Jason descended the ramp slowly, warily, just in case there were people waiting in ambush to shoot him the moment he left his ship. There wasn’t anyone. In fact, the hangar was always as it was, empty and deathly quiet.

Jason walked up to the airlock that connected his personal hangar to the transparent, reinforced dome that encircled his entire property. Jason watched, with building apprehension, as Tempest connected to the infrared security system that he had had implemented within the house and on the grounds.

“Sir,” said Tempest, the crude eyes projected on the visor of the robot blinking, “There seem to be no hostiles in the vicinity. Visual and infrared scans have exposed no signs of life on the grounds. However, I believe that Octavian is waiting for you in front of the main entrance. He seems to be in a rather compr—”

When the crowd that had gathered for the early morning had begun to disperse, Nico vaulted over the banister, landed on the dusty yard, rolled across the ground, and then jumped to his feet, arms raised to either side of him as though he had just performed a great acrobatic feat.

What few spectators remained politely clapped their hands as they laughed. “Fantastic form,” said Rakan, walking up behind Nico and patting him on the shoulder with enough force to make him pitch forward and almost lose balance.

Nico looked about and spotted the field of tents that had been set up behind the royal stage for the knights that had started coming in some two or three weeks prior to the tournament.

Percy was fairly sure that Adonis’ interior was just too good to be true. It had to be too pretty to be physically possible. That was the only way that it made sense, not to mention the fact that the interior of the ship seemed a lot larger than it had any right to be, from the outside.

Annabeth kept trying to convince him that Adonis just looked smaller on the outside because of its strange geometry, but Percy wasn’t entirely sure he bought that explanation.

Whatever the case, Percy followed Annabeth’s avatar, openly gawking at the sleek design of the ship’s interior. The hallways were organic and easy on the eyes. There were very few harsh edges, and even the intersections between corridors made it seem like every hall gently curved into the other. Nothing about the ship was precise and clinical, unlike most other starships that served C-Vita Lyrae. Percy almost felt as though he were walking through a modern art installation instead of a starship.

Annabeth’s hand rubbed the small of Percy’s back in slow circles that he supposed were meant to be comforting to him. However, they were less than effective. Percy couldn’t feel her touch, nor so much as the slightest wafting of cool air against his bare skin.

Percy still hadn’t pulled on the top half of the new jumpsuit, but it didn’t seem to matter all that much at the moment. Annabeth had come, just like he’d asked her to, except she had in none of the ways that mattered to him. At least at the moment.

Percy needed a shoulder to lean on, and as far as he was aware, it was impossible to lean on the shoulder of a holographic avatar—no matter how realistic it seemed to be. Underneath the glittering silvery-ness, at least.

The platitudes that Annabeth’s silvery avatar offered Percy did not comfort him in the slightest. His heart was still galloping at a mile a minute, and nothing he tried could get it to slow down. He felt slightly light-headed from all the emotional turbulence that was going on inside of him, and he was starting to think he was losing his mind.