Author's Note: Thank you so much for all the reviews and story alert subscriptions! Here's another chapter. (: This one has a lot more emotion & action.

CHAPTER FOUR: WE EAT COLD PIZZA

Percy's POV

I woke up in a cold sweat, bolting up from something soft, and flashed my eyes open. Darkness engulfed me. Where was I?

My eyes scanned the room. I gave a sigh of relief when I realized I had fallen asleep on Adam's sofa. It was nighttime, but nobody bothered to turn on the lights. Annabeth was sitting on the sofa across from me, her laptop's screen illuminating her body.

I blinked. With shocking realization, I remembered now. The person in my dream was Annabeth.

"Are you okay, Percy? You're drenched in sweat and you've been making weird sounds in your sleep." Annabeth walked over and sat down next to me. She took a mug from the coffee table and handed it to me.

"It's hot chocolate. Drink some, it'll make you feel better."

I gladly accepted the mug. My heart started beating faster as I put the warm mug up to my lips and a warm rush of sweetness poured down my throat. I gently placed the mug back on the glass coffee table and turned to Annabeth. She was looking at me with concern in her gray eyes.

I felt my blood run cold. There was no way I was going to lose Annabeth. Vivid images from my dream flashed in my mind - of me drowning, of Annabeth laying hurt on the island. It's been a long time since I had a disturbing dream like that, and I desperately hoped it turned out to be no more than a figment of my imagination. My mind felt hazy and strange. Something was off.

I did the best thing I could to reassure myself. I leaned closer towards Annabeth and wrapped my arms around her. I pulled her face closer towards mine, engulfing the two of us in a warm hug.

Annabeth went along with the hug and wrapped an arm around my back. My skin felt numb, and it felt as if it were a hundred degrees. I didn't want to let go. It felt so good – beyond words.

A few years back, I remember there was a time I thought Annabeth would leave me forever.

[Grover gave me the brochure. It was about the Hunters of Artemis.

"I found that in Annabeth's backpack," Grover said.

I stared at him. "I don't understand."

"Well, it seems to me...maybe Annabeth was thinking about joining."

I'd like to say I took the news well. The truth was, I wanted to strangle the Hunters of Artemis one eternal maiden at a time.

The rest of the day I tried to keep busy, but I was worried sick about Annabeth.]

I sighed at the memory. Athena had said that my fatal flaw was being too loyal towards friends... not wanting to let them go. I gave it some thought and realized she was right. But I couldn't let my best friend, who I've known for four years, disappear out of my life. It didn't feel right.

Then it hit me. This was the perfect time to tell her how I really felt. I nervously thought of what to say.

I've been told I'm a person who does stuff on instinct, rather than thinking it through. I can't blame them for thinking that.

After a few seconds, I took a deep breath to brace myself… and kissed Annabeth.

Yeah. I kissed her. Not on the cheek, but on the lips. Everything started to seem fuzzy to me, and I was scared for my life. What if I wasn't a good kisser? What if I was taking it too far? What if...?

She was a bit surprised at first, and I didn't blame her. I wasn't what you would call romantic. I found girls to be pretty confusing, actually. But a few seconds later, her lips softened into mine and she tilted her head a bit. I moved one of my hands to her lower cheek, hoping I wasn't trembling too much. Her skin felt silky soft and smelled of chocolate.

Screw our underwater kiss; this one definitely topped it. We could have stayed this way forever – since our kiss was light and didn't cut off our oxygen supply – but I started pulling away slowly. I wanted to talk things out with her now after setting the mood.

Now we were sitting on the sofa, facing each other. Annabeth's face showed a mixture of emotions that I couldn't decipher. She gave me a questioning look after a moment of silence. Oh gods, please let this turn out well. I gave a weak smile and opened my mouth, ready to confess.

"Annabeth, I – I've been meaning to tell you this for a long time."

She looked at me, trying to stifle a laugh. Why did she have to look so beautiful when she did that? Hell, she probably already knew what I was going to say.

"A-Annabeth…" I said her name softly.

I gulped. Man up, I told myself. I gathered up all my courage and got ready to tell her. To tell the truth, I'd been thinking a lot about this over the past few weeks. I knew I'd have to tell her someday; and I felt reassured after how much closer we became those last weeks of camp. Surely she had some feelings for me, right?

"I – I…" I stuttered.

"Yes?" she asked me, turning serious once again.

"I really like you. More than as friends," I mumbled quietly in a barely audible voice.

"What was that?" she asked again, although I was completely sure she heard me. My cheeks turned red and I remembered what she told me almost a month ago: "I am never, ever going to make things easy for you, Seaweed Brain. Get used to it."

