A/N: Wow I haven't updated since August. I know that isn't a far time from now, but I still feel guilty about it. I hope this chapter makes up for it!

Disclaimer: I do not own the Percy Jackson characters at all, nor do I own any ideas that came from the novel The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton.

I only caused one explosion in the science lab, and I already have detention (and it wasn't even that big, mind you). We were learning about mixing elements together to create a compound, and it turned out that mine had backfired. Some sick kid decided to trade one of my test tubes with another one that was made of gasoline instead, and if I had smelled it, I would have definitely figured out the difference.

But I wasn't stupid enough to sniff from a chemical. Guess that's the downside to safety precautions. You never know when something's going to blow up in your face.

"Are you sure you're gonna be alright? Do you need me to pick you up after detention?" Percy asked, then he gestured to the window, where there were now deep silver clouds barely hovering over the school. It was only a matter of time before the thundercloud exploded with the fluids inside. Just like my science experiment. "It's gonna be raining hard tonight."

I shook my head. "Nah. Don't worry yourself about me. Besides, don't you have family coming over? Your half-brother Tyson?"

"Yeah."

"It's probably better for you to stay with him. After all, you haven't seen him in, like, four years. You have a lot of catching up to do," I said.

"...Are you sure? Please, man, I'm not stupid enough to leave you here by yourself without any ride home."

I grunted, shoving his car keys into his hands and pushing him towards the school's front doors. "Out. Again. If you dare worry about me throughout this entire evening, I will use my knife on you."

He still tried to speak. "But...Tyson isn't even coming until seven tonight. It's only four."

I sighed in exasperation, and turned my head around to see if any teacher had saw him still here. "Well, just...I don't know, go make out with Annabeth or something while you're waiting. Not my problem. Just leave. Before they still see you here."

"I've only been here for half an hour."

"Now look who's getting technical. Go."

He made an annoyed face at me and said before leaving, "if you don't come back by seven, I will personally come and hunt you down myself," I opened my mouth to speak but he cut me off, answering anyway as if he already knew, "I will bring Tyson with me, okay? Just so he can see how stupid of a girl you are."

I shrugged and winked at him, "that's okay with me. I've met Tyson and I think he actually likes me. So I don't really have to worry about that."

There was a clutter by the janitor's closet, making my eyes fly open. "Go! I'm not even supposed to be here right now. Please?"

"Okay, okay," he said, already half-way out the door. Once I saw that he disappeared behind it, I sprinted back to the detention room, afraid that the teacher would already be there and demand to know where I was. I personally didn't care what the teacher would do to me, but there were cameras in the school and surely the teacher would find out that I was talking to Percy. And then he'd get in trouble.

Don't get me wrong; that happened a lot before, but I'm trying to change that. His mom could barely even make it out of praying to God that her son didn't become a drug addict or something like that. It wasn't like Percy was depressed or anything, but even his mom became a little paranoid from time to time.

As soon as I reached the room, I sighed in relief when I found that nobody was there with me in the room. I slowly walked up to my chair and sat in it. And waited. It must've been at least four-thirty when my head snapped up from the desk where I had been sleeping on to the sound of thunder echoing in my ears. Where the hell were the teachers? Throughout the entire time I had sat there, no one came to check up on me.

I wasn't sure if that was a good thing or something I should be worrying about. My vision went completely, blindingly white for a second, signaling that lightening had crashed upon the sky. Which was soon followed by another deafening sound of thunder.

The sound didn't really bother me that much though. It was what came after it that did. The sound of lockers clanging and jamming into each other, made me curious of either two things: I was probably just getting confused with the rain and thunder outside, or I really wasn't alone after all in the school.

Letting my tongue flick across my lips in anxiety, I pushed my body up and out of my desk, walking cautiously toward the science lab's doors. I stepped out tentatively into the dark hallways and padded lightly as possible to the locker area. I knew I was being stupid when I was doing this, but I felt my knife that was in my back jeans pocket, and, honestly, it comforted me in a not at all creepy way.

But when I reached the locker area, I didn't know whether or not I wanted to smile in relief that it wasn't some criminal breaking into the school, going through all the lockers, or if I wanted to cringe at the people I was seeing. "What are you doing here?" I asked abruptly.

Their bodies jumped a little in shock of someone else being with them, but eventually they brought their heads out of the lockers and turned to me.

