AN: I have no excuses... Or at least, I don't have any you guys would actually want to hear. Sorry this took so long, and thank you for all of the wonderful reviews and story-alerts!

Disclaimer: I do not own White Collar or Percy Jackson in any way, shape or form.

"Wow. You were really curious about Percy, weren't you?" A voice from the doorway spoke and Peter turned quickly, fighting off the déjà vu that came from the movement. There, in all her teenager glory, stood Thalia, still in her silver parka and jeans.

"What do you mean?" Peter spoke, eyeing her closely to see if she was a threat. After all, if Nico was a threat, it wasn't hard to assume the other cousin was too.

"What I mean is that you dug through his file, and searched all around for everyone he ever mentioned in any conversations."

Peter narrowed his eyes. "And how would you know about that?"

The girl scoffed. "Please. One of my best friends could rig up an internet connection in the Antarctic with nothing but a calculator. He showed me how to tell if my name is searched before he... I know when someone's looking around for me."

"And what, exactly, is your name?" Jones asked.

"I'm Thalia." The girl grinned at him. "Nice to meet you."

"Do you have a last name, Thalia?" Peter asked, so sick of the games that all of Percy's relatives and friends seemed to enjoy playing oh so very much.

"I do."

"And what is it?"

"I don't use my last name… I'm trying to get to that point where my last name doesn't really matter, like Beyonce."

"How about we make a deal?" Peter spoke, wondering if he was about to regret his proposal.

Thalia grinned. "What kind of deal?"

"You tell me your last name, and I'll tell you something you want to know."

The girl threw back her head and laughed, it was a short and quick laugh, deadly almost, like… like lightning. "And what information do you have that I would possibly want to know?"

"I can tell you about what Percy's been doing all those years he was missing."

"I can tell you that too. I keep an eye on my family, Agent Burke."

"I can tell you what he was arrested for."

"Bond forgery, try again."

"I can tell you anything!"

Thalia grinned. "Anything?"

Peter swallowed nervously. "Anything that doesn't compromise national security."

"Okay, Peter, I have something you can tell me."

"What?"

"So, I had this friend, she lived with her dad. And she was really, really troubled because not only was her mom dead, but she was never told how she died. Her mom was some celebrity, and when she died, everyone kept all the details very hush hush, and she was never told, since, like I said, she was living with her dad at the time. My friend died about twelve years ago, Agent Burke, and before she died she asked me to find out how her mom died."

"That's doable." Peter nodded (though he frowned at the 'twelve years' remark, as Thalia didn't look anywhere near old enough to really remember anything that happened that long ago) and then took the laptop Jones had been using. "What was your friend's mom's name?"

"Alicia Grace."

Peter entered the name into the search engine and then asked a few more questions to narrow down the field. (What year did she die, what year was she born, where did she live?...etc…) "Alicia Ann Grace, died May 21st 1998 in a car accident. The toxicology reports indicate that she had very high levels of alcohol in her system."

"She was drunk."

"Yes. Now tell me your last name."

Thalia grinned snarkily and turned around to begin walking away. "I already did."

Peter frowned before turning back to the laptop, where something caught his eye. Under the 'relations' section of Alicia Grace's file, there was a daughter listed… And her name just so happened to be Thalia.

Jones frowned. "She didn't tell us her last name, did she?"

"It was her mom, not her friend's that died. The only thing is… According to this, Thalia Grace should be twenty eight by now."

"That's… not possible. The girl is sixteen, Peter."

"I know that." Peter said, staring at the doorway through which Thalia had disappeared. "So, how is she twenty eight?"

Percy was panicking. Nico had been gone over half an hour and he was wondering if the whole 'you let my sister die' thing had somehow turned into a 'I'm going to let your mother die, no matter how awesome her cookies are' thing. He could have hit himself for thinking that, since there was absolutely no way that Nico was that vengeful, especially toward his mother, but the thoughts were somehow planted in his mind, and he found himself wandering on back to them every minute that the dark boy didn't return.

"What possible reason could he have for not being here?" Percy wondered, pacing back and forth in his apartment. "Mrs. O'Leary could have eaten him… Or maybe Alecto finally had enough of him and caged him up with some tiger or maybe even the minotaur… His dad could have forbidden him to go, maybe Zeus turned him into a pine tree…"

"Or maybe he stopped at McDonald's to pick up some food." Nico's voice came from behind him and Percy whirled around just in time to catch the bag being thrown at his face. "You're welcome by the way."

Grinning at the boy, Percy opened the bag and dug into its contents. "Man, I haven't had any of this in years." He moaned around a mouthful of fries.

"Too busy with all that fancy cuisine?"

"Had to keep up the image somehow… Did you find her?" Percy asked while taking a huge bite out of his big mac.

"I did…"

"Then, let's go get her!"

"It's not that simple."