"I... like you. More than just friends... and, um, I was wondering if, uh, you, er, felt the s-same way?" I asked timidly, sounding like an actor who didn't memorize his lines.

Annabeth leaned back on the sofa and sighed, giving me an amused look.

"Are you gonna answer me?" I asked her impatiently.

She gave a small laugh and shook her head slowly. Then, we sat there – in silence for a few minutes. It wasn't an awkward silence, but more like one of those thoughtful silences.

"Percy?"

I turned my head back to Annabeth. She looked kind of sheepish.

"Yeah?"

"I'm sorry." Her words were so sincere, but I was confused.

"For what?"

"For being a jerk today." She looked down, taking an interest to the carpet. Her eyelashes hid her eyes. When I didn't say anything, she continued.

"I-it's just… it's so much to take in. I can't get over the fact that Luke is gone… how many of our friends died… And all the stress from moving. I'm sorry I took out my anger on you," she confessed.

I edged my hand closer to hers and squeezed it tightly.

"Annabeth, it's okay. What matters is that we're all safe," I reassured her.

She nodded reluctantly. "It's far from a fairy tale ending though," she sniffed.

"We're demigods. Things are never easy for us," I grinned.

Annabeth couldn't help but smile back at me. She leaned near my ear and whispered, "I really like you too, Seaweed Brain."

Hearing Annabeth say that made my heart beat a million miles an hour. My body almost went numb.

She snickered after seeing the look on my face. I smiled again for the thousandth time today, so my mouth was starting to get sore. I could picture Aphrodite watching us, tearing up at how Annabeth and I made up.

At that moment, my stomach started to growl. That made me remember that I hadn't eaten anything since lunch.

Annabeth smirked and said, "Adam's gone out to get pizza for us. It's taking him a long time though."

She glanced up at the clock. My eyes grew big. It was 8 P.M. already, which meant I'd been sleeping for almost five hours.

"Did you guys have a good time while I was asleep?" I asked, wiggling my eyebrows. (Hey, I'm not that oblivious.)

Annabeth's face turned a light red. "Percy, he's nothing but a friend to me." Really? A "friend" who she's only known for half a day?

I wasn't so convinced. "I saw the way you looked at him during swimming."

She looked away from me, totally embarrassed. "Sure, he has nice looks, but you're a lot more than just that," she said reluctantly towards the end.

I grinned. "You're really flattering, you know?"

She snorted. "Don't let it get to your head."

Right after she said that, my phone started ringing. "Who could it be?" I asked, puzzled, as I took it out of my pocket.

It was a text. Shrugging, I opened it and realized it was from Adam. I couldn't believe it.

help monster in parking garage

I read it over a few times, making sure I read it correctly. It was unlike Adam not to use correct punctuation and grammar, so I figured he was in grave danger. I hurriedly gave Annabeth my phone to read the text.

My thoughts started racing. Monsters? They were supposed to be rare, now that the conflict in Olympus had been resolved. And why were they suddenly attacking Adam, someone they had no particular interest in until now?

"Hurry, let's go!" she commanded me while she dug through her backpack to find her Yankee baseball cap.

We both jumped off of the sofa and dashed out of Adam's apartment to the elevator. We impatiently stood there, waiting for about a minute.

"Does Adam have a weapon?" Annabeth asked as the elevator dinged and we stepped inside.

I pressed the button to go to the lobby. The elevator started moving downwards. I leaned against the railing. "He told me Poseidon gave him a celestial bronze sword. But he doesn't carry it with him much, though."

She stared at me like I was crazy. "Doesn't he know better? Demigods are always supposed to be armed with something."

I tapped my foot impatiently. "He's never been attacked before."

The elevator door opened and the two of us ran towards the glass doors. The clerk at the desk glared at us for disturbing the peace.

We ignored him and the other people in the lobby. I flung open the glass door, with Annabeth on my heels. The cool evening Manhattan breeze whipped against my body, causing me to shiver. Damn it, I should've brought a jacket, I thought. The sun has long set, and it was beginning to turn dark.

"Percy, let's go." Annabeth tugged at my arm and we raced into the two story parking structure.

It was dark, save for a few small ceiling lights that emitted a white hue of light. I could hear the sound of cars driving past on the street. My eyes scanned across the structure and focused on a dracaena – its twin serpent tails were wriggling restlessly, trying to wrap around Adam, who was agile and dodged them.

He noticed Annabeth and me running towards him and grinned as he shot an orb of water at the dracaena's face, stunning it for a few short moments. This bought us time while I uncapped Riptide and Annabeth put on her cap.

