Disclaimer: All publicly recognisable characters, settings ect. ect. are the property of their respective owners (Rick Riordan). The original characters (if there are any) and plot are property of the author (me). No money is being made from this work. No copyright infringement is intended.

Jason plopped onto Dakota's bunk in cohort five. It wasn't his old one, as that now belonged to another legionnaire, but laying on it still made him nostalgic of the days when he wasn't praetor yet and didn't have to get up at the crack of dawn, only to read the terms and conditions of everything he had to sign.

Nostalgia. Jason hated the lingering feeling of it, yet he had put up with it for the past eight months, and still did.

Jason laid there and, with the more time spent thinking of that feeling, the more tension built up in him. His whole body was now rigid with tension and he suddenly began thrashing around Dakota's clumsily made bed, as if that would make it go away. He once stopped after he felt better from his violent episode only to find Percy looking at him weirdly.

"Um...Reyna wants you to know that you now have stable duty for a week because you missed today's morning muster. She also mentioned something about wanting to run you through with a sword."

Jason let out a groan and flopped back on the bed. Then he rolled over to his side to face Percy, who was now sitting on the bed adjacent to Dakota's.

There was an awkward pause before Percy decided to speak again.

"So, Reyna...She's pretty tough isn't she? And that's coming from me and I've only been here for about a week, and that counts the time I was on my quest, too."

Jason didn't know why he felt the need to defend her, but drew on what little memory he had of the girl in question, before speaking, anyhow. "She's not always like that, at least from what I can remember. She is the daughter of Bellona, so I guess that she's always been serious, but I don't think that's why she's as closed off as she is now."

Jason pondered it for a moment. He was remembering something big and the thought was almost within his grasp but it, like almost every other memory of Reyna, dissipated into the depths of his mind again.

He frustratingly shook his head. "It was probably something terrible that forced her to grow up so quickly. Something really terrible."

Percy, who apparently had been holding in his breath, exhaled before quickly changing the focus of their conversation.

"So, what exactly is going on with you and Piper," he begun, and after a quick thought added "and Reyna, at the moment?"

Jason let out another groan and rolled onto his other side so that his back was now facing Percy.

"I told Piper that I needed some time."

"And Reyna?"

"I don't even have a clue. Like I said, she's closed off at the moment. It must be some defence mechanism against me."

"A defence mechanism? Why would she need one against you?"

Jason pulled Dakota's pillow out from under his head and held it close to his chest, muffling his reply.

"There's a good chance that I might have kind of have said some things I probably shouldn't have said which made her say some things she probably wasn't going to say which turned out to be some things I probably didn't want to hear."

""Probably", Jason?"

"Fine, 'definitely.'".

There was an awkward silence that followed and although he did not say it aloud, Jason knew Percy wanted to know exactly what he had said to Reyna last night. Jason sighed and turned over to face Percy.

"No judging, OK?"

"OK."

He took another breath before saying in one go "I told Reyna that she was cold and that she had no right to build walls around herself and that she shouldn't be heartbroken because of me because we were never together before, anyway."

Percy gave a low whistle. "Wow, you've screwed up. It's a miracle how you're still alive with all your limbs."

Jason scowled. "No judging!"

Percy threw his hands up. "I'm totally not judging. Nope, no judgements being made here."

Jason could not help rolling his eyes at him, Percy was such a bad liar.

"Look, Jason, I'm probably the last person you should take girl advice from,"

"But, you have Annabeth." Jason interjected.

"Yeah, but I don't know how I managed it; she's way out of my league."

And to that, they both nodded.

"But," Percy continued, "I think you just need to give her time to cool off some steam and mend because under all that shiny armour, she's just a teenager girl with the responsibilities of a whole civilisation balancing on her shoulders. Just, maybe, distance yourself from her for a while."

Jason fell back again onto Dakota's bed. "She said something along those lines to me, too. She told me to forget about her and just be with Piper but, I don't know..." Jason looked up the plain wood ceiling of the cabin. "I just have a feeling somewhere inside that tells me Piper and I aren't going to work out. It's just a feeling somewhere inside that holds me back from really loving her and I don't think that's fair on Pipes. She's a really awesome girl who deserves a guy's whole heart, you know?" Jason glanced over at Percy before sadly saying. "And I don't think I'm that guy."

Jason propped himself on an elbow, now, and saw that Percy was considering his being together with Piper.

"Piper is nice from what I can tell. Annabeth likes her a lot more than she likes Reyna," Percy quickly looked over at Jason before hastily adding "her reasons being, and I quote, "She always has that familiar smile on her face. Everything's nice when you're with her. She's a true beauty and is consistent. You always know what's going on in her head; it's not a guessing game with her."" Percy put his hands up as if surrendering. "Hey, but I think Reyna's cool. She's complex and has that real drive. In a lot of ways, she's like Annabeth."

Jason arched an eyebrow at his newly-appointed relationship counsellor.

"Like Annabeth. Not Annabeth." Percy firmly stated.

Annabeth's description of Piper, as recited by Percy, floated around Jason's head. Everything mentioned was what Jason liked about Piper, too; her warmth; her effortlessness and even her underrated beauty. But even when thinking of reasons why he likes Piper, Reyna kept floating into his thoughts.

"But that's not what I want." Jason said absentmindedly, more to himself than to Percy "I don't want absolute perfection. I want flaws. I want to see them half smile, them going from laughter to seriousness and them biting their lips while lost in thought. I want secrets. I want to know why they choose that moment to glance around, why they sometimes walk with their head slightly turned down and why they prevent themselves from saying what's on their minds instead of just letting themself go. It may be weird but I find these things..." He paused, looking for the right word. "Beautiful."

"Well, I've got some stuff I have to take care of before the day ends." Percy abruptly said as he got up and walked to the doorway, snapping Jason from his thoughts.

Great, I've made him uncomfortable and now he's leaving. Jason thought.

Percy stopped and leaned against the doorframe, rubbing his chin, before thoughtfully saying "I guess if you saw parts of a person no one else gets to see, you could fall in love with them. Like, if you just followed them around invisibly for a day and you just saw them as they were, even if they were really weird and had no friends or were vicious killing machines, you wouldn't be able to help falling in love with them."

Percy gave Jason a small smile, as if in encouragement, and then left him alone in the cabin to mull over everything said in the past quarter of an hour.

Whilst thinking of his unexpectedly good talk with Percy again, Reyna stopped floating in and out of his thoughts. Instead, she now stayed there, being a clear image in his mind.

He came to a conclusion but it was not one he was going to easily accept, or she was going to easily accept.

Love. He thought. That's the feeling I have towards her. I love her, as simple as that. It was love at first sight, love at last sight and love at ever sight.

Percy is such and awkward dork but, I guess that's why he's so likeable.

It was incredibly hard to write this chapter, mostly because the balance between my need for some humour and casualness, and my ability to make this serious and useful to the story is so easily disrupted. I hope I didn't disappoint!

Next chapter: So, Jason had finally made up his mind and, now, only has to tell the girls. Piper's up first and how do you think she'll take it? Also, you can expect to see some Leo in the next scene.

P.S. I'm sorry for posting this a day late but you know what yesterday was, right? The second of October a.k.a. The day the MoA officially came out. Oh, my Jeyna fangirl heart - broken and lying on the floor! Please understand that it was a very tough day for me, although I'm handling it better than I thought I would. I hope you haven't let RR sink our ship and remember to stay positive!