we could walk straight through hell (with a smile)

by seaweedbraens

The titans have won the war, the child of the prophecy was killed, and what remains of the demigod alliance is hidden underground. Many believe that the great prophecy was false, and that another will be revealed in time, but the sudden introduction of a new face throws everything into question all over again. [canon divergence, canon pairings]

1. out through the fields and the woods

a/n: well, here we are.

anyone who follows me on my tumblr will know that i started this fic in march of 2020, just as quarantine began. and now i'm here and i'm just like...why. why did i decide to do this.

this is the first of five chapters - it's kind of like a mix of pjo and hoo, and it's far more plotty than anything i've ever written so far. it's also hella long, and if you think this chapter is long...oof. just wait for the next one.

thanks a ton to Multi fandom geekerello for beta-ing and generally screaming (chapter 3 is coming i swear). also thank you to conner for bitching about the series with me, shar for promising to watch atla after i publish this, and haz, first for giving me good tIPS and later for being an absolute mess.

i hope you guys like it :)

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we could walk straight through hell (with a smile);

/

i. out through the fields and the woods

/

Percy's been pretty much everywhere. Part of the job, he'll joke to himself. Better to joke about his life than to break down in tears about it, that's his motto.

He's traipsed through most of the country these past couple of years, doubting all the while where the hell he's going, wondering what he's here for, looking for his destiny in the furthest corners of the country, that same weird feeling of not belonging plaguing him wherever he goes.

Inevitably, something always pulls him back in the vague direction of New York City, where he'd lived once but can never step foot into again – too many people, too many monsters: he'll be found way too easily. He always ends up skirting the borders of the city, chickening out and finding himself here, in these woods – there's nothing special about them, he would know: he's looked - but later, he will wonder if his gut (or maybe even some higher power) has been leading him here for a reason, after all.

/

Percy smells the monsters before he sees them, and –gods, that smell.

They smell of decaying corpses and cow poop and rotten cabbages all at once, and Percy tries hard not to gag as he approaches the site. He's camouflaged himself as best he can, having rubbed mud on his exposed skin well enough to conceal both his features and his smell - that demigod smell that's been attracting droves of monsters to him ever since he was a kid. The monsters say he's got a strong scent. They say it's a wonder he's survived so long all alone.

Percy hears muffled grunting and hissing up ahead; he steals forward silently, knife in hand. It's bronze – not the Celestial kind, unfortunately, and it won't wound the monsters nearly enough to kill them, but it looks enough like the real thing for them to usually cower at the sight of it, and so Percy keeps it on his person anyway, because when it comes down to it, it looks more intimidating than, say, a tree branch.

He's light on his feet, moving through the forest with a practiced ease that's come from years of hiding in it – as a kid, this was one of the first places he'd visited after being driven from home. He'd trained here for just over a year with the wolves before finally being deemed worthy enough to get to New Rome by himself.

He ducks underneath a particularly leafy bush as a dracaena comes into view. He holds his breath, wondering if he'd been seen, but she slithers by, apparently not sensing a thing. When she's far enough away, he exhales, and his breath makes a little cloud in the cold air.

Winter has turned the woods into a vast cathedral of white hanging off the branches, a palace of oak and pine and everything frozen. The colder months used to be a time of warm blankets and hot chocolate and his mother's arms wrapping around his middle, but there is some beauty, he supposes, in the melancholy death of everything fresh and green in the solitary pocket of these woods he's in.

Determined to keep moving, Percy scales a tree high enough to remain unseen from the ground as he jumps to the next one - it's delicate work trying to hold on with all the frost that's gathered on the branches - and he does this until he's right above the monsters' camp. Screened by the leaves, Percy tightens his grip on the branch and leans forward, peering downward, hoping for the best.

He inhales sharply at the sight, flattens himself against the trunk again, and focuses on steadying his breathing.

It's the Minotaur.

It's hard - very hard - to stop himself from abandoning his cover entirely and throwing himself onto the beast with neither a care for his well-being nor his life. Reason Number One that holds him back – well, the only reason that matters, if he's being honest - is the fact that he doesn't have a real weapon. He could always use an earthquake, but he's doesn't have as much control over his power as he'd like, and he's learned the hard way that using too much of his abilities drains him too quickly and alerts every monster in the area to his presence.

Percy remembers the first time he'd used an earthquake. He hadn't even known he could do it, but shortly after leaving New Rome he'd run into two gorgon-esque creatures that might have actually been gorgons – he hadn't exactly stopped to chat, after all. He'd just – felt this sudden calling, this urge to stamp on the ground as hard as he could, and so he'd done it, made the ground tremble under his shoes, and it had sent the blood in his body boiling. His heart had thundered and his hair had stood up on end and power had coursed through every cell in him, and it had been awesome.

Awesome – at least until he'd woken up, exhausted and filthy, covered in blood and dirt and plant matter from lying on the ground for days on end until his body had knitted itself back together somewhat.

Summoning an earthquake now would be like setting up a signal flare and then waiting for death. No, that's not an option.

Still, though – it's hard to curb his rage. He hasn't seen the Minotaur in eight years. Not since -

Not since the monster had, right in front of his eyes, ripped his mother apart limb by limb, snorting with malice at Percy's screams, advancing on him for the kill. Percy still doesn't know what higher power had spurred his legs from the scene.

He's been training for this moment, he's been waiting for the day he can avenge his mom. He doesn't know how the Minotaur found him that night, but Percy has always known he'd be found again.

Now it seems Percy is the one to find the Minotaur. That puts him at an advantage.

Holding his breath, he chances another look. Flanking the Minotaur are two cyclopes and three dracaena – four, counting the one Percy had brushed by earlier. They're dividing their kill in front of the fire – Percy spies glimpses of humanity in the form of a sneaker tossed haphazardly to the side, a flash of purple cloth that might have once been part of the victim's t-shirt. He winces as the monsters tear into the flesh, and wonders if it had been a demigod, or just a mortal this time.

Right in front of the fire is a pile of loot – that's what Percy had come for. He needs supplies – new weapons, maybe some armor if he can get it. He's not usually one to go seeking monsters, but he's also learned the hard way that monsters are very much armed with Celestial Bronze, and Percy can't survive on his own without a weapon forever.

The Minotaur has an awful hoarding habit, it seems - he sees several knives, a dented shield that could be of use, even a claymore that'll do nicely in Percy's hands. He itches for it. It's been a long time since he's had a real Celestial Bronze sword at his disposal.

The cyclopes he can take down easily. Maybe even the dracaenae, but the Minotaur will be tougher to kill. He's got to come up with a plan.

A sneak attack, he decides quickly, is his best bet. It's far too cold for him to stake the place out – he's only clothed in the black hoodie he'd stolen several towns ago and jeans that probably aren't even the fashion anymore. Lucky for him, though, the monsters haven't caught his scent yet, so the element of surprise is his best friend right now. He just needs to be fast enough.

With a quick twirl of his fingers Percy constructs a shield of water vapor around him, thick enough to block a volley of arrows. It could probably withstand one hit from the Minotaur's axe, though not much more, but it'll have to do for the time being: he's running on an empty stomach, and he doesn't have the strength for anything too fancy.

He assesses the wind. Though the night is cold, the breeze is low, with just enough force to make the leaves around him flutter lightly, the soft whoosh hiding well enough the sounds of his laboured breaths as Percy scales higher into the tree, as high as he can go. The monsters below notice nothing. Good.

As he always does before a fight, he takes a moment to breath. In and out, in and out. He says a silent prayer to – well. Anyone who might be listening.

Then he clutches the dagger in his left hand, inhales sharply, and launches himself off the branch.

He tucks into a roll as he descends, forcing the shield of water to curl around him defensively, and hits the ground just right of the fire, right in front of one of the cyclopes. The monsters don't have time to react as Percy fashions part of his shield into several long spikes. He concentrates, forcing them to harden into ice, and then sends them right through the hearts of both cyclopes – they fall, groaning, to the snowy ground, already turning to dust. In the confusion, Percy grabs several knives with both hands from the pile of weapons and lobs them straight at the dracaenae without even thinking about it. One gets hit in the chest and crumples at once. The other two dodge, rolling away, and come up spluttering and hissing. They send sharp arrows at him: Percy curses and forms the shield of water around him again.

The Minotaur stands, one beefy arm held out in front of the dracaenae, staring Percy down with – might that be a hint of recognition in those eyes? The dracaenae hiss. The Minotaur roars, advancing on Percy, as if to say, this one's mine.

Percy could hit himself. He should've grabbed the sword – he'd once again put too much faith in his aim, which had never been one of his strengths. He holds up his fake dagger, his mouth curled into a snarl, channelling Lupa's wolf stare as best he can, using his free hand to gather more water to himself, making his shield about five inches thick all around.

Through the water, the Minotaur looks distorted, almost comical in proportion, but nothing about this situation makes Percy want to laugh. He can keep up the dodging for a while, he knows, or he can run, but he can already feel his strength beginning to wane, the efforts of keeping up a shield on nothing but a couple of fruits from the day before proving too much for him. He could take out all these monsters with a single stomp on the ground, but he knows he'll probably pass out from the effort and end up a sitting duck for whoever – or whatever – shows up next.

Fight or flight. Fight or flight. Percy eyes the sword on the ground. The Minotaur roars again. Show-off, Percy thinks, his heart sinking. This monster is smarter than he'd realized – his call is meant for more than just intimidation. One more bellow loud enough and every single monster in the area will surely come to investigate.

He's in trouble.

He needs to kill this thing. Percy's already revealed his powers, and he can't afford to let the Minotaur get away now. The problem is that his strength is waning, and fast, whereas the Minotaur, fresh from eating his kill, looks ready to chase him for however long it takes. It seems Percy has overestimated himself – he isn't going to last long. All that's keeping him going is the thought of his mom, who had died to protect him. She had had a baby on the way. She was going to be married to a good man. Percy was going to be a big brother.

The Minotaur had ruined everything.

There's a rustle in the bushes behind him. With a start, Percy remembers the fourth dracaena that he'd evaded before, and chances a glance behind him, but the eyes that glow at him in the darkness aren't the snakelike slits he's expecting, though – they're round and fierce and distinctly human.

His breath catches. What?

The Minotaur charges.

Percy recovers his wits enough to leap to the side at the last possible second; the Minotaur goes barrelling past. Percy drops his shield and makes a reckless dash for the sword, but he's intercepted by one of the dracaena – he holds her off with his knife, which works just fine in parrying against her weapon, but he takes care not to stab her with it, as - even though she has a million openings and it would be very easy to defeat her – he doesn't want to lose his only bluff.

Where is the other one? Percy kicks the dracaena off with difficulty, clawing towards the sword. He reaches it, finally, finally, and twirls it in his open palm with a sigh of relief.

It's a good sword, he can tell. It's not his preferred form of weapon – Percy would prefer something longer, sleeker, not quite as heavy – but it's good enough, and gleams with a faint power. He almost sobs with relief. Celestial Bronze. It's been a long, long time.

He's forgotten himself – he whirls around to face the enemy, but she seems preoccupied with fighting off the multitude of vines that have suddenly made it their lives' goal to wrap themselves around the monster's scaly body. As Percy watches, wide-eyed, the dracaena is dragged off into a bush.

Unsure of what's going on but still not dropping his guard, Percy narrows his eyes, flicking a shield up as the Minotaur roars again - damn the stupid creature.

There's a screech from behind him, but it turns strangled, and even as Percy lifts the sword, waiting, he knows the dracaena is no more.

The Minotaur turns, confused. Percy flicks his hand, sending a spear of ice at the beast's left leg – his eyes widen in surprise as an arrow sprouts right above it, and the Minotaur goes down, screaming in rage. Dust pours out from the wound, but Percy can tell from where he stands, frozen, that it won't be enough to kill the creature.

Breathing hard, he grabs two more knives from the pile of loot and only just manages to fasten them at his belt when an arm juts out from behind a tree and pulls him away. Percy yelps, trying to break free, but the hand tightens around his wrist in a grip strong and warm. Percy looks up, dazed, to see a mop of choppy chocolate hair bouncing in front of him.

"Shut up and follow me," the girl says, in a voice low and commanding, and Percy, whose mouth had been open, ready to yell, finds himself obeying, even though he doesn't want to.

The girl pulls him along, breaking into a sprint, panting and cursing in Ancient Greek, wiping away monster dust from what Percy recognizes as one of the daggers he'd aimed at the dracaenae during the melee. Like shadows, other figures materialize alongside them – a buff guy with a tattoo flanking their right, brushing off blood from his knife that must've been from another one of the dracaenae, a smaller girl murmuring enchantments right behind him, her eyes flashing a lustrous gold. Another guy – no, a satyr, Percy sees his horns - jogs up to his left, holding the dented shield that Percy had left at the monsters' camp, and another boy with curly hair leads the way – lights up the way. He's got a ball of fire in his palm.

"That was reckless," the girl says, a minute or so into their run. "You're good, but did you really think you could have taken down the Minotaur?"

"Could've," Percy mutters, nearly tripping over a branch. "Could you let go of me now?"

"So you can run off again? Not a chance," the girl laughs. She turns around enough for Percy to catch a glimpse of her face. Like him, most of her face is dusted with mud and rubble to hide her scent, but her eyes shine clear in the moonlight, glinting different shades of brown. She looks, for an instant, like any other pretty girl he's seen wandering the mortal world with their friends, but she'd made him submit to her will with a single word, and he instinctively knows he has to be wary of her.

