【  𝓢𝓐𝓛𝓣 & 𝓣𝓗𝓔 𝓢𝓔𝓐  】

. . . . . ⌗ 017! ───── CRAPPY CHARIOTS! 𖤐 ‧₊˚

———————— ˗ˋ ୨୧ ˊ˗ ————————

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...        𝐓he next few weeks were oddly entertaining. There were no boring chores that the campers had to complete and everyone was fixated on making sure their chariots were beautiful and sturdy. Some campers had put bets on who would win, and they were obviously biased. No one in the Aphrodite cabin had entered the competition, they thought it was pointless roughhousing that would end awfully.

They wandered around camp, observing the different teams working together and creating big plans for a small event. Even more of a reason to not do it: it would be over in twenty minutes.

One morning, a group of sisters, consisting of herself, Freyja and a few other girls were strutting down the canoe lake, gossiping about boys and makeup and complaining about imperfections in their skin. Pandora stayed quiet for that part of the conversation, but spoke back up again when they began debating on the best mascara to use.

"Honestly, it's worked the best for me and it's not clumpy or anything—" The words died on her tongue as she stared ahead of her.

Percy Jackson and Annabeth Chase were huddled together, sketching designs in a notebook and laughing with each other. It was then that Pandora realised that she hadn't really spoken to the blonde this year, and that this was her first time really seeing her. Annabeth was beautiful, to say the least. There was no denying it, it was almost as powerful as her brain. 

"God, I couldn't imagine having one of those things for a brother." Callista sneered, glaring at the two teenagers who nudged one another as a joke was passed between them.

"He's an idiot." Freyja interlocked her arm with Pandoras, noticing her face and mood drop. "Come on."

The group of heavenly-looking girls sauntered past the children of Athena and Poseidon, as Freyja dropped a quick remark: "Do you want some eyeliner for your eye— oh wait, no, wrong brother. . . you actually have both of them!"

The rest of them snickered as they walked off, while Pandora hung around for a second, squinting her eyes down at them. She wanted to apologise for her sisters' behaviour. But when she saw Annabeth mutter a sentence of reassurance in Percy's ear — to which he visibly relaxed at — the burning sensation of rage flickered in her stomach (though she didn't know why) and she no longer felt remorse for the comment that Freyja had made.

"You're not even going to say anything?" Percy asked, sass and disappointment laced in his voice. "No apology? Nothing?"

"I don't see the need." Pandora said, not a drop of empathy in her tone. "She seems to have said enough for your puny little mind to be okay without an apology."

Percy's head rotated towards Annabeth with a frown. The blonde had parted lips and a slack jaw, she looked incredibly confused.

"Come on, we need to help the Hephaestus cabin with decorating." Freyja marched back over, yanking Pandora away from the pair.

Percy stood abruptly, his jaw wobbling as he tried to find the words to insult her back. But his 'comeback' was entirely pathetic. "Well— You— You're just a sheep, Pandora!"

However, he said her full name with such venom that it struck a chord in her heart.

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... 𝐅or the next couple days, Pandora tried to keep her mind off of her crumbling friendship with Percy. She worked at the pegasi stables a few days a week, braiding their manes and weaving ribbons into their hair. The black-haired boy showed up on one of those days, and Silena offered him a riding lesson. She was always so sweet like that. She'd explained about Pegasus and his mysterious location before demonstrating how to ride the winged horses with elegance and control.

On another one of the days, Pandora was teaching the newest recruits archery. Guess who had shown up for that too?

She was beginning to think that he was stalking her. She bit back a giggle at his horrific attempt at scoring a bullseye. Just like last year, he missed by a long shot.

The morning of the race was hot and humid. Fog lay low on the ground like sauna steam. Millions of birds were roosting in the trees — fat gray-and-white pigeons, except they didn't coo like regular pigeons. They made this annoy-ing metallic screeching sound that reminded me of submarine radar.

The racetrack had been built in a grassy field between the archery range and the woods. Hephaestus's cabin had used the bronze bulls, which were completely tame since they'd had their heads smashed in, to plow an oval track in a matter of minutes.

There were rows of stone steps for the spectators — Tantalus, the satyrs, a few dryads, and all of the campers who weren't participating. Mr. D didn't show. He never got up before ten o'clock. Pandora and her siblings sat on the stone steps, playing with each others hair and fixing each others makeup. Some of them were even flirting with non-participating campers.

