Chapter Text
Frank woke up to the sound of applause, and he worried for a few seconds that he’d accidentally fallen asleep during a Senate meeting again. It only happened once, but it was a mistake he would not be repeating. The only thing worse than cleaning the unicorn stables was being punished with cleaning them alone. He’d had gunk that he didn’t want to guess at the origin of under his finger nails for weeks afterwards.
Once the initial shock of not being in his bed settled, Frank took stock. His head felt like someone had emptied out his brain and filled his skull with jello instead. It was as if two-ton weights were perched on his eyelids trying to keep them shut. Even his back was stiff and sore, like he’d taken a nap on uneven concrete. With a rough-voiced groan, Frank sat up as much as his joints would allow and tried blinking properly awake.
Immediately, he was blinded by bright lights dancing all around his face. A drop of sweat slid down the back of his neck from the heat of a huge overhanging spotlight. The applause kicked up a few notches, and Frank was sure that he was going to have the world’s worst headache if someone didn’t turn down the volume.
Where the Hades was he?
When his vision adjusted to the sensory overload a few seconds later, Frank still didn’t have a good answer to that question. He was squatting uncomfortably on some kind of raised platform that smelled too much like a gym locker room for his liking. The entire thing was covered in a layer of chipped blue paint.
Underneath his perch was...nothing. The platform was free-standing in the middle of empty sky, the ground below nothing but a distant memory. As a guy who’d been a bird more times than he could count, heights were one of the few things that didn’t freak Frank out, but he was hard-pressed to feel comfortable looking at the void of clouds below him.
Around him bustled flying nymphs—all of them familiar in a way he couldn’t put his finger on—operating different kinds of bulky machines, including the spotlight that made him feel like he was standing under a heatlamp. A closer look outside of the ring of bright lights showed that they weren’t just random gadgets, but cameras and microphone stands and…He blinked again and sure enough, it looked like he was the main act on some kind of floating movie set, only he definitely didn’t know his lines.
“Frank?”
Startled by the sudden voice to his right, Frank nearly fell off his platform, managing to catch himself just seconds before he could trip to his death. He whipped his head around to see none other than Annabeth Chase on a platform of her own, her hair wrapped in a faded green t-shirt and a small switchblade gripped in her hand. She was wearing a large blue hoodie that said NEW ROME UNIVERSITY SWIM TEAM and checkered gray pajama pants. The expression on her face was stormy enough to be mistaken for one of Jupiter’s kids. If she felt as bent-out-of-shape as him, Frank couldn’t blame her.
“Annabeth? What are you doing here?”
“ So that means you don’t know either,” she sighed, biting her lip. She gestured to their surroundings. “Which also probably means you don’t know where here is, huh?”
“I do!” Another voice—less like a person just waking up and more a person who hadn’t slept in days—popped up to Frank’s left and this time he only flinched a little at their third companion on his own platform. Leo Valdez in all his glory looked like he’d been napping in a campfire, with ashes coloring his hair gray and soot smeared across his face. He wasn’t wearing pajamas like Annabeth, instead he was in a dark blue jumpsuit with a patch sewn into the breast pocket that said VALDEZ in a uniform red font. Like always, he had a tool belt strapped to his waist, but it didn’t look like the tool belt Frank usually saw Leo wearing. This one was rainbow-patterned and drenched in glitter, with colored marker stains scribbled across the pockets.
Annabeth didn’t even blink at Leo’s addition. She just leaned forward so that she was peering around Frank. “You know where we are?”
“I’m pretty sure I do. Me and Beauty Queen came here on our very first quest with—with Jason.” Frank frowned at the hitch in Leo’s voice, but he didn’t say anything as Leo continued, “This looks like the big wind guy’s studio. We dropped off some storm spirits for him. What was his name? Ailment? Aioli?”
“I am Aeolus!” A new, distinctly godly voice boomed.
Their spotlight surged and blinking flashes of all different colors popped to life around them. The air turned the same shades as Leo’s rainbow toolbelt. Canned applause assaulted Frank’s ears as their platforms climbed higher into the empty air.
A 10-foot tall man in a shiny sequined tuxedo whirled into the space in front of their platforms with the force of a tornado. His hair was stark white and styled like a more fashionable Albert Einstein. Without even consciously thinking about it, Frank found himself clapping at his entrance. A quick glance to his side told him that Annabeth and Leo were doing the same thing.
