I don't own Percy Jackson

Enjoy;

"Your taste in music is shit, Seaweed Breathe." Annabeth teased. I flash her the smile I'm famous for. She doesn't respond. "I don't understand this." She huffed. I pull myself up, hanging my head on her shoulder, looking at the worksheet in her lap.

"Legal stuff?"

"Yep. What the fuck is this question? Discuss the extent to which limitation of actions upholds at least one of the principles of justice? This is all bullshit. I don't understand." She huffs. I take the sheets from her, kissing the side of her head. "I'm just so tired."

"So am I. So, no homework, okay? You're still recovering, and so am I. We're not doing good. You do not have to be working."

"Dork." She mumbles back. "What can I do without work?"

"Me?"

"Fuck off."

"You have a pimple, can I get it?" I don't wait for a response, pulling myself up to her, her leaning against my waist, turning her head into me, squeezing the pimples until they pop.

"We're weird, Perce. We're really weird."

"Yeah." I sit down, grabbing my phone. Annabeth continues to work. Enjoying being with each other. I turn off my phone after a bit, watching her work. Her writing quickly, pausing, reading. Eyebrows rising in confusion, then more writing. Her pushing her hair behind her ear, bouncing the pen on my leg as she thinks about what else to do.

"Are you watching me?"

"Maybe." I hum in response. She leans her head back, flipping her bottom lip out, frowning at me. "What? You're too cute not watch."

"Fuck off."

"Never." I push her work away, pulling her into me, kissing her neck, her check, the top of her head. "I love you."

She giggles, pressing her forehead against mine, connecting our noses and heads; "I love you more."

"I love you most."

Annabeth stood in front of me, chatting as she chopped the vegetables for dinner, water boiling in the background. She's mostly talking about her university options, saying she's considering New Rome, but mostly mortal universities.

Each chop is the same, rhythmic. Chop after chop after chop. The boiling water growing louder and louder. I can't hear Annabeth talking anymore, but I can see her mouth moving. The chops are getting louder and louder, pounding getting louder and louder in my eyes. The boiling reaching all the extremes.

I take a slow, deep breathe. Trying to calm myself, trying to control the sudden tightness in my chest, the bouncing of my leg that is becoming almost uncontrollable. I try divert the energy, bouncing my leg faster, tapping my fingers hard against the table top. In any anxious attempt to keep the panic attack at bay.

Then shit hits the fan. The water boils over, Annabeth curses loudly, and all the attempts to keep myself calm fail. I take a deep breathe, but it fails. Turning into sharp, fast, shuddering breathing, hands shaking out of control. Everything burns, I try rub my arms, my face. The burning on my skin itching, screaming to be touched, but screaming if something touches it. Eyes stinging, the tears cooling my skin slightly, but not much.

"Don't touch me." I gasp out. Annabeth turns, her face paling upon realising what's happening. She moves forward. I want to move away, but my legs won't respond to my brain.

"Ground yourself, do you remember how?"

"Don't touch me." I repeat, pulling myself into her, holding my face into hers shoulders. She doesn't move her arms, but continues to whisper to me. She doesn't move her arms, and I continue breathing into her. As the panic slowly fades away, and Annabeth's voice becomes clearer and clearer.

"Can I touch you?" She asks, still whispering. I nod into her chest, and within seconds her arms are under my shoulders, pulling me up, closer to her. "You're here, with me. In the apartment. We're here, we're okay. We're alive. We're safe. You're safe. I'm safe. We're making a shitty dinner, with shitty vegetables and pasta. And we're okay."

I play with her hair, wrapping strands around my fingers, allowing myself to become calmer and calmer. "We're okay."

She pulls away from me, her hands in my hair. "Tell me next time. Okay, Seaweed Brain?"

"Okay, Wise girl."

"Pasta, vegetables and some of the chicken from last night. Sounds like a good dinner. Are you hungry?"