"Right!" Tantalus announced as the teams began to assemble. A naiad had brought him a big platter of pastries, and as Tantalus spoke, his right hand chased a chocolate éclair across the judge's table. "You all know the rules. A quarter-mile track. Twice around to win. Two horses per chariot. Each team will consist of a driver and a fighter. Weapons are allowed. Dirty tricks are expected. But try not to kill anybody!" Tantalus smiled at us like we were all naughty children. "Any killing will result in harsh punishment. No s'mores at the campfire for a week! Now ready your chariots!"

Beckendorf led the Hephaestus team onto the track. They had a sweet ride made of bronze and iron — even the horses, which were magical automatons like the Colchis bulls. I had no doubt that their chariot had all kinds of mechanical traps and more fancy options than a fully loaded Maserati.

Pandora smirked at her glamorising handiwork on decorating the chariot for Cabin Nine. Silena and Freyja had managed to convince some of the other girls to help the Hephaestus boys out. And so, with a lot of bribery and taking over of chores, Pandora and two other girls had gotten their hands glittered and sticky with glue.

There was some obvious Aphrodite flare to the chariot, but they kept it on theme with the Hephaestus cabin. They had used orange and brown as a colour theme and Pandora had fashioned a bow out of scrap metal and welded it to the front.

The Ares chariot was blood red, and pulled by two grisly horse skeletons. Clarisse climbed aboard with a batch of javelins, spiked balls, caltrops, and a bunch of other nasty toys.

Apollo's chariot was trim and graceful and completely gold, pulled by two beautiful palominos. Their fighter was armed with a bow, though he had promised not to shoot regular pointed arrows at the opposing drivers. Pandora was almost worried that their chariot was comparable to Beckendorf's — appearance wise, of course.

Hermes's chariot was green and kind of old-looking, as if it hadn't been out of the garage in years. It didn't look like anything special, but it was manned by the Stoll brothers, which was never a good thing.

That left two chariots; Poseidon's and Athena's. They were both sort of boring-looking, which made Pandora frown as she believed they were working on their chariots together. A satisfied smirk made its way onto her face as she realised they must have given up or gotten into an argument half way through.

The horses for Cabin Three seemed to be having some sort of issue understanding Tyson's discipline.

"Charioteers!" Tantalus called. "To your mark!"

Pandora watched as Percy took the reins and maneuvered the chariot to the starting line. He gave Tyson a ten-foot pole and told him an order about his job. As much as she wanted to pay attention to the Hephaestus cabin and their embellished chariot, but she just couldn't pull her eyes away from Percy and his stupid, messy hair that never seemed to be tamed.

She also started to take notice of the screeching pigeons in the trees and how obnoxiously loud they were being. She glanced nervously at the trees which shook under the weight of the birds.

"Charioteers!" Tantalus yelled out again, seemingly unbothered by the noises. But when was he ever concerned about anything other than himself and the food he couldn't obtain? "Attend your marks!"

He waved his hand and the starting signal dropped. The chariots roared to life. Hooves thundered against the dirt. The crowd cheered. Pandora clapped her hands, wincing at the loud screech that left Freyja's mouth as she supported Josh shamelessly.

Almost immediately there was a loud, nasty crack. Everyone looked towards the back of the line in time to see the Apollo chariot flip over. The Hermes chariot had rammed into it — maybe by mistake, maybe not. The riders were thrown free, but their panicked horses dragged the golden chariot diagonally across the track. The Hermes team, Travis and Connor Stoll, were laughing at their good luck, but not for long. The Apollo horses crashed into theirs, and the Hermes chariot flipped too, leaving a pile of broken wood and four rearing horses in the dust.

Pandora chuckled and shook her head as the Stoll brothers stood up from their heap on the floor, confusion on their faces.

The Athena chariot was taking the lead, Poseidon not far behind and taking over Ares. Hephaestus was gaining on them, too. Beckendorf pressed a button on the control board and a slid open on the side of their chariot, three sets of balls and chains shot straight towards the wheels of Poseidon's chariot.

Freyja celebrated too early, smacking Pandora's hand with her own in celebration and they laughed. But, Tyson's javelin pushed the Cabin Nine chariot to the side, sending them off-course.

"No!" Freyja screamed in annoyance and rose to her feet. "He shouldn't even be allowed to play! He's not a demi-god—"

Pandora shoved the girl back in her seat, and scolded her for her cruel words. Freyja pouted and huffed like a child while crossing her right leg over her left.

"What the. . ." Pandora muttered, looking up as the pigeons had risen from the trees and formed a tornado-like shape in the air, heading towards the track.

Percy and Tyson were gaining on Annabeth and her team mate, which caused the blonde to glare and tense in her chariot. But no one was paying attention to the race anymore.