He realizes with a start that her armor is shifting with the shadows to mimic the changing landscape around them – camo armor. Cool.

"I won't run," Percy says agreeably – he's tired enough to know that he can't take on four strong demigods in the state he's in. "But could you tell me where we're going, at least?"

The girl glances at the satyr, who shrugs. There's a lapse of silence broken only by the sound of their feet pattering against the ground as they run: Percy notes, with some amount of surprise, that they're heading deeper into the woods, closer to the mountains.

"Bunker Nine," the girl decides, grim finality in her voice as she addresses her companions. "Let's let Annabeth decide what to do with him."

/

Piper isn't sure what to make of the new guy.

He jogs ahead of her, barely breaking a sweat at the pace Leo's set despite his obvious fatigue – the path is uphill, for one, and besides, Leo's fast – all the while making light conversation with Grover and Butch. He's shown no signs of being bothered by being sandwiched between the two – or maybe he knows well enough not to fight them.

Piper hangs back and glances at Lou Ellen. "What have you got on him?"

Lou's eye flick towards him. "He's strong," she says quietly. "Very strong. I can't get a read on his parentage, but –" She shrugs, which is enough explanation for Piper, really. Lou's one of the best they've got at reading demigods – their power levels, their potentials, their abilities, sometimes even their ancestry.

"Water magic?" Piper wonders aloud, remembering the way he'd turned the film of water he'd been using to defend into icicles sharp enough to pierce armor. "Or…"

Lou shoots her an uneasy glance. "Or it might've been best to leave him in the woods."

Piper shakes her head at this, glancing at the guy again. He laughs casually at something Grover says; Grover smiles, pleased, and Piper wonders if, perhaps, the satyr had led them to the fight on purpose.

The trees here are young and coated with a thin layer of snow, and now that the moonlight streams freely on them from above, Piper notices his arms, caked with thick slush that does little to hide the raw power rolling off him in waves.

She shudders. He feels like Jason – but no, that's not right, not exactly. This kind of wild, unbridled strength? He feels like Thalia.

Annabeth isn't going to be happy, Piper thinks sourly, as Leo extinguishes his flames and brings their party to a halt in front of the familiar rock formation at the base of the mountain. Grover brings out his pipes and plays a little tune that Piper knows will ensure their tracks, deep in the snowfall, will be covered.

The new guy hums, studying them all. His face is brown from the soil and there are leaves in his hair, but his eyes shine a weird electrifying green that sends goosebumps right down to her toes.

"You know," the guy says good-naturedly, I was expecting something a little more exciting, but –"

"Shut it," Butch grumbles, not unkindly. "There might be monsters around."

Lou takes this as her cue to open the gates. She pricks her finger with the tip of her knife, and uses her blood to weave the Greek symbol for Eta into the stones; there's a rumble in response, then a shift in the rock, revealing a hidden door wide enough for two people to slip through side-by-side.

"Okay, I take it back, I'm impressed," the guy says. Grover huffs out a little laugh, stowing his pipes in his bag.

"I'll go ahead," Leo says hurriedly, shooting Piper a look. At her nod, he runs through the passage. There's no need to use the fire – they all know the way well enough by now to get by, even in the dark.

The stones close behind them, and the new guy sighs when they do. "So long, fresh air."

"The Bunker is drafty enough," Grover assures him. "It's got an open roof, kind of. The trees around kind of make a see-through ceiling." Piper raises her eyebrows at this: it's unlike Grover to be divulging so much about their home to some random dude. Grover is friendly with pretty much everyone, but he's also an excellent judge of character. If he's being friendly to the new kid – who he had insisted on saving - that's a good sign that he'll fit in with the rest of them.

Some comfort, Piper thinks wryly, since it still somewhat feels like she's bringing a live explosive into their camp.

Lou leads the way – Green Eyes trips a couple of times on the uneven ground, but otherwise there's not a peep out of him. Piper hums, losing the tension in her shoulders the closer they get to the entrance.

Jason is waiting, she thinks giddily.

Up ahead, she can hear Leo's voice informing the border patrol – "We've brought someone you might wanna see –"

"What?" comes another voice; there's a screech of metal that accompanies the opening of the Bunker gates, and footsteps thunder towards them.

Annabeth pushes past Butch and Lou, grabbing Green Eyes by the collar of his (admittedly disgusting) t-shirt and nailing him to the wall. The poor dude yelps; his hand flies to his sword, but Annabeth closes her other hand around his wrist, pinning him in place.

Lou conjures a ball of light in her palm, revealing his eyes, wide open in fright and anger, and Annabeth's stony face, searching, searching.

Piper stifles a groan. She'd forgotten Annabeth would be on border patrol tonight, but even so, Leo could've worded it better – and as she thinks this, Leo pops his head round the corner, looking sheepish. Piper shoots him a stern look. He really should've known better. Bringing a lone demigod back from a supply run? Of course Annabeth would've thought it might be Luke.

Only then – and perhaps far too late – does it occur to Piper that Green Eyes is their first new demigod to enter their Bunker in years. They'd done a fair bit of scouting for new blood after the War, but they hadn't found many new demigods, and since then, of course, there's been nothing: after all, how can there be new demigods without any gods around to sire them?

Having studied the new guy to her fill, Annabeth steps back, glancing away as the dude slides down to the ground, coughing and glaring.

"That's how you greet a fellow half-blood?" he grits out, and oh – there's the glimpse of power that Piper had sensed earlier during his fight with the Minotaur. Energy crackles around him like he's a livewire. His eyes flash. Every cell in Piper's body tingles and warns, Danger! Danger!

Grover steps in front of him at once, but Annabeth, to her credit, doesn't even flinch. She looks him in the eye and says calmly, "My mistake."

The anger seems to seep out of him just as swiftly as it had risen. He blinks in confusion: he'd clearly been expecting a fight. "Oh," he says. Then, magnanimously, he adds, "I forgive you."

Piper can't help it – she snorts. The guy turns to her and shoots her a crooked little smile.

The tension dissipates, but Annabeth still looks unimpressed. "I wouldn't take it that far," she murmurs, and then turns on her heel and stalks forward.

Piper steps up quickly to catch up with her. Annabeth responds by sending her a tight little smile, though her eyes are still worried – Piper knows she's more shaken than she'd let on. She grasps her shoulder and leans in. "We found him facing off against the Minotaur."

Annabeth whistles, grudgingly impressed. "How'd he get out of there alive?"

"We intervened," Piper admits. "But he's strong, 'Beth. Jason-level at least. He's got some control over the elements – could be a water mage, though we're not sure."

Annabeth's eyes tighten at this as she pushes open the gates, watching as Butch raps out the password on the doors. "We'll have to find out."

"Do you think he'll be honest with us?" Piper glances back at the guy. "He doesn't look like a bad sort, but he'd be an idiot to reveal his godly parent to us immediately."

The new guy is staring up at the doors with an awestruck look on his face that draws a smile out of Piper. The doors are an impressive sight – at least ten feet tall and broad enough for two chariots to stand comfortably next to each other, made of pure iron and engraved with a large Eta for Hephaestus. The bronze braziers on either side glow dimly with flames – Leo feeds them some more.

The whole thing feels very theatrical, and Piper can't quite resist - "Welcome to Bunker Nine," she informs him dramatically. The guy snorts, shooting her an amused little smirk as the doors swing open, although his grin quickly fades into a gasp.

The Bunker is long and wide, the size of a large soccer field, with multiple passages all around. Most wind around and around, leading to more caverns, some even to their sister Bunkers, before eventually opening to the outside world, but some lead so far deep into the underground it gets a little eerie. They'd long suspected those ones were passages to the Underworld, but they don't have a child of Hades to guide them, and there really isn't an immediate need for their use right now, anyway.

One area of the Bunker is dedicated to the weapons arena, where most of the demigods store their weapons and train. Annabeth and some of the others had built a small ring, perfect for sparring matches, and there were even a few practice dummies – mannequins stolen from the nearby towns – strewn in the corner. Next to that is the Map Wall – where they document their exploration of the passages, secret routes to the other Bunkers, and the like. Annabeth has recently lately taken to using part of the Map Wall to hang up some of her own work – shrines to the gods she'd designed but had no hopes of ever erecting. Secretly, the rest of them call that portion the Dream Wall.

Then there are the forges, where the Hephaestus kids do what they do best – build. This Bunker, they'd long figured, had been built for demigods of Hephaestus back in the day, because it came with several shelves laden with scrolls on different kinds of tools and automatons, as well as all the materials and tools you'd ever need to fashion weapons. Bunker Nine provided for all the nearby demigod hideouts - they'd have to drop today's loot at the forges, too, so they could melt the bronze and make them into new toys.

And – as Grover had told the new kid – the ceiling is the sky itself, shielded from them only by a thick layer of leaves from the trees growing either outside or on top of the structure in which their Bunker is tucked. Piper looks up to inhale the cool air deeply – the Bunker has always been nice and drafty, and the forges keep them all warm warm during the winters – before trying to spot the stars through the canopy.

Right in the middle is the campfire, surrounded by a smattering of pillows (woven by Annabeth and some of the other Athena kids in Bunker Six) and shaky chairs. It's where they gather for meetings, debrief after a Quest, and – on good days – roast meat over the flames. The fire is enchanted – even Leo can't control it – and glows different colors depending on the mood of their crew. Perhaps in the new boy's honor, the sparks seem blue-green tonight.

Home sweet home, Piper thinks, gazing longingly at the beds that line the furthest wall, a real sight for sore eyes. She sighs, allowing herself now to hang her limbs loosely and walk a little slower. It had been a long, tiring, rather unproductive mission – there's nothing much to show for it other than a couple of weapons and a demigod that might be too powerful for his own good.

There aren't many demigods awake at this time of night, but the ones that are join their little parade, enquiring about the mission and casting nervous glances at the new guy.

"He's not going to be honest with us, is he," Annabeth murmurs quietly.

"Would you be?" Piper asks, and Annabeth hums in response, grasping a random bucket, sending water sloshing down her legs.

"Um, cleaning duty is later this morning-" Piper begins, but the words die in her throat as Annabeth suddenly whirls around, splashing the water all over Grover and the new guy – or not –

The bucket clatters to the ground at the new guy's feet. The water hangs in midair, droplets catching the light from the braziers hanging nearby, turning them into blobs of warm orange, almost like those you'd find in a lava lamp.

The guy's hand is lifted in a stop kind of way. Around them, everyone's still. Beckendorf's mouth is hanging open.

"Poseidon, then," Annabeth says quietly.

The new guy nods in affirmation, reluctantly, but with newfound respect in his eyes as he appraises Annabeth.

He considers the stream of water hovering in front of him with the air of one seeing the sight for the first time. "If you wanted me to take a bath," he says - voice attempting confidence but veering straight into sarcasm territory – and he kicks the bucket upright, twisting his wrist gracefully so the water falls into it again with a tiny plop, his eyes still on Annabeth, "you could've at least waited for me to take my clothes off."

With that, his body goes slack and he collapses onto the floor.

/

Annabeth watches the new boy sleep, drumming her hands on her lap thoughtfully.

If anyone else had been doing it, she would've called them creepy. Annabeth isn't being creepy – she's getting information.

The new boy is a mystery, that's for sure. He's lean – almost unhealthily so, although a few meals at camp will definitely help rectify that. He's got an inch or so over her in terms of height, and now the thick coating of mud is drying up and falling off, revealing a set of scarred, tan, and admittedly well-built arms. His shirt had once been blue, and his jeans had once been black, even though now they resemble the forest floor more than actual garments. His hair – matted from the soil – is black. His eyes are closed now in his sleep, framed by thick lashes, but Annabeth remembers his stare piercing through her when she'd driven him into the wall. Sea-green, like the purest stretch of ocean, and practically glowing with power.

He's handsome. He's got the kind of looks that would make all the girls in Bunker Ten swoon, but the fact only makes Annabeth all the more distrustful of him.

Who is he? Why is he here?

Is he a spy? The thought nags at her day and night as she wonders if she's brought the enemy right to the heart of their home. All the information about every last demigod camp is pinned right up on their Map Wall for him to see – but here he is, sleeping in the infirmary instead of trying to glean information from them like a good spy would be doing.

Nothing about him makes sense. He looks to be around her age – nineteen or twenty – which begs the question: how the hell did he survive alone for so long? He's a son of Poseidon. A son of Poseidon! They've never had any of those. They know of Jason, of course, and there had been Thalia, and there have been rumours of a child of Hades flying around ever since Grover had admitted to sensing a strong demigod presence in Las Vegas during a Quest. This guy, however, has seemingly popped up from nowhere, and that makes him a ghost, an uncertainty.

Annabeth doesn't like uncertainties.

She rubs her face roughly with her hand, looking up as Grover, Piper and Jason join her vigil. Piper had mentioned Grover taking a shine to the new guy, and ordinarily, that alone should've been heartening – Grover's found many a powerful, reliable demigod, but something about this new dude is getting under her skin.

She's ordered a round-the-clock guard on him, but all he's done so far the past three days is cry out softly in his sleep – bad dreams are the bane of a good nights' sleep for every demigod – and drool all over his pillow, which Annabeth shouldn't have found endearing, but did anyway, to her utmost disgust. Annabeth isn't a fucking sap. Annabeth has an entire generation of demigods to preserve. She doesn't have time to smile fondly at a cute boy and brush his hair out of his face. Which she had not done intentionally. Fuck.

