Hey guys! Another update for you. I meant to have it up a few days ago, but I couldn't figure out what I wanted to write. Hopefully this will work. It's really long. :)

Also, I have a poll going on my profile right now about a story I am thinking about writing sometime, so please, if you don't mind, head over there and let me know what you think!

Percy is 31.

Maya is 14.

"We only had, like, 40 seconds left in the second half and Emily got the ball to me and I took it and scored right before the game ended," Maya explained as we walked down the sidewalk, on the way back from her soccer practice, "So our team won 4-3."

"It was just a scrimmage, wasn't it?" I asked.

"Yeah," Maya said with a shrug. "But the goalie for the other team, Deanna, she thinks she's better than the rest of us. She acts like she runs the team and I'm really tired of it. I really wish the coach wouldn't let her play as much, but she is good, I guess. Just super cocky and annoying, you know?"

I made a sound of agreement. "I've known a few of those, yeah," I answered, every school bully I'd ever dealt with coming to mind. I was honestly really proud of Maya for putting the girl in her place tonight.

She was one of the few freshmen who had made it onto Goode's JV soccer team this year, and, while I didn't know all that much about soccer, it wasn't hard to see that she was good at it. Normally, Mom or Paul picked her up when her practices ran late, but they were out tonight and, understandably, didn't want Maya walking the New York streets alone at night. Paul had called me and asked if I'd be willing to grab her. Of course I'd agreed. We could have taken the subway, but it was a nice night and a surprisingly warm one for early November. Goode wasn't far from my parents' apartment, and we'd opted to walk.

We'd left about ten minutes ago and Maya had spent the time regaling me with the events of the practice game her team had had that night. It wasn't unusual for her to talk about the events of her day-to-day life when she saw me. At fourteen, she liked talking, and I enjoyed listening. My own experiences in school, while they had gotten slightly better after I reached high school, had never been anything close to what you'd call normal. Frankly, I was glad my sister's time in school was proving to be just that.

Maya nodded at my response. "She deserved it," she summed up. I smirked. She looked at me. "You never played any sports in school, did you?" she asked.

"I was on the swim team my senior year," I offered.

"You were? Isn't that kind of cheating, because…" She trailed off and gestured vaguely toward me, "You know?"

I shrugged. "It probably would have been if I'd used my powers for my benefit. I just swam normally, like everyone else."

"But doesn't the water make you stronger?"

I shrugged. "Not as much as saltwater, but yeah, it does. I was careful. I was only ever as good as the best swimmer on the team," I said slyly, "I even let him beat me sometimes."

Maya, smiling, gave me a look and shook her head. "That's totally cheating."

I shrugged, grinning. "That's what Annabeth said too. Mom was thrilled though, which is why she didn't really press the issue."

Maya nodded. "Yeah, I guess that makes sense. You didn't swim before that because of everything that was going on, right? Like, your senior year – that was after all that?"

"Yeah," I said, "And yeah, that's why. I was kind of too busy before that."

Maya nodded, looking thoughtful. "Do you wish you'd joined the team earlier?"

"No," I answered, "I mean, yeah, I had fun swimming for Goode, but I mostly did it for Mom. I could have a lot more fun swimming at camp or somewhere if I really wanted to. But she liked that I was involved in something normal."

"What about basketball?" Maya asked, "You like that, don't you? How come you never played?"

"I did. Just not on a team. I didn't want to."

"Was it because you were dating Annabeth?" Maya asked, "There's a sophomore on my team who's always complaining that she never gets to see her boyfriend during the season because we're always practicing."

"No," I laughed. "I just didn't want to play on the school team. We weren't like that. Annabeth basically lived with us during senior year anyway."

"Why did she wait until twelfth grade to go to Goode, anyway?" Maya asked, but I had stopped listening. Something seemed off about the street we had just turned onto. It was a residential street, with apartment complexes lining the majority of it, so I was expecting it to be less crowded than the main street we'd just turned off of, but it certainly should have been busier than it was. There wasn't a soul in sight. I slowed almost to a stop, scanning the street, my hand drifting toward my pocket where Riptide waited. Maya, noticing my change in behavior, asked, "What's wrong?"

I shushed her, still looking around, my feeling of unease growing. I had a feeling I knew what was causing the local New Yorkers to subconsciously abandon a perfectly good neighborhood street, and I wasn't happy about it.

