(c) - Rick Riordan

Breakaway

One
Second chances

For a daughter of the wisdom goddess, Annabeth figured no wisdom was standing on her side. The pieces inside of her swished along with her as she swung back and forth on the hammock chair.

School starts in less than an hour - Boarding school, and another year would flow by just like that. Another year, closer to the day Percy Jackson turns sixteen, and closer to the day she will have to fight Luke for real. No, he would not be dead. The fall down Mount Othrys was simply too easy for a traitor's ending. Not in the world where Zeus controls the thunderbolt and demigods hold up skies. Oh Hades, the skies - another one of Luke's masterpieces.

"- see Annabeth." A flustered boy's voice shot up from the other side of the house. It sounded familiar, but she wasn't sure why. Maybe her brothers were up to their usual tricks again. She told herself not to worry.

"Annabeth is getting ready for school." That was clearly Susan, her stepmother's voice this time. No, she isn't getting ready; she's just sitting on the bench thinking about her troubles. "I don't suppose this is an emergency." Susan continued sternly.

The boy, whoever he was sighed. A moment later the door slammed, but the footsteps were going towards her direction. "Annabeth?"

Her mouth dropped wide open. "Luke?"

Luke nodded, his white-blonde hair getting in the way. He'd gotten skinnier and paler since she'd last seen him, if that was possible. The only part of him that still had full colour was his blue eyes, shining like sapphires compared to the rest of the mess.

In his hand he held a shining white truce flag. But she kept fingering her dagger, expecting a hellhound to burst out any minute.

"Luke...what happened to you?" She whispered, retreating from her ex-friend slightly. "And why are you here?"

"No time." Luke argued, plopping himself down next to her. "Thalia didn't oblige when I asked her about joining, and now Kronos is mad at me because I had been so sure. I thought I knew Thalia."

Anger finally hit her. She fumed. "Luke, Thalia isn't dumb."

"I should've known." Luke agreed. "But now...he is going to take the other way. I - It's going to cost me absolutely everything.

"Just come with me to camp! They'll forgive you, and -"

"It's too late for that. Will you run away with me, just like the good old times?"

Annabeth froze.

"We'll get Thalia too. I think she will cooperate to this one." He added a bit more confidence into his voice. "I swear on the river Styx I am not lying when I say this is a big deal. You are my only hope. My last chance."

She didn't know what to say. Thalia was the one that has a problem with temptation. Her fatal flaw was Hubris - deadly pride - that is the opposite of temptation. But when Luke offered Thalia a way out, she stood strong. And now Luke is offering her a way, and she is thinking about giving in.

When she was a little girl, they lived in a house surrounded by tall trees and forests that the kids weren't allowed to explore. So every single night after lights out, she'd climb down the ladder outside her bedroom and run freely into the wild, regardless of what might happen next. It's just the feeling of freedom, which she never got to experience before.

Now with Luke, it was pretty much the same thing. He'd basically stuck that picture in front of her, and asked her if she wanted to be able to run freely again. She'd be washing all her troubles away, and run away with her two best friends.

Who wouldn't take that?

She thought about it. Percy would be upset, of course. Very, very upset and mad. But at least Luke wouldn't be invading Olympus on his sixteenth birthday.

I am doing Percy a favour. Her brain informed her. I am making camp safer.

Annabeth had already run away once before, she could do it again.

"You're in." She heard herself say. "But get Thalia too, she IM'd me last night. I know where she is."

For the first time in a long time, Luke smiled.

That was short. I promise the next chapter will be longer.

R&R

-Taylor