Percy and Annabeth looked like they couldn't believe what they were seeing. After a couple seconds of awkward standing and staring, Annabeth gave me a big hug.

"We thought you were dead! Where on earth were you?" she asked, angrily wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. I didn't have time to answer because Percy pulled me into an awkward guy hug, though it was noticeably more comfortable for both of us since he'd grown another three inches or so since I'd last seen him, shortening the gap between our heights. He didn't say anything, and seemed at a loss for words.

"Well, I, uh…" The words stuck in my throat, almost as if I had a mouthful of peanut butter. "It's a long story." My gaze flicked to Percy and I gave him what I thought would come out as a knowing look. He didn't seem to have any idea as to what I was trying to communicate, and just rose his eyebrows like What?

"You can tell us later," said Annabeth, "In the meantime we need to tell everyone you're alive so they c an bombard you with questions and hugs and kisses."

"That sounds great, but I want to talk to Silena first. There' something I need to tell her." Percy and Annabeth exchanged awkward glances, like they had some bad news for me; but then she waved away my request with a slightly queasy-looking smile on her face and grabbed me by the wrist.

"Come on, Metalhead."

The three of us ran up towards the rec center – well, they ran, I hobbled – and Percy grabbed the conch shell that was lying on the ping-pong table that was in as bad a shape as I'd ever seen it. Annabeth stuck her fingers in her ears, and I did the same. Good thing, too, because my eardrums nearly burst when Percy blew into the conch; imagine if I hadn't blocked my ears.

"In three, two, one…" Annabeth counted down. At "one", Clarisse burst in, electric spear in hand. Then Clarisse's siblings. Then most of the Hephaestus cabin, along with a short new kid whose hair had caught on fire. Then Travis Stoll, fighting with his brother over something. Then Katie Gardner, who managed to make Travis shut up just by looking at him. Then all the rest, including Mr. D and Chiron.

"What going on?" demanded Clarisse, "It better be good, I interrupted a duel for this."

"Not much of duel, was it, Clarisse?" asked Mark Robronski, her freakishly strong half-brother. "I would've kicked your…"

"QUIET!" yelled Percy. Everybody fell silent. Percy very rarely yelled, especially for people to shut up. "Everybody close your eyes." All the campers looked at each other curiously, but obeyed, except for the majority of the Ares and Athena kids. "Eyes closed." Once Clarisse had sighed exasperatedly and shut her eyes, Annabeth whispered,

"Get on the ping pong table."

"What?"

"Stand on the ping pong table." I pulled up a chair and climbed onto the table that seemed to be falling apart and really didn't look like it was going to be able to support my weight. But even if it fell in, I'd survived worse.

"Eyes open everyone!" When everyone had opened their eyes, a collective gasp filled the room. They were all staring at me as if I'd dropped from the sky, mouths gaping, eyes wide. I don't think I'd ever felt this conspicuous since I accidentally blew up my old school and was the only one holding a test tube… and even then, I hadn't stuck around for very long.

Nobody knew what to say. They were speechless. I scanned the room, searching for Silena.

"Beckendorf?" asked Connor Stoll as if he didn't quite believe his eyes. "You're… you're… dude!" He collapsed onto a box of new swords for the weaponry. I awkwardly slid off the table, shaking slightly. No sooner had my feet touched the ground, Travis Stoll pulled me into a hug. Then his brother. Then Clarisse and Chris Rodriguez. Eventually, all my friends, who had broken out into spontaneous laughter, were almost suffocating me.

"Where have you been?"

"How are you?"

"Why'd you have to scare us like that?"

"You seem like a nice guy. Who are you?"

Once everyone had let go and I'd recovered my breath, I continued to look around for Silena. Where was she? Maybe she was discussing politics with the nymphs; one of her favorite pastimes. But clearly this conch was for emergencies only, and she probably would have dropped everything and ran over, knowing her. So where was she? Not in the infirmary, hopefully.

"Where's Silena?" I asked Percy, loud enough that everyone could hear. "Is she OK?"

I could tell by the way Annabeth's face darkened, but the way Percy smiled uncomfortably at me, by the way Travis looked at his feet, by the way Clarisse bit her lip as if she, Clarisse La Rue, were about to cry, that something had happened to her. I knew, but I didn't want it to be true. It the thought of Silena in pain killed me more than my fake death had. But why weren't they telling me?

"Where is she?" I repeated.

And so Annabeth told me. With every word she said, I grew number and number until I was sure that if something exploded beneath me again, I wouldn't feel a thing. It couldn't be true. It was… impossible. It was the kind of thing that happened in those really bad, really cheesy movies that Silena made me watch with her. I had an inexplicable urge to laugh because it was so ridiculous… but was it? She was a demigod, after all. Was.

"She was a hero," Annabeth finished softly.

Now I realized why there were so few campers that I recognized. There had been a full-blown war while I was gone. Many of them had died. And I hadn't even been there to say goodbye. I blinked away the stinging in my eyes.

"Did you kill Luke, at least?" I asked bitterly. "Did you kill Kronos?" I looked down at Annabeth, only to see her crying. With a jolt, I remember that she and Luke had been friends – perhaps even more. Way to be insensitive, Beckendorf. Way to stuff your overlarge feet into your even bigger mouth. "What about the spy? Who was he?"

"Well it doesn't matter now," said Travis Stoll after a while, "He… he's gone too." I nodded, still curious, but too sad to actually bother asking. I loved Silena. In fact, I still do. Where she is and how far apart we are is never going to change that. I wondered if Calypso had known; probably. And I was glad that the spy was gone too, whoever he was, because if I'd caught him I would have made him suffer.

"Good," I told them, "Because he murdered her. He murdered my girl."

I didn't even realize I was crying until felt a tear drip off my chin.


A/N: Again, sorry for taking so long to update, but I didn't have the document over vacation. Hope you liked it and weren't too disappointed that I stuck with RR's original storyline; you know, with Silena dying and all. The part where Percy and Annabeth are running down the hill is at the end of The Last Olympian. I basically picked up right after that. Thanks for being patient! - SK