"i break my sword a lot." "yes, you do."

the first thing carter ends up realizing when he wakes up is that his sword is broken. again. it's not exactly a surprise. it's kind of been this running gag in the apollo cabin, where every time carter breaks his sword, everyone starts breaking into a dance number to a song they specially wrote just for him - 'the swords aren't alright'. he barely even uses his sword, but brent is always nagging, like, "you need to be more versatile! how would you fight close range?" and everytime he does use his sword, he ends up breaking it. he doesn't even know how. he sighs as he crawls out of bed, making his way to the showers, where he gets a quick shower for five minutes, fixes up his hair for another five minutes, brushes his teeth and slips out of his pajamas into a light, cotton grey tee and a pair of denim shorts that cut right above his knee. he slips on a pair of red vans sneakers, grabs his broken sword and makes his way to cabin nine. "here goes nothing," he mutters, knowing that the cabin nine kids are probably going to stare at him, like, "again?, as he raises his fist to the door and knocks twice. "hi," he says," "it's carter, from cabin seven. anybody in there?"

"it's a long story," he says, as he steps inside. he glances around and, wow, it's hot in there. he seriously has no idea how the hephaestus kids stand the heat, and this is coming from a son of apollo, god of the sun. "i really don't mind if you reforge it or start one from scratch. anything that suits your convenience," he continues, running a hand through his dark hair. he turns around, surveying the room and the many inventions sprawled across the work tables, the - somewhat dangerous - tools placed on random shelves, and he wonders what it'd be like if he was a hephaestus kid instead. it's an odd thought, and he lets it slip into the back of his mind. broken sword now, contemplating alternative universes later.

"nah," he says, moving over to a work table with an oodly interesting item - he's guessing it's an invention of some sort - placed on it, along with a bunch of machine parts. "i barely use that thing, which is why i can afford to get it broken like, every week. it's just - i suck at sword-fighting, y'know? plus, i don't think i wanna give you any extra work. i owe you guys a lot, coming in here all the time to fix that damn thing. sorry about that, by the way," he says, spinning around, his attention now focused on surveying the room yet again. "i imagine you have lots of other cool things to build. seriously, you hephaestus kids come up with the craziest inventions," he says, his pale, blue eyes darting around the room. by crazy, he means the good kind of crazy. the hephaestus kids were awesome, in his opinion. they were underrated. he'd take them over the ares kids any day.

"i'm only good with a throwing knife. other than that, everything else works just as bad for me. so i go with the 'classic', i guess," he walks over to a table, where there's a bunch of weapons strewn across it. he runs his finger through the flat end of a blade, and it's so shiny he can practically see his reflection in it. he lifts the sword up, hefting it with his left hand. it doesn't feel right for his arm - like it's too heavy. he places it back onto the table and walks towards where the girl. "i don't think i caught your name, by the way."

carter raises his eyebrow, when she says that she doesn't have to ask for his. he doesn't figure that he's that popular around camp. sure, he gets a few, 'hi's and 'hey's around camp from people he's never really met, but he doesn't think that he's gotten enough of a reputation for random hephaestus kids to know him by name. he shrugs it off, though. maybe he's just gotten a reputation around cabin nine for coming in with a broken sword a little too much. and when sawyer says that she can make a sword than also turns into a knife, he's snapped right out of his thoughts. "you can do that?" he blurts out, but then he realizes what a dumb question that is. "no, wait, of course you can. you children of hephaestus are freaking amazing."

"sure," he says, walking over to the table, where the several weapons were laid out on. he picks up a simple celestial bronze throwing knife and turns towards the pillar. he lifts the throwing knife up, and gets into position - his left leg behind his right, as he leans his body back a little. with the knife in hand and aimed towards the pillar, he swings his arm back, and then forward, releasing the knife and shifting his weight from his left foot to his right foot, sending the knife sailing towards the pillar with force and speed. the knife embeds itself into the pillar, and carter then walks over to it and pulls it out.