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Demetri was torn on how to respond to Mary. Should he simply just ignore her existence so they could get this training over with as quickly as possible? Or should he lean into it and fight a bit more. If he was being honest, he missed Zeke. It wasn't nearly as fun to fight with these other campers. Jason was too aggressive and physical, Mary couldn't sling an insult to save her life, Andy was too sweet, Arthur too young, Rebecca too cool, and that left Leda which...he just didn't want to. Ugh there must be someone else on-board who could bring that spark in him that filled the otherwise black void he called his heart. Demi merely rolled his eyes at Mary's response. Arms crossed as he nodded along to what it was Alannah was saying. He gave a bit of a whistle as she mentioned again the fight with Gaia, showing some interest in the tale while secretly hoping they didn't meet the same fate.

Once she finished he clapped his hands together rubbing them a bit before speaking. "Right then. That sounds massively epic, I'm sure (and hoping) we dont fall into a similar situation here and that we have smooth sailing for the rest of the journey. Here that pops? No funny business k? So we have a joystick control, non inverted controls, radar for monsters, celestial bronze plating for safety and escape, red button to help others evacuate to safety as well and ibfeel like I'm forgetting something..." he paused for a moment, pacing as if to think. His pace quickened as he got near Mary and shifted into a large white goose honking at her and showing off the rows of teeth both on his bill and the sides of his tongue. His neck lunged forward as he honked in the hopes to scare Mary. He turned back into himself, falling onto his back and in laughter as he wiped a tear from his eye.

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Arthur's frustrations quickly went away as the most adorable puppy formed in Rebecca's hands. He liked cats more, but it wasn't like he couldn't not immediately fall in love it. Cooing for a moment, he looked the cute thing in one of it's pairs of eyes, before turning his attention back to the task at hand. As the attention shifted to playing a game, he thought for a moment, looking Andy over. He believed she'd get in a fight, and she didn't have any real objections about the ship yet, so he believed those two. By process of elimination, he figured she must've gotten the knife from something else, so he proclaimed, "You must've gotten the dagger some other way, because you didn't get it from a monster."

He continued to respond with his own take on the game, saying, "How about this, I like cats quite a bit more." He said, conjuring a three headed kitten, in one hand "Birds are even better though!" He said, as he stuck a hand to the ground, as bones swirled around his hand, forming into a bird on the fingers of his other hand, "And I'm secretly a prince of a small country you've probably never heard of." He said, as a small tiara sat on his head. In his experience, a lie that was close to the truth was the best kind, and even if it seemed outlandish, he bet that would throw them off. A slightly annoyed look crossed his face at the end of his statements, but he was happy to see he finally seemed to be gaining some kind of control over his powers.

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Leandra raised her eyebrows when Leda openly insulted her, though peculiarly enough, the senator didn't seem displeased. In fact, there was a smile on her lips. She looked oddly...impressed. "A truth-telling tongue can be a very powerful thing in New Rome. I'm all too interested to see what else yours is capable of," she said, a coy smirk propping itself up on her lips. She gave a satisfied nod as the Greeks faded from view, before her attention was quickly snagged by Madalyne. The amused look fell from her face, taken over by a small, tight-lipped frown. Her eyes scanned the room in search for someone to defend her, but she found no one. The people who wanted to appeared to be too afraid to do so, and others appeared to be nodding along eagerly, ready to obey their mistresses. What a bunch of kiss asses. She didn't let it annoy her too deeply. It wasn't their opinions she valued. Without another word spoken, she stood from her seat, giving a bow that was far too deep and dramatic to be in any way genuine, before taking a seat, and opening her book back up as Nancy began to speak.

Leandra Lovelace was a woman of the people. Or, at least, she always tried to be. Her job had her working among them, taking requests, getting signatures, keeping up with everything going on with everyone. There were few names in New Rome she didn't know. They were her people. She kept her ear to the ground, listened to what they had to say, and brought it up with her to the senate house. To silence her was to silence them. That's what infuriated her the most. She was their voice in the Senate, and she'd been silenced for defending herself. She'd been telling the truth when she'd said that she had been planning on bringing up finances only after the meeting had been discussed. Even so, their dismissing of the importance of penny-pinching didn't sit well with her, but she wasn't surprised. It wasn't them who'd have to pay when funds started running out. It was the people on the ground. The already uncelebrated legionnaires who'd have to work twice as hard on half the food, the probatios who'd have to clean the latrines without proper health safety equipment, the children who'd have to shiver away the winter nights because their blankets were thin and insufficient. They would be the ones to suffer.

Even Madalyne's decree that her cohort would be the only ones setting up the landing pad seemed like an unjustified and tyrannical attack on her. Dumping the entire endeavor on her cohort would surely put them behind as far as battle preparations, and if something massive truly was coming, that wasn't something they could afford. Miss Crane was setting them up to be canon fodder. She wasn't sure if it was because of the praetors' personal dislike for her, or if it was done out of a lack of respect for the lower cohorts, but both were plenty plausible. She couldn't let that happen. So as Nancy spoke, Leandra wrote in her book, setting up shifts at which a certain number of people would be setting up the landing pad, and the rest would be training, ensuring maximum efficiency on both ends. Of course she listened to Parker's description of the vision too. She'd have to be a fool not to, and she was no fool. On the page opposite to her planning of the landing pad shifts, she'd scribble down bullet points, listing any important tidbits Nancy would drop. Had she been able to ask questions, she'd have asked if Nancy had been chained up with the other demigods as well, or if she was free. But she wasn't so she simply kept her eyes on her pages and wrote.

