"Exactly, Jason agreed. Percy Jackson is at the other camp, and he probably doesn't even remember who he is." -TLH
It was far past midnight and Camp Half-Blood stood in silence except for the snores of its campers, the occasional cries from the pegasi, and the echoing bang as a daughter of Athena stubbed her toe against a pot.
After quietly scolding herself and muttering a series of colorful curse words in Greek, the girl picked up the pot. Then placed it back on the table where it should have been if it weren't for the Stoll brothers.
Apparently with the entire camp in a less then cheerful mood the Stolls had made it their personal duty to change that. And in their mind their way of doing so was to rig a small explosive resulting in the camp's kitchen to be splattered with melted marshmallow. However, they hadn't calculated the bomb's impact very accurately and in the event kitchen supplies had been blown out of the building and were now scattered around the area.
After fellow head campers had succeeded in tracking down the Stolls and cornering them, (specifically Katie from the Demeter cabin who always had a knack for being in the wrong place at the wrong time and was at the time covered head to toe in marshmallow gooeyness) the Stolls gave their signature claim of "we have no idea what you're talking about." But aside from the completely idiotic act itself, she had to agree, the camp really needed a pick-me-up.
"Everything will be fine. We know where he is and we will get him back," Piper said earlier that day.
But things were nowhere near fine. Annabeth had thought that after days of no such sign from Percy, the knowledge of his location would, at the very least, be a major breakthrough in the search and bring her some form of closure. NO—couldn't have been farther off in fact, and as a daughter of Athena she did not enjoy being wrong.
Just the thought of Percy's fate being put in the hands of Romans did not sit well with her. She, of course, knew that Percy could take care of himself—he was invulnerable for Gods sakes—but she hadn't nicknamed him 'Seaweed Brain' for just any reason. Plus the fact that he would have to prove himself to those people without any of his memories just made it worse.
What if he doesn't pass? What if they find him so damn irritating they want to kill him? (She knew that she had thought about it constantly and he was her boyfriend)
"We at least know for a fact that he's alive," her half-brother Malcolm told her in attempt to soothe her as she rambled on the exact same thoughts to her siblings.
But that wasn't the worse scenario that had entered her mind, she knew it was selfish but if it turned out true she knew she would break down and possibly go insane (not that she wasn't sure she was already). Just the thought that he might possibly get another girlfriend in the near future made her not only sick, but furious.
This fury was proved because whenever she began thinking about this outcome she found that her feet had a mind of their own and would inevitably lead her to the training area. And it always took several stuffed dummies to be slashed to shreds and the defeat of a few living opponents to blow off steam.
As she neared the site where they were constructing the Argo II, Annabeth took in the scene in front of her. It was now three weeks since they had made the discovery of Percy's location and started building the ship. You could just start to make out the shape and size of it even though it was still in the early stages of construction.
Leo had originally said it would take about six months till they would be able to set sail. Then, it changed to eight months after finding out that both the number of workers and their pace were lower that what he had hoped for.
Annabeth had to admit that when Leo had told her this she kind of overacted. By overacted that meant she had drawn her knife, ripped up another training dummy, and when she had turned to Leo (knife in hand) he had sprinted off shrieking to passerby, "SHE'S GOING TO KILL ME! PLEEEEEEASE HELP! I'M TOO HANDSOME TO DIE!"
After cooling off she had asked Leo in the head counselor's meeting, "What's it going to take to get the ship done by the summer solstice?"
"I told you Annabeth we'll never make it with the pace we're going at." Then he immediately added, "Remember don't shoot the messenger! It's not my fault, if I die every girl in this camp will cry for months over my death, I'm still so young and—"
"Leo, what if I could get you more workers?"
"I told you the original deadline is impossible, we would have to almost double our workers."
"What if we could?"
Pollux spoke up, "You're saying that you can double the amount of workers that we have? You do understand that's the same as doubling the population of almost the entire camp?" he said it with clear doubt which irritated her. Not to mention the fact that at the time the rest of the head counselors were looking at me sympathetically like they thought I was grasping at strings.
"Girl, you're a Hades of a leader and the best braniac we got here. I mean sometimes you do get a little psycho, you know? When you want to kill someone, you kinda get this sorta mad glint in your—" Leo rambled.
"What Leo was trying to say is we can't do that, you know we can't. But everything will still turn out fine, this is just a minor setback." Piper said softly, but I could hear the charmspeak in her voice.