"Yeah, it wasn't too much of a bad one. I think I can still eat."

"You can always eat, Babe." She teases, smiling softly. I push at her softly. "Come help me, it will distract you from it all?" I don't want to move, but her hands are tightly in mine, pulling me up after her, following her to the cutting board, wrapping my arms around her waist. I balance my head on her shoulder, watching her cut a few vegetables, before she holds a knife up to me. I take it from her, not really wanting to move out of the way of her, but she slips away, heating the chicken and pasta. Clicking on the stove for the chopped vegetables.

"Calm?"

"Yeah. Thank you. Remind me again how lucky I am to have you?"

"Hm?" She hums, pressing her lips against my shoulder. "Do you want to continue complimenting me, and saying how amazing and beautiful I am?"

"Annabeth Chase, you are so amazing and perfect. How did I get so lucky to have fallen completely in love with you. I love you, so much."

"I love you more." She hums, her arms now wrapped around my waist. "And most. I love you more and most."

Annabeth sits between my legs, head bobbing as she dozes to sleep. Waking up and lifting her head up, blinking her eyes. Her head back against mine, her hair tickling my head, my neck.

I can feel sleep slowly overtaking me, until Annabeth tenses in my arms, and lets out a small cry, begging to be let go. Begging to stop being tortured. I shake her softly, whispering her name. But it doesn't work. I shake her again, a bit rougher again. She mumbles in reply, tears slipping out of her eyes.

"You're with me, shh." I mumble into her ear, but she doesn't respond. I move down, turning her to lay facing my chest, her arms wrapping around mine, still mumbling, crying. Flashbacks flicking through her mind, all of there. Of that hell scape, that place that destroyed us.

We stay like this, shaking her softly, muttering until her eyes flick open, and she tightens her grip; "Percy…"

Cocopops are a morning thing. Annabeth is beside me, sitting in a band shirt she stole from me, and a pair of my boxers. I teased her that I was stealing her panties in return. She had laughed at me, saying be my guest.

She had almost passed out from laughing so hard when I walked out in them, changing quickly into my normal boxers, poking her for laughing so hard.

"I always get so tired in the mornings. I think we gotta stop having sex first off. It tires me out so much."

"Hm?" I reply, my mouth full over milk and cereal.

"Who am I even kidding, I love it. Ignore me, I'm just worrying about why I'm tired. Do you have therapy today?"

"Yeah. I told you about the PTSD diagnosis yeah?"

"Yeah. Is John good?"

"Thinking of going?"

"It helps you, may as well work for me too. I need help for panic attacks, just simply. They fucking suck."

"They really fucking suck. I have therapy at I think 12. We can go for lunch after?"

"Nah. Lunch here, then we can just cuddle forever."

"What a romantic." I tease. She grabs my hand, kissing it.

"What a tease."

"How was the session? Perce?" Annabeth is watching TV when I enter again.

"He said I'm depressed. I don't think I'm depressed. Do you think I'm depressed?"

"A little. But so I am." She is up, watching me run hands through my hair.

"I don't understand. I don't want to. I. I don't understand? He said its probably just severe seasonal depression. But we can't know for sure until summer. It's a symptom of PTSD, so it makes sense." I fade off, and her hand is on my arm. "I don't want to feel like this."

"Which is?"

"Grey. Sad. Suicidal. The usual. You?"

"Grey, anxious. Craving death. We're a match made in heaven." She mumbles. I smile at her, fiddling with her (my) shirt, pulling her in tightly. "We'll get through this. We always will. I promise you."

"I told John that you wanted to see him as well, he has your number now. We just have to go to the GP, so you can see him legally." I tell her. She nods into her chest, her arms around my waist, hands playing with the rim of my shirt.

"Thanks, Seaweed Brain."

"I'm not so much of a Seaweed Brain, huh? I'm organising your therapy sessions."

"Shush, you. Left overs for lunch?"

"If take out's for dinner, yes."