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Ezekiel smirked and chuckled, shaking his head. "I mean, there's an aspect of us knowing we'll get the job done when it matters but your sarcasm is correctly placed Janelle. And for your information Kristin, I am a lovely gnat. The best one out there," he said before the bus driver announced it may be awhile. "Unfortunately Janelle, this will be no All-America family road trip. There will be plenty more mysterious stops and detours we will have to survive. And I do mean that in the literal sense." He liked Janelle, he wanted her to be as prepared as she could be and to succeed. If only to shove it in the others faces that she could do well and was brave and that Ezekiel could keep them safe.

Ezekiel watched Kristin leave the bus and stood, sliding the sun pendant back into his pocket while he grabbed his pack. He brushed Janelle's upper arm with his hand so she knew where he was and if she wanted to grab his elbow again. "We shouldn't leave her alone out there. I'm going to go stand at the bottom of the steps if you want to follow," he said. He headed down the small walk way and onto the bottom step. "What's the verdict," he asked Kristin. He looked out at the landscape around them, trying to see if he could notice anyone or anything watching them or getting ready to attack them. "Well, there's something or someone out there alright. I just can't get a sense of where," he noted. "Come out, come out wherever you are," he taunted. It probably wasn't the best play but Ezekiel didn't want to play games.

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Janelle was just listening to what the others were saying, figuring they probably knew more about their situation then she did, having been on a quest of their own before. It made her wonder just how often people were sent off on quests to go save the world or something like that, since so far from what she knew this sort of thing seemed to happen more often then you would have thought. That wasn't exactly very comforting, knowing that the world seemed to like ending or trying to anyway. Her attention was quickly drawn by the bus stopping and the sound of Kristin instantly getting up to get off the bus.

"...What's goin ahn?" she instantly asked as Zeke more or less said that they shouldn't let Kristin off the bus alone or something. When Zeke offered her his arm again, she gently grabbed on and followed him to the doorway of the bus. Her eyes (despite not really seeing and all of that fun stuff) grew wide as she heard the sounds of something nearby. "I 'ear 'ooves, dey aren't too clahse though. wait a minute dat's naht quite right..." she said to the both of them, as if she was focusing on something. "Dey are just beyond de treeline.

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He watched as the kids sat there trying to manipulate the mist or whatever the hell it was, he couldn't help but smile somewhat at the pair. "Looks like dey're gettin de 'ang o' it," he commented towards Lauryn, nodding back towards Andy and Arthur. "Ahh, I figured based ahn what you all were actin regardin de situation. Doesn't surprise me dat dat din is cahmmon," he responded to her comment regarding everything not exactly having a dull moment. It was something he could tell just based on what had happened so far.

Hearing the comment regarding playing a game or something to get to know each other or something, Jason just shrugged. "I'm all for playin a game o' some sort, it'd prahbably be a whole laht o' fun. Unless de keds want to keep oehp wit creatin all o' de illusions usin de mest ahr whatever it's called. he responded to Lauryn's suggestion with a bit of a shrug. Though it sounded like Arthur might be all for just messing with the Mist or something at this point.

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Mary nodded her head towards Alannah as she was talking about how the escape pods worked, before she turned to look at Demetri as he decided to make a fool of himself a bit more by turning into a Goose of all things. A goose? Who the hell would be scared or startled by a goose? Clearly Demetri was running out of creativity or something regarding this whole thing. "So, let me get this straight, you find it funny to make a fool of yourself since you think that people are afraid of geese? Wow that's a bit of a stretch Demetri, honestly," she said towards him with an eye roll.

An idea formed in the back of her head, and she more or less smirked at Demetri, before she giggled slightly thinking about it as she looked at him. "Now, I'm not afraid of geese, though there might be one animal, who you as a child of Zeus might want to learn to fear considering it is the sacred animal of Zeus' fickle wife Hera." With those last words, she proceeded to shape shift herself (an ability she has that she doesn't tend to use) and shifted into a cow, before she promptly turned around and sat on Demetri, not getting back up again. It didn't matter that she didn't exactly have arms or hands or something, instead, she crossed her front hooves, as if she was clearly crossing her arms annoyed.

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Argo III Crew Deck:

"A game would be fun, and Two Truths and a Lie would be perfect." Lauryn said giving a smile to them as she looked towards Jason for a moment and then stared at Arthur who started to make some illusions of his own, which was pretty amazing to see as well. Lauryn was about to start her turn when the entire crew deck of the Argo III was filled with a heavy mist. And it was there for a minute, everyone would be able to see three figures, the first one was a feminine figure while one was shaped like a dog, while the other was on the feminine figure's shoulder, which looked more like a ferret of some kind.

When the mist finally cleared it was Hecate herself, she looked over at the little group of demigods before her though she was mostly focused on Rebecca, and Andy at the moment and gave Arthur a smile. "Two Truths and a Lie is an excellent game." Hecate said, the Polecat that was on Hecate's shoulder Rebecca would instantly know that it was Gale, and the Black Labrador was Hecuba two of Hecate's former enemies who she had turned into animals. Gale climbed onto Arthur's shoulder before letting out a gasy fart right into his face which would stink really bad, and Gale making some chattering sounds.

