Just a heads up, this chapter has a lot more drama than revelations and I found it more of a challenge to write than my other chapters. The next few chapters though will incorporate more action and revelations so I hope you stick around I guess?

"So much for this plan…" Will muttered almost to himself. He couldn't believe they were relying on coffee to get more memories out of him. At first, it had sounded like an ingenious plan. It worked once, why couldn't it work again? He was delirious when they fed him the coffee though, so did someone have to knock him out for him to remember something?

He looked up at Annabeth to see that the blonde was practically in her own world.The straw was in her mouth but she didn't look like she was sipping anything, and her eyes were unfocused.

"You okay?" Will asked. "I'm sorry about what I said a while ago, if it's stressing you out."

She removed the straw from her mouth and grimaced at her friend. "Of course it's stressing me out, Will. If I have to kill you, you think I'd be happy?" she asked, narrowing her eyes at him. "And now you're not the only one I have to watch out for."

"Percy?" he guessed.

"His impulse sacrifice will be his downfall." Annabeth recited.

Will raised his eyebrows in surprise. Why does that seem familiar?

"If you remember, before we left, Rachel ran to Percy, crying," Annabeth started as she ran her fingers through her messy hair.

"Rachel? The one with the red hair?"

"We never introduced you to her, did we?" Annabeth asked, mostly to herself. "I guess it was pretty stressful to hear those from her, we didn't even bother to tell you her name."

"She looked like she knew me, though, and she told me about Halt as if she knew him." Will sipped his coffee, silently hoping that the taste of the rich brew, mixed with his thoughts on that name would trigger something. Disappointingly, it didn't.

"She's an oracle, someone who has the power to see the future. She knows her fair share of things, she's just not allowed to reveal most of what she sees." She purposely emphasized the last part, as to not give Will false hope.

"Oh…" Will lowered his head in disappointment. "I was actually hoping we could press her for more."

"Trust me, if we did, there would be no such things as quests anymore," Annabeth said. She suddenly gave a heavy sighed and buried her face in her hands.

"If you're stressed about this, we can just go back up to the room. Nico might be back."

"It would be worse if we were there. I actually came here cause I needed some time away from Percy." She rested her chin on her hands and looked at Will. "The prophecy thing has kinda started to become a taboo topic for us. All it does is cause us to fight. Heck, I didn't even bring it up to his parents, Thalia or to Nico. Percy would kill me if I did. But that's the thing: I can't be the only one worried about him."

"I'm worried about him too," Will added as he lowered his eyes to the cup. He didn't want to make eye contact with Annabeth when he said that. Though he really meant it, he still ended up asking himself 'how could a cold-blooded assassin be worried about anyone?' and he didn't want to think that Annabeth might be thinking the same thing.

"Will, I don't doubt that," she said. "You know what Percy's fatal flaw is?"

"Fatal flaw?" Will asked.

"Heroes can't be perfect, you know, and all – or at the least most – of us have a flaw which, if we don't try to mellow down, will be our downfall. Mine is Hubris, or in simpler words, pride."

"And Percy's…?" Will gestured for her to go on.

"Loyalty. Rachel said he was going to trust someone, make an impulse sacrifice and that is what might kill him in this quest. Percy didn't spend much time thinking about it. He might be in denial, or too focused on helping you. A mix of both? I dunno. But it's kinda left to me to foresee possible dangers." The possible danger of Percy dying. She would have added if the word 'dying' if she wasn't so scared that just speaking it might make it happen .

"And you think I'm a possible danger?"

She was silent for almost a minute and Will let her. He had already started to understand her train of thought.

"Will, I'm really sorry. I care about you, but there's so much about you we don't know. Percy trusts you but you really could be an assassin for all we know. I mean, from what I see you're a good person but...the pieces just fit too well. It's scary. And worse comes to worst, I kill you. You know how painful that will be to have to go through all that?"

"I can try my best to not let it consume me. I'm sorry if that's all I can promise you," Will managed to say through the tense atmosphere.

"I know you can't promise me anything more than that. I trust you to at least...try." Annabeth paused to sip her drink. "Gods, I should've gotten a decaf, how am I going to sleep tonight?" she commented all of a sudden.

Will couldn't help but smile. Through everything, they all still wanted to release the tension and experience a bout of normalcy, and though it may have been a weak effort, it was still something.

Eventually, he found himself going along with it too.

QUEST FOR ORIGIN

The two friends returned to the room a few hours later to see Nico back in the bed and Thalia and Percy sitting side by side. Their eyes all focused on one thing on the wall.

It was only when they entered the room did they see that the doctor was holding something against the light in front of them. "If you compare this to the MRI results a while ago, you'll notice that there's something missing. That gap is where an ACL is supposed to be. When you were attacked by the bear and tried to escape, you probably jerked your knee or twisted it suddenly, causing the ligament to tear."

Attacked by a bear… Annabeth thought. It took her a while to register that that was their backstory and when she did, she silently scolded herself for forgetting something that important.