He wracked his brain through the mythology classes he’d taken since arriving in the demigod world a few years ago. Aeolus definitely had something to do with the sky, what with all the cloud nymphs and their current location. Was he some kind of cloud god? Maybe he did weather stuff, though that was more Zeus’ domain.
It hit Frank a second later when he had to keep his balance against the gales around him. He remembered being in Lord Auster’s palace and hearing the lazy complaints of his servants about their big boss. Aeolus was the guy Auster answered to, the master of all four of the wind gods.
“Welcome, one and all, to the first ever episode of Hephaestus TV’s most anticipated game show of the century! We’ve gathered three unwitting heroes for you today to compete in a raucous 52 minutes—not including commercial breaks—of pure entertainment as they face off against my Wheel of Quests!”
Frank glanced at his fellow unwitting heroes and gulped at how much higher they were now. All of them stood at eye-level with a floating Aeolus. Annabeth no longer had her knife raised in an attack position, but her grip on it looked just as strong under the glare of the studio lights. Leo was rapidly dusting ashes out of his hair and trying to rub the soot from his face unsuccessfully.
Aeolus’ back was turned to him, but Frank could track him on the giant screen propped up in the center of the set of his apparent game show. He made a sweeping gesture and the screen flashed to a new camera’s view, this time showcasing the three bedraggled demigods.
“Let’s introduce our contestants, shall we?” Aeolus started. More canned applause (along with a few obviously fake calls of “Whoop!” and “Yeah!”) sounded. Frank counted his lucky stars that he couldn’t see a studio audience of any kind. Less magical beings they might need to fight to get out of this nightmare. He found himself wishing he’d slept with his migraine medication clutched in his hand like Annabeth probably had her switchblade.
“A heart of gold, a brain of silver, and a shiny knife of bronze, we have the legendary daughter of Athena: Annabeth Chase!”
Confetti cannons shot paper ribbons and sparks of glitter off the sides of Annabeth’s platform. Each boom made Frank wince, but Annabeth didn’t even look phased. Instead, she regarded the camera with a steely gaze and a confident smile. Her shabby pajamas might as well have been royal robes. The only thing that gave away her nerves was her white-knuckle grip on her weapon.
Frank looked down at the stretched pair of basketball shorts and threadbare t-shirt he’d worn to bed last night as the cameras panned to focus on him still awkwardly crouching where he’d awoken.
He tried to summon some of Annabeth’s confidence. Between her, him, and Leo, they were arguably the most detail-oriented of the Seven to get kidnapped together. The odds of them getting out of this with minimal damage looked pretty good as long as they stayed smart about it. And hey, at least he wasn’t shirtless like he usually fell asleep this time of year. Frank was not built for California summers; Vancouver was so much cooler in July.
“He can be a lion, a tiger, or a bear, oh my! But today he’s only here to win, it’s the son of Mars: Frank Zhang!” More applause, this time no less headache-inducing even if the fake audience was cheering for him.
Frank scrambled so that he was standing up properly instead of hunched over as his own confetti cannons went off. He tried to smile for the camera, but a stray ribbon flew straight into his mouth and he spent a few too many seconds trying not to choke to do anything more than an awkward thumbs up at their imaginary viewers.
“And last, but certainly not least: we have the master of mechanics, the star of soldering, the ace of assembly, it's the son of Hephaestus: Leo Valdez!”
The second the camera panned to Leo’s spot, his hands caught fire and sparks shot from his hair. Still covered in dirt, Leo finger-gunned and blew a kiss towards the “audience” like he appeared on game shows all the time. Honestly, it had been a few months since Frank had last seen Leo (if he remembered right, he was hanging around Indiana these days) so maybe he did.
“It’s Leo time, baby!” the demigod in question shouted. The fake applause grew impossibly louder, like it was responding to his enthusiasm. A few lovelorn chants of his name echoed around the studio, and Frank had an inexplicable memory of Leo returning to the Argo II raving about the immortal fan club he'd managed to charm as a trick.
Aeolus raised an eyebrow at Frank and Annabeth as if to say Now that’s a performance. Take notes, before turning back to address the viewers. His teeth looked impossibly white under the glare of the lights.
“What a delightful bunch! I’m sure they’re all resourceful heroes with enough accolades and trophies to fill a room, but will success on the battlefield be enough to survive my randomized gauntlet?”
Oh great. Gods never meant anything good when they talked about sending heroes through a gauntlet. And Frank really didn’t like the sound of “randomized” either. Mind whirring with the possibilities of what could be waiting for them, he tried to remind himself that he wasn’t helpless and he wasn’t alone. They weren’t even in cages, which was a definite improvement to some of the other godly kidnappings that Frank had been a part of.