"I can't deal with these nightmares, Annie. I can't deal with them." Her arm is over mine, rubbing me slowly. Tears are falling thick and fast, the panic simmering underneath all the emotions. Her knuckles are rubbing against my skin, kissing the other side of my body. "I feel so sick."

"Do you need to get up?" I pause before answering her, but I barely can before my throat feels full, and I push her off, running to the bathroom. Barely making it to the toilet, leaning over it. Annabeth is in after me, hand on my back. "You're okay. It's going to be okay."

"It doesn't feel like it." I mutter, leaning over the toilet again, my throat burning as more hits the toilet. "This feels so fucking endless."

"It's just hard right now. It's just hard now. Because its different. We don't have a quest. It's quiet. It's different to us. It's strange, I know. But we're together, so it's okay."

The apartments pool was always hot, the window fogging up from the heat. I pull myself up to the wall of the pool, my checks slightly hot from the physical exhaustion. Annabeth was laying on a pool chair, reading some book that I didn't give a shit about.

"Come swim with me?"

"I'm reading."

"So?" I coax. She raises her eyes from the book, as I pull myself out. She doesn't reply, looking me up and down slowly. "Are you checking me out?"

"Am I not allowed?"

"If you don't come swimming, no." She groans, folding a page, climbing into the pool with me.

"No races."

"Just one?"

"No!"

"Is it because you know you won't win?"

"Percy, need I remind you. You're the son of the sea god. You will always win."

"Come on…" I try, holding her arms, kicking my legs benth me in the deep water.

"You just want to nickname me Loser for the week."

"You won at our last competition. It's my turn."

"Fine." She drops under the water, pushing off. I can almost hear her laughing, saying she gets the head start.

I push off after her, breaking into an easy sprint-freestyle, easily beating her.

"Loser." I tease. She splashes water. "Don't even try."

"Bitch."

"A sore loser?" I question. She splashes water again, then pulls close to me, wrapping an arm around my neck.

"Jerk."

I sink to the bottom of the pool, no sound reaching me. Calmness. Everything is quiet. Everything is different to how it was ten minutes ago, screaming at each other for the stupidest reasons.

Annabeth had another quest. I didn't. I wasn't in the quest. It was her and a new kid.

I begged her not to go, begging that I was worried about her. I was worrying that she could die. She denied that she could.

"I'll be fine. I have that kid, Tyler. We'll be fine."

"But what if you aren't?"

"I'll be careful. I promise, okay?" She took my hands, but I pulled away. Glaring at her.

"What if you die?"

"I won't."

"Tyler is too young… What if. What if you're overwhelmed? Anything could happen, this is so dangerous."

"PERCY I'M PERFECTLY CAPABULE."

"I'M NOT DENYING THAT! I'm worried about you. I'm really worried about you."

"You're worried about yourself. This is selfish."

"I DON'T WANT YOU TO DIE, IS THAT TOO MUCH TO FUCKING ASK?"

"BELIEVE IN ME!"

"I do." I rack my hands through my hair, shaking with anger. I take a long, rough breathe out of my nose, and another one in. "I just hate that I can't protect you."

"Then you don't believe in me." She is standing close to me, hands crossed over her body. "If you believed in me, you would let me go."

"I believe you. I tell you that every day. I'm just worried about your wellbeing, and possible death."

"WE'RE DEMI-GODS! FOR FUCKS SAKE, WE'RE IN DANGER EVERYDAY!"

"That doesn't mean you need to put yourself in more danger, Annabeth."

"It does, if it means defending the camp, and defending the world. If you believed in me, if you know I can do this. Let me go."

"Not without a fight."

"I'm going, whether you like it or not."

I pause, bitting my lip. Leaning against the wall. "Talk about this at dinner. I need to calm down."

"DON'T YOU LEAVE THIS FIGHT!" She snaps, but I'm already out of the door.