"How's he doing?" Piper asks. Her hand has found Jason's: he rubs circles over her knuckles. Gods, they're nauseating, but it makes her melt, just a little.

"No change." Annabeth crosses her arms and stares at the sleeping demigod, who sniffs a little and hugs his pillow a little tighter. It's very hard not to smile.

"He's looking a little better," Grover observes.

"I don't think he's a spy," Jason says adamantly, and Annabeth rolls her eyes. Jason had taken first watch the night they'd found Percy and had come away from it feeling some intense, protective Big Three brother bond or some shit – he's been defending the unconscious demigod ever since, even though he has nothing to base his arguments on.

"I wouldn't rule it out just yet," Piper says thoughtfully, and honestly – bless Piper for her voice of reason. "He came with us a little too willingly. Maybe he wanted us to find him."

"Or maybe he just wanted to get away from the Minotaur," comes a gruff new voice, and all four of them turn in surprise to see the guy blinking slowly, turning to face them. He's still lying down, he still looks weak, but his eyes gleam with a mischief that sets Annabeth on edge at once.

"Sorry," he says unapologetically, clearing his throat and rubbing it as though he hasn't spoken aloud in a while. "You guys were speculating too loud, and since I was the topic of discussion, it seemed only right to jump right in, y'know?"

He sits up with difficulty. More mud falls off him - he really is filthy. Annabeth needs to get someone to show him the baths…right after –

"Who are you?" she demands, standing up and taking a few steps towards him, just enough for him to have to look up at her to meet her eyes – let him know who's in charge, here. "What's your name? How did you survive so long outside of the Bunkers?"

He doesn't say anything. Annabeth lifts a brow, regarding him coolly, but at once she notices him giving her the exact same treatment, and it doesn't improve her mood.

"Is this a private staring contest, or can anyone join in?" Jason asks casually. Grover shushes him.

"Answer her," Piper says from behind. Her words are laced with power and magic, fuelled from the charmspeak. "And don't lie. I'll know if you're lying."

He looks up at her with defiance, mouth sealed in a thin line. Annabeth resists the urge to throttle him, but the charmspeak seems to be getting the better of him, and his mouth opens against his will, and he looks frustrated at the fact.

"I'm…Rick," he says unconvincingly, after a moment of struggle.

Piper extricates her hand from Jason's and comes to stand next to Annabeth. Her eyes flash. "The truth."

Rick – or not Rick – deflates and sighs: words burst from his mouth in a steady stream. "I'm Percy. Perseus if you want to get technical with it. I really am here because I needed to get away from the Minotaur – I wouldn't have been able to defeat it alone in the state I was in, and then when your people found me I decided it wasn't worth the fight to get away. I'm not here to spy, or disturb your peace –" He waves an arm towards the exit of the cave – "if you let me go I'll be out of your hair in ten minutes. As for how I survived – well. A combination of skill and sheer dumb luck, I guess." He glares in Piper's direction. "You're a daughter of Aphrodite, aren't you? Did you just charmspeak me? Did you charmspeak me into following you last night?"

"Three yeses," Piper says casually, examining her nails with great interest.

Percy scowls at Annabeth. "Well, does that answer all your questions, Your Highness?"

Annabeth glowers at him. "I'm just warming up."

"Okay, let's all calm down. He's been out cold for three days, you can hold off the interrogation for a bit longer," Grover says soothingly, appearing at Annabeth's other side, while Jason steps up from behind Piper.

"Percy, you said?" he glances over Percy critically. "Percy…Jackson?"

Percy Jackson winces. "Present. You've heard of me?"

"We ran into Reyna two years ago on a Quest," Jason says absentmindedly, ignoring Piper's small hmph at the mention of the daughter of Bellona. "She told me about you." Jason turns to Annabeth, gesturing with a tilt of his head. "He's the one who beat Iapetus."

Annabeth's knife drops from her hand at this proclamation – she has to retrieve it, blushing. Grover is spluttering. Piper's eyes are wide open, awestruck.

"I don't really like to broadcast it," Percy says modestly, though he's sitting up a little straighter, shoulders thrown back to display the full width of them. Whether or not he wanted to make this titbit known, he is proud of it, and all of a sudden he looks impressive and confident, which, she has to admit, is kind of hot, and she hates herself for even allowing the thought to cross her mind. It's fucking infuriating. "I won that fight mostly because of the sheer dumb luck thing."

"Nobody wins against a Titan because of luck," Annabeth says scathingly.

"Yours was the only victory we had against a Titan during the War," Piper gets out in a rush, seeing Percy open his mouth, possibly to make some kind of satirical retort. "Our spies reported it during the battle – we called you the Titan Killer, but you vanished after that, Reyna said she hasn't seen you since they retreated underground. Half of us think you're dead, and the other half never believed you existed. You're kind of a legend, dude. How did nobody know your parentage?"

Percy shrugs. "Very few people do. I swore Reyna and –" his expression darkens ever so slightly, piquing Annabeth's curiosity at once – "and a couple of others to secrecy. The more people who know, the easier it is for monsters to find out. I didn't want that information out there."

"But why?" Jason's brows are furrowed. "You can trust demigods. It's not like they're going to sell you out."

Percy leans forward. "Information can be tortured out of anyone," he says seriously. "And besides – I mean, you might believe in this whole We're all in this together thing, but I've seen some signs of demigods working for the other side, and so I decided it would be best not to trust anyone with, um, information this sensitive. Especially back then…I didn't want the Titans to come recruiting, and now…well, I was just trying to stay alive."

The mood drops at once: Percy's words have the same effect as a raincloud blocking out the sun.

"Demigods spies," Piper murmurs. "So we were right."

Annabeth nods mutely. It's something they'd suspected (Annabeth had practically confirmed it when she'd killed one of the enemy soldiers and been splattered with real blood and not monster dust, but it's not a memory she likes to relive) since the last War – a lot of their people had vanished during the War without a trace and without any signs of being kidnapped, and, more worrying that that, the monsters and Titans had had an intimate knowledge of their battle plans, their formations, their numbers, their attacking strategies – the kind of information only a demigod on their side would know. Annabeth had hoped against all hope that the monsters had used some kind of bug to listen in on their conversations – but apparently that was not so.

Things have been quiet since then, though, and truth be told, Annabeth has avoided the topic altogether, even in her head. The thought of a traitor within their midst had seemed unlikely, but not an impossibility – it makes her shudder every time. She owes some of these demigods her life, and it distresses her to think that someone in their family, someone living peacefully in their midst, is just keeping them all alive, waiting to sell their location out at the right moment.

"How do we know you're not a spy?" she demands, even though she has no base for her uncertainties and everyone in the room knows it.

He raises an eyebrow. "You don't. But like I said, I can leave right now if you want me to. And besides, most spies don't go around killing Titans and nearly losing their lives in the process."

She grunts, displeased. There's a story there. She'll get it out of him later.

"If this is about before, I would've told you about my parentage eventually." This is addressed directly to Annabeth, who colors under his stare, realizing her mistake at once. "And thanks to your little display when I was brought in, everyone in your camp knows I'm a son of Poseidon now, so, well. Thanks for that."

"That seems a little far-fetched," Jason says. "Nobody except for Reyna knows you're a son of Poseidon? Surely some monster –"

Percy shrugs. "I don't use my powers too much. And when I do, I don't leave any monsters alive."

Silence follows his statement. Annabeth glances quickly at his hands, at the confidence in his face, and drops her gaze. He doesn't seem to be lying, and besides, it only takes someone sure in themselves and their skills to drop statements like I don't leave any monsters alive.

And revealing his parentage…she will be the first to admit she'd fucked up, which is, honestly, unlike her. It's just that something about the challenge in his eyes, even as she'd pinned him to the wall, had rubbed her the wrong way. She'd wanted to show off her strength and her intelligence. She'd wanted him to know where he stood.

It had been the wrong thing to do. She knows that, she does, and she wishes she could've swallowed down her pride, but something about the reproachful, almost disappointed look he's giving her grates at her every nerve. She stands tall. "Nobody here will sell you out. I trust each of them with my life."

Percy meets her gaze unflinchingly. "I'll make my mind up on that when I actually meet them, but for now…well, I'm going to have to trust you, then. Trust your faith in them." He gazes around at all of them, annoyingly calm and assessing – the look reminds her, she thinks, unnerved, of herself. "All of you. Daughter of Aphrodite, you look like a son of Zeus-" He smiles, then, lightly, nodding at Jason's SPQR tattoo. "Or should I say son of Jupiter?"

"I don't really mind either," Jason says, in far too cheery a tone. "Jason is fine."

Percy is brushing off some mud from his own arm to reveal his own SPQR brand. "Guess this makes us co-workers. Co-cohort-mates? My tattoo was more of an honorary thing, though, even Octavian couldn't argue after the whole Iapetus thing-"

Jason's expression brightens. "Fifth?"

"Fifth," Percy confirms. He rolls his eyes like they're gossiping. "You're that Jason, right? The one who turned down praetorship? Everyone loves you back there. Dakota wouldn't shut up about you."

"I miss them," Jason says honestly, and the words are drawn from him easily, almost wistfully, like he's been thinking them a lot. Piper raises her eyebrows. "I mean, I would go back to visit, but…" his voice trails off. It's too dangerous, Annabeth knows. The Roman settlement shifts underground around the Californian region, keeping tabs on Othrys, and although they're more in number than the Greeks, well-defended, and near-impossible to find, Jason could risk leading monsters right to his old friends. Besides, they haven't had real contact with their sister camp in years and years – not since the Titans took control of Iris-Messages. Annabeth can only hope they're still alive and fighting.

Grover places a placating arm on Jason's shoulder, but addresses Annabeth with a certain hardness in his voice when he says, "That's enough for now. I'll show Percy to the baths." His gaze is telling her to stop being so tough on the new kid on his first day – Annabeth wants to argue that technically it's his fourth day, but whatever. She does feel a little contrite at the severity of his expression – it's rare to see Grover so defensive of someone.

"Baths?" Percy's expression brightens. "Water is good for me."

"Fine," Annabeth relents, disregarding Grover's answering beam. Unable to help herself, she points her dagger at Percy, who goes a little cross-eyed looking at it in a gesture both ridiculous and adorable. Either he's just a little stupid or a brilliant actor.

"Don't even think of running," Annabeth warns. "I've got more questions."

He holds up his hands in surrender. "Consider me well and truly stuck here," he says, and suddenly his face breaks into a smile so open and disarming that Annabeth's insides flare up with an unfamiliar heat.

"Good," she gets out, thrown, and walks away from him as fast as she can.

/

Jason chomps on a taco, watching Annabeth sketch the rough outline of a temple of some kind with a stick of graphite. It's something she does when she's bored – or stressed. Right now, he would guess the latter.

He watches the swoop of her pencil and guesses, "Demeter?"

"Good eye," Annabeth says, stopping her draft long enough to smile at him.

Piper yawns easily, stretching her arms, kicking Jason lightly under the table, and settling comfortably at Annabeth's side – so Annabeth's stiff posture hadn't been lost on her, either. "So," she says, in a conspiring kind of voice, "what do we think of Percy?"

Annabeth looks around them quickly – luckily, most of the other demigods in the mess area are absorbed in their own conversations: though, to be fair, they're all also talking about Percy – and shrugs.

"I don't think he's a spy," Jason repeats. This, at least, he is sure of. Percy's definitely hiding some big secrets, but he's at least appearing to be answering their questions honestly so far – which is better than he'd hoped for, to be honest. Demigods have it rough, and travelling alone must've been brutal, so he doesn't blame Percy for being on his guard.

"That's not what I mean," Piper says, waggling her eyebrows. She nudges Annabeth so hard the graphite falls from her hand. "He's cute, isn't he?"

Annabeth splutters, "What- he was not! He looked like some kind of mudchild." She sounds far too defensive to be taken seriously, and Jason finds himself hiding a smile.

"Well, he won't be a mudchild when he gets cleaned up." Piper spoons some salsa into her mouth and chews calmly, effortlessly ignoring the silent fit her best friend is throwing beside her. Jason raises his eyebrows. Seeing Annabeth – their usually cool, composed leader – this riled up is rare. Annabeth has the kind of patience akin to nurses in hospitals – the kind who have to deal with screaming relatives - and her anger is more cold, not fiery. She's never, in all of Jason's time knowing her, flailed quite like this before.

Well, he thinks, sharing a secret smile with Piper as he tucks into his meal, Percy Jackson must've really gotten under her skin after all.

After breakfast, Jason, bored, cleans his sword, oversees a sparring match between Nyssa and Christopher, and drapes himself over Leo in an effort to bribe him into making some more tacos for him –

"Because I'm your best friend," Jason whines. It's not even like he's that hungry or anything - they grow enough for each of them to have seconds, and there are always supply runs to the nearby towns for them to stock up on essentials – he's just bored. Leo seems to sense this and attempts to throw him off – in vain – before giving up and hunching over his workbench, grunting under Jason's weight.

"Piper's my best friend," he wheezes. "Not you, you great whale. And, if anything, you should be cutting down on the tacos, damn-"

"Not my fault you're so teeny," Jason counters easily, used to the insult. "Pleaaase, Leo, just one," he adds, against his better judgement, trying not to show his extreme reluctance at having to be polite to his idiot of a best friend.