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"See you guys when we get there." Kiera said waving to the Romans who were there, she wasn't sure how things were run over there but watching them all argue was actually really entertaining to watch as well. She looked at Leda and smiled laughing a little bit, it had been really entertaining to watch, she had to wonder if they ever actually got into any kind of physical fights at all. "So, what now?" Kiera asked, when she started to hear some loud squawking or goose sounds and some laughter as well coming from the wheelhouse and looked towards Leda for a moment. "I'm going to check that out." Kiera said as she made her way over towards the wheelhouse.

Alannah couldn't help but start laughing seeing Mary shifting into a cow and sitting on top of Demetri, seeing Mary even crossing her hooves like she was crossing her arms. "And they say that karma is a bitch." Alannah said laughing some more, mainly at Demetri's misfortune of being a cows seat cushion. Demetri would be completely fine, even having a thousand pounds of Cow Mary on him Kiera would poke her head in seeing a cow sitting on Demetri and started to laugh as well. "Well this is just as entertaining to see." Kiera said giggling some more.

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Madalyne looked towards Leandra for a moment, though she didn't like the way that she had spoken to her friend Nancy was pretty much family to her and Niah as well. She would of course defend them not matter what happened, though Madalyne did feel bad for abusing her power over Leandra to basically silence her for the rest of the emergency meeting. Madalyne then went back and sat down in her seat looking towards Nancy as she spoke about the prophecy that she had seen. Though the Second Titan War, and the War with Gaia were things that happened while she was still trapped within the Lotus Hotel and Casino she knew that the visions were still serious regardless.

She was surprised that they were all in the vision as well, and it was something that she did not want to really know either but there wasn't much that she could do about it right now. She made a note to go and confirm with their Augur Alexandra, Nancy's half sister, with the vision as well. "Nancy and I can go see Alexandra to confirm things for sure, also increase the guard detail around Camp Jupiter and New Rome increase security." Madalyne said looking over at the other Senators within the building. "If anyone has any issues any votes on that we should reconvene tomorrow morning?" Madalyne asked, as hand started to raise agreeing to come back in the morning and discuss more on the matter tomorrow.

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Kristin knelt down to get a better look before yanking out the arrow, and started to look at it very closely, turning her attention over towards Zeke and handed him the arrow. "I'm not sure but someone who has really good aim." Kirstin said as she looked towards Janelle when she asked what was going on. Kristin couldn't be sure really either if she was honest and turned towards the treeline squinting her eyes a little bit to get a better look. When another arrow came flying at the three of them luckily it missed and embedded itself into the side of the bus.

Kristin quickly pulled out her spear and went to stand by Janelle just in case looking over at Zeke he was their archer right now. Zeke would be able to see what looked like a figure of a Centaur in the distance before disappearing again into the treeline. Sadly Kristin didn't have a bow on her as she looked at Zeke. "What do you see?" She asked looking at Janelle for a moment as well. "Can you try and see if you can hear some more?" She asked her.

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Rebecca tilted her head at Andy, considering Andy's three statements. All of them seemed reasonable for a daughter of Zeus, the king of Olympus. If she had to guess, she would have gone with the lack of fear of heights as being the lie. The others were just so typical for demigods and the last one seemed to be so obviously Andy's attempt at passing off a small lie as an easily believable truth. However, her attention was quickly caught by Arthur's rapid progress with manipulating the Mist. She had heard that children of the Big Three tended to have an easier time with the Mist than others (not more than the children of Hecate, of course), but it still was a bit awesome to see. "Well done, Arthur!" Rebecca gushed. "We'll make a witch of you yet."

The son of Ares, Jason, seemed to be more content with observing than participating. Rebecca didn't mind that. In her opinion, the children of the god of war were probably the most ill suited when it came to learning magic. Whereas Athena had some associations with magic, Ares was all about violence and brute force - none of the dedication and seriousness required for magical craft.

Suddenly, the room filled with a thick and heavy mist, cloaking everything like a fog. Her heart quickened its pace as she made out three figures in the mist. She instantly knew that her mother, the Queen of Witches and Ghosts, had arrived on the Argo III. The last time she had seen her mother had been that winter, when she and the other year rounders took a trip to Olympus for the Winter Solstice. With her mother present, Rebecca stood up a little straighter, trying her best to impress her. Her mother was the Goddess of Magic, her idle, and she wanted desperately to be her mother's favorite daughter.

She got the sense that Hecate was here with a warning, here to impart something important perhaps. "Mother," Rebecca said softly. "We're all blessed to have you here... Everyone, this is my mother, Hecate, the Triple Goddess, Queen of Witches and Ghosts."

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Leda was smirking a little bit after the Iris Message ended. As much as she felt the Romans were a dysfunctional mess, it was nice to know that she was attractive by both Roman and Greek standards. After all, she was fairly certain that the blonde, Leandra, had been flirting with her due to that little bit about her tongue. She secretly hoped that it would make Kiera feel a little bit jealous. She started to giggle again, looking at the wheelhouse with confusion. "What the bloody hell is going on in there?" she asked, shaking her head.

She followed Kiera without a second of hesitation, essentially moving from one source of entertainment (the Real Housewives of New Rome) to the next (A cow???). Her jaw dropped, seeing the son of Zeus underneath a cow. The cow had its front hooves crossed, looking almost angry or disappointed. She scanned the room quickly, noticing that Mary wasn't there. She then started laughing her head off as Leda put two and two together. Mary was a shapeshifter. She must have turned into a cow, probably picking it since the cow was sacred to Hera, Zeus' wife. "That's fucking ace," she cackled. "Better get used to being sat on by cows, Hera's no doubt going to be gunning for ya, mate," she advised Demetri.

