In the bowels of the Argo II, Leo is working on the ship’s mechanism and reflecting on all that he has experienced in the quest so far. He recovered the lost text of Archimedes, On Spheres, from Rome; picked up a bronze astrolabe in Bologna; and brought a chunk of crystal from Ogygia, where he fell for the immortal Calypso. Odysseus constructed the astrolabe but lacked “a crystal to use as a homing beacon” (72). Leo has the crystal but still needs to figure out how to use it to return to Ogygia. Over his bulletin board, he has pinned a drawing of the Argo II and a sketch of Calypso. The image of the ship, which he first saw in a dream when he was seven, reminds him that dreams can come true and inspires him to believe that he’ll find his way back to Ogygia again.

In the mess hall, he finds his friends eating breakfast. Conferring over how to subdue Nike, the goddess of victory, the demigods realize that she could provoke their competitiveness. They decide to send Percy, Leo, Hazel, and Frank, since their divine parents aren’t inherently antagonistic toward each other.