Disclaimer: I do not own Rick Riordan's books or characters...

It was midnight on the Argo II when Piper woke up to the silence. It wasn't like she had a nightmare or anything... She had simply opened her eyes and when she looked to her side, her clock read "4:45." She blinked away the last few doses of sleep, and after her head cleared the murk, she stepped out of her bed. Piper decided to let her footsteps take control and wandered mindlessly around the ship. The place was pierced with darkness, but she knew the Argo by heart. Piper hadn't bothered to put on a shoe as her bare feet felt all the rough ridges and bumps of the wooden planks underneath her soles. She shivered from the crisp air surrounding her.

As Piper walked around with the tips of her fingers gliding across the wall on her right, she started to think. Think not about the present, nor the future with gaea and all, but she thought about the past. She thought about all that had happened and sighed. She felt old. Maybe not as older than some of the other members of the seven, but she certainly felt as if she had lost the innocence she had when she was back home listening to the Cherokee stories her father sang to her.

Piper's fingers continued tracing lines on the walls until she was stopped by a door that led to the deck. She pushed open the door just as a gust of ocean wind blew through her. Her kaleidoscope eyes took in the surrounding. It was a clear night where bright spectacles danced across the universe. The vastness of the ocean was tinged silver from the unbitten moon above, and the rhythmic beating of the tide lulled the ship through the night.

Peace. She scoffed dryly at the irony. Such tranquility in such chaos.

She was just about to walk over to the dock's railings when her eyes caught sight of a humanoid figure. Piper felt adrenaline kick into her system as her breath shortened. She slowly unsheathed her dagger and tiptoed towards. She raised her weapon and was just about to plow it down on whatever it was when the figure swirled around and caught her arm before she could do anything. Piper instinctively stiffened.

"Percy?" Her voice wavered as the adrenaline left her.

"Piper?"

"Ya, its me." Piper replied

"Oh, hey! ... Uhh.. So... Umm... Hey!"

Piper stifled a laugh, noting how he wasn't exactly the smooth talker she had thought he was. Piper's eyes adjusted to the darkness and relaxed as she took in the familiar face. Seeing Percy itching the back of neck and shifting stiffly in place, Piper became aware of how awkward he was around her. Except for the special occasions where they would plan out battle plans or scream at each other "Duck!" or "Behind you!" Piper had never conversed with Percy with himself alone.

"So... What brings you out here?" Percy asked, desperate to keep some form of conversation going.

"Just wanted some fresh air I guess. I could be asking you the same. It's like almost 5 right now."

Percy Jackson fidgeted with the beads of his camp necklace. His eyes flickered to the ground and he had seem to have found sudden interest in his shoelaces. He ran his fingertips over the engravings of the last bead and stayed silent for a moment.

Piper mentally slapped herself as realization rammed into her. Of course it's the nightmares; he's been through tartarus, you idiot!

"You don't have have to answer. I wasn't thinking, you know about tartarus and nightmares and... I'll shut up now." she stuttered, face hot from the flash of embarrassment.

"No! I mean... It's ok... I mean I'm ok... I mean... I didn't have nightmares..."

"If it isn't because of nightmares, then why-" Piper asked before she stopped herself. She caught herself staring into him, studying him. She then noticed the tolls taken from tartarus.

Percy had lost weight... a lot of it. His face looked gaunt, and even under the coverage of a baggy sweatshirt, she could imagine his thin frame. His tan skin lost pigment except for the dark purple shadows beneath his eyes. He was in desperate need for a haircut as locks threatened to fall past his eyes. His eyes... They looked frozen, hollow. Piper wondered if they were seeing at all. Percy wasn't suppose to be up here. He was suppose to be at the sick bay.

"Percy, you look terrible. Did you even sleep at all?"

"I'm fine, Piper."

Piper eyed him skeptically.

"Seriously, I'm okay. Who knew making toilets explode could be so exhausting?" Percy tried for a smile; it came out as a twitch.

"No, Percy. Seriously. Tell me. Tell me what's going on" She wasn't buying his act any more.

"Look, I'll fix the plumbing by morning. As for fixing the actual toilet..."

"Stop changing the subject. You're always locked inside your room; this is the first time I've seen you this whole day you know? Tell me what happened down there. Are you even eat-" The guy looked like he was going to collapse any second now, and the fact that he kept avoiding Piper's eyes made her even more concerned

"I'm fine! I'm okay..." Percy ran his hands through his hair, a habit Piper noticed he did when he felt frustrated. Piper wondered whether he was saying that to her or himself.

"Percy, please?"

Uncomfortable silence fell upon them as Percy looked conflicted about what to do. He leaned heavily on the metal railing next to him, and Piper pretended not to notice crimson seeping through his bandaged leg. Ignoring the fact that the guy looked like he'd recently been hit by a truck, without Riptide in his hand, Percy Jackson looked almost human. Almost.

The silence drove Piper insane. She even considered charmspeaking when Percy let out a sigh.

"Maybe Gaea was right."

"Percy, don't listen to her. She tells me some horrible stuff too, but she's just trying to manipula-"

"No. Don't you realise how useless this is? I mean all of this. The battles, the war, the Gods?" As Percy said this, his face was eerily calm. Piper struggled against the urge to back away from him.

"Percy, you have every right in the world to be angry at the gods. But the gods are better than Gaea." She hoped he hadn't noticed the uncertainty in her voice as she said this.

"Are they?"

Piper couldn't answer, and Percy took advantage of her silence.

"You should've seen what it was like down there. I mean, there was so many monsters. There was that cyclops I killed a few years back, the karpos I killed a few weeks ago... And I started to think, how stupid of me? To think that I could actually get a shot at life if I defeat just one more telekhine or just one more gorgon. Don't you get it? Demigods only get to live once, but monsters never die, doors of death closed or not. Even if we defeat Gaea, she'll come back again and again and again..."