They pitied me and I hated it, to prove my point I took out a picture from my pocket and held it up for everyone to see. It was a picture from last summer taken right after the war. In the picture I stood in the middle arm in arm with Percy, to my right was Thalia, then Nico. Next to Percy was Grover, then Tyson. We were all in mid laugh; together the six of us had acted as generals leading the war against Kronos.
Everyone around the table had leaned in to take a closer look at the picture.
"We know you miss Percy, Annabeth but—" Jason tried to reason.
"Not that!" I had taken a deep breath and continued, "When we fought Kronos we had allies fight with us and when Percy went missing we sent out different search groups. Percy and I led the camp," she pointed to the two of them in the picture, "Thalia led the Hunters of Artemis," pointed to Thalia, "Grover is a Lord of the Wild which means he led the nature spirits," pointed to Grover, "Tyson is a general of a Cyclops army," pointed to Tyson, "and last but not least Nico can get an entire army of the undead any time he wants," pointed to Nico.
(Not to mention the Party Ponies that were led by Chiron, but Annabeth figured that if they were involved in the construction it be much more counterproductive. Meaning they'd get so stoned and...Let's just say no one in their right mind should trust them with hammers and blowtorches.)
"Wait—hold on a sec, you're actually serious? You could double the number of workers we have?" said Leo, a little flabbergasted.
"Yes. We know where Percy is now so we don't have to use them as search teams anymore. Without Artemis being able to contact them the Hunters have gotten a little bored and they have about thirty members now. Tyson's army of Cyclops will be especially helpful seeing how their also master blacksmiths. The nature spirits and undead will help in any way they can." I tried to speak as confident as I could and secretly felt proud of the surprised looks I was getting from everybody.
"And you're sure that all of these different groups will be willing to help in the construction?" said Jason.
"Of course the six of us are like a family and Percy is part of that family, we'd all do anything to—"her throat had gotten caught at the moment and she took a second to pull herself together again, "they'll be more than willing."
"Six months, you got it," said Leo, grinning.
They looked at her and nodded, but they were doing so with respect. At least I hadn't failed completely as their leader, I thought.
That head counselors meeting had taken place two weeks ago. By now Hunters, Cyclops, nature spirits, and yes, some of the undead had already settled in. The fact that they had doubled the amount of workers was evident in the work they had completed.
As she remembered the meeting she subconsciously took out the very same photo from her pocket. They were all so happy that day they defeated Kronos. She remembered them actually believing—including her, that they might finally once and for all get some peace. Now she realized just how stupid they had been, they were demigods for crying out loud! Not to mention that this was leading up to a war possibly even worse that Kronos, they were going up against Gaia this time. Did the same generation seriously have to fight in both the Second Titan War and the Second Giant War? Would we ever catch a break? Looking back at the laughing faces in the picture it also hurt to wonder—When was the last time she laughed? Oh yeah, Percy.
She began walking done the row of cabins, still invisible under her Yankees cap. She had gotten use to taking middle of the night strolls around the camp, everyone suspected but didn't have the heart to go to Chiron, who would be forced to punish her.
She took a step into Cabin three and just stood there for a moment. The sight, smell, even the sounds there reminded her of Percy. His cloths thrown everywhere, the smell of the ocean, and the sound of the fountain in the middle of the cabin, souvenirs from past quests —all so Percy, pretty much every place in the camp had some kind of connection to him.
Annabeth changed into one of his shirts and inhaled, the sea, Percy always smelled like the sea, not the salty kind of smell that stings your nose, but the relaxing sea breeze.
She walked over to his bunk and stared at the mirage of pictures above it. Some were old, from when he was only twelve and then throughout the years he spent at camp. She always felt some sort of happiness when looking at that wall because out of all of his friends she was in more pictures that anyone else.
The one picture that was framed on the nightstand showed her and Percy fast asleep on the beach. They were only thirteen at the time so it was way before they started dating, but Percy still had one arm around her shoulders, the other rested under his head. While one of her arms supported her head the other was draped over her stomach. Both of them looking peaceful and even though they were sleeping you could see the slightest hint of a smile on their faces.
Annabeth remembered being surprised when she found the very same picture in Percy's pocket while they were on a date about a month back. It had been originally taken by the Stolls for the sole purpose of making fun of them. Annabeth had swiped away the picture easily from their grasp considering the tip of her blade was pointed directly to either of their throats. Afterwards Percy promptly dumped them into the lake—or more like they were pulled in by the lake itself.
