Falling.
Annabeth thinks she is falling. She feels like she is falling.
She knows that she's falling.
It is dark, and she is scared. She is flailing all the way, and wonders why she hasn't reached the bottom yet.
Then it hits her. She is falling to Tartarus.
Panic rises up inside of her. She is too traumatised to think straight. And now she remembers everything clearly.
She feels a squeeze on her hand- a reassuring one.
She turns her head and Annabeth's eyes meet Percy's. She feels guilty, for she is the reason why he is next to her.
He pulls her towards him and and holds her shoulders tight. She sees absolute terror in his eyes, yet he tries to put on a brave smile, and it is sweet.
But tragic.
Her eyes are filled with tears as he kisses her.
And in the midst of that, she remembers something else. She remembers her first fall.
-Flashback starts-
For some reason, Annabeth keeps finding herself constantly glancing at the new kid at Camp Half-Blood. He looks rather... clueless. He is obviously still trying to comprehend the fact that he is a half- blood. She rolls her eyes. What an idiot.
And he drools.
It makes her laugh.
She puts on her invisibility cap and disappears as he walks towards the big house.
He is talking to Dionysus and Chiron about the quest. Finally, a quest she can go on. And even though this seaweed brain is the supposed son of the supposed almighty poseidon, she has a strong feeling that he is going to mess up. And she won't allow that.
They head out for the quest soon enough. Grover comes along too, and she feels relieved.
They don't make it far before they cause an explosion in the bus.
She scolds Percy for coming back for Grover and her at the bus. She is afraid that if he had died in the process, then the entire quest would be over. But then she feels horrible.
"Look, I…" Her voice falters. "I appreciate your coming back for us, okay? That was really brave."
"We're a team, right?" He shrugs.
She secretly smiles. Maybe he isn't so bad after all.
She looks at Percy as the wind blows his hair backwards while they are on the pegasi.
They fly next to each other side by side.
"Your dad seems pretty cool." He says to her.
"I guess so. We've been arguing for so many years."
"Yeah, you said."
"You think I was lying about that one?" She sort of challenges him.
She tells him about how her dad and her step- mother still live in San Francisco, and that she can't be too far from camp.
"So what are you going to do now?" He asks.
"I don't know." She pauses. "But thank you for rescuing me."
"Hey, no big deal. We're friends."
She bites her lower lip as she asks her next question. "You didn't believe I was dead?"
"Never." She blushes at his response, much to her own surprise. She doesn't know why she is blushing.
Soon after the gods have their meeting on whether they should kill Percy because of the fact that he is the son of one of the big three, she sees him talking to her mother, Athena.
Annabeth is truely shocked.
She hears Athena speak to him. "I will leave you. For now." And she walks away.
She frowns at Percy. "Was she giving you a hard time?" She asks.
"No... it's fine." He obviously lies. She knows him that well.
Annabeth touches the new grey streak of hair Percy has, which matches hers: a painful reminder that they have carried the sky.
And a reminder that he had come for her.
"So..." She says to him. "What did you want to tell me earlier?"
Percy looks at his surroundings. "I uh... was thinking we got interrupted at westover hall. And... I think I owe you a dance."
Another lie. He is not telling her what he really wants to tell her. She doesn't know what exactly he wants to say, but she doesn't want to press him for details.
She smiles instead. "Alright, seaweed brain." He takes her hand, and they slow dance. His hands are warm and they fit perfectly with hers.
Whatever he wants to really tell her can wait.
Annabeth is sort of excited to spend an afternoon with Percy. It's been a long time since she last saw him, and a day going to the movies seems like a peaceful, non monster related activity.
Of course, she soon realises she is wrong.
She is walking up the hill towards Goode high school when she finds him tripping over his legs as he is running down.
"Hey, you're out early!" She laughs, and holds onto his shoulders to keep him from tumbling down the hill. "Watch where you're going, seaweed brain."
But then she sees her, and her face turns sour.
"Percy, wait up!" The girl yells.
She is a curly haired red- head and has freckles on her face. She is wearing a t- shirt and a pair of navy blue jeans.
She frowns at the girl and stares at her, then at the school that seems to have caught fire.
"What did you do this time?" She demands. "And who is this?" Annabeth crosses her arms.
He goes on to introduce the both of them to each other. She finds out soon enough that her name is Rachel.
"I'll make up some story," Rachel says. "I'll tell them it wasn't your fault. Just go!"
She runs back into the school.
Annabeth glares at Percy for a moment. Then she walks off.
"Hey!" He jogs after her. "There were these two empousai. They were cheerleaders, see, and they said camp was going to burn, and-"
"You told a mortal girl about half-bloods?" She demands.
"She can see through the mist. She saw the monsters before I did."
"So you told her the truth."
"She recognised me from Hoover Dam, so-"
Annabeth stops in her tracks. "You've met her before?"
"Um, last winter. But seriously, I barely know her."
She fumes inside.
"She's kind of cute." She states.
She can see the expressions on Percy's face. Shock, confusion, and embarrassment.
"I- I never thought about it."
She turns away and walks away once more.
Yeah, right.
She remembers what he told her clearly. Put your cap back on. Get out. I'll be fine. Besides, we have no choice.
She has tears in her eyes as she sprints for the metal spider.
Stupid seaweed brain. Stupid greek gods. Stupid quest.
And then she hears and sees the explosion at the volcano.
Stupid life.
He is gone.
When she goes back to Camp Half- Blood, the camp sing a-long has already started. And as she walks towards the camp fire, everyone stares. And she doesn't care.
She tells Chiron quietly.
He nods.
And she locks herself in her cabin and cries.
She feels more horrible then she should be. She can't seem to get her emotions under control. Annabeth knows that she is good at masking her emotions.
But it is evident she can't right now.
Some part of her feels that- that maybe the reason she can't is because she might love-
She shuts that thought out of her head.
Percy is her friend. Nothing more.
She buries her face into her pillow.
Then why does it feel like she does?
She and Percy stand back to back and brace themselves for monsters.
She holds her dagger in her right hand and keeps an eye out for them.
But then she sees him, out of the corner of her eye. He wears an eyepatch and revenge is written all over his face.
Ethan Nakamura.
Monsters are everywhere, causing chaos and disorder. He is just there, holding a dagger in his hand and staring at them.
And then he twists his body and and hurls the knife towards them, but Annabeth knows it isn't meant for her.
It is meant for Percy.
So in that moment she makes her decision.
And she cries out in pain as the knife pierces her shoulder.
Percy spins around, with eyes wide open as he sees her wounded, and catches her before she goes limp and collapses.
And as she looks into his gorgeous and dazzling green eyes, she realizes: it didn't matter.
Because she had already fallen.
-flashback ends-
And as Annabeth turns to face Percy once more, she is glad that for both the falls, it had been with him.