“Don’t go anywhere and find out after these messages!” Aeolus said as the applause and cheers around them abruptly ended.
It was like a balloon deflating watching Aeolus lose his rigid posture and tight-lipped smile. Dozens of lights shut off and cameras were rolled away. One of the cloud nymphs yelled, “Let’s get the wheel in here!” and all around the studio, nymphs and—Frank gaped when he saw the sheer amount of harpies—began disassembling the structures built around them like they were made of Legos.
Aeolus himself didn’t say another word. Instead, he flew off to a similarly-patchwork studio in the distance, calling for makeup as he went. Now that they weren’t being blinded, Frank could see more sets and stages built in the air around them. Forget a game show, Frank had a feeling Aeolus ran a whole TV network from up here.
None of the nymphs or harpies approached the demigods. Without hulking film equipment or boisterous wind gods bearing down on him, Frank finally felt like he could take a breath. He stretched out his back until it popped and shook out his stiff shoulders. Annabeth and Leo both looked like they were also taking the time to recover from the past few minutes
“Did you guys also get knocked out by a beefy cloud nymph in the middle of a midnight breakthrough and get dragged out of your forge?” Leo asked from the edge of his platform.
Annabeth shook her head, “I was sleeping over at Percy’s dorm. Turned off the lights and closed my eyes only to wake up here. What about you, Frank?”
“Fell asleep on the couch in the Praetor’s Villa,” Frank shrugged. “I guess Leo being kidnapped awake means this isn’t all some shared nightmare then. You said you’ve met this god before?” He turned to Leo.
“Oh, we go way back. We asked him for help, he tried to kill us, you know—the usual demigod stuff.”
“Did he say anything about being trapped on his hit new game show as you were running for your lives?”
Leo pretended to think about it for a moment, “You know, Zhang, I don’t think he did. Does the daughter of Athena with the silver brain remember anything from myth about a random gauntlet?”
“Unless he’s speaking literally, no.” Annabeth sighed, as if to say Why can’t it just be easy for once. Frank could relate. “I don’t think Aeolus ever put heroes through trials in ancient Greece. His claim to fame was more about sending brave demigods on their way with helpful winds and a pat on the back.”
“That’s what I thought,” Leo said. “When we came to give him some storm spirits, he knew Jason from helping him on a quest in his Camp Jupiter days. He almost helped us too, but Big Bad Potty Sludge got into his head before we could.”
The three of them shared a collective shudder at the mention of Gaea. Nearly three years since the end of the Giant War and the memory of the Earth Mother was still enough to send a shiver down their spines.
Frank groaned, trying to break the tension. “I doubt he’s going to do much helping now, but it’s good to know he probably won’t want to kill us outright with the—whatever the wheel he mentioned was.”
He surveyed the whirlwinds of activity happening around them, trying to take a headcount of Aeolus’s employees. “I don’t suppose either of you have gained the ability to fly in the past few months since we’ve seen each other?” They both shook their heads. “Then fighting our way out probably isn’t the smartest move,” he continued, gesturing to the void of sky below them.
“Which means we need to think our way out…” Annabeth said, her mouth turned down in a considering frown.
“…which means we should probably go along with the game show—at least for now,” Leo finished.
Right on time, a nymph with stormy gray hair done up in a 60s-style beehive flitted over to them and shook a clipboard in each of their directions.
“Can you please stand on your cues so we can start rolling again?” She asked, exasperated. “And no more of those pyrotechnics, Mister Valdez. We’re dealing with a lot of sensitive equipment, young man.” Leo spluttered, but she just held up her hand and said, “I don’t want to hear it. Get into position, all of you.”
“Our cues…?” Frank wondered.
The nymph pointed to the floor of his platform where—sure enough—a bright red X marked the center. “Honestly, it’s like none of you have ever been on a set before.”
The trio exchanged looks, but dutifully all moved to stand on top of their respective red Xs.
Frank saw Annabeth’s face shift into a respectful smile and she said to the cloud nymph, “Ma’am, we’re new to the entertainment business and we were wondering about how long filming will take? Is this live?”