She had always known that they had gotten the picture back but up until a month ago she never realized he had kept it. After finding it in his pocket she had teased him, however, she was secretly overjoyed at the fact that he had been so sweet to carry it around with him, now it was framed.
She curled up into his bunk and let the tears fall. His cabin and the beach was where she was reminded most of him and these were the only two places that she let herself fall apart completely.
It took all of her energy not to breakdown sobbing in front of others. Without Percy the camp had turned to her as the leader and refused to listen to her attempts of declining the position. As the leader it was her responsibility to remain strong or at the very least look it. But she had to admit it didn't come to her as a surprise that the other campers weren't buying her claims of 'I'm fine'.
"It's so sad to see her fall apart," senior campers would occasionally whisper as she passed by.
As for the new campers she would hear them mutter things along the lines of, "Does she ever smile?"
She knew that her act wasn't very convincing considering that she was barely eating, sleeping, or doing anything other than working for that matter. This was all very evident in her once startling gray eyes now bloodshot, now skinny figure, and complete disregard toward her appearance.
Some campers like Piper, Rachel, and her siblings would constantly have to remind her to do simple things like eat and drink, according to them she hadn't exactly been taking care of herself. That had been proved in the first few days of Percy's absence and that had caught the attention of Will Solace, head of the Apollo cabin.
After what to her felt like an interrogation it was revealed that she had been working on no sleep, very close to dehydration, and her food intake had equaled to about two measly crackers in the past three days. This of course just had to take place at the campfire where everyone of course heard, breaking any chances of her looking sane to any fellow campers.
The tears then turned into heartbroken sobs, she quickly shoved her face in a pillow, not wanting to wake others up.
Annabeth's POV
I woke up finding myself grasping Percy's pillow, now soaked with my tears. I scolded myself for breaking down. The camp suspected, just like they had with the nightly strolls that I slept in Percy's cabin. I never told anyone, never talked it, but they knew.
Every morning the Athena cabin would wake up to find one of their campers missing and later in the day they would find me working on the blueprints for the Argo with shadows underneath my eyes.
I got dressed fast, not really caring, and made my way over to the Athena cabin. They were just starting to get ready for breakfast.
When I opened the door the cabin immediately quieted down and all eyes were on me. They knew where I had been which I could tell in their pitying stares. But I was used to it, I hated it, but for the sake that I wouldn't go completely insane I chose to ignore it. I honesty could not care less anymore; the only thing that mattered now was getting Percy back.
They all began to file out to breakfast, but out of the corner of my eye I could see one figure linger in the doorway as I gathered up blueprints.
"Are you coming, Annabeth?" It was the voice of her half-brother Malcolm.
"No, I need to finish calculating the exact measurements for the control room and then start on the plans for the individual rooms and then—"
"You can work on that later, you need food to function. By the way, when was the last time you ate?"
"I um I think….." He had his eyebrows raised at me, looking at me worriedly.
"Did you eat yesterday?"
"No, but—"
"Then you're coming to breakfast, now, come on."
I glared at him. He flinched, but regained his composure to look firm. I've had this fight with him and others to. Last time it ended up with me being dragged to the tables, given a full plate, and forced to eat it all in one sitting.
I sighed, rolled my eyes, and walked out the door without another glace at Malcolm. I knew it was foolish to be mad at him; he was only trying to help of course. But it didn't stop me from getting irritated.
Everyone had already been seated, and again all eyes were on me. It was rare for me to attend breakfast nowadays or any meals for that matter. If I realized that I was starving myself I would simply take a small snack from the Aphrodite cabin who were handing them out to the workers of the Argo.
I took a small spoonful of eggs and half a piece of toast, sat down, and ate it all in under a minute. Got up and left with all eyes on my retreating back.
When I was out of everyone's line of vision I put my Yankees cap back on and walked into Percy's cabin. I kneeled down next to one of the bunks and pulled out a pile of blueprints. Everyone saw that I had been constantly working but they had no idea how far I had actually gotten. I knew if anyone actually saw how much I had done they would all raise their eyebrows at me and force me to get some rest, which I was in no mood to deal with.
I had actually already finished planned the basic layout and calculated all the measurements. It was still very basic but it would make Leo's job a whole lot easier. I tucked these plans into one of my bags except for one. Then, I headed off to the construction site. It was still deserted due to the fact that everyone was still at breakfast.
