Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Chalice of the Gods(16)

My eight-year-old legs were not up to the chase. I’d never been a great runner, and now I was falling behind Annabeth and Grover.

“Hurry!” Annabeth yelled back at me, like I hadn’t thought of that. “Over here!” She bolted toward the play structure with big plastic crawl tubes.

I wanted to ask what her plan was, but I was already out of breath.

“Guys, grab that table!” She pointed to a high café table, the kind you’d stand around to mingle at a fancy party or whatever.

It took me only a second to understand why she wanted it. By now, we’d had enough adventures together that I was usually only a few steps behind Annabeth’s thought process, rather than a few days.

Grover grabbed the top. I grabbed the pedestal base. It was heavy, and I wasn’t nearly as strong as a feral chicken, but we managed to lug the table over to the entrance of the play structure. Annabeth plunged into the tunnel first, then Grover and I followed, pulling the base of the table in behind us like we were corking a bottle. The circular tabletop was just big enough to block the entrance, leaving no room for chickens.

A moment later, the flock slammed into the play structure, making the plastic tubes shudder. The chickens screamed in outrage. But for the moment, we were safe.

“How long until they figure out there are other ways into the tube?” I asked.

“Not long.” Annabeth’s eyes blazed with intensity. I could see how afraid she was, but I also knew she lived for these situations. She was at her most Annabeth when she was thinking her way out of an impossible predicament.

That was good, because we tended to have a lot of those.

“Why chickens?” I grumbled. “Of all the animals . . .”

“Would you prefer jaguars?” she asked.

“It’s because of Hebe’s temples,” Grover said, chewing his knuckle. “The priestesses always kept hens and chicks. Roosters were kept in Hercules’s temple. The birds only got together on Hebe’s holy day.”

“Oh, right,” Annabeth said. “Hebe married Hercules when he became a god.” She shuddered. “I almost feel sorry for her.”

“Hold up,” I said. “Grover, how do you know about the hen/rooster thing?”

“Daycare,” he said miserably. “Hebe sponsors daycare centers for young satyrs. We used to sing ‘Happy the Holy Hen’ every morning.”

Suddenly, I had a new theory about why satyrs aged half as fast as humans, but I decided this might not be the moment to discuss it.

“You’re a member of the Council of Cloven Elders,” I said. “Can’t you ask the chickens to back off?”

“I can try.” He bleated something in Goatenese.

The chickens slammed into the play structure with even more force. A steely beak punctured the plastic between my legs.

“I guess that’s a no,” Grover said.

“Hebe’s holy day,” Annabeth mused. “Baby chicks . . .”

I frowned. “What are you thinking? Some kind of distraction? I don’t have any roosters handy.”

“No, but there were chicks in that coop. . . .”

“So?” I yelled as another beak almost gave me a thigh piercing.

“So we need to get back to the coop. And grab a chick.”

“Killer hens are chasing us,” Grover said, “and you want to run to their coop and steal their babies?”

“Yes. And then run again.” She raised her hands defensively. “Percy, I know you’re going to say this is a terrible idea—”

“This is a terrible idea.”

“—but you have to trust me. Let’s go.”

She crawled deeper into the play tube. I grumbled under my breath and followed. As much as I hated her idea, I had none of my own—and I did trust her.

The tunnel angled upward until we were crawling just below the ceiling. I glanced out one of the Plexiglas bubble windows and saw most of the flock still running around on the floor, squawking angrily. A few of the smarter birds had figured out that, hey, they had wings! Some flapped up and body-checked the play tube. Others ran along the top, pecking at the plastic, but so far they hadn’t figured out how to get to us.

We stopped at a T.

“Grover, go left,” Annabeth said. “Distract the flock while Percy and I go right and make a break for the coop. We’ll rendezvous back at the karaoke bar.”

“Do I get to say this is a terrible idea, too?” Grover asked.

“Just do your best,” Annabeth said. “You’re the fastest runner. You’re also the only one who speaks Chicken.”

“Technically Chicken isn’t a distinct language,” he said, “though many animal dialects sound just like Chicken. . . .”

“Dude, just yell at them,” I suggested. “Do you know any fowl insults?”

“This is a family amusement center!”

“Where they are trying to kill us for complaining.”

“Good point,” Grover said. “I will insult the chickens.” He shouldered past me and crawled down the left-hand tunnel, his hooves moving like cloven pistons.

“Let’s go,” Annabeth said in her best squad-leader voice. And off we went down the right-hand tube.

We slid down a bendy-straw chute and plunged into a ball pit, which wasn’t great for making a quick escape. Fortunately, the chickens were preoccupied. At the opposite end of the play structure, Grover had emerged in all his insult-flinging glory and was bounding across the Skee-Ball machines, throwing the wooden balls behind him, making the hens trip and weave. I remembered some myth about a woman throwing gold apples behind her to slow down guys who were chasing her. Skee-Balls seemed to work pretty well, too.