Dear Grover,

At this point, I'm sure you're dying to find out what happened at the conclusion of our quest, if Annabeth and I ended up surviving. (Spoiler alert: we did.)

After our encounter with Charybdis, once again we had a lull in our journey for another day or so. I gotta say, by the time we had been going the same direction in that tiny rowboat for three days, I was getting a little stir-crazy.

Until we hit the Gulf of Mexico.

Without any warning, a series of turbulent waves barraged our boat. The open ocean before us looked like a series of huge rolling hills, each of them threatening to capsize us.

"Is this your dad's little problem?" Annabeth shrieked.

I gripped the sides of the boat tightly, scanning the horizon for signs of the Cetus. "Maybe?" I squeaked.

"There!" Annabeth yelled suddenly, pointing to the left. "There--I think that's it!"

A massive tail fin--possibly bigger than our boat--was arching back into the ocean, about fifty yards away. "Uhh, boat?" I asked. "Could you follow that Cetus?"

Immediately, the boat rocketed in that direction, throwing Annabeth and I out of our seats. As we approached, I could make out the creature a little better whenever it surfaced for breath: a large greyhound-shaped head, the body of a dolphin, and an enormous tail that fanned out like a whale. I remembered suddenly that the legendary Perseus, my namesake, once had to kill the first Cetus because Poseidon had sicced it on Andromeda.

Wait, surely that's not what my dad meant when he asked me to get it under control ... ?

No. I just needed to tame him.

But how?

I glanced around the boat, looking for inspiration. Okay, so maybe I should have spent the last couple days thinking up a plan. That's what Annabeth was thinking--I could tell from the daggers she was glaring at me.

"Annabeth," I said, "pass me that bag of Funyuns!"

"What?"

"Just do it!"

We were close to the Cetus now, maybe about ten yards. The next time his dog-like head surfaced, I opened the package, its crinkling sound echoing loudly across the water.

As if on command, the Cetus froze in the water. Flaring his nostrils, he pivoted slowly to face our boat.

I pulled an onion string out of the packaging. Then I threw it to the creature. He leaped out of the water like a dolphin, catching it in his canine jaws with a loud crunch.

"Good boy!" Annabeth praised. The Cetus panted happily and swam closer.

In no time at all, the Funyuns were gone, and Annabeth and I had gotten the creature to do tricks like backflips and "speaking" when we asked him. It was clear that someone had trained him at some point. The question was, who? And why had he gotten so disobedient?

The Cetus was looking at me questioningly. "Sorry," I said in response to his hungry look. "We're all out."

We really needed your ability to talk with animals, Grover. I can't speak Cetus. But I think he understood my meaning well enough, given his drooping tail and sad puppy eyes. And I think I was coming to understand the situation better too. I thought about my promise to Charybdis, and suddenly it was all clicking to me.

"DAD!" I yelled. I probably should've warned Annabeth before I did it, because she jumped about a foot in the air and almost fell into the water.

"Percy!" she admonished. "Don't do--"

But my shouting had been effective. Poseidon emerged from the water, looking like he just stepped off a yacht with his Hawaiian shirt and sandals. "This better not take too long--" he started, but halted midsentence when he saw the Cetus. "Ah, good! You did it! Excellent work, Percy."

"Dad," I said, before he could leave again, "you need to take better care of your responsibilities. All he wanted was a treat and some attention!"

"Well, that's good to know, but honestly, Percy, I don't have time--"

"I want to adopt him," I cut in again. I rubbed the Cetus behind the ears, and he grinned happily. "He's going to be part of our family."

Poseidon just stared at me.

"Also," I added, "remember Charybdis? She misses you. You should pay her a visit."

Now it was Annabeth's turn to stare at me, surprised by my audacity.

My dad rubbed the back of his neck. "All right, kid. Maybe you're right. Maybe I've been a little ... negligent lately. But hey, it's a lot of work being a god!"

I gave him a skeptical, unwavering look.

Finally, he caved. "Okay, okay. I'll stop by and say hi to her on my way back to Atlantis. And I guess I can take the Cetus with me too." The Cetus barked in agreement. "He is pretty cute," my dad admitted.

"Good," I said. "I'm gonna stop by Atlantis soon to make sure he's doing all right."

Annabeth sighed in relief as the tension diffused. "Great. Sounds like our work here is done. Can we go home now?"

Without a word, Poseidon waved his hands in the air mystically, making exaggerated circles with his arms. Our rowboat whipped itself around, the nose of the boat now pointing us back in the direction of Long Island Sound, where our journey had begun days ago.

"The Swedish Fish will guide you back," Poseidon called as we sped away. "They're waiting for you off the coast of Florida!"

It's possible that we'll beat this letter back--I'm not sure how fast Swedish Fish can swim. But if not, don't worry, Grover! We're both okay, and ready for a school year without any monsters this time.

Time for a long nap on the way back,

Percy (and Annabeth)

Cetus tail

(Flavio Gasperini on Unsplash)

Author's Note: As with the other stories, the main characters--Percy, Annabeth, and Grover--are originally from Rick Riordan's series. In this chapter, I introduced the Cetus (sometimes spelled Ketus), which is a sea monster said to have the head of a greyhound, the body of a dolphin or whale, and a huge tail, which is the description that I kept here. This story touches on the original myth of the Cetus briefly, but I'll expand it a little for better understanding. It is not clear how the Cetus was created, but Poseidon sent it to Ethiopia because Queen Cassiopeia had made the claim that her daughter, Andromeda, was the most beautiful woman, even more than the Nereides. In retaliation, Poseidon had the Cetus attack Andromeda while she was chained to a rock. Before she could be eaten, though, Perseus rescued Andromeda and married her. If I had more space to work with, I would have liked to get more into the details of Poseidon's relationship with the Cetus, such as why he was neglecting the creature and how he used to spend more time with him. However, I found myself running out of room with the word length once again. Additionally, I wish I could have been able to include Annabeth more in this story, but because Percy is the narrator, I needed to focus more on him and on his personal growth through the things he's experienced in this journey.

Bibliography: Ketos Aithiopios, Theoi.

Cetus (mythology), Wikipedia.

Percy Jackson and the Olympians characters belong to Rick Riordan.