She came to the pool, standing over the edge. I watch her thinking, sitting there for a while. Her legs dangling in the water, on her phone. She looks down every few minutes, seeing if I have moved (I haven't).

I can't admit that I'm wrong, nor will she. I can't let her go, because if she dies it's on me. It's on me for letting her go, and not protecting her. If she dies, it's all on me.

There's a burst of bubbles next to me, and Annabeth is sliding down the pool wall, using her hands in a rough motion to pull her to the bottom, grabbing my leg to pull her up to me. She puts her feet on the bottom of the pool, holding my arm now, about to pull us up. But I move faster, holding her, and putting a bubble around the both of us.

"I can't let you leave without a fight, because I'll blame myself if you die, because I wasn't there to protect you, and I didn't stop you from doing something that killed you."

"Then you don't believe in me."

"Stop pulling that. I do believe in you. You're strong enough to do this quest on your own, you literally completed one of the hardest quests to exist. But my belief in you, does not change the fact that I'm worried about you, and I worry about you dying. It never will change, and I will always put up a fight if you're going on a quest, because I worry."

"Don't."

"I always will. I love you, and me loving you comes with me worrying about you. I know I'm being a shitty boyfriend, but please. Let me worry."

"Let me do this quest."

"I always will. But I still worry so much. I do trust you, I do believe in you. I just can't lose you."

"I know." She mumbles, leaning her head on my chest. "We're a mess."

"When aren't we?"

"Touché."

"When do you leave?"

She pauses; "tomorrow."

Everything was okay when she came back, holding each other tightly, breathing into each other. She was injured, but not badly. Nothing Will couldn't fix. We went back home after that, basically connected at the hip again.

Her laughing, mostly at me trying to cook food. Teaching me. Cooking together, leaving me to chop all the vegetables and meat up, her to do the actual cooking, stating I'd probably burnt the entire city down if I could.

But she taught me, and I learnt. Slowly.

On the morning. That morning. I woke up first, cooking her favourite breakfast. Eggs with bacon on toast. It took a little longer than thought, and she was awake by the time I was cracking the egg.

She sat at the bench, wearing one of my shirts, and boxers, her hair falling over her, blond curls framing her face.

"Don't over cook the eggs 'cause you're staring at me."

I smiled at her, going back to cooking, handing her the food when I've finished, watching her eat.

"I love you." I tell her. She smiles back.

"I love you. I have therapy today. John is suggesting I might have PTSD too. I mean no shit, Sherlock. But.."

"It's hard getting a diagnosis."

"Yeah." She finishes. "But it should be good. Amazing breakfast, by the way. You may have to cook for me everyday."

"Sure." I pause.

"Are you prepared for the quest tomorrow?"

"Always am."

She doesn't return for hours. I try distract myself, going to the gym, working out. Keep the panic attack at bay, then swimming. Laying.

Something is off when the clock hits 5, and she hasn't returned. I risk calling her, and nothing happens. She doesn't pick up.

Then the panic attack happens. Screaming, holding myself against the wall. Breathing in and out too fast, hyperventilating. Its panic I have never felt.

It doesn't stop until there's rapping on my door, I stumble for the door, opening it. Two men stand there. Men in blue.

"Percy Jackson?"

I can't respond, I can't speak. Shaking too much to move my mouth, to utter words. So I nod.

They don't say anything, for a moment. "Can we come in?"

I don't move out of the way, unable to move. "No."

"We're here to talk to you about Annabeth Chase. She's been reported dead, in a car accident."

"She. She doesn't – she doesn't drive."

"She was hit, along with three others. A rogue driver."

I can't respond. Swaying slightly, the panic building and screaming more and more. There's a tightness in my throat. I reach for the door, but it's not there. There's warmness coming out of my mouth, and the officers stepping forward, holding me up, taking me to a couch.

Lovely.

Yes this is overdone, I just want to write this.

Next update when 5 chapters are written...love y'all

~ Georgia