perrrrcccaaabeth: Thank you so much for reviewing, I'm glad you're enjoying it. Yey for musicians indeed!

VCRx: Really? I've read a few music fics while writing this one, must of the time the songs are kinda 'obvious', like really popular ones. I try and give things my own mix while also adding stuff people might now and enjoy. Thanks for reviewing!

A Handsome Nerd: Do you hate me yet?

Got something to say? Leave me a review!

THE ROAD – CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE

Annabeth

"Why are we here?" Nico broke the silence of the four of us sitting around the table.

Things, somehow, managed to get worse and worse between everyone. As always, I felt like it was my fault. The whole debacle between Frank and Leo made me think about how I almost rushed everyone back in to work when we clearly all needed time to think and organize our thoughts. I felt so selfish in my own actions, that I did this to try and get over my problems that I caused even more of them for everyone else around me.

More of those same incidents kept happening. Whether they were big or small, all four of us had things we needed to address. I took the previous night to make a phone call to Thalia, to try and explain to her and seek advice from someone older than me, someone I respected.

"I just don't know what to do." That was all I had to say to sum things up. I told her everything – I told her about my fight with my Piper, I told her about the time I saw Percy at the show. I told her of Leo's injury, leaving out the part about his emotional outpour out of respect for him, and I told her about everything else after that. Like the other day, when Nico walked in silently and tried playing something I assumed he had written at home. After a few tries and failing he got visibly angry, smashing his guitar against the ground and walking out.

I could hear her sigh from the other side of the line, contemplating her answer, "I don't know what to tell you, Annie. I feel like I can't tell you, as badly as I want to."

"What would you do?" The question felt helpless almost, which I really hated. But that's how I felt, and I couldn't hide it anymore, especially not from Thalia.

"I'd just try talking to them. To me it just sounds like you have a lot of issues you aren't dealing with, and you know the last thing I want to happen is you get hurt somehow."

I chuckled humorlessly to myself, "You know I can fend for myself"

"I do." She quickly agreed, "I didn't mean physically. You've been through enough shit as it is. You owe it to yourself to find the place you belong in."

Her words echoed in my head as we all sat around and across from each other, not saying a word. As soon as Nico spoke I remembered I wasn't here to sulk, but to achieve something. For all of us.

"Because we really need to talk" I looked back at him, but felt like I was addressing the entire group.

"What about?"

"I feel like we're rushing things" I took a pause and let my eyes make contact with each of theirs, "And there's a lot of stuff on all of our chests we need to deal with."

"Then shouldn't we be home?" Nico responded again, his words heavy and empty.

"I agree with her." Leo spoke up for what was the first time since we spoke privately to each other. Everyone's eyes darted to him at once. Frank, who was sitting next to him, rolled his eyes and rubbed them tiredly.

"We all know what this is about, right? We're all dodging it; we all know where this started." He wasn't looking up, but everyone heard him; whatever guilt I was feeling before was nothing compared to what I felt now.

"Can we not mention that anymore?" Nico snapped, raising his voice louder than I expected.

"So we're just going to avoid it?" Leo interjected, raising his voice as well. It all felt like what Thalia had described to me on the phone the previous night – there was so much tension between the four of us that we weren't even aware of.

"I didn't mean avoid it, I meant avoid him." Nico corrected, his voice oozing bitterness.

I didn't know how long they went back and forth. The more he was mentioned, the more memories came back, the more pain it caused me and them. I felt more and more sadness build up inside my chest that I felt like my heart was going to explode. I knew it was only a matter of time before the tears started falling as well. This was all my fault, I created this whole mess, and now I was just sitting there silently, uselessly.

"You can't just pretend nothing ever happened. Yes, he walked out on us. Yes, he quit. Yes, he was selfish-"

"I know all of that!" Nico interrupted Frank mid speech. If the anger wasn't clear on him before, it was now.

"And you're just going to keep pretending? Keep avoiding it?" Frank challenged him, the two locking eyes very intensely. Nico pushed his chair back and stood up, walking back and forth frantically around himself.

"Yes, I'd love that." He scratched his head in agitation. He didn't look back in my eyes, but I could tell he was going to snap any moment now. "I'd love to keep avoiding it. I'd love to just move on and pretend he never existed. You don't even know how much I want that." As he kept talking his lip quivered, and instead of anger, there was sadness, helplessness. He took a shaky breath in before he continued.

"I never had anything before this, like all of you. It was always me and my sister against the world after my parents left us. I made a promise to myself that I would never allow us to suffer, to live in our past. I kept trying with music because that was the only thing I was ever any good at. Yes, we all have demons we have to address, but you better believe it when I say I will not let someone walking out on me kick me down again."

The tension in the room, the boiling of emotions, was replaced with an eerie silence as we all dropped our heads. It couldn't have been so long, but it felt like the entire world stopped and we were the only ones living. It gave me some needed time to think, time I desperately needed and didn't have. I tried my best to logically focus, to put my emotions aside, and let my brain go through all the experiences over the last few weeks. I felt like somewhere, along the chaos, we all managed to lose each other.

"Why are we fighting?" I spoke up for the first time in a while. I felt everyone turn to me slowly but as I felt the tears start flowing, I decided to keep my head down.