It wasn't unusual for me to be the first one there or the last to leave. The only person who spent nearly as many hours working on the ship was Leo. I picked up a hammer and set to work. Ten minutes later Leo appeared.
"Brainiac, you really need to take a break." His tone was disapproving.
"I'll take a break when we get Percy back," not even looking up from my work.
"Annabeth—"
He flinched under my glare and sighed, getting to work. Everyone knew that simply telling me to eat was pushing my tolerance, and knew better than to force me to do anything else.
After a while more workers began to file in, once and a while leaving for class when they needed to. It annoyed me that they still had classes going on when they could use that precious time to contribute to the Argo. I, for one, refused to attend any of my classes, which no one questioned, not even Chiron. They saw how determined I was and knew I would be willing to fight for the right to work. Not wanting to be ripped apart by my dagger, they let me be.
The horn was blown for lunch time and again the construction site started to get abandoned, except for me and a few people who called, "Annabeth?"
I shook my head, but didn't look up till everyone had left. I put my Yankees cap back on and swiftly walked over to the Athena cabin.
No one was there of course and without a second thought I began packing cloths and everything I might need into the bag with the blueprints. Then I heard people walking up the steps to the cabin, I froze. Two campers entered: Malcolm and Piper.
"What are we looking for again?" asked Malcolm.
"Leo needs the plans for the very last floor."
"What were his exact words?"
"He asked, 'Beauty Queen, can you go ask Annabeth for the blueprints of the bottom floor? Oh, and go get me a girlfriend while you're at it, a hot one at that, and not a female Cyclops like the last time."
"What did you say to that?" a hint of humor in his voice now.
"I used charmspeak to make him slap himself and then he whined for a while."
Malcolm chuckled and started to look through a pile of blueprints I had left on the drafting table. "It looks like Annabeth didn't really organize these blueprints, she has piles of them, some are for Olympus and some for the Argo."
"I'm also guessing that she hasn't been sleeping in her bunk?" Piper observed by the fact that my bunk was the only one that didn't look slept in.
"Yeah, I got curious one night and found her in Percy's bunk instead, she was crying," sounding sad.
"Oh Gods I feel sorry for her. She's so worried about Percy and she still has to lead the camp. It's like in her mind she thinks she doesn't have enough time to take care of herself."
"Yeah I know what you mean, everyone's worried about her, especially the senior campers who's known her for years."
"Um…What was she like, you know, when Percy was around? Did she laugh?"
"Oh yeah, when Percy was here she was genuinely happy, laughed all the time."
Piper looked thoughtful for a moment, it surprised Annabeth that Piper actually cared how she felt.
"Okay. Got the plans," Malcolm said holding up a long blue sheet with Annabeth recognized as the layout for the bottom floor.
"Good, Leo and everyone else is at lunch. We better eat too." Malcolm nodded and they left.
So they and everyone else was worried about her, Annabeth thought. Of course, she knew that they were all worried about her; it just really irritated her when she heard them say they were worried. The only person who didn't irritate her when they got worried was Percy. When it came to Percy he knew that she could take care of herself, and it was just plain sweet knowing that he cared for her. He would look so cute when he was worried; his eyebrows would—stop it, I told myself. I could not break down now.
I double checked that I had everything packed cloths, medicine, money, weapons, etc. Then I shoved the bag under my bunk and went back to the Argo.
When I got back to the ship everyone was still at lunch, so I took off my cap and started working again, like I had been there the entire time. My mind began to wander and somehow I found myself thinking about the sickening scenario of if Percy finds a new girlfriend…
Four years it took her to get that brain-dead guy to open his eyes and see her. With all that work she was not just going to let those four blissful months of dating die in vain. This was why she had to carry out her plan to get him back, with or without the help of anyone else.
The only reason that she hadn't left the second they discovered his location was because she knew that they needed her to help plan the Argo. Now that she had finished planning the basic layout, nothing was stopping her from getting him back. She knew that the earliest that she could leave would be tomorrow night and she wasn't going to delay it.
She would of course have to wait till everyone was asleep, then the only real obstacle would be whoever was on guard duty…
"Annabeth?"
The voice came from behind and startled me, it was Piper. As I was visualizing my plan I hadn't noticed that lunch had finish and workers had already poured in.
"Yeah," I was in no mood to deal with people who were worried about me.
"You didn't come to lunch today."
"Yeah," definitely worried, ugh.
"Remember what Will told you?"
