Percy Jackson & the Olympians

"Atlantis?" "That's a myth." "Uh... don't we deal in myths?" "No, I mean it's a made-up myth. Not, like, an actual true myth." "So this is why Annabeth is the brains of the operation, then?" "Shut up, Grace."

"I'll succeed. And Hecate? I'm not choosing one of your paths. I'm making my own. We're going to find a way to stop Gaea. we're going to rescue our friends from Tartarus. We're going to keep the crew and the ship together, and we're going to stop Camp Jupiter and Camp Half-Blood from going to war. We're going to do it all." "Interesting. That would be magic worth seeing."

"Maybe love was no match for ice... but Piper had used it to wake a metal dragon. Mortals did superhuman feats in the name of love all the time. Mothers lifted cars to save their children. And Piper was more than just mortal. She was a demigod. A hero."

"My mother showed me the truth. I was fighting against my own nature, and it brought me nothing but misery. Giants are not meant to love mortals or gods. Gaea helped me accept what I am. Eventually we all must return home, Praetor. We must embrace our past, no matter how bitter and dark."

"His mother's unkept promise was at the core of who he was. He'd built his whole life around the irratation of her words, like the grain of sand at the center of a pearl. People lie. Promises are broken. That was why, as much as it chafed him, Jason followed rules. He kept his promises. He never wanted to abandon anyone the way he'd been abandoned and lied to."

"Your beloved has unleashed a special curs-a bitter thought from someone you abandoned. You punished an innocent soul by leaving her behind in solitude. Now her most hateful wish has come to pass: Annabeth feels her despair. She, too, will perish alone and abandoned."

"Percy tightened his grip on Annabeth's wrist. His face was gaunt, scraped and bloody, his hair dusted with cobwebs, but when he locked eyes with her, she thought he had never looked more handsome. "We're staying together," he promised. "You're not getting away from me. Never again." Only then did she understand what would happen. A one-way trip. A very hard fall. "As long as we're together.""

"What have the demigods given you? They have erased your old self, everything you were. Titans and giants... we are meant to be the foes of the gods and their children. Are we not?" "Then why did you heal the boy?" "I have been wondering that myself. Perhaps because the girl goaded me, or perhaps... I find these two demigods intriguing. They are resilient to have made it so far. That is admirable. Still, how can we help them any further? It is not our fate." "Perhaps. But... do you like our fate?" "What a question. Does anyone like his fate?"

"Tartarus was in a class all by himself. He was more powerful than the gods or Titans. Demigods were nothing to him. If Percy charged to help Bob, he would squashed like an ant. But Annabeth also knew that Percy wouldn't listen. He couldn't leave Bob to die alone. That just wasn't him-and that was one of the many reasons she loved him, even if he was an Olympian sized pain in the podex. "We'll go together.""

"You've got the wrong impression." "You've got the wrong impression, if you think you can attack me and take me captive. Where are my friends?" "Unharmed, right where you left them. Look, it's three to one and your hands are tied." "You're right. Get another six of you in here and it might be a fair fight."

"Talking to enemy statues now? Futile. You have roughly two minutes of life." "Oh, but I don't abide by your time frame, giant. A Roman does not wait for death. She seeks it out, and meets it on her own terms."

"As always, the subject of Bianca lay between them like a loaded gun-deadly, easy to reach, impossible to ignore."

"So what if he was a hero? So what if he did something brave? Evil was always here, regenerating, bubbling under the surface. Percy was no more than a minor annoyance to these immortal beings. They just had to out wait him."

"Oh, did you expect me to play fair? I am the God of love. I am never fair. [...] "Is this guy Love or Death?" "Ask your friends. Frank, Hazel, and Percy met my counterpart, Thanatos. We are not so different. Except Death is sometimes kinder."

"Percy didn't feel powerful. The more heroic stuff he did, the more he realized how limited he was. He felt like a fraud. I'm not as great as you think., he wanted to warn his friends. His failures, like tonight, seemed to prove it. Maybe that's why he had started to fear suffocation. It wasn't so much drowning in the earth or the sea, but the feeling that was sinking into too many expectations, literally getting in over his head."

"Percy, let me go. You can't pull me up." His face was white with effort. She could see in his eyes that he knew it was hopeless. "Never"

""It's natural to feel fear. All great warriors are afraid. Only the stupid and the delusional are not. But you faced your fear, my son. You did what you had to do, like Horatious. This was your bridge, and you defended it."

