Chapter Text
Truth is that bridges are generally much cheaper than hotels in the city center:
Travis‘ pov:
Our other train journeys were much more bearable than our first. I really hoped that this stupid horse was still stuck in the vacuum cleaner. During our train ride I saw the sun setting so slowly. Our walk and the train hopping had taken an astonishing amount of time. But what should you do when you are a demigod? I looked at my backpack and became thoughtful. It was weird. Will and Miranda were very trustworthy people, really, I couldn't think of better people to accompany me on a mission. However, there was something... Personal between us.
Both had been part of the faction "don't trust Hermes children" during the first war and even after that I had never really warmed up with them. In the end, I think I was the one with trust issues. I flinched at that. What was that? I never had such thoughts, something like that was usually pushed into the farthest corner of my brain or I just simply lied to myself. Yes, I knew I was lying to myself, but it was all just a self-protection! What's going on with me today? It was almost the same as outside Central Station, where I had just talked about my father. I didn't do that otherwise. I didn't say what I thought. I lied and twisted truths or just kept silent.
There was something weird going on.
Then a thought came to me. A very horrible, horrible thought. An interpretation of our prophecy, in which I really hoped that the next best teacher would come by and write a big, red F on me. Okay, no. I decided to test my theory before I raced out here.
"Hey Miranda? Why are you in camp all year round?"
"I hate my father," she told me, then slapped her hand onto her mouth. Will, too, looked at us in confusion. In every other situation, she always answered this question evasively. She would have her reasons and so on.
I groaned in frustration. "Guys, I have a very bad feeling about this." "What?"
"This last sentence of prophecy. 'The truth advances.' What the truth advances on us? Can any of you lie?" The other two looked at each other.
Then Will began: "I hate... N... N... Nuts. No. I love Nico. No, I hate... damn, you're right, I can't lie.' He looked panicked and I almost got sick. What was a Hermes son who couldn't lie? A nobody, just a shadow of himself, that’s what he was! I got up and walked left and right in distress. "All right. I know we're certainly curious little assholes, but we really shouldn't tell the others stuff about us that we want nobody to know. I have a few secrets that I would like to keep. The phrase 'I don't want to talk about it' should suffice. Miranda, I'm sorry I asked you about that. You don't have to tell us anything about your father."
I didn't even notice how the other two reacted but kept walking. When I didn't get an answer though, I looked at them. They both looked at me quite amazed. "What?" I asked.
It was Will who reluctantly replied to me: "I'm sorry, I just underestimated you, I think. After all the time I was sure you were stupid and childish, I hadn't expected such an adult suggestion from you. And I didn't expect your apology to Miranda."
"What do you think? That I'm a complete asshole?" In response, both looked uncertain. At one point, Miranda said, "I don't want to talk about it?" Frustrated, I groaned. Cool. Great. The two people I now have to travel with for who knows how long think of me as an asshole. "All I wanted for half my life is that people like me and think I’m nice and yet I manage to make everyone think of me as an asshole. Well, great." I dropped back into my seat and looked at the ceiling of the train. Somehow, I really didn't feel well.
"You... Really?" Miranda suddenly asked softly. "What?" "You just want people to like you?" I shrugged. I didn't even notice that I had said it out loud. "I don't want to talk about it," I just muttered. The others at least seemed to respect this and did not ask any further. For the rest of the train journey, I was immersed in my thoughts. I wondered what might have triggered our truth-telling. But I couldn't really think of anything. Sometimes I wish I had a little bit of Athena’s genes in me. Miranda and Will also seemed to be deeply engulfed in thought.
Then Will looked out the window and asked, "How long until Pittsburgh?" "About twenty minutes." "Do you think we'll find a place to stay there? I doubt that we should go any further today. It's late and I for my part didn't have that much sleep last night."
I nodded and added, "And I’m all in to get food first too. I'm starving.” Miranda held her belly, and I concluded that she was feeling no different. Our breakfast and the little snack break were both far too long ago.