Leda could barely hold back her laughter. "We made contact with the Romans - they're a rotten mess, tons of arguing with each other, real nightmare. They're making a spot for us to land outside their camp, since, well, y'know what happened the last time Greeks showed up with a flying ship named after the Argo."

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Nancy nodded, approving of Niah's initiative to arrange emergency war games. They were going to have to drill the Legion for just about every scenario they could think of - unfortunately, her prophecy hadn't indicated what types of maneuvers would be the best, so they'd just need to be ready for everything. "Rad. We'll definitely need one for with the Greeks. Increasing the guards and security is great, but we should also fortify, build some traps. We can rotate the cohorts through on building duty so as to not overtire anyone..."

Her voice had trailed off for a moment, her eyes looking at Leandra. She hated herself for what she was about to do. "Leandra, I'm placing Alexia Fernández in charge of fortifications and traps. Your cohort will rotate through with the others until the Greeks arrive, at which point you'll be playing host... And yes, you can verbally acknowledge this order." There was one last thing that she wanted to make clear before allowing this session to end for a reconvening the next day. In her vision, the demigods had been chained up at the shrine to her father. "I also want imperial gold weaponry stashed at the shrine to Apollo. We can't change the prophecy - the demigods will be chained there - but we can at least be prepared for it and have weapons easily accessible for cutting those chains."

As Madalyne then motioned that they end the session for the moment, Nancy took a brief moment first. "Madalyne and I will be available if you need us," she told them, before raising her hand in favor of ending the session. They had a lot of work to get done. They needed to speak to Alexandra to get confirmation of the prophecy, maybe even more details. Niah had war games to plan. The cohorts would be busy building traps and fortifications. Madalyne and Nancy would need to be in deep planning, thinking of different strategies that they could employ in an attempt to survive. And of course, she had to hope that her father wouldn't mind if Nancy turned his shrine into a weapons cache.

"Long live Rome."

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Andy wasn't certain what Jason said. She couldn't figure it out past his accent, but it didn't sound like he made a guess about what Arthur's truth and lies were so she made a guess. "I'm just gonna go with the most outrageous one, you're not royalty...right? You got mine right. A random homeless dude gave it to me." She said and pulled the knife from the bracelet to show it off, then returned it.

When the strange woman appeared Andy didn't know who she was, but she guessed the woman was a goddess. Or an enemy. Andy half stepped behind Rebecca who seemed like she knew what was going on, her hand was back on her bracelet ready. But then Rebecca introduced the woman. Andy's eyes went wide. This was the first goddess she had met. She had met Dionysis so she could say the first god. Andy also had a theory about her homeless friend who had given her the knife, but she wasn't ready to voice it yet.

"Hi, I'm Andy." Andy had no idea how to properly introduce herself to a god. So she went with a basic introduction. She lifted her chin trying to look brave.



Niah was still angry at Leandra, but now was the time to deal with that. That was for after the war that was looming over them. She did some mental calculations. The battle would be fought on Rome territory they could do a lot to prepare for it. They had a lot of practice with engineering chaos because of the war games. Nancy was right to put Alexia Fernández in charge of setting traps.

Though, something caught as strange. There were only four from Rome who were involved in Nancy's vision, but it took place on their land. Precautions were definitely going to be necessary. She considered her invisible sword and if they had anything else similar that could be secreted on the four of them. Yes, she was including Leandra in that because their survival was a team effort.

"I have no further questions." Niah said, her stuff was mostly packed up, but she pulled out her sketchbook real quick and made some notes. "Long live Rome." Niah added to the cheer. She didn't have to dilly dally though. She needed to get the emergency war games set up and ready.

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Demetri was still laughing, wiping some tears from his eyes as Mary spoke out about his little prank. "Hey, geese are plenty scary. They're vicious and nasty and have teeth on their tongues!" He was so distracted by her dismissal of the goose that he hadn't caught her warning before she shape shifted. Her weight crushing down on him but not enough to actually hurt him. "I'm not gonna lie, I'm impressed by your shifting as much as I am with your humor." He spoke through clenched teeth and in between breaths as he attempted to push her off of him. A futile feat given the circumstances. He couldn’t stay down there for long, and he really didn't want to breathe in any methane that may escape down the hatch and towards him.

With his short breath he chuckled out "I'm not quite sure which fate would be worse. Your cow self sitting on me and crushing me...or just regular old you. But I suppose this look is a bit of an improvement." He doubted she could see but he stuck his tongue out in a joking manner, accompanied by a wink. The tongue however was a horrible idea as he could taste the cow stench now and nearly gagged as he transformed himself into a gorilla. Using the new animals strength Demetri pushed Cow Mary off of him and moved a bit away, knowing she may try to kick or ram him because of what he just said. Sure it wasnt nice but it was all in the spirit of fun. He tried shifting back and noticed he hadn't budged, half worried half glad that he was still in this state.

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Leandra's lips pursed when Nancy addressed her, her writing ceasing and her head tilting up from her book to look at the bushy-haired praetor. Her eyebrows slowly furrowed together as Nancy spoke, raising her pen up to rest against her chin, listening to the command with a small, thoughtful frown. There was a silence for a few seconds, even after Nancy gave the blonde senator permission to speak. She cast her gaze down at her notebook, where the outline of a system involving the rotation of Cohort 4 between training and setting up the landing pad sat written in black ink. This new...development meant that she'd have to make some edits to it, and her cohort would be spread even thinner. After a few seconds, she looked back up.