"If this invisible guy was Love, Jason was beginning to think Love was overrated. He liked Piper's version better-considerate, kind, and beautiful. Aphrodite he could understand. Cupid seemed more like an enforcer."

"You remind of my own children, Jason Grace. You have blown from place to place. You are undecided. You change day to day. If you could turn the wind sock, which way would it blow?" "Excuse me?" "You say you need a navigator. You need my permission. I say you need neither. It is time to choose a direction. A wind that blows aimlessly is of no use to anyone."

"Get in the elevator. I'll hold the button." "Yeah, right! You promised, Seaweed Brain. We would not get separated! Ever again!" "You're impossible!" "Love you too!"

"When she died, the words would probably be written on her tombstone: There were too many of them."

"We're going to run out there together." "Then what?" "I have no idea." "Gods, I hate it when you lead."

"Never assume you're safe, and never, ever tempt the Fates by announcing that you think you're safe."

"You're late." "Sorry, Sunshine. Traffic was murder." "You are covered with soot. And you managed to ruin the clothes I made for you, which were impossible to ruin." "Well, you know. I'm all about doing the impossible."

""You should've died for your crimes. That was the punishment. Instead you got exile. You should have stayed away. Your father Orcus may not approve of broken oaths. But my father Hades really doesn't approve of those who escape punishment." "Please!" That word didn't make sense to Nico. The Underworld had no mercy. It only had justice."

"You could make even the most terrifying topic easier to talk about by framing it as something that happened to a couple of Cherokee hunters hundreds of years ago."

"Annabeth Chase, LXX: Annabeth, p. 527"

"Okay, maybe monsters kept coming back forever. But so did demigods. Generation after generation, Camp Half-Blood had endured. And Camp Jupiter. Even separately, the two camps had survived. Now, if the Greeks and Romans could come together, they would be even stronger. There was still hope."

"I am the mother of all terrors! The Fates themselves! Hecate! Old Age! Pain! Sleep! Death! And all of the curses! Behld how newsworthy I am!"

"This took so long to make." "You can't rush perfection." "Yes, but will it work?" "Getting out, no problem. But to get back I'll need Festus and-" "What?" "Festus. My bronze dragon. Once I figure out how to rebuild him, I'll-" "You told me about Festus. But what do you mean get back?" "Well.. to get back here, duh. I'm sure I said that." "You most definitely did not." "I'm not gonna leave you here! After you helped me and everything? Of course I'm coming back."

"She loved the architecture here. The houses and gardens were very beautiful, very Roman. But she wondered why beautiful things had to be wrapped up with evil history. Or was it the other way around? Maybe the evil history made it necessary to build beautiful things, to mask the darker aspects."

"Hercules was a bitter, selfish jerk. He'd hurt too many people, and he wanted to keep on hurting them. Maybe he'd had some bad breaks. Maybe the gods had kicked him around. But that didn't excuse it. A hero couldn't control the gods, but he should be able to control himself."

"Annabeth thought she knew pain. She had fallen off the lava wall at Camp Half-Blood. She'd been stabbed in the arm with a poison blade on the Williamsburg Bridge. She had even held the weight of the sky on her shoulders. But that was nothing compared to landing hard on her ankle."

"Stay where I can see you." "What are we, kids?" "Kids are baby goats. They're cute, and they have redeeming social value. You are definitely not kids."

""Janus and his doorways. He would have you believe that all choices are black or white, yes or no, in or out. In fact, it's not that simple. Whenever you reach the crossroads, there are always at least three ways to go... four, if you count going backward."

"You deal with mythological stuff for a few years, you learn that paradises are usually places where you get killed."

"It isn't easy being a brilliant inventor. Always alone. Always misunderstood. Easy to turn bitter, make horrible mistakes. People are more difficult to work with than machines. And when you break a person, they can't be fixed."

"I don't have much time," my mom said. "Percy, whatever you decide, I love you. And I know you'll do what's best for Annabeth." "How can you be sure?" "Because she'd do the same for you."

"Be careful of love. It'll twist your brain around and leave you thinking up is down and right is wrong."

