orenda [leo valdez]

xxxii. Otis Doesn't Do His Pirouette

❝just as the stars shine in the dark

so do you❞

⤷ perry poetry

△△△

Things went wrong immediately.

The giants vanished in twin puffs of smoke. They reappeared halfway across the room, each in a different spot. Percy sprinted toward Ephialtes, but slots in the floor opened under his feet, and metal walls shot up on either side, separating him from his friends.

Piper ran to Nico, and Jason and Kira ran to Otis.

Otis pulled his spear and heaved a great sigh, as if he would much rather dance Swan Lake than kill another demigod.

Kira and Jason shared one look, and they knew what to do.

Kira was the distraction, scampering around and trying to look easy-to-kill while Jason attacked.

Jason blocked Otis' spear, and his tiara fell. Kira sliced it in half, and he gave an evil look at the girl.

Forgetting about Jason, the giant advanced on her, swinging his pear wildly.

The giant insisted on doing a pirouette with every attack, which slowed him down.

Kira used this to her advantage, and stabbed at him every time he pirouetted.

Next to them, sandbags rained down around Piper and Nico. Piper tried to pull Nico to safety, but one of the bags caught her shoulder and knocked her down.

"Piper!" Jason cried. He ran toward her, completely forgetting about Otis, who aimed his spear at Jason's back.

Kira launched herself in front of Jason, using her sword to deflect the spear towards his brother. It flew across the room and skewered Ephialtes through his side just as he was getting to his feet.

"Otis!" Ephialtes stumbled away from his control board, clutching the spear as he began to crumble into monster dust. "Will you please stop killing me!"

"Not my fault!"

Otis had barely finished speaking when Percy's missile-launching contraption spit out one last sphere of Roman candle fire. The fiery pink ball of death (naturally it had to be pink) hit the ceiling above Otis and exploded in a beautiful shower of light. Colorful sparks pirouetted gracefully around the giant. Then a ten-foot section of roof collapsed and crushed him flat.

Jason ran to Piper's side. Kira ran to Percy to make sure he was alright after his fight with Otis' brother.

Sadly, the giants weren't finished. Ephialtes was already re-forming, his head and shoulders rising from the mound of dust. He tugged his arms free and glowered at Percy and Kira.