story.