Something I wrote about half a year ago that has no plot behind it and I have no interest in continuing this, sorry. This is up for adoption so if you want it, please PM me.

No one could be trusted.

Rely on yourself.

Those phrases had been drilled into Annabeth's head since she had been born.

Run. Fight. Hide.

Basic commands that kept her alive.

Don't stay too long in one place.

Don't trust. Don't rely.

They will betray you in the end.

Annabeth had grown up thinking that.

Survive. Thrive. Like a weed. Like a leech. Her step mother used to scream at her. But that didn't matter. Her step mother was gone. All that mattered was living till tomorrow, seeing the sun paint the sky pink and purple and red. Then she would know she has survived another day, and her heart would always be filled with momentary relief.

Then it returned to what was crucial. Surviving.

After all, that was her life.

To keep living. Annabeth didn't even know for what. For her brothers, who had vanished beyond the gates one day? For her dead mother, whom she never knew? To fulfill all the promises she had made over the years, to Thalia, to Luke?

As much as Annabeth tried to fill her head with these thoughts, she knew what she truly lived for.

Him.

The boy she had met once, beyond the gates, when she was twelve. She had snuck out once, believing all the rumors, the screams, the vanishing teenagers were just some cruel, mean joke played on them. She had never regretted anything more.

They plagued her once she was in the forest, soulless eyes staring blankly into her panic filled ones, grey hands reaching, tearing, eager for the few moments of life they would get if they caught her, got her, and stole her soul away to their mistress hidden deep in the woods. Bad breath filling her nostrils, they came closer, closer, closer, and she had shrieked and screamed and cried and fought, but still they came closer, and she was about to give up, to leave herself to her fate, doomed, when a hand pulled her back. Then she was gone, suddenly, and they moaned and moved mindlessly around, searching for prey no longer there.

It was him, sea green eyes staring down at her in concern. She wisely kept silent, and thanked him with her eyes, glad that she wouldn't ever be one of them. Once they were gone, he released her and suddenly she was alone again, and sea green eyes seemed like a faint memory. She made her way out of the woods, back to the safety of the gates.

She never returned. She wasn't that foolish.

Every now and then, she did wonder, you know, she wasn't heartless: How was he? What was his life like? Why was he in the woods then? Why had he saved her? Why hadn't he done anything else to her?

She wasn't blind. She knew that the world, after falling to ruins, was mostly full of evil now. There were men who would brutally murder or god forbid, the four letter word staring with 'r', women. It wasn't even limited to women anymore. Girls too, all for living another day.

Most that were left were scum. She knew that. Those who were willing to murder, to kill thousands and millions of people just so they could survive. She hated those the most, and prided herself on not being like them. She judged and killed for justice. She didn't delude herself, sometimes she did cruel things, after all, it was all for yourself now, but she would never stoop as low as to do what those scum were doing.

She wouldn't.

Even within the gates, the people there were scared. They lived in fear, but in peace, and Annabeth found it weird too, that a town could be so afraid of the night but yet appear so calm in the mornings, when they all knew most had probably hid under their blankets till dawn the next day. But she kept quiet. Everybody did.

Because if maybe they didn't acknowledge the screams, they would go away.

Maybe if they pretended, the screams will disappear.

But they never did.

And so they lived in fear, day after day, pretending, deluding, dreading the night, hating the eventual day when the gates would crumble under they're relentless assault.

There would be no happily ever afters in this fairy tale.

This ending couldn't be prevented.

And they pretended; they gave fake smiles, told so many lies, till they themselves couldn't even tell truth from lie.

And still the screams continued.

And yet the disappearances happened.

They never stopped.

They never would, till the day the gates crumbled.

Then they were doomed.

And yet they pretended there was a way out, a way to keep living, to survive. Truth was there wasn't. And they all knew that, but they tried to put it aside, to pretend that one day, they weren't going to perish in the village where each of them had grown up, and they indulged in that ignorance.

People were foolish enough, scared enough, to try the only way out. The gates. They would sneak out in the middle of the night, and there would be proof they died or not. The screams.

All did.

Most would drop by the dead's house and say their final farewells. There weren't any funerals; resources couldn't afford to be wasted that way.

And Annabeth was tired of playing this stupid game of pretend, to see who can keep it up the longest before their façade crumbled. She wished the town would come together as one and actually make a decision about what to do instead of pretending the screams, the dead people, didn't exist.

And so she wondered and daydreamed and built sandcastles and fantasy plans of escaping in the air.

Annabeth sometimes wondered, what lay beyond the woods? That dark forest she had seen—what lay beyond it? She knew that the woods most definitely did not go on forever. So what was behind it?

Sometimes she wanted to return to where she had ventured when she was twelve, because she was so, so tired of this game. All games must come to an end. It was time for this one to.

But no. She would stay inside the gates and keep herself safe, at least for a month or so. All for him. And it was strange, weird, but she knew that's why she kept living. Just so that maybe, perhaps, she could see him again. And she knew, it was foolish, foolish hope, but she couldn't help it.

Somewhere along the way, she had fallen in love with a boy she didn't even know the name of.

And love was ferocious. It burned, it scorched everything in its path, but even the strongest will fall prey to what they thought only existed in storybooks and swore never to let happen to themselves: they fell in love, so deeply, so passionately, it was impossible to pull yourself out once you had fallen in.

And was it wrong, Annabeth wondered to herself, if you didn't want to?

Even though this is up for adoption, I will still like to know what you think of this. Review please. Thank you!