Leo drops his jaw as he stares around at the assortment of campers milling around. "Did I hear that right? Will all of you be willing to testify as witnesses? Jason just said please."

Jason aims a punch at his shoulder. "Does this mean you'll do it?"

Leo puts a finger in the air and cocks his head as though thinking about it. Jason releases him, hopeful, but Leo only drops his hand theatrically and says, "Not a chance in hell." Uncooperative bastard.

"I need Annabeth to double-check some of these measurements," he murmurs, turning away and flicking away some oil from underneath his fingernails.

"Annabeth's gone," Jason informs him.

"What?" Leo twists around: his hair goes under Jason's nose, and he sneezes. "Where?"

"The kitchens."

"She never goes to the kitchens," Leo says, disbelieving. It's common knowledge that Annabeth + cooking = disaster.

Jason shrugs. "I think it was to escape." He recalls Annabeth, hands over her ears, spitting out a strangled Fuck you to a giggling Piper before hightailing it to the kitchens where she knows Piper won't follow, and suppresses a chuckle.

"From who?" Leo sharpens his pencil against his knife, finally succeeding in pushing Jason away.

"Piper was teasing her about Percy," Jason reveals, dropping his voice – if anyone else hears, it'll spread like wildfire and Annabeth will skin him for starting rumours.

Leo whistles. "I see."

"Could be nothing," Jason relents. "Could be Piper rediscovering her Aphrodite blood."

"But what's he like? Percy, I mean." Leo looks up from his parchment, brown eyes sombre. "He get the all-clear from Annabeth?"

"Yeah, she seems to believe his story." Jason tears a bit of parchment away; Leo bats him away without even glancing at him.

"You think it's just that?" he asks. "A story?"

"He seemed genuine enough," Jason defends. "Decent guy. Maybe I should talk to him more. Get something out of him. He knew Reyna, after all." And Jason feels a pang of guilt at the name – they'd been best friends, after all, even though their last meeting had been lukewarm at best, and the one before that even less so.

"Anything to get you out of my hair quicker," Leo grumbles, darting away when Jason makes a grab for him. Slimy fool.

Jason takes the passage to the bathhouse – which is honestly a kind of hot spring deep in the caves, fed by the underground streams, heated by the earth. It really shouldn't even be there, but the water feels magical, healing, and everyone's just assumed that their predecessors had used some godly magic to create the pool. It's large as a small lake, divided into two by a stone wall– half for the boys, half for the girls – and it's humid as all hell; he has to wipe away the thin sheen of sweat that's formed over his forehead before he's even reached the place.

Grover's sitting at the side of the pool, fanning himself, a set of folded clothes in his lap. There's an unmoving dark shape in the water that Jason deduces is Percy only because Grover fixes him with an awestruck look and declares, "He's been under there for an hour!"

"Well, tell him to get out," Jason says brusquely, even though his eyebrows raise at this new piece of information. Children of Poseidon can breathe underwater. Noted. "I want to give him the tour."

"Isn't that Annabeth's job?"

"I have a feeling she'll be okay if I take this one," Jason replies, and Grover smirks.

Jason plops down beside him and touches the surface of the water with his hand. Immediately, Percy stirs – somewhere in his head Jason notes that Percy really must be strong if he was able to sense such a minor ripple - and swims to the surface, emerging from the pond with all the grace of a soaked poodle.

"This is great," he enthuses, pushing his hair out of his eyes, spitting water out of his mouth. All the dirt and grime has been washed away, revealing skin browned from the sun and shockingly raven hair. His tattoo from New Rome stands out sharply against his skin, dimming his other scars in comparison. Jason winces at a particularly jagged one stretching from his collarbone to his shoulder.

Percy notices him looking and winces. "Iapetus," he says. "They don't call him The Piercer for nothing." He wiggles his fingers at Grover. "Towel, please?"

They wait as Percy changes – there's a particularly convenient outcropping of rock that doubles as something of a private locker room. Percy appears in some old blue hand-me-downs (all their clothes vary in shades of blue, black, brown, and green – all the better to blend into their surroundings) that might've once been Jason's, but they fit him well enough. There are rips in the jeans, like most of the rest of theirs – only the holes aren't for fashion, they're from monster claws. Percy shakes his hair dry like some kind of shaggy dog, making Grover laugh, and the answering smile he receives in response is wide and toothy and entirely too innocent for the Titan Killer.

It's a stark contrast to the sharpness in his demeanour when he'd been talking to Annabeth, and Jason finds himself wondering how long it's been since Percy's laughed freely. He wonders if he's ever had anyone to laugh freely with.

Percy's been alone for a long time; he must've been very, very lonely.

They part ways with Grover at a smaller side-tunnel: he's supposed to be helping some of the Demeter kids with the harvest. As a satyr, Grover has nature magic that helps their little crop grow faster, grow better. The Demeter kids they've got are talented, but they're green – no pun intended – compared to their siblings in Bunker Four, and Grover's been a good teacher to them. They're the reason the rest of them even have food on the table.

"You run a tight ship," Percy says, impressed, as Jason explains this to him. They clamber their way back to the Bunker proper, Percy stronger and sure-footed, looking much better than he had when he'd first arrived. Water is good for me, he'd said before. Did the water restore him? If that was the case, Jason's calling foul – after all, the winds don't make his wounds heal any faster.

"It's mostly Annabeth and the rest of Bunker Six. They made this whole system really work," Jason admits. "I came here only right before the War – she's been here since – gods, I don't even know when. Years and years and years. I guess you could call some of us older ones – Piper and Leo and Beckendorf and Grover and me - leaders, in Bunker Nine, at least, but everyone around here knows Annabeth's the one who's been keeping us all alive since…well, forever, kind of." Jason flashes back to the moment they'd convened in Bunker One, desolate after fleeing from New York. Annabeth had been the one to formulate a plan to survive, taking charge effortlessly, and everyone had listened to her, even Clarisse.

Percy hums thoughtfully. "She doesn't seem to like me," he says, kind of wryly.

"Don't take it personally," Jason assures him. "Annabeth's territorial about her friends. Plus you're powerful – you give off this aura of cross me and you die –"

"That's not my fault," Percy says, almost a whine, but there's a smile in his voice. "And my aura is no different from yours, mister son-of-Jupiter."

"Annabeth's been putting up with us Big Three demigods for so long, she's used to it," Jason grins back, "but believe me, she took a while to warm up to me, too."

"It'll take me years," Percy groans. Then he pauses. You said us, though?"

Jason curses a little under his breath.

"You don't have to tell me," Percy says awkwardly, leaning against the wall, watching Nyssa practice her swordplay. His fingers tap lightly against the pockets of his jeans.

"Nah, it's cool." Jason shoots him a look. "Grab your sword, we'll go get some fresh air."

Percy interprets this correctly for Let's talk alone and bounds over to the arena, grabbing his sword, and rushing back to Jason, nearly impaling himself in his enthusiasm. He holds the sword with an experienced hand, even though he'd only gotten it a few days ago during the monster raid, according to Piper. It's a larger blade than most – Jason's partial to his gladius, but to each their own, he supposes.

He motions Piper over, who joins him wordlessly, planting a kiss on his cheek that makes Percy raise an eyebrow and Jason blush, but all Percy says is "You guys are cute," before gesturing for Jason to lead the way.

They walk back to the doors – Piper makes small talk with Percy, pointing out every demigod they cross by name. Percy greets everyone cheerfully, barely seeming to notice the somewhat unenthusiastic response he's receiving in return, that wide smile plastered on his face, and if it were anyone else Jason would immediately think they were being fake, but Percy gives off this air of wanting to be here, genuinely enjoying meeting people, and it makes Jason laugh softly.

Harley and Travis are manning the gates. Harley grins at Jason, who ruffles his hair, but Travis raises a questioning eyebrow at Percy – a silent question for Does Annabeth know?

"We're just taking him out for some fresh air," Jason says casually, which really means we'll keep an eye on him if he tries to run – but Percy seems to pick up on this anyway, snorting silently and leaning against his sword.

"Is it true you beat the Minotaur?" Harley asks him, eyes blown wide open.

Percy chuckles. "Nah, your friends dragged me away before I could finish the job–" Piper scoffs beside him – "but I'll get him next time for sure."

"Cool," Harley breathes. Percy grins and waves goodbye.

"How old is he?" he asks, thoughtful and a little sad, as they trek up to the main entrance.

"Ten," Piper says, with a barely-concealed wince. "He's one of the youngest here; him and a couple of others that age are the last generation of demigods we know of left in the country."

"Cute kid," Percy says thoughtfully. Then - "Last generation, huh?"

"I'll give you the whole backstory," Piper says. "So the Titans really began to gain a presence after World War II, but the gods still had enough power over the last twenty years or so to maintain their physical forms," she explains. "Ever since the Titans began to take over, though, the gods have been losing their strength – the last time anyone saw or felt the presence of any of them was five years ago during the War. The gods don't have the power to reform again right now, so we assume they haven't had the time – or energy, literally – to go around banging mortals…" Percy snorts, and she continues, "After the War, when we went into hiding and things calmed down somewhat, we sent scouts – satyrs, mostly – all around the country to round up whoever was left. Demigods usually begin to attract monsters around age twelve, and kids that age were easy targets for monsters, they were wiped out early. Our scouts took whoever they could find, including a lot of the younger kids, who still had a chance. Harley came in with that group – a lot of them were lost along the way. He was probably five years old back then."

Percy winces, but says nothing. His eyes go dim. Jason figures it's a lot to take in.

The path inclines slightly upward, but Percy doesn't seem too winded by the climb, so maybe the water really had energized him. Piper cuts her finger with her knife and traces the Eta at the dead-end, and the rocks move to open for them.

It's a nice day outside. A light breeze, not too much sun. Percy looks up at the mountains and comments, "They're a lot more impressive in daylight."

Piper finds a nice spot under a tree and throws herself down underneath it with a breathy sigh, but Percy looks around warily. Piper smiles at him and pats the ground beside her, holding her other hand out for Jason. "Don't worry. Monsters never venture this deep into the mountains, and never when the sun is out."

"I know," Percy says. "I'm just – used to being jumped. Force of habit, I guess."

Jason sits down next to Piper; she leans against him. She must've taken a bath today, too: her hair smells clean and her skin glows in the dappled sunlight. Sometimes, on days like these, when it's just the two of them, Jason can close his eyes and imagine them having a picnic somewhere nice. He feels a slight pang of yearning at the thought. He knows the life they lead, and it's not like Piper's ever pressured him for anything other than what they have right now, but –

He'd like to take her out on a date sometime, a date to some place nice and normal.

Percy sits cross-legged in front of an adjacent tree. If it weren't for the large sword laid at his feet, he could probably pass off for someone much younger, a teenager skiving off school.

"You had something to tell me," he prompts.

"Right." Jason leans against the tree, taking Piper with him, who giggles a little, righting herself. "So. Thalia."

/

Jason and Piper are kinda sickening, Percy thinks, as he runs a finger down his sword and watches them cuddle. Percy's been travelling mostly solo, and relationships hadn't exactly been a priority – the only girl he'd really felt close to had been Bianca, who had been more like a sister than anything else – but he supposes that these half-bloods, who have been living together for a while, have probably had all the time in the world to get crushes on each other, and even date.

His is the worst position to be in right now – he wonders how Annabeth manages with these two kissing around her all the time, but he figures that she has more than enough other people around to distract her.

Annabeth, Percy thinks, unwillingly.

He glances at Piper again. She's smiling at him, beckoning him forward. She's pretty - beautiful even, with smooth brown skin and rich hair the color of strong coffee. She's pretty the way Percy would expect a child of Aphrodite to be, even though it's very obvious that Piper's trying to downplay her beauty – her hair is cut at odd angles, and she wears baggy clothes – but, well. It's not like she has any other choice in the latter.

Annabeth is different.

It isn't so much her looks: the chiselled cheekbones, the determined set of her jaw, or the gold woven in her hair. It isn't her edgy frame, the confidence in her posture, or even the flash of grey eyes that are a bit like looking at a cloudy winter sky.

Annabeth is beautiful in the way a sword is beautiful. All angles and sharp lines barely softened by the shapeless outfits they all have to wear, cutting enough to hurt if you get too familiar, but beautiful all the same. She looks like the kind of person who has elbows poky enough to pierce a hole through you, the kind of person who could take you apart with a single glance.

Percy's hooked.

He feels…weird around her, and he's never felt it before, not this way. He's bigger than her, stronger physically, probably, but something about Annabeth makes him nervous. Not the same kind of unease he'd first felt around Piper, who seemed like she could bring an army to its knees with no more than a few select words, or Jason, who Percy could tell at once had a whole different kind of power running through his veins.

Annabeth seems powerful in a different way. Everyone in the Bunker turns towards her like sunflowers chasing the sun, and Percy can see that it's not because she's beautiful, or full of charisma, or anything of the sort. It's her strength, her surety, the way she strides out as if the world will fall into line in front of her.

He'd enjoyed their verbal spar from before. Almost at once he'd gotten the impression that Annabeth was both smart and used to getting her way, and so making her trip over her words and catching her off guard had been infinitely satisfying. Judging by the incredulous stares from Grover, Piper, and Jason, Percy'd gleaned that an unsettled, stammering Annabeth was not the usual thing. He'd liked the effect, though. It made her tough exterior less intimidating. It made her seem more human.