"So, what's the treatment?" Percy asked from his spot at the end of Nico's bed.

"It actually depends on the patient. Some choose to have surgery, and some choose not to and instead learn to live without the ligament," the doctor replied, pausing for a moment. "I'm guessing, though, that he is probably into hiking right? Into outdoor physical activities?"

"Yeah…" Percy answered. If you count fighting monsters and doing quests, he added silently to himself.

"Then I recommend he takes the surgery. If not, he'll have to deal with instability in his knee joint forever."

"When can I take that surgery?" Nico asked with a no nonsense tone.

"When do you want it? We can schedule it around next week, allow some time to heal, do some planning, find a donor…" the doctor went on as he put the MRI results back in an envelope.

"As soon as possible. We don't really have the time for all this," Nico said, raising his voice to the doctor.

Percy stared at his injured friend in surprise. He was impressed that Nico was this determined to heal and join the quest but at the same time, it horrified him to know that finishing the quest meant more to him than his own health.

"We'll have to talk to your parents, too, and fill out the paperwork. We're also going to have to brief you about the—"

"They'll say yes," Nico said indignantly, as if the person he was talking to was not a trained professional but more of a mothering hen.

"Nico…" Thalia started, looking like wanted to tell Nico off for what he was saying but decided against it.

"Alright, if your parents are willing to do paperwork by tonight, we can schedule the surgery for tomorrow afternoon at the latest and we can start on briefing as soon as your parents arrive." The doctor looked to Percy. "What time will they be back?"

"My dad will be back in an hour or so. He should be done teaching around now," Percy answered reluctantly.

"And he will consent to this surgery?" he asked, once again.

Percy nodded, not looking straight at the man in front of him. He felt some unsure feeling building in his stomach and he knew that he would probably end up arguing against Nico if he made eye contact with the doctor because, all promises and peripherals aside, he knew that the doctor was right: recovery was moving too fast. At the same time, he did want to finish the quest. It's a sacrifice Nico's willing to make, he told himself. More incentive to finish this.

"Okay, a nurse will come in an hour with the paperwork, have it filled up as soon as possible and I'll be back to orient you as soon as I have the go signal," the doctor said, his tone unreadable. He then left the room without looking back.

QUEST FOR ORIGIN

The three demigods in the room were all against Nico's decision and Percy and Thalia tied for most vocal. The hour after the doctor left and before Paul arrived was spent trying to convince Nico to rethink his decision, but to no success. He had already made up in his mind and everyone had to grudgingly agree that his decision was in their best interest.

So, when Paul arrived after a long day, Nico practically shoved the papers in front of him. Everyone except the latter stayed silent, yet were praying that he, the only person with actual authority over medical decisions, would argue against it. To their disappointment, though, he didn't look like he wanted to argue with someone who had made his mind up hours ago.

At around dinner time, Sally arrived, the doctor following behind her.

"I saw him in the hallway, something about a surgery…" she said, glancing expectantly at Paul.

The latter just smiled wryly at her, as if to say, "I'm as clueless as you are."

To his surprise, though, she accepted that as an explanation for the moment and turned her attention to the doctor who was looking through the folder and looked like he was trying to memorize its contents.

Everyone watched silently as he closed the folder and cleared his throat.

"This surgery is what we call ACL reconstruction surgery. The main ligament connecting your thighbone and shinbone was torn during the accident. Normally we would get the ligament from a cadaver but seeing as he wants this done as soon as possible, we will be getting it from your hamstring. I scheduled an operating room for the procedure at ten in the morning and without complications, it will be done by twelve. After that, we can have him discharged the next day. I assume you're up for it?" he asked as he raised one eyebrow to Nico.

The latter nodded, his eyes focused on the doctor.

"For ACL, the recovery process is up to the patient and their pain threshold. Some take months before going back to physical activity and some go back in a matter of weeks. We'll see how your son is after surgery and from there we can discuss a plan." The doctor then clasped his hands together. "Alright, I think that's all for now. We won't be serving you dinner since you can't eat twelve hours before surgery and a nurse will come in first thing in the morning to start administering the anaesthesia."

With that, he left the room.

"Why is this my first time hearing about this?" Sally said as she glared accusingly at Percy.

"Apparently, he has a torn ligament and they can only properly fix it through surgery," Percy explained, his eyes focused on nothing.

"And he practically forced the doctor to have it scheduled tomorrow," Thalia added. She placed a hand on the railing of Nico's bed and glared at the patient.

"We don't really have the luxury of time, do we?" Nico argued as he lay back on the bed, returning the dagger stare of his cousin. "And you need all the help you can get?"

"Do we really need your help? According to Percy here, you don't even have any demi-god powers at your disposal anymore."

Nico flinched hard enough for everyone in the room to notice, but quickly composed himself. "Out of everyone in the room, I'm the only one who actually knows my way around the Underworld. And what I've seen there isn't something I can easily describe… You guys can die there!"

"And you can't? Well, from what I'm seeing, you look like you'd have a better chance of dying than us!"