"This is so pointless. We're getting nowhere." I had tossed logic aside at this point. I tried focusing on Thalia's words, that I should find the place that I belong. Maybe to do that…maybe…

"So we're just gonna quit?" Nico spoke up first, breathing heavily, "We're just gonna give up?"

The silence, the tension, was now replaced with dread. What were we doing?

"You've been like my family. You three…you can-"

"Don't say it." Nico warned me, but despite the finger he was pointing at me and the anger in his voice he was getting shakier, "Don't you fucking dare say it."

"But you can. You're all-"

"I don't want to move on, Chase!" His scream echoed throughout the room, sending chills up my spine. Nico ran a hand through his hair nervously and disappeared.

"Annabeth…is it-" Leo looked at me sadly from across the table. Frank had his head buried in his hands. Despite how little he showed us his negative emotions, I felt like he was trying his best not to cry too.

"We all need time. To think." I stood up and gave him a hug, letting him cry on my shoulder. I was trying my best not to cry on his. I grabbed my bag from near the entrance and left, heading back home. I was numb the entire way back home. I was sure I nearly crashed into another car, but my head was too clouded to remember anything, or even care for my own safety. I didn't know if I really meant what I had suggested. Maybe it was for the best, and maybe I was digging my own grave. I didn't really have an answer.

I could hear my phone buzzing against my bed sheets, but I decided to ignore it. I didn't want to answer. I looked through my bedside drawer and took out my note pad, the same one I had used a week ago. I flipped through the pages and stared at the words I had written a week ago. I hadn't made any progress since then. I wasn't even tearing up anymore, I was just sitting there, frozen.

I know, you're, gone, gone, gone

My phone kept ringing, bringing me out of my trance. There were too many missed calls for the screen to even display all of them. Most of them came from Piper, and a few odd ones from Jason. Even Beckendorf called twice. I figured it was about what happened back at the studio. It made sense, really – Nico must've told Beckendorf, and Piper must've found out from Frank or Leo. Jason probably called to try and help calm his girlfriend down. The phone ringed once again, showing Piper's name. I avoided it, yet again.

I needed a break. I felt my stomach growl, and forgot I hadn't had anything to eat in a long time. I walked into my kitchen and made a sandwich – I didn't have the energy to make anything else. I ate in silence and went back to my bedroom. My phone kept ringing constantly, so I decided to put it away and open my laptop instead. I barely got the chance to search for anything when a headline popped up on my homepage. It was advertising a new song, with a girl shredding a guitar and a guy I could barely recognize through all the black he was wearing.

The song started, abruptly cutting into a video that made me freeze in place. It was a girl, who I assumed was around my age, and a guy. It wasn't just any guy – it was Percy.

I barely paid any attention to the music. I couldn't hear anything because whenever he was in the shot, I was staring at him. I was in disbelief. Before I could even comprehend what happened, the video ended. I replayed it instantly. I kept replaying it, over and over. This reminded me of the Percy I saw back when he was playing with the Stolls. He didn't look confident at all, not like he always was – he was scared. The whole song felt like it was relegating him to a supporting role. His parts were so simple and I knew, I knew deep inside he was capable of so much more. I hit the replay button one last time and started scrolling downwards, reading through the article attached to the post.

"The bright spot of this collaboration has to be the performance of Zoe Nightshade. The young 22 year old has all the momentum in the world right now. However, the same can't be said about her partner for this song."

No.

"Percy Jackson, more than ever, looked sloppy. This performance, along with his last feature with the Stoll Brothers, shows a very steep decline for who was once in the consideration for one of the best rock guitarists in the world."

No.

"Furthermore, the star seems to have gone dark on social media. We have not heard word from Jackson in over two weeks. Rumors accelerated ever since this picture was leaked online."

It was Percy, and the girl from the video. They were hugging.

"Rumors have accelerated throughout the music world about what caused this tremendous downfall."

No…

A loud knock on my door brought me out of my trance. I marched towards it in rage, not even aware at how angry I was. I knew it couldn't be true. They were setting him up, they were trying to bring him down. It couldn't be true.

I took a deep breath and rose up on my toes. I could see Piper on the other side of the door, breathing nervously. I couldn't tell if it was because her face was distorted from the peep hole or if her eyes were red from crying. There was a part of me that considered going back to bed, back to my sorrow, but I couldn't. I opened the door for Piper, looking her up and down as she was covered in a deep sheen of sweat, her eyes filled with tears.

"Why didn't you pick up?"

This time, I didn't feel guilt surge through me. I was numb, empty.

"Piper…"

"Why didn't you pick up?" She asked again, a sob nearly wrecking her body.

"It's not…Piper, I don't know what the guys told you, but we didn't break things up. We just need-"

"Annabeth" She cut me off abruptly, biting her lip. She wiped the tears away from her eyes, meeting mine directly. A hurricane of unclear emotions started rumbling inside me, as I awaited what she had to say through her rampant breaths.

"Percy's brother is in the hospital."

A/N: Thank you to everyone who reviewed the last chapter, that was what really motivated me to write this next chapter so soon. Plus my foot is DEAD at the moment, I literally cannot step on it. I was boxing and probably pulled a muscle, which means pain that stopped me from going to school, so that meant more time to write. If the top of the page came out in bigger font, at least it looked like it, don't ask me why. I don't know. ENJOY! Extra special cliffhanger for A Handsome Nerd.