He's never been the type to go out of his way to get someone on his good side – he's always been a people person, and communication comes easily to him, but something about Annabeth makes him want to get her attention. Makes him want to impress her, of all things. It doesn't make sense.

Plus - there's something about this place. About the warm of the heart, the steady clang of metal from the forges, and the sounds of chatter and laughter from the demigods. There's something about these people, and even though it's only been a day (not counting the three he spent knocked out on the infirmary bed), Percy feels protective of them in a way he hasn't felt about anyone in years. Not since Nico and Bianca, at least.

Seeing Harley had done it for him. The kid reminded him way too much of Nico, with that open, trusting expression and easy smile and admittedly kinda silly question. Percy had known things were bad. He's been keeping monsters at bay nearly all his life, even more so after the War – he's seen the darkness of the world now that the Titans run it. He's seen the cruelty demigods have been facing at the hands of monsters, sometimes even by mortals with the Mist pulled over their eyes like a veil. But finding out that kids like Harley were the last generation? That there would be nobody to carry on the fight after they all met their inevitable end? That hit hard.

"So," Jason says, and Percy snaps back to reality. "Thalia."

"What do you know?" Piper asks, placing a soft hand on Jason's knee as though this is a sore subject.

"Um, not much," Percy admits. He'd been at the Roman front after all – Thalia had been where the fighting was fiercest, facing down against Kronos. "I know she was the strongest demigod in generations, that she could control lightning. There are rumours she hurt Kronos so badly he hasn't been able to regain his mortal body ever since."

"It's true," Piper confirms. "Annabeth was with her during that final fight: she told us Thalia managed to strike Kronos, but not deep enough to kill him – he was forced to release most of his power to kill her and subdue the rest of us. The rest of the Titans used the opportunity to destroy the gods' thrones on Olympus – the source of their power. But Kronos had vanished. He's not dead – we'd all be living out in the open otherwise, but he was definitely wounded."

Jason clenches his fist. "She was my sister," he says in a pained grunt. "Not just my half-sister. She was my real sister – we had the same mother."

"Oh," Percy says dumbly. He'd been wondering what a Roman was doing so far from home.

"I'm sorry," Percy says, after too long a pause. "That sucks."

"She was the last family I had," Jason says in a strangled voice, running a hand through his golden hair. "It was bad enough that we were separated when our mom was killed – when we found each other again I couldn't just leave her alone." He runs a hand lightly over the grass beneath him. "That's why I left New Rome – why I turned down being a praetor. Reyna wasn't happy about it, but especially since Thalia was – since we thought, at the time, that she was the child of the Prophecy, I knew I had to be with her. I got to spend a-about a year with her before-" He doesn't finish.

"Before we lost," Piper completes, which is putting it lightly, Percy thinks.

"I remember that," he says. "Losing, I mean. It was bad enough, we were being overrun by monsters, and then all of a sudden, Othrys rose – like fifty, a hundred feet, in minutes, and it kept rising. Monsters started pouring from every entrance of the fort. That was when we knew."

"What was it like?" Piper asks. "On your end?"

Percy closes his eyes to remember it all better.

"Chaos," he finally says. "I mean, even back then, with demigods and legacies…we were outnumbered about four or five to one. Plus there were three Titans – Atlas, Oceanus, Iapetus. They wiped out half our army with just the three of them – most of the legacies gave themselves up to protect the rest of us. They held the monsters back long enough for us to get away. They knew our lives were more valuable than theirs, we had more godly blood." He nods at Jason. "You know how the cohorts work – they're well-oiled machines. It was like they were fractured apart." He shakes his head. "We were fighting a losing battle from the beginning."

It's tough to admit. He recalls the sky closing in on them, grim faces around him, the legion's eagle sparking lightning, the battle cries of the troops ringing loud and clear in his ears. He can still see the moment Othrys began to rebuild itself, his comrades falling around him with still breaths and unseeing eyes as the monsters broke through their formation and flooded their army. The legacies had immediately formed a wall around the demigods – Percy distinctly remembers Commander Zhang, a middle-aged Asian woman, turning around and yelling for the demigods to run, tears and blood mingling, painting her face red. Despite the overwhelming odds stacked against them, Percy'd realized, with a sick, sinking feeling, that everyone had had hope. Everyone had been praying for a miracle, and it had taken watching Reyna calling for retreat with tears streaming down her cheeks for him to really accept that they'd lost and that there was no rallying from here.

Piper makes a quiet sound of distress. "It was the same at Olympus. We barricaded the city as best we could, but there were just too many monsters. If we blocked the tunnels, they used the rivers – we really could've used you back then. The city was overrun in just a few hours. The gods were busy fighting Typhon – how they expected us to hold Kronos, Hyperion, and Krios off, I don't know." There's a bitterness to her voice that Percy can relate to.

"Krios," Jason spits, with an intense venom Percy hadn't believed he could posses.

"You fought him?" he deduces.

"Titans are dirty," Jason says ominously. "I was fighting Krios when Prometheus distracted me. Krios stabbed me in the back."

Percy hisses. "Cheap shot."

"I lived only because Leo got me to a healer in time." Jason clenches his fist. "If I ever see him again…"

"How'd you defeat Iapetus?" Piper cuts in, looking at Jason worriedly and leaning her head against his shoulder. There's something like shame in her eyes.

"Drowned him in the Tiber." They don't ask him to elaborate, and Percy is glad for it: aside from seeing Bianca's prone form on the ground (that memory Percy remembers with shocking clarity), the rest of the battle was a blur, anyway. He'd been a ball of instinct that day, swiping with his sword, dodging Iapetus' spear while always, always looking for an opening. Iapetus had lived up to his reputation as a great Titan warrior, wounding Percy severely in multiple places before Percy had finally gained the upper hand by stepping into the river and repelling the Titan with renewed force. Percy's faced a lot of monsters since leaving home, but Iapetus, he thinks, had been one of his hardest battles, and even so, he'd won only because of his father's powers.

It had been a brutal clash, but a satisfying one: Percy recalls dragging Iapetus under the water, using the currents to keep him there, and then filling his lungs with water. He remembers rising from the river, breathing hard but victorious, sword held up in triumph - the Romans had lifted him onto their shoulders, chanting his name like he was a king. In that moment, it hadn't mattered that they'd lost so many of their own, it had just mattered that a Titan had been bested, and that meant the others could be killed, too.

Hope is a dangerous thing, Percy thinks ruefully. A little of it and you can turn the tide. Too much of it and you can be broken beyond repair, like a glass sculpture.

They all sit there for a while, Piper stroking Jason's arm in a manner so tender that Percy feels like an intruder. He gazes upwards and tries to make out the mountain peak.

"So why are we still alive?" he wonders aloud, trying hard not to sound too dejected. "If the Titans took over and the gods are gone, aren't we supposed to be dead? What are we supposed to do? Wait until the monsters eventually weed us out and kill us?"

Piper and Jason share a loaded look.

"Well, we're not entirely sure," Piper says. "But Annabeth has a theory."

"We were supposed to die that day," Jason says quietly. "I think if Kronos had been at full power, we definitely would've."

"It comes down to those final moments," Piper continues. "It comes down to Thalia again. To where she struck Kronos, and when. It's widely believed that she hit him right before he unleashed his full strength – she probably hit a weak point of some kind – and her final blow prevented him from unleashing his godly form and killing us all. Those few moments after her death – when Kronos was reeling from the impact – they allowed us to escape, to round up whoever was left and escape into the Labyrinth. We had to bomb the passages behind us, collapse all the tunnels so the monsters wouldn't follow us."

"That still doesn't answer the question, though," Percy counters. "And even if that bit about Thalia hitting his weak point is true, why did I survive? Why did New Rome survive?"

"Like we said, just a theory," Jason replies in a low voice. "But you must know how our world works by now. Everything happens for a reason, and nothing is ever a coincidence."

Percy nods.

"We think that there's another prophecy out there," he murmurs. "A prophecy that could turn the tide, make all the difference. We thought that the last prophecy was the Great Prophecy – but what if it wasn't? What if it was all meant to happen this way? What if we were meant to lose the first battle? What if we're meant to wait, hide, bide our time, until the real Great Prophecy is revealed to us?"

Percy blinks, suddenly overwhelmed with apprehension and fear. "So you're saying-"

"Thalia wasn't the hero of the prophecy," Piper says grimly. "There's someone else out there who will trigger a whole other set of events that'll set the ball rolling all over again – possibly leading to another war, a Great War. That's why we're alive, Percy. We're alive because we weren't meant to die. We're alive because the gods are going to rise again – and we have to be ready when they do."

/

"So when's Percy's test coming?" Piper asks Annabeth cheerfully. Annabeth glares at her.

The test is a tradition of sorts at the Bunker. New demigods are usually put to the test – to prove their courage, their loyalty, their resourcefulness - within a week or two of them joining. It's also a good way to get a read on their skills and their parentage, but Percy, Piper has to admit, is a special case. It's been a couple of weeks since his arrival, and he's proven his mettle by surviving so far on his own – probably killing hundreds and hundreds of monsters, including a bloody Titan. And he's turning out to be a real asset to have around the Bunker as well. He's gone out of his way to be helpful around their little camp – putting out Leo's stray fires, helping the children of Demeter water their crops, helping Jason out in teaching the younger kids how to fight with a sword. He's pleasant to be around, funny in a dry kind of way, and he's given the girls something to talk about, which is honestly the best part. Piper's been growing tired of hearing about just how lucky she is to have Jason, oh my gosh, but now the girls are too busy staring at Percy and calling dibs to get on her back about Jason. Truly, a blessing from the gods.

He's settled in in record time – it had taken only a few days for Jason to grab him for sparring practice. Only a few days for Leo to start making him his secret mini tacos he usually reserves for Jason, Piper, Annabeth, Harley, Jake, Nyssa, and Beckendorf. Only a few days for the campers to ask, Hey, where's Percy? whenever they had enough time to lounge around by the campfire.

For her own part, Piper enjoys having Percy around. They've got night patrol together on two days of the week – there's a schedule hung up by the Bunker entrance, right next to the calendar Travis had managed to steal from someone's house during his last supply run. Percy's regaled Piper on several of his wild experiences – one story involving Percy having to catch a shapeshifter to bribe him for information had her in splits – and Piper had found herself opening up to him bit by bit, telling him about her life with her father (mostly without him), back when she'd been too young to display any signs of being a demigod.

She can tell he's a good dude – he's got his walls up, for sure, but he's kind. He's got a soft spot for Harley and Gus and Victoria and some of the other kids: Piper had caught them clamouring for a spot on his lap during dinnertime – her coo at the sight had made Percy blush crimson and stammer out an explanation that she'd managed to piece together much later – his mother had been pregnant when she'd died; Percy could have been an older brother. It would explain the soft look of sadness he gets when he looks at the kids all cuddled together on a single cot, crying softly because of the nightmares.

Jason likes him, too, which is great, because they really can't afford to have two of their strongest demigods fighting – they could probably collapse the Bunker if they ever got to using their powers. Jason's not like Thalia, though, who had been quick to anger – he's much more mellow by nature. Percy isn't the angry type either, but he's definitely more of a wild card, and he brings out the snarky side in Jason and it's really fun to see. They've taken to having sparring matches in the evenings and they both tend to get really into it – usually, Annabeth's the only one who can defeat Jason when he gets going, when he needs a release. Percy keeps Jason in check, and in spectacular fashion, too. Jason refuses to admit Percy's better than him. Percy says he's just jealous.

Everyone seems to like Percy, actually. Leo likes Percy because he doesn't get burned by his fire – they occasionally have these Fire Vs Water matches that leaves everyone in the vicinity either singed or soaking. Grover likes Percy because he's interested in where Grover's travelled during the satyr's scouting duty – turns out they've been to a lot of the same places, nearly crossing paths a lot of times, leading to a whole exclamatory conversation about It must have been Fate! and the like that has all of them, even the most superstitious of the group, rolling their eyes. Beckendorf likes Percy because Percy gave him a couple of tips (advice Piper would've given him in a second if he'd asked!) about where to take Silena on a real date. Silena likes Percy because his advice had finally spurred Beckendorf on enough for him to finally – finally! – make a damn move, even though they've been dating for a couple of months already. Travis likes Percy because Percy'd proven himself as a fellow prankster when he used his weird Poseidon-y powers to make Leo's pants wet, the effect lasting for nearly two days and making it look like Leo was peeing himself around the clock. So yes. Everyone likes Percy.

Everyone except Annabeth.

Piper's never seen Annabeth this way before. Percy's presence seems to have made Annabeth only more closed off and distrustful, which makes no sense – Nyssa, Lou Ellen, and many of the little kids, who had joined their group after the War, did not receive the same treatment, though, granted, they haven't had anyone new in the past three or four years. Still, though, Annabeth had always been perfectly civil to them in the beginning, showing them the ropes, even teaching them the basics in Greek and Latin.

But there are people who have walls, and then there's Annabeth.

Annabeth has got a fortress up, surrounded by a moat and several layers of booby traps.

Piper knows – she knows why this is. Annabeth's lost just about everyone she loved most – her father, Thalia, Luke. She knows she's protective about the Bunker and all its occupants to an almost ridiculous degree, but this animosity towards Percy seems like something else entirely.