"Preparing for the Greeks, helping with the traps, and preparing ourselves for the war to come? That's quite the workload...but I suppose if anyone can do it, it's Cohort 4. Though I will be submitting a request for a minor withdrawal from the celebratory feast funds. Just enough for coffee and pastries in the mornings, and quality spreads in the afternoons. Good food results higher morale and better work," she said, before looking down at her notebook. She lowered her pen to write, but before it hit the paper, she pulled it back, the way one would if they almost cut the wrong wire of a bomb. She looked puzzled for a moment, before speaking again. "I'll write up a quick schedule concerning which cohorts will be aiding my co-centurion with the battle preparations at which times. It might be a bit sloppy, given our time restriction, but I'm sure it will do." Even if a messy timetable were among the things that the people of Camp Jupiter would worry about in the time of crisis, they wouldn't have had to. Leandra's version of 'sloppy' was still more straight-laced and organized than many people could ever hope of achieving.

"Long live Rome...and her people," Leandra stated, raising her own hand to vote to adjourn the meeting, decorated with pink acrylic nails sharp enough to be afraid of, with her pen resting between her thumb and forefinger.

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Smiling at Andy, he very pointedly didn't tell her if she was right or not. About to gush about his recent mist related achievements, he was cut off as the room filled with mist. This was odd, to say the least, and he was ready to attack whatever the hell came out of there. It seemed, however, that Rebecca wasn't perturbed much by the phenomenon, or at least, she wasn't afraid. That kept him from throwing his knife blindly into it at one of the figures, but he was still on his toes. He never knew what to expect any more, and that meant he was always a little on edge.

As the woman stepped towards them, coming into sight, he watched the ferret run up is shoulder, and gagged as it farted. Coughing, and glaring a bit at it. If Rebecca hadn't made it clear that this was a god, he probably would have thrown it off himself immediately, but now he was afraid of what wrath that might impose. Giving him a little pet, he followed Andy's suit, also unsure of the protocol for introducing himself to a god "And uh, I'm Arthur, Miss Hestia... Ma'am?" He said uncertainly, he wanted to ask why the Goddess had just shown up here, but he didn't know how rude that would be.

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Ezekiel took the arrow from Kristin and frowned a little at it. He weighted it in his hands and flipped it over to get a good look at its make and to see if there were any markings on it. All that he noticed was the faint golden glow of the celestial bronze arrowhead and he sighed. ”Well, safe to say whoever shot the arrow is here for us. Celestial bronze is no joke,” Ezekiel said and handed the arrow to Janelle so she could get a feel for it. ”Do try not to cut yourself. Something like that passes straight through mortals but for creatures, gods and demigods, that will do a whirl of damage.”
Another arrow shot out at them but the archer either had poor aim or was giving another warning to them. Ezekiel peered out, following Janelle’s direction of the something big and bad being near the tree line, when he saw the shape of a Centaur and frowned. Mentally he noted how impressive Janelle's hearing was but continued to focus on the task at hand. ”It looks to be a Centaur,” Ezekiel said and stepped off of the bus. He withdrew his own bow and notched an arrow. ”Starting to miss the flesh eating horses,” he noted. The Centaur drew back into the trees and Ezekiel kept his bow ready at his side. ”I’d rather not venture into an unknown forest, especially if there is a herd of them. If we do engage in fighting, I’d like to draw them out,” he said and looked at Kristin. A dramatic option was Ezekiel trying to light the forest on fire, he would leave the less dramatic ideas to Kristin and Janelle.

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Mary clearly wasn't too amused by what Demetri was saying, and so instead, she just aimed and sent her back leg flying back to kick him. Her first attempt missed, however, her second attempt at kicking him was successful as she hit the target where she was aiming. What had been her target exactly? Right where it would hurt directly below Demetri's waistline, with enough force that it was definitely going to be more then a bit sore. With a flick of her tail, she instantly started to shift back into her normal self, and unlike Demetri, she had shifted back to normal.

"Wow, performance issues much Demetri? Or are you planning on staying as a big ape, though not sure if that would be much of a downgrade considering your typical personality, but eh, whatever," she said with a shrug before turning to look at Leda as she spoke about the whole thing with Rome. "So glad you agree with my animal choice, however that's a good thing, the idea that they at least are now aware that we are coming. Showing up unannounced is never a good thing to do when you are trying to make friends."

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Jason nodded as he was somewhat distracted a bit by what was going on with the illusions that the two younger kids were creating. They seemed to be enjoying themselves, and honestly he was still questioning why the hell the kids had been allowed to tag along. Especially considering the fact that they weren't very old, and they truly shouldn't have gone on some crazy adventure or whatever, especially since last he checked it was entirely possible that they could get killed. This was not a good thing to have to deal with at their age.

Of course, there was then the sounds of someone randomly appearing out of nowhere in the room, and he turned to look at the woman who had appeared with a dog of sorts and another animal or something on her shoulders? Who the hell was this person? Of course, others in the room instantly knew who she was, and the most obvious being Rebecca, who introduced the woman as her mother, the goddess Hecate. Jason wasn't even too sure what to even say regarding that, so he figured it might be best to just keep quiet and see what was going to happen.

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Janelle took the arrow carefully from Zeke, moving her hand along the arrow head carefully as she examined it by feeling the arrow. From what he was saying, it wasn't going to be an easy thing, since these things were meant to hurt demigods easily. "Wow, this is no joke of a weapon..." she muttered a bit, as her head perked up, hearing the creatures in the trees ahead of them. Zeke saying he'd rather not venture into an unknown wooded area made sense. Without knowing how many enemies were ahead of you, then there was no way to tell just how much danger you'd be putting yourself in. No, it was better to wait a little bit until maybe they could figure that out.