Will had given me a whole lecture on how I needed to pay more attention to my health. I, of course, had shrugged him off but other senior campers had noticed and backed him up. That angered me. They had told me that I needed sleep and food to function, blah blah blah. Then somehow that would help Percy, I honestly wasn't listening.
"Yeah, Yeah," trying me best to show Piper that she had no chance of convincing me of anything. When I stole a glance sideways, Piper had a sympathetic look on her face. I guess she had decided that I was a lost cause because she left, leaving me to analyze my escape plan.
When it was dinnertime I continued working after everyone had left. It wasn't till the campers had gathered around the campfire that I put my Yankees cap back on.
The Apollo campers were leading the sing along, everyone looked happy, but it wasn't the same. It wasn't just me that was hit by Percy's absence, but the entire camp was a little miserable. They all looked cheerful enough in the sing along, but if you looked at the fire itself, it wasn't that large or bright.
I put that thought aside as I spotted the Hunter. I snuck silently up to her and tapped her back. "Come with me," I whispered. Unfortunately, this made her jump and spill the glass of punch in her hands on a burly Ares boy in front of her.
"Hey! Who do you think—"the boy's eyes widened when he realized he was yelling at the lead Hunter herself, "um…never mind, sorry Thalia."
Apparently Thalia had succeeded in making even the Ares cabin a little frightened of her. Thalia nodded to the boy and walked off away from the campfire. When she reached a vacant field she spun around and whispered, "Annabeth?... Please take it off, I hate talking to nothing!"
Annabeth felt a little chuckle rise in her chest, it was humorous to watch the Hunter get frustrated when she wasn't aware of her surroundings. She took off the cap and forced a smile to her best friend—other than Percy of course.
"Hey, Thals."
"Hey, is everything okay?" She was obviously wondering why in the world I was using my Yankees cap to talk to her.
"Before I tell you, you have to swear on the River Stynx that you will not share this with anyone else. ..and I also just wanted to say that, well, you and Percy are my best friends and I can't thank—"
"Oh my Gods, Annabeth, you're scaring me, are you dying?!" She put the back of her hand on the girl's forehead, in attempt to take her temperature, but Annabeth quickly swiped it away.
"No!" she groaned and continued, "just please swear so I can tell you."
Thalia sighed. "Fine, I swear on the River Stynx that I will not divulge any information that is given to me in the next hour by you, Annabeth Chase, to any nosy souls, blah blah," thunder echoed in the distance, "BLAH!," glaring up at the sky, then looking back at Annabeth, "now spill."
"I'm leaving tomorrow night for the Roman camp to get Percy back." I felt so anxious revealing my plans for the first time that my words came out as a slur.
Thalia took a deep breath and gazed intently on the stars. After a few moments, Annabeth became impatient and waved her hand in front of the electric blues eyes—no reaction. "Earth to Thals…you okay? You're stiff enough to pass for one of Medusa's statues right now! Please talk to me."
Thalia took another deep breath and studied her, "I guess I always knew you weren't going to wait six more months to get him back."
"Wait…so you're not going to try and stop me?" I asked warily. I reminded myself of the fact that they were equally good fighters and if she did try to stop her there was no telling who would win that fight—of course there's the fact she could strike me down with a lightning bolt, I shuddered.
"Look, Anna, I know it's pointless to try and stop you—Hell, I'm the one that taught you to never let anything stand in your way," she smirked, "and I know that you're really irritated at the fact that everyone thinks that your having a 'break down' right now, but just know that I'll be here to back up your decisions and kick the ass of anyone who thinks otherwise."
I smiled, if it were anyone else I probably would be under house arrest in one of the rooms in the Big House right about now. Thank the Gods for Thalia. (specifically Zeus)
"Now that that little sappy moment is finished, go on with what you were saying."
"Okay, well like I said you're my best friend and with getting Percy back, I kinda…well, um…" I was beginning to stutter.
"Wait, you didn't think I was going to let you go alone did you?" I looked at her sheepishly.
"Well, I'm coming with you one way or another. The Hunters should be fine without me for a while since they're staying here. Plus, I feel that it is my duty to humanity to give that Kelp Face a piece of my mind for getting himself kidnapped and us into this whole mess."
"That's not fair this is entirely Hera's fault, not Percy's." Anger began to bubble inside her as she thought of the Queen of the Gods.
"Oh don't you worry we'll take extra care in dealing with that—," thundered echoed louder this time, Thalia scowled at the night sky, "let's focus, do you have a plan?"
"Athena always has a plan."
