My phone rang right after she said that.

I picked it up slowly. Instead of a familiar name, like, "Paul," or "Mom," or "Annabeth," there were unfamiliar numbers. I pressed the send button and held it up to my ear.

"Hello?" I said warily.

"Percy," a girl on the other end panted. "It's Rachel."

"Rachel?" I said, noticing quickly that Annabeth was right next to me and listening to our conversation. "What's wrong?"

"Can't say." She replied. "But I need you to come here."

"To New Hampshire?" I asked incredulously. "That's like an eight hour drive."

"Don't drive." She snapped quickly. "Take anything- just get here fast."

She hung up.

"Well." I said, annoyed. "That says a lot."

After Annabeth left, I felt a little lonely and tried to finish my homework, but it was hard to with Rachel's phone call echoing in my brain. Why did I have to go?

During dinner, my mom even noticed I was down. We were eating dinner, just the two of us, like before my mom married Paul. Paul was still at the school, finishing up with grading papers and stuff, being a literature teacher and stuff.

"What's wrong Percy?" She asked me. "I thought you loved pasta."

"Sure I do." I said. "It's just that... Rachel called earlier today. She said she needs me to see her as soon as possible."

"Where is she?" My mom asked.

"New Hampshire."

My mom played with the spaghetti with her fork. "I don't want you to leave so soon, again, Percy. I just got you back."

"I know, I know," I said. "It's just pretty urgent, apparently. I have to get there."

My mom exhaled. "Just promise me you'll be safe, okay?"

"Sure," I told her. "That much I can promise."

***

I really hate demigod dreams.

The point is, they're never normal dreams. I mean, they're be prophecies, glimpses of the past, or whatever. Anything but normal dreams.

Rachel was running in a dark alleyway, at night. Her clothes were grimy, but they weren't the usual T-shirt and crayon jeans, it was more like a formal shirt and a skirt. Her crazy red hair was greasy, weighing it down. there was dirt smeared onto her clothes and face, and she was breathing really hard. She stopped and took out her phone from her skirt pocket. I noticed that she was wearing heels. She clicked a few buttons and grimaced. She slid it back in her pocket.

"Nothing." She sighed. She looked behind her warily as if a monster were to pop up randomly.

Rachel leaned against the wall of a building. It was still summery, but she shivered. She kicked off her heels and sat there barefoot. She took out her phone and started pressing random buttons.

I was dragged out of my dream by the sound of my phone ringing. Groggily, I picked it up and blinked at the bright light it projected. I scanned through the text that Rachel sent to me.

603-785-2056 texted: Percy, where are you???? You deed to be bear.

I realized the last sentence was supposed to say, you need to be here, but my dyslexia just made it hard to read. I tried to text back to her, but my progress was slow. I'm coming tomorrow, I texted.

I quickly speed dialed Annabeth. Impatiently, I waited for her to pick up, my eyes darting around the dark room. I quickly noted that my clock read 2:18 am when Annabeth finally picked up.

"Percy?" She mumbled groggily. "It's 2:20 in the morning. I thought you weren't a morning person," She accused me weakly.

"I'm not." I replied, yawning. "Its just that Rachel just texted me."

There was a small moment of silence. "So?"

"I'm leaving tomorrow." I said gently.

I could feel her shock and sorrow and even a little jealousy when she hung up the phone abruptly.

Instead of calling her back, I opened up a new text.

Do you want to come with me?

I waited a few seconds before her text came back to me with one word:

Yes.