A/N: I posted this back in January of 2011; I remember expecting to get, maybe, ten reviews at most. Imagine my surprise when I logged in to my account to find seven times that amount!
I was rereading this the other day, and caught a few things I wanted to change. So this is the re-post, obviously, with minor corrections.
Hope you enjoy; please drop a review when you're done.
A bird chirps, breaking the silence and solitude of the forest.
The boy jumps. He had been so caught up in his thoughts, he hadn't noticed the animal light the branch of a tree beside him.
Ever since the boat full of Greek demigods arrived, the Argo II, he hadn't been able to concentrate. It could be because of his ADHD, but something tells him that that's not it.
He walks into a clearing and stops when he catches sight of the blonde-haired girl. Daughter of Minerva. Athena.
He shakes his head, trying to clear it. He can't decide which names to give the gods anymore.
He looks at the girl again.
She's drawing patterns in the dirt with an arrow.
He creeps up behind her, but she doesn't appear to notice.
"Um...hello?"
She leaps a foot in the air, spins around, and glares at him. "What in the name of the gods was – "
She stops when she sees him. Her face softens, and becomes one of - pain? Sorrow? Longing? He can't tell.
But there's something about her. The way her blonde hair is curled, like a princess'. The way she looks at him, with her stormy gray eyes. They remind him of fog, or mist. When he stares into them, he feels himself being pulled back into a distant shadowed memory, something about an island and beautiful singing, and a rescue. A dangerous rescue.
He blinks, and flashes back to the present.
She stares at him. "What are you doing here, Seaw - Percy?"
He steps back, wariness running through is veins. "H-how do you know my name?"
She's still staring at him, searching his face as though looking for something that isn't quite there. She's waiting for something, although he doesn't know what.
There is a silence, and something inside of her seems to crumble.
She's still looking at him, pain and disbelief in her eyes. "I can't believe it," she murmurs. "It's all true, everything Jason said, everything he suspected..." She peeks up at him, lifting her gray eyes and staring at him full in the face. "No, no, no, no, no..."
He's confused, but feels sorry for her. He wants to see her smile, for whatever reason, and he would be lying if he said he wasn't the tiniest bit attracted to her. "Um, is there anything I can do to...help?"
That's when she turns on him.
"Is there anything you can do to help? Do you know how much pain you caused me? When Rachel spouted that prophecy about finding someone with one shoe? Do you know how much I hoped it was you? And then, instead of finding your boyf - instead of finding who or what you were looking for, you stumble upon three demigods and an old satyr who don't know what in the name of Hades they're doing? And after they embark on this dangerous quest, the way we used to, you find out that that one person you were looking for - that one person that means the world to you - has lost every single memory of you, and everything else, for that matter? Do you know how that feels?"
He's stunned, frozen, standing there, not knowing what to do. But before he can think of something to say, she rushes on, a wild light in her stormy gray eyes.
Her voice lowers into nearly a whisper, and the fury dies from her face.
"Do you know how to help me, Percy? Do you? The only way - the only way - is nearly impossible, but I have to keep hoping. Because I can't do anything else. All I can do is wait. That's all. And you know - you used to know - my fatal flaw. Hubris. And you used to know how I hated not knowing what to do; how I hated not being able to do something. Because I feel that I can do everything better than everyone else - that's what hubris is. But here, I can't do anything at all. I can't. Do you know how much it hurts, seeing the one you love being torn away from you, without him even knowing? To see him standing there, so close to me, and yet so far? He doesn't know. Not at all. And all I can do - all I can do - is watch."
He stays silent for a while. He's never really known what to say in situations such as this one – has never really known what words of comfort to offer.
After a considerable pause, he says, "You must really care about this guy."
She stares up at him, pain filling her eyes. Something inside of her seems to fall; her walls crashing down. She flops down on the ground and sighs.
"He had the most amazing green eyes," she murmurs. "Just looking into them made me feel like I was drowning. And the way he flipped his hair drove me crazy - and what made it worse was that he had no idea he had that effect on me."
He sits down next to her, keeping a slight distance between them. After all, they don't know each other that well. Right?
She takes a deep breath, then continues. "He was the bravest person I ever knew. We went on quests together. He saved my life more times than I could ever count. We went on a quest together, to recover Zeus - Jupiter's - lightning bolt. He battled Ares - Mars - and won. We saved our friend, a satyr named Grover, from being eaten by Polyphemus. The Cyclops. He saved me when I was tricked into taking the place of Atlas and holding up the sky. That's how I got this gray streak." She picks up a strand of her hair and holds it in her palm. Unlike the rest of her blonde hair, it is a startling shade of gray, much like her eyes.
He frowns. He has one in his hair, just like it.
Seemingly without thinking, the girl reaches up, her hand locating the exact spot he found his own gray streak that day, looking in the mirror of his new cabin at camp. She fingers it for a while, then seems to realize what she's doing, and lets go.
"It was because of him we found our way through Daedalus' labyrinth," she murmurs, dropping her eyes to the ground. "He had this crazy idea of using a mortal with clear vision - a mortal that could see through the Mist - to navigate it and locate the workshop. I was convinced it wouldn't work. Probably because I wanted to lead my own quest, and I didn't want to depend on a mortal girl." She chuckles softly. "And he led our army in battle during the Great War, and defeated the Titan Kronos."
He's silent for a second, staring at her in awe. "I wish I could do that," he whispers.
She looks at him, pain filling her gaze. "You don't know how much you can do," she says quietly. Her eyes flicker to him, then away.
"Tell me more," he says urgently. He doesn't know why, but the topic of this...this hero intrigues him.
Without replying, she continues. "The first time I met him, he had just defeated the Minotaur with his bare hands. He was carrying its horn. His mother was gone - taken by Hades for ransom. I couldn't believe it when I saw it. How could an undetermined demigod with no training at all, no knowledge of the mythological world, defeat something as powerful as the Minotaur?" As he stares at her, she keeps talking. She's caught up in another world, another time. A better time. "And when you opened your eyes, you stared at me. You looked so scared. I didn't know what to do. But the second I saw you, I knew: you were the demigod of the prophecy. You were the one. And now, you're gone."
He notices that instead of saying he or him, she's saying the word you.
She keeps talking, staring at a spot in the sky, far away. "I took a knife for you, during the war. Your Achilles spot. Right there."
She puts her fingers on the small of his back. Before he can question what she's doing, he feels a jolt, and a thousand volts of electricity seem to arc through his body.
Without stopping to catch a breath, she continues. "I was injured. The blade was poisoned. You came up to see me, because they kept me in the hotel to heal. 'Annabeth,' you said, 'you can't die when I owe you a favor.' And I laughed, because you didn't just owe me one favor. You owed me many. But I didn't care, because you were there with me."
He's about to correct her, but realizes she has just said the name Annabeth. She said that this boy, the one she cared about, called her Annabeth. The name sounds familiar. He feels he should know it, but...
"You had run upstairs from battle just so you could see me," she murmurs. "Jake told me so. He said you didn't want to listen to any updates or battle plans. All you cared about was seeing me, and seeing if I was all right. You - "
"You're starting to say 'you,'" he interrupts gently.
At first, she doesn't get it. She's still in another world.
Realization seems to hit.
She stares at him, pain filling her gaze.
He needs to know more.
"What was his name?" he whispers.
She looks at him, an unfathomable expression in her eyes.
"His name," she says, "is Percy Jackson."
And she turns and walks away.