"That's enough!" Sally Jackson put her shoulder on the young hunter and guided her to the sofa. "I may not know what exactly is going on now but I'm sure you two fighting is what's going to make it worse. Thalia, you're going home with us. I think you need to give Nico some time to rest."

The hunter narrowed her eyes, ready to slap Sally's hand away, until she saw the stern look in her face. In a way, she was able to understand how that woman was able to raise Percy even with his ADHD and Dyslexia. "Just don't kill yourself, Nico," she muttered coldly.

"Percy?" Sally then asked. "You haven't been home in a while."

The young demigod shook his head. "I'm thinking the nurses would find it weird if the whole family left their son in the care of two strangers. It would probably be better if I stayed. We'll see you in the morning?"

She nodded. "First thing." She made her way to the door, a tired looking Paul and Thalia following behind. "Last calls, Will? Annabeth?"

Annabeth just smiled gratefully. "No, thank you. I think I'm better off keeping these three company."

"Same for me," Will added.

After a few more minutes of reassurances and goodbyes, Annabeth eventually found herself alone with her three other friends, yet at the same time, she couldn't help but emphasize the word alone. Because as soon as they left, everything went silent.

She turned to each of her friends one by one to see they had all drifted off to their own worlds.

Percy had been partially swallowed by the couch and looked dead asleep. Will had taken the side of the couch, asleep against armrest. Nico had his back to her so she really wasn't sure if he was asleep.

"Percy…" she whispered, leaning close to her boyfriend's ear. The latter had no reason to pretend he was asleep, so if he was still awake, he would have reacted. Just as Annabeth expected, Percy was dead to the world.

She made her way to Nico's bedside and sat on the nearby chair, putting her hand on his arm as she did. "Nico…" she started. "You still awake?"

The boy rolled over to her side and looked at her questioningly.

"I just wanted to talk to you… And apologize about a while ago. I guess I was just stressed and I should really explain that."

Nico lay himself flat on the bed and looked away from Annabeth. "If you're just going to give me hell about my decision, don't. Honestly, it's insulting. It's like you guys don't trust me to have thought this through."

"Honestly, though, your knee could end up worse for helping us, and your wounds… They haven't even healed yet," Annabeth reasoned.

"If we're choosing between the end of the world and my health, it's pretty much a no brainer."

Annabeth bit her lip. It was only a while ago did she actually try to incorporate Nico's thinking into hers. From there, she started to reflect. She would have been pissed off too if she were in Nico's place. He had so much to offer them – advice, guidance, intel – but Thalia and Percy wouldn't have it, all because he was offering it to them in this state. As she tried to imagine those two doing that to her, she actually felt slightly insulted even if it was just her imagination playing with her feelings.

"Yeah, I've actually started to understand where you're coming from and that's why I really wanted to apologize to you," Annabeth said.

"It's fine, really. I'm actually more pissed off about the fact that Thalia and Percy are treating me like I'm an invalid than anything else," Nico explained.

"Yeah, and about Percy…" she started. "He's just really like that…"

"I guess so," Nico replied, not finding much of anything else to say.

"It's getting late," Annabeth continued. "You're going to sleep then?"

Nico bit back a sarcastic remark and turned to his side, his back facing her. "Yeah, goodnight. Thanks for understanding me, though." He said, keeping his tone flat and unreadable.

Annabeth put her hand on Nico's shoulder and squeezed it.

She then settled herself on the sofa between Will and Percy, mentally banging her head against the wall. It had been the perfect chance to tell Nico about Percy's prophecy yet she'd found herself to have hesitated at the last minute.

She had already established with Will that that was something Thalia and Nico had to know, and she knew she'd have to tell them. But, when she started to bring it up, she felt some force pulling those words back inside her.

She wasn't scared of Percy getting mad at her. Actually, that was not even something she considered when she started talking to Nico. No, she was more scared of what Nico could bring to the discussion than anything else.

Nico said his powers were gone. Yet, it took a while for his aura to eventually fade. It took a while before Nico was completely incapable of shadow travelling. At that moment he might still be able to predict and sense deaths and Annabeth didn't want to take the chance. She didn't want Nico telling her anything he might know, anything he was sensing.

She didn't want the prophecy sounding more inevitable than it already was. She was in no way ready to accept it.

Thanks to my beta Merlyn Pyndragon.

I'd like to thank all the people who reviewed and the ones who offered to beta but I still have a beta haha and we've been working together for a long time. We just had a bit of a misunderstanding hehe.

Guest: Yeah! Thanks! I'm still alive as I write this and I'm hell bent on finishing this story.

Anyway, as boring as this chapter was, leave a review in the box below? A writer could always use some encouragement and feedback. As always an "update soon" and a "nice" will also work. Also, I'm pretty much open to questions about the story but I may not answer some since it would reveal too much about the story.

So far, I can't reveal the RA time frame nor the POV of any RA characters because it will be revealed in time but I will see if I can answer any other questions so once again…

Do leave some feedback!

Next chapter will hopefully be posted by the first week of June or earlier.