She cocked her head to the side as she closed her eyes (even though it didn't really do anything since she couldn't see to begin with) and took a deep breath, listening to the world around her. "...I can hear one, in the trees directly in front of us," she commented opening her eyes, before she tried to tell if there were more. "I-I-I think there is only one..." Janelle added, before she heard something else, and that one turned into more. "Wait, there are more, I think I hear 5 of them now... Which means there probably could be more..."

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Argo III Crew Deck:

Hecate turned to look at her daughter and gave her a loving smile. "It's good to see you again my daughter." Hecate said while Gale started to sniff at the tiara that Arthur had made with the mist, and then started to try to knock the thing off of his head. Lauryn was pretty quiet as well for the most part and looked at Jason to see what his expression was, when Hecate spoke looking over at Andy and Arthur.

"Unfortunately you are incorrect I am not Hestia Goddess of the Hearth, Home, and Family." She said shaking her head a little bit at Arthur and turned her attention fully on Andy. "You will find the family that you seek in New Rome, search the family archives there." Hecate said giving Andy a slight smile, now addressing everyone in the room. "There is an artifact that was originally mine, it is very powerful you and the Romans must keep it safe from the upcoming war." Hecate warned, when she looked over seeing Desdemona came out from her room seeing the woman there, and picking up some of the conversation and eyed the goddess up and down for a moment.

"You don't look much like a goddess to me." She said shrugging slightly, Hecate glared at the girl before snapping her fingers, and Desdemona was turned into a little goldfish. Gale immediately stopped messing with Arthur's tiara and instantly ran over and ate the goldfish rather quickly before climbing back onto Hecate's shoulder she gently petted the little ferret under the chin. Lauryn's eyes going wide seeing what she had done.

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Kiera wasn't really sure what was actually going on or why Mary was a cow, but it was still really funny to watch seeing Demetri being sat on by Cow Mary. "Damn I should have taken a picture of you crushing Demetri, that would have been really funny to see." Kiera said with a few laughs. Kiera watched as Demetri started to shift into a gorilla and managed to push Mary off of him, though Mary had other plans, she and Alannah winced seeing Mary kicking Ape Demetri in the nuts. A part of her was actually glad she wasn't a guy otherwise it would have really hurt like hell.

"Remind me to not piss you off Mary." Alannah said laughing a little bit it was actually really entertaining, as she turned to Leda as she announced that they made contact with Camp Jupiter. "That's good to hear then, the last time that we came there it kind of caused a war during the whole Gaia thing which isn't a good thing at all really." Alannah said looking at the two of them. "Did they bring up anything else?" Alannah asked and Kiera shook her head slightly. "Nope other than that they are going to make a landing zone for us, and meet us there as well." Kiera answered.

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"Long live Rome." Madalyne said as the other senators left, she looked towards Leandra for a moment and gave the girl a slight nod before turning her attention Nancy and stretched out slightly. This day was certainly going to be really interesting with another war coming soon and it was something pretty big as well by the sounds of it. "Well lets go see your annoying half sister Alexandra." Madalyne said as she looked towards Niah and smiled towards her friend for a moment and nodded towards her. Grateful that Niah was willing to set up the training scenarios for what was to come next, she kind of hoped that Niah would follow the two of them.

Madalyne made her way out of the senate building, there was a building not to far from the Senate Building and Madalyne opened the door, as she looked around. The area looked to be a rather large mess like always entrails of stuffed animals were everywhere, though there was something new. "Alex?" Madalyne called out as she made her way deeper into the room, and stopped to see that Alexandra was busy at work with a large painting and in a trance. Seeing the painting up close looked almost exactly like how Nancy described it, and she noticed the blonde and ginger in the painting as well from the Iris Call, Nancy would recognize this as well.

Leandra would feel a tap on her shoulder when she turned around it would be Maggie Ortega, one of the former Praetors that came before Madalyne and Nancy and gave her a slight smile, holding a little baby in her arms. "Seems like you got your work cut out for you." Maggie said as she looked over towards Niah and smiled giving her a friendly wave and smile, it wasn't uncommon for former Senators or Praetors to come out and help as well as give any advice or pointers as well.

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Kristin looked at Zeke and Janelle when Zeke said that it was a centaur which she found pretty weird since they usually did work with demigods. She then smacked her forehead remembering that there was a subspecies of Centaur that worked with Gaia, they were the ones most likely trying to kill them. They were pretty violent as well when it came to fighting them from what she heard from other campers, Kristin looked at Zeke and Janelle. "So, they aren't the friendly ones like Chiron." Kristin said as she looked for an opening but couldn't see one, and with Janelle pointing out that there were five instead of just a single lone one.

"Janelle and I will jump them, you just draw them out alright?" Kristin said, sure she could easily pick up a bow and use one, but she didn't have one on her at the moment and Zeke was the only archer around right now. Kristin gently touched Janelle to let her know which way to go drawing out her spear from her bracelet, Zeke would be able to see one of them now as it came out from behind the treeline.

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Rebecca bit back a slight smile as Arthur called her mother Hestia. She hadn't heard of someone get those two mixed up before, yet it was amusing to imagine her mother tending to the hearth and home - and Hestia awaiting unsuspecting travelers at crossroads, armed with dark magic. Laurynn and Jason both had fallen silent, which Rebecca could understand. Her mother was a titan and had a certain reputation to her. She had even sided with Kronos in the Second Titan War. "What sort of artifact, mother?" Rebecca inquired. There were tons of artifacts and relics in the world sacred to Hecate and Rebecca would have been surprised if only one was present in New Rome. She was happy though to know that Andy would also receive some information about where she came from as well.