"Why isn't it that simple? You put on the Yankee hat that you somehow got from Annabeth before she… then we shadow travel there, grab my mom, and come back here!"

"Like I said, not that simple."

"Why isn't it that simple?" The McDonald's meal lay forgotten.

"She's in a hiding place that's very well designed and underground… I don't know what it looks like on the inside, therefore I can't shadow travel inside of it accurately… I might accidentally trap myself in a wall or something."

Percy groaned. "So, we find the designer, or the architect, we interrogate them, or force them to give up some pictures or something, and we get my mom back!"

Nico smiled sheepishly. "Still not that simple."

"Why is it not that simple?" Percy yelled.

"It was designed by someone who… knew what they were doing."

"Who? Who is this elusive designer that the freaking Son of Hades can't track down?"

"I can track her down."

"Then why don't you? Oh, wait, I know the answer! It's not that simple."

"We know her, Percy."

"And why in Hades is that a bad thing?"

Nico breathed in deeply before shutting his eyes. "I don't want to tell you this. Really. I really, really, really don't."

Percy's eyes flared. "Tell me, or you're going to find out just how loyal Riptide is, returning to my pocket through all these years…"

"It's Annabeth."

There was silence.

"It's Annabeth, Percy… somehow, she's… alive."

Thalia winced from outside the door, where she had been listening in with Mozzie and Rachel. "That's not going to go over well…" She muttered before she realized what had just been said. "Wait, she's alive? How?"

Mozzie's eyes widened and he began cursing under his breath. "This is not good, not good at all."

"Why?" Rachel and Thalia demanded.

"Percy's a hopeless romantic… He had this big, passionate, whirlwind romance with Kate, just because she looked like Annabeth. If Annabeth is really alive, and just for some reason didn't care enough about Percy to let him know that, it'll crush him."

"Maybe we should pay her a little visit." Thalia grinned as she cracked her knuckles.

"I think this is something Percy has to deal with alone." Rachel murmured, though when Thalia glanced at her incredulously, she noticed that the red-head's eyes were blazing with the same dark emerald color as Greek fire. "And once he deals with it, we'll be there to finish dealing with it."

Nico stared at Percy, who was staring at the floor. A knock sounded at the door. "Is everything okay in there?" Thalia cried, obviously listening in, but Nico couldn't bring himself to care.

"I think I broke him!" He yelled back, and the door swung open as Mozzie, Thalia and Rachel burst into the room.

They crowded around the seated form of Percy, who was still staring at the floor as if it were the most interestingly fascinating thing in the room… For Hades' sake, he hadn't even blinked since Nico had told him!

Rachel put out a finger to poke him but Mozzie irritably slapped it away.

"Like I said," he addressed Thalia and Rachel. "He's broken."

"Do you think maybe we should do something to snap him out of it?" Rachel asked, studying Percy warily.

"Way ahead of you." Nico answered, returning from the sink (though no one had registered his absence) with a full glass of water. "Stand back… We don't know how Seaweed Brain will react in his element."

Rachel, Thalia and Mozzie took a few steps back, and Nico grinned widely at them before splashing the water into Percy's face. Suddenly, the calm was broken as Percy leaped up, and dried himself off within seconds. It seemed he hadn't forgotten his abilities, after all.

"What do you mean she's alive?" He shouted and the water droplets that had sunk into the carpet were suddenly lifted into the air, where they hung like strangely ominous diamonds.

"I mean that her heart is currently beating, her brain is active, and her soul is still present inside her body." Nico answered, stepping back so he was as far away from Percy as the others.

"But, how could she be alive? I saw her drown! And why wouldn't she tell me?"

Nico took a deep breath. "Percy, I think you should sit down for this, or your little Water Droplets of Doom will decapitate someone. Seriously."

Percy sat, and stared at Nico, wide-eyed. He looked like a puppy that had just been dropped out of a third story window and kicked repeatedly. "How could she be alive, Nico?"

"From what I can tell, she was dragged down into the ocean, in what you saw as a drowning, but was really a deliberate homicidal act. Whoever did it quickly stole her away and somehow caused complete and utter amnesia. She was then tossed up on shore where she was found by some kindhearted folks. She was adopted, renamed, and never remembered who she used to be. She then went to college and became a very good architect, sought after for many reasons. Her designs were both practical, and beautiful."

What sounded like a laugh or a sob suddenly burst out from Percy's throat. "She's an architect, practical, beautiful… It's just like her." He bit his lip and hid his face in his hands.

"Let's give him some time." Thalia murmured and the others agreed as they went out into the hallway.

Sorry about the length of this chapter, but I wanted to get this up quickly so I could start writing the next one. I was a little unsure of how I wanted to deal with Annabeth, but I think that she's kind of irreplaceable in Percy's life, and (let's face it), I'm a sucker for a happy ending.