Percy closed his eyes as if he were reliving Tartarus again. Piper felt the urge to do something, anything. The crew needed Percy and if he was giving up on hope now, then she wasn't sure if they'd even have a chance at winning the war. Yet, Piper didn't say anything because deep inside the back of her head, she knew Percy was right. She remembered what her mother had said to her once 'Give me a hero, and I'll write you a tragedy.'

"The Gods are powerless; they can't protect us. All they do is hide up in the clouds while their children does all the dirty work. They take us for granted, Piper. But Gaea...Gaea is different... She's powerful. She can protect us. We can live."

Percy's eyes, which was hopeless and dull, now gleamed. Gleamed with evil. This wasn't right. This wasn't Percy. What he had just said reminded her of a monster... it... I mean he reminded her of Gaea. Piper had to talk to him. She needed to tell him this was wrong. But the lump in her stomach made it impossible for her to use charmspeak.

"Percy, power isn't everything"

"Power is everything"

Percy's eyes seemed to be glowing in the dark.

"We may not be as powerful as Gaea, but we've still made it this far haven't we? That's gotta count for something, right?" Piper sounded desperate.

"Percy, you are strong. You defeated Kronos for gods' sakes! You saved millions of lives" She recounted her experience in Camp Half Blood: the stories of Percy and Annabeth's quests, the Battle of Manhattan- Percy was a legend.

Percy's let out a dry laugh. His eyes gleamed like a mad man, churning angrily, with no hints of the beautiful sea green she had once seen before he and Annabeth plummeted into the pit. Percy started laughing harder, clutching his stomach and gasping for air. Piper watched him with pure horror.

"Me? Saving people? You should tell that joke to Leo. I bet you heard that from Camp Half Blood. I'm sorry to burst your bubble, but the stories they told you are lies. I mean sure, I've been through a couple of quests and earned some brownie points for helping someone here and there, but I don't save people, Piper."

Suddenly, Percy stopped laughing and his face contorted into something Piper could only describe as cruelty. His knuckles turned white as he clutched the railing a bit tighter than he had to.

"But have you heard the full story, the real version? If anything, I can tell you this; I'm not the person you, or the seven, or the rest of the world thinks I am. I'm not a "leader" or a "hero." I'm a mother fucking monster! And you know it; you're scared of me."

"Percy, you're not a monster." Piper mentally cursed at herself as her voice wavered as she said this.

Percy's voice got louder. The ocean churned violently, nearly flipping the ship over. The cacophony of sark salt water clashing into each other flooding the deck. His breath was coming in deep angry staccatos as he made no effort to control the turbulence. Percy was soaked as if his powers were going haywire. Piper didn't know what to do. She needed him to calm down, but she was scare out of her mind. Percy went on.

"I'm the one who killed Bianca! There, I said it. I'm the one who killed her along with Beckendorf and Michael Yew and Silena and Ethan Nakamura... They all died because of me! I'm the one who made my mom's life a living hell! And... And I'm the one... I'm... Bob..."

Then Percy did something Piper had never seen him do. He slid down against the railing onto the wooden floor. Then Percy Jackson started crying. Percy never cries.

Piper kneeled down beside him and held him. He sobbed into her shoulder, hand clutching onto her T-shirt as if it were his lifeline. She just held him there, caressing his hair as tears soaked her shoulder. His sobs ricocheted through his skin, muscle, bone.

"I don't know what to do anymore." He croaked.

Percy's eyes met Piper's. Gone was the Percy with the glowing eyes. What was left of him was a boy; a boy who had suffered before and wasn't sure he could do it again.

"Everybody thinks that I'm the perfect hero, that I'll "save them all." But I Can't... The people who trust me with their lives... I'm not powerful enough to protect them. I try! I try so hard. I train and train, but no matter how much I train, I'm not able to defeat monsters that are thousands of years older than me." PErcy looked as if he were tormented- tormented by a past he couldn't undo until death released him from it's hard grip. Percy's hands were shaking.

"Hey... Hey! It's just the pressure coming to you? It's okay..." Piper realized that there was no such thing as the Percy Jackson. He was just Percy- just a boy that's scared and angry at all that the world stripped him of.

"Personal loyalty." Percy whispered.

"What?" Piper wasn't sure if she had heard that correctly.

"Personal loyalty... It's my fatal flaw. Athena told me once that I would sacrifice the whole world for the people I love. But what good is that gonna do if I can't save them either. "

Realization dawned on Piper as she now understood why Percy felt this way. It was his fatal flaw. Piper wanted to tell him that it was okay again, that everything was going to turn out fine. But she couldn't lie to him anymore. All that she could do for him was just be there with him, watching the stars. It was then when Piper found out that Percy won't break... Because he was broken too long ago.

"Now that you know what I really am, why are you still next to me?" Percy asked with such pain and self hatred in his quiet voice.

Before Piper could say anything, Percy stood up and walked away, leaving Piper to sit there and sort things out.

Piper watched as he walked towards the doors, and as she did so, she could've sworn she saw him mutter something along the lines of, "Bob" and "hello."

The next day Piper went to breakfast

Percy Jackson was sitting on his usual spot next to Annabeth. Piper just looked pitifully at him as he laughed and made sarcastic jokes with the crew. When he saw Piper come in, he greeted her cheerfully as if yesterday never happened. Just when she thought he could trust her with his vulnerability, he had built a stronger wall, encasing himself under a mask of coping. He couldn't stop wearing that mask, for he didn't know any other way. Piper wasn't fooled anymore. Under that layer of the sparkling sea green eyes, she saw his little game of "let's play pretend".

I see you Percy... All I, Piper Mclean, can do for you is hope for the best.