“ Ha , it might as well be with the haphazard way Lord Aeolus has decided to film it. I told him time and time again that trying to fit more than one trial into the final cut would blow our budget —pardon the pun—sky high, but he wouldn’t listen!” The nymph shook her clipboard angrily in her fists. “This entire show is going to be prerecorded and premiered in front of a live studio audience on Olympus. That is, if we can finish it within the next 500 years.” The nymph turned towards a harpy who was cleaning the lens of a camera behind her, “Maraschino, what in Hermes’ name is taking you so long to set up? I didn’t realize we hired geriatrics here!” And with that, she flew off without another glance in their direction.
“Any guesses about the trials she mentioned?” Frank asked.
Leo shuffled on his X. “Maybe in show-biz speak, trials is another word for ‘relaxing beach vacation’?”
“Maybe Aeolus has decided to let pigs fly,” Annabeth sighed. “We need to find a way out of here soon. If I had to guess, I’d say the Master of Winds is going to give us some showy, rapid-fire quests to complete, or die trying.” She looked at both of them. “Let’s see what the first trial is, but keep your minds sharp. If one of us sees an opening to escape, we should give some kind of signal.”
Leo perked up, “Like a codeword?”
Annabeth nodded and continued, “It can’t be something we’d say or do normally, but it can’t be too obvious. Do either of you know semaphore?” They both shook their heads. “ASL?” Leo waved his hand as if to say a little bit but Frank shook his head. “The phonetic alphabet?” This time Frank nodded, but Leo shook his head. Annabeth groaned in frustration. “What about—”
“Couldn’t we just use Morse code?” Frank asked. “We’re all familiar with that, right?”
They all blinked at each other. Slapping a palm to her face, Annabeth muttered, “Why didn’t I think of—Yes, let’s do Morse code. Signal ‘go’ when you see a chance to split. We can figure out specifics—”
“Quiet on set!” a voice screamed behind them. Frank finally glanced up from their little corner of the studio only for his eyes to go wide. It looked nothing like the empty set they’d woken up in.
There were large, shiny stones floating behind each of their perches. The stones were too far apart to form a real footpath, but they made a loose trail to a velvety red platform about 30 feet away. Standing on the platform in rigid glory was something that looked a little like the Wheel of Fortune if the Wheel of Fortune had foreboding symbols of doom instead of dollar amounts. At first glance, Frank could make out the shape of a sphinx with its claws out, a cyclops holding a baseball bat, and a brightly burning log.
Even though it had been about a year since he’d rid himself of his cursed firewood, the sight still sent an uncomfortable trickle of sweat down his back. Frank sent a quick prayer to any gods that were currently awake that they wouldn’t have to deal with any fire tonight.
We’re playing it smart, he reminded himself. This was just another quest, and at this point he’d done tons of those. He wasn’t an unclaimed probatio who couldn’t be trusted with any jobs besides feeding Hannibal the elephant. He was Praetor—more than that he was part of a team. Even if the Prophecy of Seven was complete, the seven heroes had faced things much worse than Hephaestus TV’s ratings, and they had faced them together. He trusted Annabeth and Leo with his life and he knew they trusted him with theirs—a trust he’d earned. They could do this.
“Roll camera!” A harried voice said somewhere in the back of the studio.
They’d better do this.
“Rolling!”
“Speed!” The same voice shouted.
Oh gods, he really hoped they could do this.
A harpy wearing a dress made from coke bottle wrappers flew in front of Frank holding a clapboard. In a scratchy voice, she brought the clapboard down in front of the camera and said, “Mark!”
Aeolus burst onto the set in a gust of wind that almost sent Frank flying. He barely recovered in time for the master of the winds to adjust his suit and shout, “Action!” He’d only just caught himself when Aeolus turned on his TV-host charm.
“Welcome back to Aeolus’ Wheel of Quests, the only immortal game show where the quests change every show! On this inaugural episode, Annabeth Chase, Frank Zhang, and Leo Valdez will compete to see if they have what it takes when the stakes aren’t the end of the world itself, just a pitiful end to their puny mortal lives.”
Frank frowned, but Aeolus continued without sparing any of the demigods a glance.
“What will the wheel throw at them tonight? A battle? A puzzle? Maybe even a feat of strength? Only Tyche knows! Can these three heroes of Olympus make it out alive?” With a flourish, Aeolus turned to face the demigods. A spotlight glared hotly against Frank’s face once again, but this time it only served to highlight the matching expression of determination on his and his companions faces.
Frank, Annabeth, and Leo all exchanged a look familiar to any demigod being played with by the gods like a cat toy on a string. The look said, We’ll find a way out, and we’re not letting some immortal tug us around anymore.