When the train finally stopped and we got off, the slightly cooler night air hit me. The day had been incredibly hot again, but the trains had all been air-conditioned, so it had all been tolerable. I kind of hoped that all our fights like the one with the Anemoi would take place in air-conditioned rooms. However, I knew that we really shouldn't be hoping for so much luck. But the monsters could really limit themself to fights in the evening or morning when it’s not that hot, right? A light wind blew around my nose. The air carried this typical evening scent, and I could feel how my body noticeably relaxed. I've always been feeling better when it gets dark. I knew it was the other way around for most people, but I just felt safer when the protection of darkness surrounded me. At the moment this was disturbed by the light of the streetlights, which illuminated everything at least a little bit, but that was just how it was in a city center.
We had walked out of the station area wordlessly and looked around for a fast-food restaurant. We really didn't have enough money for high-quality food. It was also much easier to slap a sloppy McDonald's burger in the face of a monster than a fillet mignon or something.
In the end, my instinct and growling stomach had led us to a subway on Penn Ave. We ordered our sandwiches as take away and I looked around. A cheap hotel would have been my first idea to stay overnight, even if I hated hotels. Too many bad experiences. Nevertheless, I tried to start my internal navigation system with the command "cheapest hotel in the area". As we walked, I ate my sandwich and looked around. The city was amazingly clean. I had never been to Pittsburgh, so I tried to memorize everything I saw. You never knew when you could use it.
When I ate, I threw my packaging into a trash can at a bus stop. The others did the same as me. It only took a moment of silently walking when we weren't busy with food anymore for Will to start talking: "So Travis... you mentioned this morning that sometimes you randomly think of facts about a city when you're there. Do you have anything interesting to say about Pittsburgh? Maybe it helps us with the other two things. Anything about eyes or scales?" I grabbed my chin and thought. Pittsburgh...
"Second largest city in Pennsylvania, after Philadelphia. Also called Steel City, because of the steel industry. City of Bridges, for obvious reasons. Hmm, what else? A lot of museums and relics from the steel industry on display for visitors. And nothing else interesting. At least not for us. If you are interested in the history of steel construction and the industrial revolution, this is the city for you. But as a demigod you will not find anything interesting here. Sorry, I don't have much more." "Hey, that's far more than I expected. You have a really cool ability," Miranda said, smiling at me. The compliment came so unexpectedly that I only managed to say "thank you" bashfully. As far as I could remember, no one had ever described my gift as cool. When I was very young, I was just the weird nerd who has far too much useless knowledge, which other five-year-olds didn't care about. And in the camp the ability became unnecessary very quickly, because there was never really a big trip to go on. And then, of course, there was this whole thing with it connecting me to Luke. Without being able to influence my reaction much, my face dropped.
It was Will who yanked me out of my thoughts: "And it's not even that uninteresting. Do you think any of these steel factories make scales? That would be at least a starting point." I shook my head. "I highly doubt it. As almost everywhere, the steel industry here has been dead for a long time. Just the relics of it are still here as museums and sights. " "Well, maybe it has something to do with it. But that something we can take care of after we have the feather." Miranda and I just nodded and then suddenly we stood in front of a big house. The hotel that my inner navigator had been looking for. Miranda was the one to ask for the price for a night and Will and I secured the surroundings.
A few minutes later, Miranda returned with a grumpy face. She looked at me and asked, "Are you sure this was the cheapest hotel in the area?" I nodded and she continued, "Damn city prices. They charge 74 dollars per night and per person here." "What?!" Miranda just nodded in frustration and I dropped my head in my neck. That would be 222 dollars for the three of us. For one night. They're nuts if they think the average poor teenager could afford that! Well, to be fair, that probably weren’t the kind of people they liked to attract anyway.
"Okay, Plan B. We all have a sleeping bag with us, right? Has any of us not had any experience of being homeless?" It was almost sad that Miranda and I just shook our heads at Will's question. Unfortunately, it was relatively normal for many demigods to live on the streets at some stage in their lives. "Okay, so were agreeing on doing that I suppose. Travis, if this is also the city of bridges, surely there must be one nearby under which we can sleep, right?" I just pointed to the left and said, "Roberto Clemente Bridge, this way."