"Hey! Over here!" I yelled at the ferocious reptile. It whipped its head around and gave an evil smile.

"I've been expeccccting you, Perccccy Jackssssson," it hissed. I expected it to start attacking me, but instead it turned its head back to Adam, who sneaked closer to me. This dracaena knew I was invincible, I realized.

"Not ssssso fassst!" it screamed when it saw Adam was getting closer to me. It pointed its sharp spear at Adam and sparks of blue electricity spewed out, crackling as it electrocuted him. He winced at the pain and collapsed on the hard concrete with a thud.

I glared at the dracaena, pointing Riptide menacingly at it. It gave a harsh laugh. Where was Annabeth? She should've killed it by now, I thought to myself.

I stepped closer towards the monster and starting jabbing it with my sword. It dodged every move. It gave me a wicked grin before it was replaced by a look of pain and started dissolving into tiny particles of dust.

Annabeth reappeared, dagger in hand. "Sorry, Percy. I was trying to delay killing it so we could get more information from it, but when it injured Adam" – she looked behind my shoulder nervously – "I had to do something."

I understood. "Let's talk about this later. I need to heal Adam."

Then, I finally heard the rushing sound of water. I turned to the source of the noise and saw a fountain of water spraying from a broken water pipe on the side of the parking garage.

Lucky for us, it was already dark and very few people were out on the streets. Focusing on the water, I moved it towards Adam and doused him with it. Annabeth was by his side already, holding his arm and trying to get him up. I ran over to them and saw Adam's eyes flutter open. He winced, but slowly sat up.

"Sorry about that, guys. I – I wasn't expecting to be attacked, so I didn't bring along my sword," he said.

Annabeth looked at him with a comforting gaze. "Look, it wasn't your fault. Can you tell us what happened?"

He finally got the energy to stand back up and started walking to his car. We followed him. "I was just buying pizza, you know, and everything was normal then. But when I finished parking my car and got out, I saw that huge monster thing –"

"It's a dracaena," I informed him.

"Yeah. A dracaena. It started attacking me but I managed to defend myself with some water from the pipes." Adam gave us a rueful smile. "I hid behind a column so I could text you. Right after I sent the message, it found me. Lucky for me, you guys came a few minutes later."

He opened his car door and took out a box of pizza. "It might be a little cold, but hey, it's better than nothing," he winked.

Annabeth frowned. "A monster can't be a good sign. I wonder why it came here to target you. We need to be careful during our quest."

"C'mon, we can worry about this later. I'm starving. Race you back!" I yelled as I sped off towards the lobby.

"Hey! Cheater. No head starts," Annabeth laughed as she ran after me.

Adam started sprinting after the two of us. "I'm the one holding the pizza!"

. . . . . . . . . .

It was 9 o'clock when we finished eating the pizza.

"So, where are we going tomorrow?" I asked Annabeth and Adam after we finished cleaning up. They looked at each other happily. Annabeth went over to get her laptop and set it down on the dining table. After she opened it, I saw pictures of a breathtaking beach with foamy waves and an orange sunset. Next to the beach were wetlands – little patches of grass surrounding small ponds, alive with birds and wildlife. As you went in deeper, it became a forest, with tall trees and plants everywhere.

"What do you think?" Adam asked me.

"It's perfect," I grinned. It had everything the current camp had – a beach, a forest, and a serene setting.

"Where, uh, exactly is this place?" I pressed.

"Huntington State Park," Annabeth answered.

"It's in Southern California. More specifically, Orange County. You know the show called The OC?" Adam asked me.

I snorted. "The one about all those stupid rich kids and their oh-so-difficult lives?"

Adam looked hurt. "It's not all like that. I used to live there, and trust me, it's nothing like the show."

"You lived there?" I asked incredulously.

He nodded. "Yep. I actually lived in the same city as the place we're going to: Huntington Beach. Also known as Surf City. It's a great place. You guys are gonna love it."

"Let's start planning," Annabeth interrupted. "It's 9 already and Seaweed Brain here still didn't finish his homework."

I rolled my eyes. "I can just copy off of you guys later."

Annabeth glared at me. "You're not going to learn anything by copying."

I was about to retort something, but she held her hand up, stopping me. "Chiron sent me the measurements for the new camp. We're going to have to make sure we draw the border correctly. And, one last thing. How do you plan on getting there?"

I laughed. "How do you think? We've got two sons of Poseidon here."

I really tried making their conversation at the beginning realistic. I hope Percy and Annabeth weren't OOC - I wrote what I thought they would say based on their personality - Percy being nervous and kind of timid, Annabeth being witty and tomboy-ish.