Annabeth spoke first. “Master Aeolus, what exactly are we here to do?”
“Did I not just explain it?” Aeolus said, exasperation breaking through his bright tone. “You’ve got to compete against—“
“Right, right, the wheel over there,” Leo butted in. He waved his hand and Frank tried not to flinch at the small sparks shooting from his fingers. Months on the Argo II and a few weeks hosting Leo at Camp Jupiter this summer to help with some of the repairs post-Triumvirate meant he’d gotten used to Leo’s tendency to catch on fire when he was stressed. Or excited. Or tired. Or really feeling any emotion at all. But the sight didn't sit quite as easily in his gut as he would've liked. At least these days he could safely call Leo a friend.
“Makes total sense,” Leo was saying. “It’s just—well. We all see the wheel over there” He pointed to the object in question. “And that’s great, really awesome production value—I love the spokes, that’s high-quality design. It’s just, we thought it’d be best—this being the first episode and all—if you could give a crash course on the wheel. For the audience.”
Frank and Annabeth both nodded vigorously as a contemplative expression overtook Aeolus’ face. “Well…I suppose it would add more tension if the audience knew the exact dangers that awaited you.”
“And danger is very good for ratings,” Annabeth added.
With what was probably the fifth flourish in as many minutes, Aeolus sent a smile to the camera and said, “Very well! I’m sure everyone is on pins and needles wondering what horrors await our contestants, but look no further. On Aeolus’ Wheel of Quests, we leave their odds to the Fates!”
He spun around in a mini-tornado of sequins and hairspray, appearing next to the eyesore of a wheel. Colored light bulbs lit up each spoke and they flashed in a rainbow of hues the closer that Aeolus got to them. Even with the 10-foot god standing next to the display, it looked big.
“ Each of these courageous demigods will have a chance to spin my Wheel of Quests. Every symbol you see represents a challenge I’ve prepared especially for them, but the specifics of what challenge they’ll face will remain a mystery until you hear this sound—” and a loud DING DING DING echoed through the studio. “Once the challenge has been decreed, our heroes will work together to face it, but who knows how long they’ll be able to stand together?”
For once, Frank wished Annabeth hadn’t been right. They were about to be forced into a randomly generated quest. He didn’t have a slingshot, let alone his bow. Annabeth was armed with a knife with a blade barely longer than her pinkie, and Leo’s toolbelt pockets didn’t look like they held much else besides glitter glue.
“Who gets the honor of spinning the wheel first?” Annabeth asked.
“Why, that’d be you, my dear!” Aeolus clapped his hands and the floating stones behind Annabeth’s platform shifted and zipped around until they formed a decent bridge that led straight to the wheel.
Aeolus’ cheerfully blank stare didn’t leave much room for guidance, but the next step in the game show was clear. With only a second of hesitation, Annabeth took one step onto the stone path. When it didn’t crumble under her feet, she took another and another. Soon, she stood in front of the wheel that would decide their fate. It looked even more imposing with a normal-sized human standing next to it.
Frank took a deep breath. He wasn’t going to let a game show prop scare him.
A few seconds passed where Annabeth just stared at it, muttering under her breath too quietly for him to hear. She had the expression that he’d come to know as her “planning” face on. It was when her eyebrows looked darker blonde scrunched together on her forehead, and you could tell she was biting the inside of her cheek. Percy always said it was cute, but to Frank, it signified that some monster was about to meet their untimely disintegration.
Without any change in expression, Annabeth reached a hand to grip the edge of the wheel and gave it a heaving turn.
The click of the spokes was the only sound Frank could hear for what felt like hours. Did she have to spin it quite so hard? While they waited on pins and needles, Aeolus assured them that they’d put music over this part of the show in post.
Finally, the wheel crawled to a stop. A final click echoed around them before the promised DING DING DING sounded. Frank craned his neck to see what the wheel landed on, but he realized he didn’t need to. The symbol appeared hanging over Annabeth’s head like she was getting claimed again, only this time there was no thunderous applause from fellow campers, only a canned studio audience they couldn’t see.
Highlighting the straight line of Annabeth’s back was the abstracted gaping maw of a large sphinx.
“Does that mean we have to fight a freaky cat lady?” Leo wondered to his left.
“It means that you lucky three get to participate in one of the oldest game show traditions known to silly mortals like yourselves!” Aeolus boasted.
“Gladiatorial combat?”
“No, no, you all will be put to the test in an epic round of…Trivia!”