I just caught the movement in my peripheral vision in time to get my sister out of the way. "Maya, get down!" I yelled, pushing her toward the ground rougher than I'd intended to. I barely had time to draw my sword before a giant claw slammed into me. I flew a few feet through the air, Maya's terrified scream of "PERCY!" sounding behind me, before landing in the middle of the street and rolling to my feet. I held Riptide firm and took in the monster, the cause of the empty street – Mist was powerful stuff. It was a giant scorpion, like the kind Daedalus had imported to camp for capture the flag when I was fifteen. I hadn't seen one since, but I figured this one was recently reformed and had come for revenge. With my luck, that was probably pretty accurate.

Maya was still on her knees on the sidewalk where I'd left her. I hoped she wasn't too scraped up, but I couldn't worry about that now. "Get out of here!" I yelled to her as the scorpion swung at me with his tail, which just so happened to be dripping with venom. I dodged, unable to wait to see if Maya listened, and went on the offense, looking for a chink in his armor that I could get to. During that capture the flag game, Annabeth and I had never gotten the chance to actually kill one, on account of the fact that we'd ended up way outnumbered and, in our efforts to get away, had accidentally discovered the entrance to the Labyrinth in Zeus' Fist.

I tried to remember what the plan had been when facing the scorpions last time, but that was over fifteen years ago and Annabeth had been fighting it with me. I almost wished she was now, except that if she was it would have meant our young kids were here as well. It was bad enough Maya had to be here, but she at least knew the truth.

The scorpion was circling me now. I'd discovered it didn't have great peripheral vision and liked to keep me in front of it, expertly using its tail to keep me where it wanted me. I, obviously, kept trying to get behind it anyway. The noise it was making had started off as sort of an angry clicking, but grew into more of a hiss as it became agitated. I kept trying to catch a glimpse of Maya, but the thing was massive and quick, and I didn't have the chance.

In a lucky swing, I managed to take one of its hind legs off. Unfortunately, I'd been aiming for the tail, which was spewing more poison than ever, and severing the scorpion's extremity only served to make it angrier while still leaving it heavily armed. It swung its tail hard at me. I ducked and rolled underneath, but couldn't avoid the venom dripping off of it. I could feel it burn my skin as it made contact.

Fortunately, in missing me, the scorpion deposited me exactly where I wanted to be – directly behind it. It realized its mistake quickly, but I had already taken advantage of it and, gritting my teeth, got to my feet before it got the chance to swivel around. It swung its tail once more, lower to the ground. I just managed to jump over it and, as I landed, brought my sword down in a wide arc, accomplishing my goal in cleanly severing the tail from its body. The scorpion screamed in agony, still trying to hit me with a tail it no longer had access to and whirled around, this time faster than I could get out of the way. I narrowly avoided a giant claw and backed away to mentally regroup. It was disarmed of its venom, but those claws were still nasty.

The scorpion was favoring the side that was missing its back leg, and I saw an opening. In a classic basketball fake out, I stepped to one side and then quickly spun and headed for the other, making it around to the monster's side in its second of confusion. I launched myself at its abdomen and somehow managed to make it on top of its body. Its shell was hard as steal, but there were chinks running along the top of its back, and I saw my opening. The scorpion was spinning, still searching for me on the ground. I shook my head and army crawled my way toward its head, holding on for dear life. When I finally made it to the top of its armored back, I got to my knees and, with all my might, stabbed Riptide through the space just below its neck, almost decapitating it completely when it jerked violently to the left in shock and pain. It didn't move again, and as the body crumbled to dust, I jumped off the shell and rolled to my feet on the street once more.

"Maya!" I yelled, running to the spot on the sidewalk where I'd left her. She wasn't there. "Maya!" A choked cry sounded from a nearby alleyway between two apartment buildings, and I ran toward it. It was pretty empty except for a few dumpsters and some scattered leaves. I called my sister's name again as I stepped inside and a moment later, her petite body slammed into mine with a surprising amount of strength. She wrapped her arms tightly around me and clearly didn't plan to let go any time soon. I hugged her to me as she cried. She was shaking. "It's okay," I told her, "It's okay, Buggie, I promise."

"Is it gone?" she managed after a few seconds, talking into the fabric of my sweatshirt.

"Yes."

"Is it gonna come back?"

"Not for long time," I promised her. "It's okay now. Gods, I'm sorry, Maya. That thing shouldn't have been anywhere near you. I'm sorry you had to see it." She shook her head against me, whether in acknowledgement or agreement I wasn't sure. I continued to hold her for another minute or two before she started to loosen her grip.

"Are you okay?" she squeaked, pulling away for the first time.

"Yes," I said, "Are you?" I put a hand on each of her arms and backed up a step to examine her. The knees of her jeans had torn when she fell, but the denim seemed it have taken the brunt of the impact. She was a little scraped but there wasn't much blood. I sighed. "I'm sorry I pushed you."