For one, Annabeth's barely spoken a full sentence to the guy. She exits rooms he enters, schedules his patrol in a way that ensures their paths will never cross, and basically tries to act like he doesn't exist. It had been okay at first, but now Percy's noticed, and he's not taking it well.

"Do I smell or something?" he'd demanded Piper one day – evidently, Percy's the kind of person who isn't used to being loathed to such an extreme degree. "I've tried everything. On that last supply run, I stole some extra pencils for her because she's always drawing those buildings of hers, and she didn't even look me in the eye! She just muttered a half-ass thanks to the wall – the wall, Piper! I don't know what else to do."

He'd looked so downcast, so much like a baby seal, or some other infant aquatic creature, that it had made Piper's heart melt with sympathy. How the fuck was Annabeth resisting this?

"Look," Piper said, placing a hand on his shoulder. "I'm not the smartest demigod here, but I know people, and I get them. It took me a while to figure Annabeth out, and even longer for her to trust me back. She isn't going to smile and praise you and tell you her deep dark secrets, because she's still in the process of deciding whether you're worth it or not. But Annabeth is one of the best people I know, and when she does let you in, she's your friend for life, y'know? She'll walk with you through hell. She's incredibly loyal."

Percy raised an eyebrow. "Incredibly loyal? You sound like you're describing a dog."

Piper swallowed down the response of "If Annabeth were a dog, she'd like to lick you all over," and settles for shoving him.

"She'll come around," she'd told Percy bracingly, but in the days that followed, nothing had changed.

Which brings her to her last resort: "So when's Percy's test coming?"

Annabeth fixes her with a confused look, pinning up another map on the wall. "The test?"

"Uh, I know you don't really call it that, but it's a test," Piper babbles. "Whenever someone new joins, they go through the motions – patrols, supply runs, getting to know everyone. And then the test – the monster raid. Everyone knows you aren't really in with us if you haven't gone on a monster raid."

Annabeth scoffs. "Bull."

"It's true," Piper persists. "Ask everyone. And plus, plus, Beckendorf and Leo mentioned wanting to strengthen the defences. And our month is almost up, we've got to distribute more weapons to the other Bunkers, and Leo was saying they'd need a lot more Celestial Bronze for it, so we're overdue for a raid, anyway." It's not a huge lie. Leo had mentioned them needing more metal soon, maybe in a few weeks. But hey, why do it later when you can do it right now, right? Carpe Diem and all that!

Annabeth gazes at her. "I guess it has been a while."

"It has," Piper agrees, careful to not sneak any charmspeak into her words. Charmspeak would work on anyone with lesser mental strength than Annabeth, who has a knack for picking out the magic on her tongue and shutting her brain to anything Piper's suggesting, even if it's for her own good. Which it usually is. Gods, dealing with Annabeth can be frustrating sometimes.

"Fine," Annabeth relents in a grumble.

"Great!" Piper claps her hands. "When will you take him?"

"Me?" Annabeth lets out a short bark of laughter. "No way. I'm too busy here. You can take him."

"Busy with what?" Piper asks suspiciously.

"Stuff," Annabeth mumbles evasively.

"Oh my gods," Piper laughs, "you have to stop doing this, 'Beth."

"Doing what? I've been perfectly nice to him," Annabeth protests weakly. "I've been so decent, giving him his space – " She resolutely ignores Piper's scoff – "I'm just…letting him settle in."

Piper rubs her tongue against the roof of her mouth, searching for something to say. The problem with Annabeth's behaviour is exactly that, kind of. She is the perfect leader when she interacts with Percy, but she isn't always with everyone else. She knows her job, and she knows how to do it, but she always takes the time to engage everyone in conversation. She shares a laugh with whoever is on patrol, offers her assistance in the forges, and runs theatrically from Silena whenever the other girl even begins to suggest a makeover. She teaches knife throwing, plays hide-and-seek (invisible-mode) with the little kids, and complains loudly when it's her turn to clean the bathrooms. She's both friendly and clear-headed in her rules, which is a wonderful quality in a leader. But with Percy, she's barely cordial, and Piper can see why that must be a slap in the face for him.

She tells Annabeth this. Annabeth stiffens and shrugs, "You're watching me pretty hard. Should Jason be worried?"

"Don't change the subject." She grins when Annabeth scowls. "Why do you hate the guy so much, anyway? You're acting like he burned down all your blueprints – which Leo almost did, once, and you don't hate him for it."

"I don't hate him," Annabeth defends. "It's just…he's a son of Poseidon and I'm a daughter of Athena. We're not supposed to get along."

"That's utter crap and you know it," Piper interjects, perching on Annabeth's workbench. "By that account, none of us should be getting along, then. Look at Silena and Clarisse – look at yourself and Clarisse, for that matter!"

"We hated each other in the beginning," Annabeth says, frowning.

"And now you're friends," Piper counters. "And that only happened when you both put your ginormous egos aside and gave each other a chance. Percy's a good guy, Annabeth. Shouldn't it mean anything that everyone here seems to accept him?"

Annabeth scoffs, drawing a line on her parchment with unnecessary force. "Yeah, you guys took all of two seconds to start fawning over him," she says bitterly.

"Annabeth," she says in disbelief, "you can't be jealous."

"I'm not jealous." She rolls her eyes, crossing her arms. "I just think it's stupid to trust him so readily. He's come out of nowhere, he knows too much for a normal demigod, he doesn't seem to have any loyalties to anyone, he-he's infuriating."

And then it clicks into place for Piper – "You don't hate him. You just don't understand him."

It should've occurred to her sooner. For all his openness, Percy is still somewhat of a question mark, and he has this air of what will he do next? about him. There are times when he answers a question in a way that makes it seem like he's saying a lot, but in reality he's told them nothing at all. For Annabeth, who usually relies on her innate ability to read people, Percy is probably a total mystery. It must be incredibly frustrating.

"He's not a spy," Piper reminds her.

Annabeth hangs her head, blonde curls spilling all over the place. "That part I believe. It's the rest I'm unsure of. It's like – he spews all this bullshit all the time, but there's real facts in there, too, but I don't know where to look. It's fucking annoying."

Piper can't help it - she laughs. Annabeth glares, although her lips are twitching in a smile. "You must think I'm being so dramatic."

"Nothing I'm not used to." Piper drums her fingers against the table. "And easily remedied. Just take him on the raid. Talk to him. Percy's a nice dude, I swear. And he wants to talk to you, he's been bitching about it to me enough over the past few weeks."

"He has?" Is Annabeth blushing?

"Yeah," Piper confirms. "Please talk to him, Annabeth. Do it for me. His complaining is getting insufferable."

"I'll think about it."

"Oh no no no," Piper cuts in. "You are doing this. Trust me on this one, Annabeth. He'll be good for you. And you'll be good for him. This is destiny, and all that shit."

"If this is you setting me up-" Annabeth warns, her eyes flashing, and Piper holds up both hands in surrender.

"Didn't even think of it," she promises, which is a blatant lie, but she tries for a smile.

"Fine," Annabeth grouses.

Piper hugs her around the neck. "I love you – oh, look! Speak of the devil." She gestures towards Percy and Jason walking back in from the hot spring, both looking pink and clean. Piper waves them over.

Jason gives her a quick kiss on the cheek when he reaches her. Percy just looks stunned that Annabeth hasn't immediately vacated the vicinity at the sight of him approaching (although Piper had noticed her legs twitching as though itching to bolt).

Piper knows Annabeth is glaring at her, but she pointedly avoids her gaze to instead smile smugly at Percy, who is preoccupied with staring at Annabeth with apprehension. It's an amusing triangle of looks.

"Uh, you called?" he asks, running a hand through his still-damp hair, looking uncharacteristically nervous. Piper gives him a thumbs-up' he just looks for worried.

"Yeah," Annabeth says, muted, pretending to examine her diagram. "I'll be needing you for a monster raid tonight."

"Oh," Percy says uncertainly, although he looks a little excited at the thought of getting to fight. "Will anyone else be joining us?"

He casts Jason a look that says Help. Jason snickers.

"No," Annabeth says, looking up to meet Percy's terrified gaze. "It's just you and me."

/

Contrary to popular belief, Annabeth isn't made of steel. She feels nervous - and happy and heartbroken and giddy - just as much as the next person.

What is she feeling now, you ask? Something akin to pure terror.

Maybe she's overreacting. Well. She knows she's overreacting, but really, there's no other word for the feeling that runs through her at the sight of Percy sheathing his sword and making his way towards her, all hard lines and flashing eyes.

There's something scary about him. About all the Big Three kids, really – it's just downright daunting being next to power as pure as the kind they hold. Thalia had been a storm all by herself – in a rage, she could've torn down the entire mountain range if she'd wanted to. Jason, who'd been trained by Lupa as a toddler, has always had more of a check on his abilities, but even he sometimes needs a release, and Annabeth's seen firsthand how he's felled enormous trees with his powers.

Percy feels like neither of them. He isn't as blatantly commanding as Thalia, and he isn't as calm as Jason. He feels like…a ticking time bomb, kind of, only the countdown is stuck on one second from detonation, and she's just left wondering when he's going to burst.

"Ready to go?" she asks, once he reaches her side. Every bit of exposed skin is covered in a layer of mud and leaves – the herbs are Grover's concoction and give off the aroma of mint, which should have them smelling suitably forest-y and will be just enough to hide their scent. All in all, Annabeth decides, nobody should be allowed to look as attractive as he does, not when there's soil caked all over his face.

"Yeah," he confirms, smiling a little awkwardly, and Annabeth has to give it to him, because he doesn't look nervous, at least at first glance. His hands are stuffed loosely into his pockets, and the set of his shoulders seems relaxed, easy. Only the slow shifting of his weight from foot to foot betrays his agitation.

Annabeth quickly gives him a brief of their mission. Monster raids are meant only for stealing weapons and any other items made of the magical ores, and if they can avoid direct confrontation with the monsters, all the better. They strike at night, since that's when monsters leave their hideouts, and return by sunup. The more they can grab, the better – Bunker Nine is always in need of more Bronze to melt into new weapons – but not at risk to their own safety.

She looks up when she's done. Percy nods, pulling his hood up over his hair, which had been sticking up messily in a way that didn't look like he'd spent hours on it in front of a mirror, but rather like he'd been running his hands through it one too many times. He looks a bit pale, but when he voices his agreement his eyes sparkle at her, and Annabeth gulps.

Right in front of her salad, as Leo would say.

Which is just. Great. Honestly. Great with his stupid windswept hair and the stupid, hard plane of muscles under his clothes, and his stupid eyes and his stupid, stupid smile.

It's not like Annabeth has never felt physical attraction towards anyone before. There had been Luke, and later, even a couple of mortals she'd seen on supply runs, and although Jason is like a little brother to her (he's eleven days older than her, but that's a minor detail) she can understand, even appreciate, why so many girls moon over him constantly.

Percy isn't like that. He's lean - he isn't terribly muscular, but he still looks strong, and it's a good look on him, ugh – and built like a sprinter or a swimmer, and isn't that fitting, Annabeth thinks, frustrated with herself. Percy's features are sharper than Jason's - and striking, too, combined with his pitch-black hair and those aquamarine eyes. He's got a dusting of stubble, and he has this – this infuriating, impossibly-wide smile that, when she sees it, makes Annabeth occasionally lose track of her train of thought, and then promptly want to bury herself alive.

Yes she is ridiculously attracted to the son of Poseidon. No she is not going to act on it.

The worst part is that she knows, in her heart of hearts, that Percy isn't that bad a guy. She'd seen him place a packet of pencils on her bed, and the very fact that he'd even gotten her favorite brand right would've made anyone melt through the floor, but she had only scowled and refused to be taken in by the bribe, because respect needs to be earned, and Annabeth's doesn't come that cheap.

This is not some kind of romcom, despite whatever Piper might think. Piper, who, from the other side of the Bunker, waves exaggeratedly at them and shouts, "Go get 'em!" with a horrible knowing look in her eyes. Percy responds with equal enthusiasm.

At the very least, Annabeth is glad that Percy seems to like Piper. She knows most people take one look at Piper and peg her as a rich trust fund girl – despite all her efforts to hide it, Piper does give off an air of someone who's never wanted for much all their lives. Which is correct in some ways; Piper does come from money, and she can really be a real bitch when she wants to be. But there's so much more that people don't see, so much more beneath the surface, and if she's honest, she knows she couldn't wish for a better sister, even if there are times when she really does want to strangle the girl.

No time like the present - Annabeth flips her off when Percy's not looking; Piper guffaws loudly and winks shamelessly, making a go on, be a leader kind of motion with both her hands.

Annabeth's a good leader, and she's very good at delegating. She can direct armies in battle, she knows who to put in command of which division to form the most effective line of attack or defense. She knows that Piper could have led this raid herself with no loss of effectiveness, and she could've made her go if she'd wanted to. The thing is…truth be told, Annabeth is curious about Percy, and it's been a while since she's been on a raid herself. This is the kind of situation she thrives in – the kind of problem solvable using only her wits to track the monsters, and then her skill to kill them.

It might have been a couple of months since she's been on a monster raid, but Annabeth knows the drill – she practically invented it, after all.

Outside, Percy and Annabeth share a grim look before setting off at a light jog. Annabeth keeps her compass in her hand – it's powered by magic and will always lead the holder back to the Bunker should they get lost.