"New lesson class," I announced. "Most monsters will vaporize when sliced with a celestial bronze sword. This change is perfectly normal, and will happen to you right now if you don't BACK OFF!"

"Wow," Thalia muttered. "Apollo's hot." "He's the sun god," I said. "That's not what I meant."

"What Luke told you back on the Princess Andromeda, about starting the world from scratch.. that really got to you, huh?" "My fatal flaw. That's what the Sirens showed me. My fatal flaw is hubris." "That brown stuff they spread on veggie sandwiches?" "No, Seaweed Brain. That's hummus. Hubris is worse." "What could be worse than hummus?" "Hubris means deadly pride, Percy. Thinking you can do things better than anyone else... even the gods."

"She looked like she was ready for a fight. Her fists were balled, but I thought I heard a quiver in her voice. Suddenly I realized that despite her angry attitude, she was afraid of me. She probably thought I was going to fight her control of the river, and she was worried she would lose. The thought made me sad. I felt like a bully, a son of Poseidon throwing his weight around. I sat down on a tree stump. "Okay, you win.""

"Percy, I was kidding myself. All that planning and reading, I don't have a clue where we're going." "You're doing great. Besides, we never know what we're doing. It always works out. Remember Circe's island?" "You made a cute guinea pig." "And Waterland, how you got us thrown off that ride?" "I got us thrown off? That was totally your fault!" "See? It'll be fine."

"“Hey, can I see that sword you were using?" I showed him Riptide, and explained how it turned from a pen into a sword just by uncapping it. "Cool! Does it ever run out of ink?" "Um, well, I don't actually write with it." "Are you really the son of Poseidon?" "Well, yeah." "Can you surf really well, then?" I looked at Grover, who was trying hard not to laugh. "Jeez, Nico," I said. "I've never really tried." He went on asking questions. Did I fight a lot with Thalia, since she was a daughter of Zeus? (I didn't answer that one.) If Annabeth's mother was Athena, the goddess of wisdom, then why didn't Annabeth know better than to fall off a cliff? (I tried not to strangle Nico for asking that one.) Was Annabeth my girlfriend? (At this point, I was ready to stick the kid in a meat-flavored sack and throw him to the wolves.)”"

"She raised an eyebrow. "You got something to say to me, Seaweed Brain?" "You'd probably kick my butt." "You know I'd kick your butt." I brushed the cake off my hands. "When I was at the River Styx, turning invulnerable . . . Nico said I had to concentrate on one thing that kept me anchored to the world, that made me want to stay mortal." Annabeth kept her eyes on the horizon. "Yeah?" "Then up on Olympus," I said, "when they wanted to make me a god and stuff, I kept thinking—" "Oh, you so wanted to." "Well, maybe a little. But I didn't, because I thought—I didn't want things to stay the same for eternity, because things could always get better. And I was thinking . . ." My throat felt really dry. "Anyone in particular?" Annabeth asked, her voice soft. I looked over and saw that she was trying not to smile. "You're laughing at me," I complained. "I am not!" "You are so not making this easy." Then she laughed for real, and she put her hands around my neck. "I am never, ever going to make things easy for you, Seaweed Brain. Get used to it."

"I didn't think-. Well, I didn't think you liked heroes." "Because of that little spat I had with Hercules? Honestly, I get so much bad press because of one disagreement." "Didn't you try to kill him, like, a lot of times?" "Water under the bridge, my dear. Besides, he was one of my loving husband's children by another woman. My patience wore thin, I'll admit it."

"I wouldn't worry too much. The last Great Prophecy about you took almost seventy years to complete. This one may not even happen in your lifetime." "Maybe, but it didn't sound so good." "No. It certainly didn't. She's going to make a wonderful Oracle!"

"My son here convinced me that perhaps I should prioritize my list of enemies. As much as I dislike certain upstart demigods, it would not do for Olympus to fall. I would miss bickering with my siblings. And if there is one thing we agree on-it is that you were a TERRIBLE father."

""You are okay?" he asked. "Not eaten by monsters?" "Not even a little bit." I showed him that I still had both arms and both legs, and Tyson clapped happily. "Yay!" he said. "Now we can eat peanut butter sandwiches and ride fish ponies! We can fight monsters and see Annabeth and make things go BOOM!" I hoped he didn't mean all at the same time, but I told him absolutely, we'd have a lot of fun this summer."