Reyna blinked. "You're kidding me, right?" she seemed to ask to no one particular.

"What are you doing here?" Jason asked in a complete monotone voice.

"Detention."

"With no teacher?"

I shrugged. "I don't know. They gave me detention and left, I guess. The teachers here are weird."

He nodded in understanding and even smiled a little, which surprised even me, not just Reyna who was now looking at us like we were not even humans, but some weird hybrid breed that somehow makes it okay for a Soc to talk to a Greaser so casually without much shame at all. Trust me, I know that feeling too well.

"So what are you doing here?" I asked again to them, ignoring the icy look I was receiving from Reyna.

His somewhat tilted-up smile dropped just like that at the question. He looked at Reyna, who still hadn't taken her eyes off of me. Seeing that Reyna wasn't going to answer back, he turned back at me and replied, "we are putting some food and other necessary supplies into the Socs' lockers," he said without any hesitation after that.

I furrowed my eyebrows in confusion, while Reyna snapped out of whatever murderous state she was in and swung her head to look back at her platonic friend. "Jason," she hissed at him, at this point just plain out furious.

He glanced at her. "What?"

She just shook her head in shock at him, her mouth gaped open, obviously indicating that he was some kind of idiot by revealing that out loud. "Why are you putting the supplies there? I mean, I thought that the Socs had everything," I said.

Reyna snorted. "Yeah. That's what they all think."

Jason ignored her. "Well...I mean I guess me and Reyna are okay, but the others...not so much. That's why we're trying to help them."

"Why do they need help?" I asked quietly.

He was hesitant for a second, but finally sighed and said, "you know how the construction and where everything is going on is all the Greaser property?"

I nodded. "So?"

"Well, you know how the property is more nearer to the Socs than the Greasers?"

I stared at him, thinking about it. Yes, it was true. The Greasers had to fight for a couple of years to own what we had before-the old crop field. But before, it hadn't really belonged to us. It used to belong to the Socs. But since we knew how to handle crops better than they did and we could have actually put the field to use, we actually had something worth fighting for.

So you could understand how awkward I felt about a Soc talking about something that used to belong to their side of the town to someone like me. Too bad, though, that all those years of bickering about who got to have the crop field was put to waste by Annabeth's mother and Jason's dad. It wasn't their fault, I knew, but that didn't change my mood about the field getting destroyed.

"Yes."

"The construction is also causing the downfall of the Socs currently, is what I'm saying. It's causing a lot of pollution, so the water's pretty much tasteless and barely pure to drink. We used to have to trade some of our machinery for your crops, so yeah, you could say that we're running out of food pretty fast," he said, not really looking straight into my eyes. "The only main families that actually have a good amount of all of these things are mine and Reyna's."

It was quiet for a while, the only sound that could be heard was the heavy crashing from the rain outside. Then when I got the guts to say something, I said, "Oh." I didn't know what to say after that. Not to mention the guilt, now that I know what had actually been going on from the Socs' point of view.

So now both sides were suffering: both the Socs and the Greasers. The Socs, who were suffering physically, and the Greasers, who were suffering emotionally. Who knew that our real enemies would be someone from the outside?

And I didn't even know that I was voicing my thoughts out loud until I said it. "Exactly..." Jason murmured, his eyes lighting up in realization.

I frowned at him. "What?"

He shook his head absentmindedly and said with a lot more confidence than before, "just think about it. This entire time the Greasers had been suffering the loss of the crop field,"-I flinched-"but now there's also the Socs. Now the Socs have also been suffering a great deal as well. I mean, we'd do anything to go back to the way we were. Anything."

I nodded slowly, trying to make sense of the situation. "So what you're saying is that...if the Socs and the Greasers were allied with each other"-I could not believe I actually had said that out loud-"...than we might actually have a chance of returning back to normal?"

My mind buzzed with such possibilities. I had talked before with Percy about how the Greasers would always be outnumbered if we dared try to defend our crop field alone. We needed something else. We needed the other half of the whole. "We could start a stand-up. And get other people involved. We could...but it'll be difficult."

"Near to impossible, more like," he replied. "But the least we could do is try. Don't you think?"

I blinked at him again. "I guess. Okay."

"Okay."

"Good."

"Great."

Then it went back to being silent again. "...Why are you telling me this?" I talked quietly, almost to the point where I was almost whispering out the question.