"How do you know where we're going?" Percy whispers, bringing the hood of his hoodie up. It's black, and the overall effect makes him look like a creature born from the shadows, silent and deadly.

"We'll head to where Travis said he spotted some monsters during his supply run," Annabeth murmurs back, before remembering that this is supposed to be a test and picking up the pace.

Years and years of fighting have kept Annabeth in shape, but to her surprise, Percy keeps up easily, and still he finds the time to babble on about anything and everything along the way.

He starts with wondering aloud what monsters they might run into, and then seamlessly transitions into what weapons the monsters might be carrying, which then turns to a one-sided speculation of the merits of Celestial Bronze over Imperial Gold (Annabeth knows the answer to this, which is: both metals, enchanted by the gods, have similar functions but different compositions. Celestial Bronze is lighter and gives off a faint light, while Imperial Gold is denser and more suited for heavy weapons. Annabeth, herself, has always been partial to Bronze).

Annabeth marvels at him. She'd been half-expecting him to whip out his sword and try to take her head off, which she would've been ready for, of course. Annabeth loves being underestimated. She loves defying people's expectations of her, because nobody really expects her to be a leader, a strategist, and a stellar fighter besides.

To her chagrin, though, he isn't attacking. He's doing that thing where he's filling the empty space with pointless chatter. Which is weird, because he's always clammed up around her while in the Bunkers, although he's apparently perfectly willing to chat with everyone else. He's not even trying to escape. It's frustrating. Annabeth had expected him to scarper within a week, but he's still here, and she doesn't know why.

And they really should be quiet, but Annabeth doesn't quite have the heart to snap at him to shut up, even though it's honestly just common sense to remain silent while tracking monsters.

It's thrown her off - Percy talks and talks and talks until she's quite convinced she knows most of his life story and she can scarcely believe she'd considered him a mystery before this, only then it occurs to her that he could just be trying to distract her, throw her off the scent, which is, of course, preposterous, and she isn't going to listen to a damn word he says. Take that, Percy Jackson.

Still, though, she finds herself storing away random facts about him such as:

His favorite color is blue.

His mom's name is Sally. Was Sally. He doesn't mention how she died, but his eyes get a little tighter around the corners and Annabeth infers that whatever the cause for the death was, Percy still feels guilty about it.

He worked on a farm once because he can talk to horses.

He likes jelly beans (the blue ones, of course).

He got drunk on some ceremonial Roman wine with a centurion called Dakota the night before the War began. He insists that he didn't get that drunk, but the way the tips of his ears flare red suggests otherwise.

He likes strawberries, even though he hasn't had one in years.

By the time Annabeth finally finds her voice long enough to interrupt, he's talking about medicinal herbs, of all things. Annabeth's head has been trying to keep up with this onslaught of information and she's ended up not having a single clue of how they got to this particular topic of conversation and it's pissing her off, because she's figured that Percy's hiding some big shit that he covers up with superficial tales like these. Annabeth's usually able to get a good read on people within the space of a few conversations with them, but Percy remains ridiculously elusive to her.

"How do you know all this stuff?" she asks finally, wondrous, cutting him off mid-spiel.

He takes a moment to pause. "Been around. A lot of trial and error." Then he colors. "Oh my gods, I've been rambling for the past thirty minutes, haven't I? Were we supposed to be quiet? I'm so sorry, I tend to do that when I'm nervous."

How the hell did you survive this long by yourself, Annabeth wants to say, thinking that his incessant droning had, at least, succeeded in dispelling the awkwardness between them. What comes out instead is, "You're nervous?"

"Uh, yeah." Percy gives her a very duh look.

It takes a lot of effort not to scoff. This is the hero who beat Iapetus?

"Monster raids should be easy for you," she offers. "Grab whatever you can and run, mostly. If we have to engage, I mean, you seem powerful enough to take them."

He laughs. "I'm not nervous about the raid." He looks at her, bright and honest. "I'm more nervous about you, to be honest."

"What?" This unexpected burst of honesty catches her so off guard that she stumbles over a rock and has to right herself, cursing. "Me?"

She has an inkling of why – she knows very well she hadn't offered him the warmest of receptions upon his arrival, but she can't help asking anyway, "Why?"

For a while, all she can hear is the sound of their soft breaths as he ponders this.

"Why do you hate me?" he asks bluntly.

Annabeth colors despite herself, and she curls her fingers around the compass unconsciously. "I don't hate you."

"That's a little hard to believe," he says dryly, and even with all the grime on his face and the darkness she can tell his eyebrows are raised. "I mean, I've been trying to be nice. You know I have." He's talking about the pencils, and Annabeth winces, because yeah, he keeps on extending olive branches her way and she keeps – burning them.

She gives up the pretense. "Look, I don't hate you. I just don't trust you. Can you blame me?" She searches his eyes. "Why are you still here?" The words are torn from her throat before she even realizes they had been there.

And as if he'd known she would ask, as if her doubts had been plastered across her face in indelible ink, Percy smiles – a small, sad smile, laced with something like pity.

"Here? You asked me to come," he says, innocently enough, but there's a sharp gleam in his eyes that indicates he knows exactly what she means. Percy's always been exceptionally quick to avoid Annabeth's line of inquiry, and she's sick of it.

She ignores him, stalks up to where he stands, motionless, so that they're face to face. "What's your game?"

"My game? I was pretty good at Monopoly as a kid, but maybe that was my mom letting me win." He's relaxed, easy in a way he shouldn't be when she's seconds away from straight up threatening him.

"I mean," she hisses, "What is your plan?"

"Well, that's not a very clever question, is it?" Percy smiles guilelessly at her. "If I have a devious plan, I wouldn't just tell you. And you haven't believed me from before, when I said I haven't one, so you probably won't believe me now."

"You have to be planning something," she says, shaking her head. "Why would you be here otherwise?"

"Maybe I like the whole mi casa es su casa thing you got going on."

Annabeth scoffs, stepping away – she'll never admit it, but Percy's aura had flared up, defensive, the moment she stepped into his personal space, and something in her had warned her to get back to avoid getting burned.

It doesn't mean she's backing down, though. "You said yourself you've been alone all these years. Why do you suddenly want to change all that?"

"Is it so hard to believe that I'm tired of all that running?" His gaze bores into her. "I'm tired, Annabeth. I understand you've been through some shit –"

"Yeah, exactly," she interrupts. "You said yourself that you've seen demigods working for the other side. So far you haven't proved you're one of them, but that doesn't completely discount you from being a spy."

"You can't just wait for me to do something even remotely shady before deciding I'm a spy and throwing me out," he says, closing his eyes and making an expression that Annabeth interprets as a plea for patience. "Maybe I haven't shown any traitorous tendencies because I'm not one."

"You can't just take the innocent-until-proven-guilty path," she grunts petulantly. "If you're stealing information from right under our noses – I'll never forgive myself. It's happened before."

"I'm not a spy, Annabeth." Percy crosses his arms. "And if you're just going to be rude and distrustful of me, you can keep doing it. I'm not going to betray your Bunker. And you can kick me out if you want to, you have the authority – and I'll go if you really want me to. But as long as you let me, I'm going to stay. Like I said, I'm tired of being chased. And sometimes reasons don't need to be deep and complex. They can be incredibly simple."

Unable to stand the disappointment in his eyes, she looks away. "I'm not going to kick you out."

He snorts. "You sound disappointed."

"It doesn't mean I trust you."

"Trust is a two-way street." Percy examines his sword. "I get your reservations; you haven't treated me in a way that warrants my trust, either. But I'm willing to try if you are. And that means you stop glaring at me like I'm a bug."

It startles a short laugh out of her, even though his matter-of-fact, surprisingly brutal statement makes her sting all over. "Fair enough."

Percy hums; Annabeth bites her lip, removing the water bottle from her backpack and taking a gulp before offering it to Percy, only to find him staring at her.

"What?" she asks, on the defensive at once.

Percy cocks his head. "You don't like relying on anyone, do you?" he asks, voice unusually gentle.

Annabeth stares at him. "No, I suppose I don't," she says, and she then she flushes and tries to think if she's ever admitted that to anyone before.

Percy nods, like this explains everything.

It pisses her off even more. Annabeth doesn't rely on people because – because, well, everyone disappoints her eventually. There had been her mother, who had left. Her father, who had shunned her. Thalia, who had died. Luke, who had betrayed them all.

She'd grown up independent – she'd had to. Her father had acted like she wasn't even in the house, and only addressed her by name when he was drunk or tired. After a couple of glasses of wine, he'd admitted he hadn't wanted a child back then, he wasn't ready to be a father, and he wasn't sure what to do with her – even though he seemed to have no trouble being a father to his two mortal sons.

The ugly truth was hard to take for a seven-year-old.

It's different with the Bunker – with Piper and Jason and her siblings. With them it is an easy give-and-take, a mutual respect that ties their bonds together. But Annabeth knows that she will never depend on anyone the way she had on Thalia and Luke and her father – she will never give so much of herself to anyone ever again. It will only lead to her getting hurt again, and Annabeth isn't bulletproof, not even close.

Her fear of losing everything all over again – that's what's keeping her from an arms' length from Percy, but she certainly isn't going to spill her guts out to the upstart son of Poseidon, not when she knows nothing about him.

"Your dad and my mom," she says after a while, settling on the easy excuse, one she knows her siblings will jump right to, "never got along."

He frowns. "They were both on the same side, weren't they?"

"Yeah," she says, put-off at his bluntness, "but after the whole Medusa thing…I don't know. Athena and Poseidon never really cooperated. Maybe that's why I have this…extra aversion to you." Catching the look on his face, she adds quickly, "It's nothing personal."

"Oh, that's good to know," he quips, and she can't help the laugh that emerges, unbidden, from her chest.

It is quiet as Annabeth wonders what to say. She can't very well tell Percy that she isn't sure about him largely because she doesn't like it when she can't see people's motivations: she doesn't trust it. Her father had taught her clearly that something as simple as love wouldn't work, and Luke had finished the job.

"I'll be honest," he says. "You're powerful and smart, and I don't want to make an enemy out of you." He kicks at the ground lightly. "So if the only reason for your, uh, aversion, is because of our parents – well…they must've had to cooperate sometimes, right?"

She considers this, oddly touched. "The chariot," she says finally. "Athena designed it, but horses are your dad's sacred animal. So they had to work together for it to, uh, be a thing."

"We don't need to be enemies because our parents were," Percy says reasonably, hopefully. "It's our life, not theirs – they don't dictate the choices we make."

Annabeth thinks of her mother. Then she thinks of her father and how much he's hurt her and damaged her beyond repair, and she wonders if it's really that simple.

In her heart of hearts she knows he is right. Their parents don't dictate their choices – Annabeth has learned the hard way that she must be made of metal if she wants to survive this cruel world, but that doesn't mean she can't try to heal.

It doesn't mean she shouldn't give Percy a chance. She'd given her father about twenty, after all, and everyone deserves at least one.

She nods at him. She can learn to trust him, maybe, but she's going to keep both eyes wide open. "That's…wise of you, Percy."

"Coming from the daughter of the goddess of wisdom, a real compliment," he hums, holding out his hand. "Sounds like a truce."

She takes it. Percy's palm is warm. "Truce. And I have to admit I appreciate the effort. We could've continued coexisting just fine - I'm not sure I would make as frightening an enemy as you think."

"You're joking, right?" he asks with a mirthful smile. "You're the leader of Camp, you're a perfectionist, you're super intimidating, and I have a feeling I'm going to fuck up in front of you and ruin your impression of me forever, and besides, Piper mentioned something about a test. I'm shit at tests. Nearly flunked outta fifth grade. What if I fail? Will I get kicked from the Bunker? Will you give me a recommendation letter, so I can at least go join, I dunno, Bunker Eight or something?"

"Rambling again," she points out, trying not to smile. "And also, FYI: Bunker Eight doesn't exist. We just call them Squad Eight, for the Hunters of Artemis."

"See what I mean," Percy says with feeling. "I got kicked out of a Bunker than doesn't even have people in it."

She snorts out a giggle and tries not to notice how Percy's face lights up at the sound. "The only reason you're getting kicked out of Eight is because you're male."

"Oh," he says.

"Yeah."

"So I won't get kicked out of Nine?" he asks hopefully.

She huffs. "Not unless you piss me off, no."

"Oh, great," Percy groans, rolling his eyes playfully, "I'll be out within the week then, nice knowing you."

"Could be sooner," she hums. "I guess now would be a good time to tell you that 'monster raid' is code for 'I disarm you, abandon you in the woods, and leave you to be eaten alive by whatever passes by. Could be a monster, could be a bear. Who knows? That's the fun.'"

"Oh, like you could disarm me," Percy scoffs.

"Oh really." Feeling suddenly bold, Annabeth slaps her Yankees cap onto her head, feeling herself disappear from sight; Percy screeches and trips to the ground, where he stays, whipping his head around.

"What the fuck," he demands.

She creeps up to him on silent feet, whispers "Boo," in his ear and smirks when he jumps. Annabeth takes the cap off, smug. She's not usually a show-off, but she can't deny that Percy's reaction had been extremely satisfying. "I could totally disarm you. Hard to defend when you can't see me coming."

"I definitely didn't see that one coming," he admits, face lit up when she hands it over. "Magical item?"