After a short walk I noticed satisfied that the bridge was already occupied by some people. We looked at each other and mingled with the people. The scene looked like in many places. At one corner, a man laid on several blankets and drooled onto an old magazine. The used syringe was still lying next to him. Two older men sat leaning against a bridge pillar and shared a loaf of bread. And on the other side, there were four teenagers sitting together, all of whom didn't look gender-conforming, which made me think about how shitty their parents must be. One of the four had only one eye.
The young Cyclops looked at us briefly and then turned back again to his friends. They seemed harmless, so we stayed peaceful. We looked for a place as protected as possible and spread out our sleeping bags. Will's caught my eye. There were several embroideries on the side, a few of them looking as if a beginner had embroidered them. Smiling Suns and lyres. I also spotted a crooked grinning cat and two Pegasi. Grinning, I asked him who had done it. "Oh, everyone. The Apollo cabin basically has three sleeping bags at the ready, which we can take with us on quests. Whenever a new Apollo child comes to the cabin, they are allowed to embroider something on all sleeping bags. We actually have a fourth, but no one is allowed to take it with them. The embroidery goes back a few generations and we cannot risk that this might be destroyed."
I laughed, but then nodded affirmatively. It was kind of cool that every cabin had its strange traditions. It made me pretty happy to think about. Will, meanwhile, seemed to be deep in thought. Then he suddenly pointed to the crooked-grinning cat and said, "I did that one. That was the cat that was always laying around my old neighborhood. I had named them Sir Meowlord Catselot."
Both Miranda and I had to laugh at the name. "Hey! I was six, okay?" the Apollo son said, defending his name decision. However, he was also grinning, so I knew he didn't feel offended at our laughs. The conscience that he had just told the truth only made the whole story even better. Smiling, I sat down in my sleeping bag and yawned. Miranda also saw this and suggested that she would do the first night watch, as she was apparently the only one to have slept well last night. Somehow, I was almost jealous. I had spent the last night rolling in my bed and worrying. My intention to go to bed early had backfired terribly, because I was lying in bed but still couldn't sleep. Half the night such a stupid feeling in my stomach accompanied me that I simply had not been able to shake off. But it had an advantage. Now I was tired enough to lie down and fall asleep almost immediately.
Miranda had given me the shift as a third night-guard and wished us a good night after which I had already drifted away.
When I opened my eyes again, I saw... Forest. What? How did I get into the forest? I tried to get up and found that I couldn't move. I wasn't really here; it was a dream. Frustrated, I wanted to be able to scream more than anything. A demigod's dream was the last thing I would have wanted right now.
Even before I could look around, my dream body was dragged through the forest. I got almost sick at the speed, especially when I came to a stop just as quickly. Now I was on a clearing guarded at all corners and ends by a lot... things that I had never seen before in my life. Hairy things with white fur all over their body. But I saw two who seemed to have black fur, but that could only be a strange fashion statement. The monsters also had insanely huge ears. So huge that I would almost laugh at it, if it was only possible in a dream. On one of the monsters closest to me, I could count eight fingers on one hand. Somehow my brain didn't quite get it right. Eight fingers were far too much even by monster standards.
A loud voice, spewing swears and profanities, drew my gaze to the middle of the clearing. There was a huge golden cage. In it was a woman who had her eyes blindfolded. She was tied to all sides of the cage; half of her body was covered by the golden and bronze shackles. She definitely had to be powerful when you really needed so much heavenly bronze and imperial gold just to lock her up. "Of your own free will, you have to be honest, of your own free will!" she cried, and suddenly the smell of smoke filled my nose. The dream changed and I was in a fire. The smoke and flames were all I could see, and I thought I had to die. Could you die in a dream? Desperately, I tried to wake myself up, because I preferred to not find out the answer to this question. But it didn't seem to help, because instead it just got hotter. Struggling for air, I was trapped in my burning dream.
Then I heard a deep laugh and any attempt to breathe was unsuccessful.
Gasping for air, I sat up way to fast. I could see black dots in my vision and I still felt like something tried to stop me from breathing. Vaguely I realized somebody was holding my hand, so I tried to figure out who is with me.
After my vision cleared, I saw Miranda's distressed face.