The pigeons had begun to dive-bomb at the spectators and swarm the contestants.

Beckendorf was mobbed. Josh had tried to bat the birds away but he couldn't see anything. The chariot veered off course and plowed through the strawberry fields, the mechanical horses steaming.

"Josh!" Freyja screeched, while protecting her hair with her hands. She cried at the swarming.

"My hair!" Callista screamed as the pigeons pecked at her ginger strands.

"Get off!" Pandora yelled as she flailed her arms around, trying to smack the birds out of her vicinity.

In the Ares chariot, Clarisse barked an order to her fighter, who quickly threw a screen of camouflage netting over their basket. The birds swarmed around it, pecking and clawing at the fighter's hands as he tried to hold up the net, but Clarisse just gritted her teeth and kept driving. Her skeletal horses seemed immune to the distraction. The pigeons pecked uselessly at their empty eye sockets and flew through their rib cages, but the stallions kept right on running.

Pandora screamed as one of the birds landed on her shoulders and pecked at the flesh on her exposed arms. With the pigeon now up-close, she could see that they weren't normal birds, but they were mechanical-looking, with beady, evil eyes. She waved her arm frantically, trying to shake the animal off of her, but it was too involved in indulging in the delicious meal that was her arm. Her arm bled as her skin was torn and she grabbed the bird by the wing and threw it on the floor, stomping on it multiple times and breaking it down into a twitching heap of metal.

Another bird began to attack Pandora and she just sobbed in pain and feeling completely overwhelmed. "Why is it me?"

Elio was quick to come the rescue, shoving an arrow into the neck the bird and throwing it away. He wrapped a muscular arm around her and dragged her away from the stands, hoping to shield her a bit more by keeping her in clearer air.

"You okay?" Elio panted out, holding her shoulders.

"No!" Pandora cried, tears running down her cheeks.

She could feel every unorganised strand of hair on her head and every tear of flesh on her arms and chest. She was also, nearly 100% sure she had bird poo in her hair.

Wounded campers ran in every direction, with birds shredding their clothes and pulling out their hair, while Tantalus chased breakfast pastries around the stands, every once in a while yelling, "Everything's under control! Not to worry.'"

Suddenly, a loud song of violins and moaning Italian men began blaring out of nowhere, sending the birds into a fit of torture and craze. They started flying in circles, running into each other like they wanted to bash their own brains out. Then they abandoned the track altogether and flew skyward in a huge dark wave.

"Now!" shouted Annabeth. "Archers!"

With clear targets, Apollo's archers had flawless aim. Most of them could nock five or six arrows at once. Pandora was tempted to help out but she swore that every time she stretched her arms more than usual, she split herself a new wound. Not to mention Elio was firmly telling her no. Within minutes, the ground was littered with dead bronze-beaked pigeons, and the survivors were a distant trail of smoke on the horizon.

The camp was saved, but the wreckage wasn't pretty. Most of the chariots had been completely destroyed and some even lit ablaze. Almost everyone was wounded, bleeding from multiple bird pecks. The kids from Aphrodite's cabin were screaming because their hairdos had been ruined and their clothes pooped on.

"Bravo!" Tantalus said, looking directly at a certain daughter of Ares. "We have our first winner!" He walked to the finish line and awarded the golden laurels for the race to a stunned-looking Clarisse.

Then he turned and smiled at Percy and Annabeth. "And now to punish the troublemakers who disrupted this race."

"You! Pinkie-Pie!" Tantalus pointed a finger in a shaking Pandora's direction. "It was your idea for the secret contraption for the Hephaestus cabin, right?"

"Oh, leave me alone!" Pandora stropped, tears roaming down her cheeks. "You look like you died fifty centuries ago so give it a rest you bag of bones! Oh, and maybe invest in some anti-aging cream you wrinkly freak!"

Percy and Annabeth blinked at Pandora. Neither of them had heard her lash out like that anymore. Percy's face contorted into concern when he saw the dried blood on her arms and realised that she must've been one of the campers that got it the worst.

"Well, responsible for the loud noise that the secret compartment caused or not, you will now be facing punishment with these fine demi-gods." Tantalus said sourly, a glare on his face as she screamed relentlessly at him.

Pandora let out another sob and stormed off to her cabin.

— 𝒋𝒂𝒔𝒎𝒊𝒏𝒆 𝒔𝒑𝒆𝒂𝒌𝒔

was this supposed to be published
yesterday? yes. did i forget? yes.

i've been watching euphoria recently
and i'm so tempted to write an elliot
fic but i need to finish this and my
walker one first so whatever.