After the war Travis feels empty.
He feels empty, but when he sees his cabin looking at him – most of all, when he sees Connor looking at him – he forces a smile on his face and laughs. He almost chokes.
He doesn't though.
Instead he motions at his half-siblings and shouts, "C'mon!" He looks around for Percy and Annabeth and hopes nobody will pay him any attention once a real leader is around.
Travis sees the rubble and destruction caused and the emptiness hurts. He thinks he should be happy. They won after all. He had told everyone they would win but the whole time he didn't believe it. Now here his friends and family were and he had been right but it didn't feel good.
He spots Katie Gardner in the middle of a collapsed building. She's cradling a dead demigod in her arms and crying. Then he notices that's what a lot of campers are doing.
The first day back at camp he tries to pretend everything is normal.
The thing is, nothing is normal.
As soon as they get back to camp, he and Connor decide to lead the others in throwing Percy and Annabeth into the Lake. People laugh but it all sounds fake to him. He leaves them to it and instead goes back to Cabin 11 to start making boxes for his brothers and sisters that didn't make it back. For their families if they had one.
He and Connor were supposed to do it together but he can't put his little brother through that.
Looking at how little some of his dead siblings had, Travis feels like he might want to cry. He can't so he tries to get angry.
Realizing he can't feel anything right now, he quickly finishes packing and labeling the boxes. He takes them to the Big House.
The only other person there is Katie Gardner.
Her eyes are red and she looks awful.
She sniffles, carefully placing box on top of box.
Travis doesn't bother letting her know he's there. He also doesn't bother trying to mess with her. Somehow he knows that would just make them both feel worse.
He stacks his boxes next to hers and she startles.
Quickly, she wipes at her cheeks and nose.
"Travis," she says.
He looks at her. He watches a tear leak out of the corner of her eye. Instinctually, he reaches out and brushes it away with his thumb.
And somehow, the girl he called his arch nemesis becomes the reason he stays for as long as he does.
He tries his hardest to pretend the war didn't change him but the emptiness never leaves him. He laughs and jokes with his siblings. He watches some of them fall apart. Connor becomes angry and distant but Travis just keeps forcing laughter out of his throat.
He goes to the woods as often as he can without it getting suspicious. He finds her in the same spot every time surrounded by brown vines and half-dead flowers. It's a stark contrast compared to the green grass and rushing waterfall she sits near.
When he feels like he can't take it anymore, like he can't keep up this façade, he thinks about the woods. He thinks about Katie's desperate kisses and her nails leaving red lines down his back as her hips dig into his.
He stays at camp for exactly one month after the war before he decides he can't take it anymore. He knows it's time to leave when he wants to walk past Katie's dead foliage and keep walking until, unarmed, he finds a monster to tear him to pieces.
Two kids had already done it and a third attempted to but was stopped by four wood nymphs.
He talks to Chiron about leaving camp, then goes to see Katie.
He lets her pull him to the ground and kiss his lips, but when she tries to pull his orange camp shirt over his head, he stops her. She bites his lip, hard.
"Katie," he starts. When she tries to kiss him again, he holds her back by her shoulders. He takes in the dark circles under her eyes, her tangled brown hair and for the first time in a long time he thinks he feels something. A little quiver where his heart should be.
"I'm leaving."
He can see her processing his words. A line forms between her eyebrows.
"I can't stay here anymore. I think – I think I'll go crazy if I stay. I don't know how to stop it. I just can't st – I can't take it."
He watches the tears rolling down her cheeks until his vision goes blurry.
When he blinks, he realizes he's crying, too. He touches his fingertips to his face, then stares perplexed at the glistening wetness.
"Y-you can come with me, if you want," he chokes out. "Please come with me, Katie."
She's so still he thinks time has frozen. Then suddenly he's being pulled back by his arms. He looks around wildly, trying to spot the monster that's attacking.
He's dropped onto his back before he sees more vines growing down from the large tree in front of him, forming the rest of Katie's wall.
"Katie!" Travis calls. "Please! Just talk to me!"
He shouts her name until his throat hurts but it's no use. So he stands up, wipes his face, fixes the bag he'd packed the night before on his shoulder, and leaves.