"What?" Maya replied, her voice still weak but sounding a little more like herself. She glanced down at her torn jeans. "Oh. I don't care. It's fine."

She looked at me again, and then at my arms. My sleeves had holes burnt into them from the scorpion's venom. My back, which had taken the brunt of it as I'd rolled, probably looked much worse. My skin was pretty painful at the places where the poison had burnt completely through. Maya lifted a hand to a large patch of burnt fabric on my forearm, her fingers resting an inch above it. I grabbed her hand and held it. "It's nothing. I'm fine, I promise."

She just shook her head silently. I sighed, "Come here," and hugged her again. "I'm okay, alright? Everything's okay."

She nodded. "I know." After a second, I let her go.

I gave her another once over and sighed at her torn knees. "I'll buy you a new pair of jeans," I promised her.

"Seriously, I don't care," she said, "And I don't think Mom will either."

"Oh, she'll care. Just not about the pants." I studied her for another second. "Come on," I said, "Let's get you home. Do you have your bag?"

"No. It's still out on the sidewalk, I think."

She was right. Her backpack was slung haphazardly on the road a few feet from where I'd left Maya. While she retrieved it, I pulled a badly squished square of ambrosia from my pocket and ate part of it. I had to do something about the burns from the venom before they could get worse. What I really wanted was a shower or, even better, a dip in the ocean, but the godly food would have to suffice for now. Immediately, the throbbing along my arms and back subsided to a dull tingle. By now, people were starting to populate the street again and Maya was standing beside me, eyeing me strangely. I held her gaze. "I'm trying to decide how freaked out to be," she supplied.

"It's a lot, I know," I told her sympathetically as I began leading her back down to sidewalk toward my mom and Paul's apartment.

"I mean, I always believed you and, like, I saw Mrs. O'Leary that time and stuff, but…" she shrugged.

"I know," I said.

"Does that happen to you a lot? Being attacked like that?"

"Not as much as it used to," I answered as we stopped at a crosswalk, "But it's not exactly rare. I'm sorry you had to be there."

Maya paused for a second and then said, reasonably, "It was probably bound to happen sometime."

I couldn't argue with that. It was impressive enough that it had not happened before she'd learned the truth. "You're probably right."

She was quiet for a minute or so, long enough for the crosswalk signal to change and for us to cross the street. Then she said quietly, "You're a really good fighter."

I glanced down at her. "Buggie, that's not how I want you to think of me."

"I know," she said quickly, "But its true." She shrugged. "I'm glad it is." She glanced at me and then looked quickly away again. "So is Mom," she added, "I talked to her about it once, after you told me everything. She said that she never minded always having to mend your ripped clothes because it meant you still needed them. That you were alive to need them." She stopped then and looked at me again, this time without looking away. "Did she ever see you do that? Like, fight monsters like that?"

"Yeah," I answered, "A few times."

Maya nodded. "Were you scared?"

"When?"

"Before. When that thing attacked you."

I thought about it. "I was scared for you," I decided, "That it would turn on you or that you'd get hurt in the crossfire."

"You weren't scared for yourself?" Her blue eyes were earnest and genuinely wanting to know.

"I don't know. Maybe. I can't really think like that when I'm trying to kill a monster. Fear doesn't help. I guess I'm scared of getting hurt really badly and especially of dying and leaving Annabeth behind with the kids. And of leaving you." I glanced at her.

Maya was quiet for a minute. We were almost to the apartment when she spoke again. "I'm glad it was you."

"What?"

"I'm glad that Great Prophecy was about you. That both of them were."

"You are?" I asked. I wasn't.

Maya nodded. "Yeah. Because if it was about anyone else, they wouldn't have done it right. You don't worry about yourself; you worry about others. You wouldn't have let the world be lost. That's why you had to do it. And I'm glad you did."

I just stared at her, at a loss for what to say. Maybe she was right. I'd never thought about it like that. I was pretty surprised that she had. "Thanks, Maya."

She nodded. "You never answered my question, by the way."

"What question?"

"About Annabeth."

I blinked at her, confused at the abrupt change of subject. "What question about Annabeth?" I remembered no such question.

"Why didn't she go to Goode until her senior year?"

"Oh," I said. "She bounced from school to school. She was in a boarding school around here in ninth grade, I think, and lived in California with her family after that for a little while. She went to Goode our last year so we could be together after everything."

"Awe," said Maya, and just like that, everything seemed fine again.

Thanks for reading! And don't forget to check out the poll on my profile!