Good gods! Why did it itch so much? Ever since she had cut her foot in the arena today nothing had gone right. First she was supposed to meet up with Rachel to talk about how they've been since their last break, but she had to cut that short because Rachel had a meeting with Chiron. Then she was going to go back to her cabin, maybe work on some of the designs she had for the new Olympus, but everything in there was just not right. Upon entering the normally completely clean and organized Athena's Cabin, everything had been flipped over and by the looks of it, it was a battleground.
The spider. Oh gods, the spider! She was almost paralyzed in fear as her stomach turned in knots and her heart raced at the sight of it. She wanted to scream, she wanted to hide. Annabeth would've loved it if her feet would actually move in that moment, because she had to get out of there!
"Annabeth!" she heard Percy call from the door, "What's up?"
"Spider." He stepped around her into the cabin. Finding the spider he simply stepped on it. Annabeth had never been so grateful for him. He killed all the spiders, and had easily been accepted by her siblings for doing that. The tension relieved from her body and she went to scratch the area that was covered by tape. Of course, she had been hit on her Achilles heel, the place that was so painful to get cut at, "So, Wise Girl, you can stand up to the Titans, but not to a spider?" he teased, but in that moment, she really didn't want to deal with that. She shot him one of her famous glares, and he laughed, "I was kidding!" He followed her out of the cabin.
"What'd you do to your heel?" he asked when he noticed her bandaged heel.
"I was practicing sparring and Travis spotted my opening: my Achilles Heel."
"A metaphorical Achilles Heel? Not the actual muscle." She shook her head, "They actual Achilles Heel. It wasn't deep enough for any serious action, so I just put a Band-Aid and some tape over it." She shrugged. Little did she know how many problems that would cause the next day.
When she woke up the next morning, her bandage had ripped itself off in the middle of the night and her fingernails were matted with dried blood. She looked down at her cut and noticed the new layer of dried blood, and excessive amount of new raw skin surrounding it. She groaned as she touched the inflamed spot and felt the need to itch again.
She itched it until the raw skin began to bleed again and even then it still itched. She couldn't stop it! No matter how many times she tried to placate the itch, it came back to her.
"Annabeth, you all right up there?" her sibling, Mark, asked her. She turned her heel out towards him, "I think I had an allergic reaction to the tape." He stared in almost disgust at the nastiness that the cut had become, "I'll go get Will from Apollo."
Apparently, children of Apollo don't like waking up before the sun is at its highest, so dragging Will into their cabin was a bit of a hassle, but once he got there, he was almost laughing at her, "Will, would you stop laughing at me? Gods, this is already embarrassing enough!"
"Annabeth Chase, the girl who fought the Titans is brought down by tape!"
"If you tell anyone about this, Will-"
"Consider me warned!" he said back still holding in his laugh. But then, oh whoever it was, was going to hear it from her later. Percy came in, freaking out, "What happened, Annabeth?"
"I'm fine, Seaweed Brain! It's just a little cut!" she shrugged.
"From what I've heard, it's more than that!" he looked at her heel, "I heard your whole heel is bleeding, and that you woke up covered in blood!" she laughed at that one, "Honestly, I'm fine, Percy! Will bandaged me up. I reopened the cut in the middle of the night, no big deal."
"Promise me you're fine."
She almost laughed, "I, Annabeth Chase, promise I am fine."
He believed her without any other questions. But still to this day Percy doesn't understand why whenever Annabeth's around Will, Will calls her the Titan of Tape.