"Because...because I want this over with just as much as you do. And, just like the rest of the Socs, I'd risk anything to go back to the way it had been before. And plus..." Hesitation skimmed across his eyes for a second before his blue orbs flickered to the ground for just a moment, and then he returned his gaze back at me. I felt intimidated, just like I had last time he looked at me like that when I was at his house for the first time, but now it was different.

Last time, he was looking at me like this because he wanted to know whether or not he could trust me. Something inside of me, though, tells me that we were way beyond the trust issue part, based on what we had just told each other. So why was he looking at me like that? And why was it suddenly so hard to breathe in the wide-spaced locker area? I realized that if I didn't get out of that place soon, I just might start having a heart attack.

"Plus, what?" I barely heard myself say.

"Plus..." he started, still not wavering his gaze. "I said I would help you. And I will."

Reyna, who hadn't said a word during the entire exchange, who had been silently fuming in Jason's stupidity of giving out the information, now just looked annoyed. "You guys are insane."

And that was enough for us to break out of the...of the whatever you'd call it.

"Look, I don't know what the heck has been going on between you two ever since she came over that time, and I'm not even sure if I want to know," she said, looking at us with a peculiar expression. "But all I'm actually sure of as of right now, is that both of you are crazy. And stupid, not to mention that."

Jason turned to her again. "Look, Reyna, this is the only way to help them. Don't you want that?"

"Of course I do," she said, her eyes softening a little, "but why does she have to get involved?"

I snorted. "Trust me, it's no party for me either."

She glared at me, but Jason cut her off. "Please? What other way are we supposed to do this, then?"

She was silent for a moment before finally sighing and giving in. "Alright. The least I'll do right now is to not tell anyone of what you idiots are planning. But I'll help you."

I think I actually smiled at her after that. She didn't do it back, of course, but it was still gratifying to hear her say that.

She looked out one of the corner windows in the far back of the locker area, and she winced. "Well, I'm gonna go now. The rain looks like it's only getting heavier by the minute," she turned to Jason, "you sure you're gonna be okay?"

He nodded and smiled at her. "Yep. Thanks, Reyna."

She smiled back and turned to me. Her smile instantly faded and she just nodded in my direction before pulling up the hood from her rain jacket and running out the doors so she could reach her car fast.

After she left, I cleared my throat and said out loud, "well, I should probably get going too. I guess this detention thing didn't really count for the teachers. I guess they were smart enough to stay home," I laughed bitterly.

Jason raised his eyebrows at her. "You have a car?"

I hesitated before saying, "um, no. But I don't live that far away."

"You're joking, right?" he snickered. "It's raining knives out there. Even walking just a little bit out there is dangerous, let alone more or less a block away."

"...You know where I live?"

"You know where I do," he pointed out. "And don't you live in the same apartment area as Percy?'

"Yeah. But I'm still not letting you drive me."

"Why not?"

"Because."

"Because, what?"

"'Cause we're supposed to be hating each other, idiot," I said, frustrated. "Because, yes, this entire peace pact we just created without anybody's consent totally makes us friends."

He didn't react the way I was hoping he would. Because the only gesture he made with his body was just a simple shrug. "Well, we are certainly acting like it. So I guess we are."

And cue the confusion. "A...huh?"

"Yeah."

"What do you mean?" I asked, shaking my head. "The...the rivalry and all that. In what world have you heard of a Soc being friends with a Greaser?"

He frowned, thinking about it. "I guess this world."

I jerked my head again at him. "Reyna would hate you. Percy would hate me."

He narrowed his eyes at me. "I don't really care. We don't have to make it public if you don't want to, God," he retorted.

It was quiet again before he spoke again. "I...I don't really know how to act in front of you anymore. I...I'm sorry."

Something weird fluttered inside my chest after that. I couldn't explain it if you asked me, but I knew that it was definitely there. And I wasn't sure if it felt good or bad. But judging by my next expression, it might have been the initial. "Ditto," I uneasily smiled.

And damn, the tension.

After about a whole thirty seconds of us not saying another word to each other, I let myself speak again. "So you gonna take me home now, or what?"

A/N: Not satisfied with this chapter. At all. I feel like it was poorly written. But I guess it makes me even more terrible to say that I was too lazy to change it. But I hope you guys have a different opinion about it.

Till next time,

Penguin