Mona, the daughter of Aphrodite, came out of her room and Rebecca smiled pleasantly at her, motioning for her to come join them. Unfortunately, Mona opened her mouth and openly disrespected Hecate. Rebecca winced as her mother changed Mona into a goldfish and then Gale ate Mona, before darting back up onto Hecate's shoulder. It had been a very long time since Hecate had killed a demigod. She remembered something Chiron had told her once - that a demigod could go anywhere and challenge anyone, as long as they were brave enough. Mona certainly had been brave to say the least. And stupid.

"And, blessed be, where might we find this artifact?" Rebecca asked, aware of the cold tension in the room.

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Demetri had turned himself into a gorilla to combat Cow!Mary and Leda snickered, especially as Mary brought up his inability to perform. Mary had turned back into an ordinary human girl, her red hair positively sparkling in the light. For a brief moment, Leda's ADHD prompted her to realize that easily half of the demigods on their trip were gingers. Weren't gingers only one percent of the population or something like that? "I honestly doubt we'll make friends with the Romans," Leda admitted with a shrug. Sure, the camps had better relations than they had in the past, but that wasn't saying much. After the Civil War, where the Romans sided with the Confederacy and the Greeks with the North, the gods had manipulated the Mist to keep the Greek and Roman demigods apart. Their reunion had ended in another fight between the two groups and here they were, flying to New Rome and expecting a new result.

"How goes learning to fly the ship?" Leda asked, leaning back casually. "Or is it still shape shifter fight club?" After all, once she and Keira finished up with the Iris Message, they had come in here to see Mary sitting on Demetri as a cow. She wouldn't have been particularly surprised if they hadn't even gotten started on learning the controls. Demigods tended to have ADHD - that wasn't really helpful for standing and paying attention and listening carefully, when fighting was just so much more fun and engaging.

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Nancy gave Leandra a weird look, a mixture between confused, angry, and disgusted. She didn't really see why Leandra needed to mention bringing up a request for coffee and spreads - that seemed like something she could have just done without needing everyone to know. Of course, everything Leandra did and said annoyed Nancy to no end. She would have complained about Leandra's breathing if there wasn't anything else to be irritated by. She briefly daydreamed about snapping Leandra's acrylic nails. Maybe she'd have to ask Terminus to classify Leandra's nails as a weapon so she couldn't bring them into New Rome. That'd be amusing.

"Oh gods, that sounds fun," Nancy said sarcastically. She wasn't especially close with the other children of Apollo. For the most part, people tended to stick with their cohort. They weren't like the Greeks where everyone lived with their half-siblings. Nancy doubted she even knew all the names of her current siblings at Camp Jupiter. To be fair though, her father was a bit of a slut. She went with Madalyne to the augury, instantly fixating on the painting that Alexandra was making. It was almost identical to the vision she had seen, just with two exceptions. The surroundings didn't look like New Rome or Camp Jupiter. The gem she had recovered with Niah and Madalyne last summer was in the center of the shrine as well.

"That's not New Rome... Or Camp... So where is that?" Nancy murmured. As much as she didn't like her sister, she wasn't going to shake her or demand her to snap out of the trance.

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Ezekiel smirked and nodded. ”Yes, definitely not a friendly Centaur and I think these ones will give us more than detention if we act out,” he joked poorly. He turned and took the arrow back from Janelle and replaced it with the regular one on his bow. He stepped forward, taking a stance and took aim at the Centaur who revealed himself again. ”I swear if I’m about to kill Chiron’s cousin or something,” he muttered before taking a deep breath and released the arrow. It hit its mark but didn’t take the Centaur down. This fight wasn’t going to be an easy one. ”Don’t take unnecessary risks,” Ezekiel found himself saying to them all.
He notched another arrow and took aim again. ”Cover your ears.” The sound would travel away from them but initially, the sonic boom of the arrows would be loud and he assumed Janelle would be more sensitive due to her heightened hearing.
Before he could get a shot off though, two more Centaurs came out of the trees and fired. Both arrows hit their mark, one in Ezekiel’s shoulder and the other in his thigh. He sucked in a breath, initially only feeling the impact and then the pain spread through him and he hissed, cursing a series of brilliant swear words. Even a few British ones that would make Leda proud. ”Turns out they have good aim,” he told Kristin through gritted teeth. The arrow in his thigh would be manageable but the one in his shoulder was going to prove difficult when it came to firing arrows. All the same, Ezekiel seemed to be coping with the pain. Thanks the gods for pain tolerance and adrenaline.
He picked up his bow and took aim, breathing through the pain and relying solely on the adrenaline pumping through him. He released the sonic arrow, listening to it screech through the air until it silenced when it hit its intended target and the first Centaur fell to the ground, dead. He dropped his bow arm down to give it a rest. ”I’ll cover you from here as much as I can but I don’t know how stable I can keep.” He couldn’t move much with the arrow in his thigh and until he had time to assess the damage, he wasn’t going to pull it out and risk bleeding out.
Children of Apollo with the healing factor were great in a fight. For others but they couldn’t heal themselves.

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Demetri saw the hooves barelling towards him as he held out one apeish hand and managed to stop their attack. The sudden appearance of Kiera and Leda however triggered his short attention span as his mind forgot and neglected Mary for the moment, allowing her to land a hit directly where it hurts most. Demi placed his hand there and howled in pain as he leaned againt the wall and shifted back into his normal shifted self. Still holding the soar spot as he slowly slid down the wall until his tush made contact with the floor. "That's just a low blow there Mary. Even Zeke wouldn't stoop so low." He spoke through gritted teeth and coughs as he leaned his head back in pain.

They'd mentioned this Gaia thing quite a bit now, both with the fall of the last Argo as well as now with the Romans. Making a mental note to look into the matter later when he was back at camp and away from most of these people. As he sat quietly for a moment he thought of Zeke, wondering how he was doing and hoping he wasn't in as much pain as he was right now. Sure Zeke may of been a jerk but at least if he ever got physical Demi didn't fully mind it. Speaking through closed eyes he answered Leda. "Oh its been going down right swell. Learned quite a bit honestly but I'm more curious about these Romans and how we are going to meet them or even be welcomed by them. From the sounds of it we aren't exactly chummy."

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As the meeting came to a close, Leandra arose to her feet, eyes still glued on her book. Her pen, guided by her steady hand, formed lines on the page straight enough to cause a ruler to have an identity crisis. A grid began to form as she did so, but she stopped when she felt the light tapping of a finger on her shoulder. She let out a sigh as she turned around, expecting to see one of the unpleasantly stern faces of the camp’s praetors, but she was pleasantly surprised when she saw who really approached her. Maggie was quite the friendly face around New Rome, and she got on as well with Leandra as she did with just about everyone else. Leandra let her shoulders drop, a smile replacing the the concentrated frown she'd previously worn.

"Oh, Madame Ortega! I cannot tell you how lovely it is to see a pair of eyes that isn't looking at me like I'm the uninvited drunkle who decided to crash the wedding," she joked, casting a glance over at the remains of the senators dispersing from the meeting. Any disdain for them she had was hidden behind her eyes, away and out of sight. She then looked back to Maggie, giving a single nod. As she began to speak again, her eyes lowered to the baby in the woman's arms, and, friendly smile on her face, she held a finger out for the baby to play with, with its tiny little hands. "Yes, I do suspect it'll be quite the busy few days. But I think my cohort and I will be able to handle it. The only problem will be making sure that we don't fall behind as far as training. Something's brewing, and I'm not going to let my people be the first to die when the war begins."

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Watching Mona be turned into a fish, and then eaten, Arthur couldn't help it as a look of disgust and horror crossed his face. she was a person, and a friend at that, and he couldn't cope with the death of another. He wanted to tell the Goddess to bring her back, to to ash out, but he knew that would strike the ire of this superior being, something that would result i his death as well. Once more, all he could do, was run, and run he did. Not even saying anything to Rebecca, he dashed away, heading for his room, and locking it behind him. He could feel panic rising in him, and a scream erupted from his lips.

Tears began falling down his face, he couldn't do this again. The gods had taken two people from him now, for seemingly arbitrary reasons. Mona said something stupid, but that didn't merit death. How would anybody think this was okay? It was horrid and evil, separated from any semblance of morality. His heart felt like it was going to explode out of his chest, and the world started to fade to black in front of him. His head spun, he couldn't deal with any of this. It was too much.

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Andy's jaw dropped, but she quickly closed it. She had a family. Hecate had confirmed it. Andy had no idea what she was supposed to look up in the records. She didn't even have a name to go by. The name Phillips was just one the system had given her. Heck, her first name probably wasn't actually Andy. But if Hecate was right, then she had a family at the Roman camp who might know. Or know who her mortal mother was. Andy had never really wanted to meet her mortal mother, she had wanted family, but not the person who had dumped her before she could even talk.

Andy was considering asking Hecate for advice on what to look for when Mona came into the room. The next few seconds went by so quickly Andy didn't even realize what had happened at first. Mona was there, then she was fish, and then the fish had been eaten by the weird gassy animal of Hecate's. Arthur bolted from the room. A lot of emotions went through Andy all at once. She wanted to fight Hecate, wanted to bring back the friend of Arthur's. She wanted to ask what more information Hecate could give her about her own family. More importantly, she wanted to be there for Arthur.

Andy looked between Rebecca and Hecate and then ran after Arthur. The only place he could go to be alone was his room so she went there first. She knocked gently. "Arthur, can I come in?" Her voice was quiet, but hopefully loud enough for him to hear.



Niah gave Ortega a warm smile and a quick wave to the baby. She would have to find some time before the Greeks showed up to shower the baby in love. Niah had no desire for children of her own, but she did adore babies. Niah considered what she needed to do and decided to find out more information about what they potentially facing was more important than either squeezing the baby's cheeks (it didn't help that Leandra was already playing with them).

"The Greeks are on their way. It seems like we have another Great Prophecy. I'm going with the Praetors to find out as much as I can about what we are expecting so I can get some war games set up to train the cohorts accordingly. I do need to play with your new little one as soon as possible. So if you need an hour or something I'd love to watch them for you. Just let me know." She said and then hurried after the Praetors to the Augury.

She arrived just in time to hear Nancy talking about the painting. Niah looked at the gem, her mind flashing to the danger that they had gone through to get it back. They had been told it was very important back then. She supposed this might be why. A war was being fought with it at the center of it all. "Where are there temples to Apollo? Other than here? Or, what if it is moved?" Niah had been thinking about having a couple of tunnels built that went to the temple, but now she worried it wouldn't help at all.