"Gift from my mom after I led a successful Quest. It only works for me." She laughs when Percy immediately tries the cap on and checks his arms to see if they've vanished. He pouts when he realizes that he is, in fact, decidedly not invisible.

"Cool," he says. "I wish I had a magical item."

She rolls her eyes and resumes the jog. "You can control water. Aren't magical powers enough for you?"

"Yeah, well, I want to be invisible."

"I wish there was a magical item to make people shut the fuck up," Annabeth ponders. "Maybe then we might actually have a chance to find the monsters before they find us. Which, at this rate, they will."

There's a beat of silence which she spends panicking – has she been too blunt? But Percy just lets out another of those carefree laughs of his that makes her shoulders drop in relief.

"You're much less scary when you loosen up," he says approvingly. "All bark and no bite."

She jabs him in the side so hard he slams into a tree and goes sprawling. "I have plenty of bite, thanks."

"I meant it as a compliment," Percy wheezes, and she shouldn't feel this content watching him struggling to stand. "Fuck, what the hell are your elbows made of, knives?"

She grins. "Biting enough for you?"

"I don't know why you use a dagger when you got those." He dusts off his jeans, the moonlight highlighting the wispy ends of his hair, turning him into something soft and ethereal.

"Why would you be scared of me, anyway?" she asks dimly, transfixed by the sight. "I mean, you've killed a Titan."

He casts her a sideways glance. "You can't not know how intimidating you are."

She shrugs, because she does know. Annabeth's got the severe look that all children of Athena share, with gloomy grey eyes and sharp features. All her years of training have made her strong, turned her body into a weapon (hence the elbows). She knows how scary she can look when she's sizing someone up; that's how she prefers it, if she's being honest, because first impressions matter. She remembers all too well how monsters used to look at her those first few years when she'd been on the run with Thalia and Luke – she'd been viewed as too young, too weak, as someone to be protected.

Nobody will think of her that way again if she has something to say about it.

She's not surprised that people consider her intimidating. What's surprising is that Percy is one of them.

Half of her is pleased, the rest of her is disappointed. It's a weird feeling.

"I didn't mean to be unwelcoming," she says finally, running a finger down her sheathed dagger. "You've got to understand. You're an anomaly, even by demigod standards. Someone with your power having survived alone so long? You can't blame me for expecting the worst." She gulps, finding her throat dry. "We've lost too many people."

His brows furrow. "In the War?"

"To the other side," she discloses heavily, unsure of why exactly she's confiding in Percy whilst trying not to think of Luke and thinking of nothing else. "I-I've never wanted to admit it aloud. We had so many people, Percy…and then, as the Titans grew in strength, demigods would just…leave. We tried to hope, for a while. That they were abducted, that they were taken in the night by some monster, but then, during the War…" She sighs. "I haven't told anyone this, but - I struck one. I couldn't see his face. I assumed he was a monster, at first, taking on a different form…but then his body didn't turn to dust, and I knew. I couldn't even remove his helmet. I couldn't. He might have been a friend."

There are tears in her eyes; she blinks them away. Percy is kind enough to pretend not to notice.

"I understand," he replies softly. "I mean, I like to think I made a bunch of friends when I fought for New Rome, but since then, I've been my own responsibility. I can't imagine…doing what you do."

"Doing what?"

"Leading," he says simply. "Being responsible for every single demigod in the Bunker. You've built a great family back there, and each and every one of those demigods are loyal to you and loyal to their friends. You've built a home with a base of – of allegiance, and trust. So I guess I get why you didn't accept me, Annabeth."

She cracks a small smile. "It'll happen." She stops to consider the new developments in their relationship. Friendship. Acquaintance-ship. "It's happening."

"Well, it's about time." He smiles, eyes curving into half-moons. "And for what it's worth, I won't betray you – any of you. I like it at Bunker Nine. Feels – homely." The word comes out like a prayer.

She gazes at him. "You've been with us for a month and a half."

"Yeah, so?" he says defensively.

She doesn't quite manage to conceal her chuckle. "You're a little nuts, sometimes, Percy."

"What's nuts is throwing half your dinner plate into fire for gods that might not even exist anymore," he says gleefully, dodging the light kick she aims his way. They both grin at each other, and Annabeth feels lighter than she has in weeks.

"Come on," she says finally. "Let's go get some loot."

/

Monster raids are…something else.

Percy still thinks it's insane that they're the ones chasing the monsters – Percy avoids them like the goddamn plague, breaking the pattern only when he'd needed more weapons, and even that he does only when he has absolutely no choice. To ambush monsters on a routine basis? Percy can't even imagine the risk. It sounds like suicide.

Annabeth seems a seasoned veteran, at least. She teaches him to read tracks, pointing out trodden-on twigs on the ground that Percy never would've known to look for. She's cautious and methodical as a teacher, and she smiles, pleased, when Percy spots claw marks on a tree trunk that she hadn't noticed yet.

She does seem to be making more of an effort with him. Percy might've had to goad her into a real conversation, but he's pleased with the results, anyway. He can tell that she really is trying to be sincere about giving him a chance, and he suspects that even though she knows she'd behaved inappropriately, she doesn't often admit it. Percy doesn't want to belittle the effort.

Besides, he really had been telling her the honest truth about why he wanted to stay with Bunker Nine. He can't put his finger on it exactly, but there's something about the place that makes him feel at home. Even when Annabeth had been treating him like the dirt under her shoe, Percy had felt as though there was nowhere else he'd rather be – although that might've just been the loneliness talking.

He hadn't been lying when he'd told her he didn't want to get on her bad side, either. Annabeth's aura radiates a sharp strength and there's no mistaking the born-to-lead vibe that wraps her like a second skin. He's never seen her in a real fight, but he's watched her train, and she moves completely differently compared to the Romans. Her moves are calculated, yet fluid, closer to Percy's own fighting style, which excites him. Most of the Greeks, he's noticed, have their own distinct style of fighting, a sharp contrast to the textbook manoeuvres every Roman soldier is taught.

He's eager, he notes, eager to fight by Annabeth's side. He hasn't had someone to watch his back in – in years: Nico had been too young, and even though Bianca had been competent enough once he'd taught her basic swordplay, she doesn't compare to Annabeth. Annabeth, who, on the other hand, from what he's heard from Piper and Jason, has been thrust into her life as a demigod at an unfairly young age, and has been handling weapons since she was younger than ten.

Annabeth might specialize in strategy, but Percy's forte is sneak attacks and decisions that are fucking crazy but actually work in the end. Percy's kind of certain they'll work well together.

She leads him deeper into the forest – which is most always crawling with monsters, she says. They must suspect a Bunker is nearby – drawn by the magical energy, she supposes aloud, but Bunkers can only be entered in the company of a demigod.

"Jason told me there are passages leading to caves in the mountains, to nearby towns – all over the place," Percy says. "Why can't the monsters use those? I mean. Not that I want them to, but-"

Annabeth stops to examine a gash in the earth, possibly made by some kind of metal. "I don't know if anyone told you this," she says quietly, "but the Bunkers – honestly, most parts of the country – are connected through the underground tunnels of the Labyrinth. That's how we defended New York, by using the Labyrinth to travel fast between the areas of assault. And when – when we were forced to run, we used the Labyrinth to get away. We cut off the tunnels to New York, so the monsters couldn't follow us, and we sealed off most other entrances with magic, so only the touch of a demigod's blood and a password can open it."

"Magical energy?" Percy wonders aloud.

"I don't know how else to describe it," Annabeth admits. "Have you ever been…drawn somewhere? Like your demigod blood is trying to tell you to go somewhere?"

"Yeah," Percy says, astounded. "Here."

Her eyebrows furrow and she slows her pace. "What?"

"Here," Percy stresses. "Or Bunker Nine. Or whatever. I was twelve when the monsters came. New York was crawling with monsters, stormy all the time."

"Thunder, not lightning," Annabeth recalls, eyes wide. "That was when Zeus' bolt was stolen. Thalia and Grover and I were on a Quest to find it - you were in New York when that happened?"

"Yeah, it was my home," Percy breathes. "We – I lived there."

"Grover," Annabeth says quietly. "Like…a long time ago, he said he felt a powerful demigod presence in New York, but the half-blood was too young. The plan was to bring them back to the Bunkers when they matured a little." She inhales sharply. "I wonder if that was you."

"I…don't know," Percy admits. "It could've been."

"But you said New York was your home," Annabeth says thoughtfully. "Past tense."

"Yeah. There was a monster attack - I had to run, and I came here. To this forest. I was here for like a week – because, like you said, something was telling me to stay…but then Lupa found me."

She lets out a long exhale. "I mean, I don't remember the exact month, but I feel like if you'd maybe stayed longer, if we'd come back at the right time, we might've run into each other."

They stare at each other.

"That's insane," Percy says finally, and his voice cracks a little, imagining a life where he could've been found by Annabeth at age twelve, a life where he could've had a family to go back to after losing his mom.

"Yeah," she says gruffly, breaking their eye contact and forging ahead, her footsteps light. Percy follows, trying not to stumble over as his mind processes all this information, all the what-ifs that could've been.

Annabeth glances back at him and seems to find him in a pitiful state, because she says kindly, "Don't beat yourself up about it. If there's one thing I've learned as a demigod, it's that things happen for a reason. If we didn't meet back then, then we weren't meant to – and that means we were meant to meet now."

It's a small comfort, he supposes. Better than nothing. "I guess so. Bet twelve-year-old you was nicer, though."

She snorts, covering her mouth with a hand. "Trust me, twelve-year-old Annabeth was coming back from a failed Quest. She was in the worst mood. She might've killed you on sight."

He stares. "You were on a Quest, you said – for Zeus' Bolt?"

"Lost," she says bitterly. "We got waylaid, someone must've planted it in our bags somehow, and then when we were following the trail to the Underworld – a false trail, mind you, we lost the Bolt. It was some tricky magic – it appeared in Thalia's bag the moment we got to the Underworld - not that we noticed - and then we lost the bag to Tartarus. We basically hand-delivered it to Kronos."

Percy winces. "How'd Zeus take it?"

"How do you think?" Annabeth asks, sweeping a matted curl from her forehead. "Thalia had to report it to him, he was furious – nearly blew her apart. The only reason he didn't was because of the Prophecy." She glances sideways at him. "You do know the Great Prophecy, right?"

"Yeah. A half-blood of the eldest gods - Lupa taught me."

"Well, at the time, Thalia was the only child of the Big Three we knew about," Annabeth tells him. Her eyes get that pained look they always do whenever she talks about the daughter of Zeus. "She was our only hope – that's why she was sired, y'know? The gods' presences had been waning since World War II, monsters were beginning to spawn faster, and Othrys was starting to rise again. The gods were losing their strength, and fast – Zeus and Poseidon sired several heroes that were killed as babies – Zeus must've really been desperate if he'd chosen to have more children after that. We thought that Thalia – and then Jason, were the only Big Three kids, and we pinned all our hopes on them. More so on Thalia, because she was older. We had no idea you existed."

"I mean, would it have mattered?" Percy asks. "Thalia was older than me – it's not like I could've been the Hero of the Prophecy."

She studies him, eyes shining grimly even in the dull moonlight. "Still, though. Makes you wonder."

"I guess." Percy kneels by a dark patch in the soil and points. Annabeth nods.

"We're getting close," she says.

They slow down and draw their weapons. Annabeth carries a dagger with Ancient Greek carvings on the hilt, and Percy switches his claymore from hand to hand, trying to get a feel for the weapon. It's a good sword, though not the one for him – it's not balanced right, just like every sword he's ever used. He sighs, wondering if he's being too picky.

Annabeth holds a finger to her lips. Percy nods.

Together they make their way through the trees – Percy had considered himself pretty stealthy when the situation called for it, but Annabeth moves without even making the slightest of sounds. Even her breathing's gotten slower. He figures that's the kind of moves you'll need with a magical item like hers.

He lets her take the lead, covering her back, glancing around every few seconds for signs of danger. Annabeth had been right – they are getting close. His demigod senses are tingling, warning him of danger.

After fifteen minutes or so, Annabeth holds her hand up and points. Percy squints into the darkness, barely making out large shadows moving along the trees.

"Two – no, three," Annabeth whispers. Her voice is so soft Percy has to strain to hear the words. "Heading –" she checks her compass – "north-west." She glances at Percy. "Most monsters travel west during the nighttime, to keep the sun at their backs when morning comes."

"What's the plan?" he mutters under his breath, hoping he doesn't sound too excited. He's eager to show Annabeth what he can do, he's anxious to prove himself in a way he hasn't felt since Lupa's many, many tests.

"I'll sneak up on the lead one," she says, patting her pocket where he now knows the invisibility cap is stored. "You take out the one in the rear, and we can double-team the last one left. Shouldn't be too hard."

Percy nods. He knows he can do it, even without a magic item to make him invisible. This is the part where he shows Annabeth that he isn't going to be dead weight, because over the years Percy has become extraordinary at breaking and entering – but really what he does is not break anything and still enter anyway. He is lissom and lithe, and he's certain nobody in Nine can match his efficiency at scaling walls, drifting across rooftops, shimmying up trees, and picking locks with barely a sound. He's hidden in forests for days, in trees with nowhere to go but up, and so this feels like familiar territory. He traces the monsters' path with his gaze, checking and double-checking, because in his impatient excitement he'd already figured out a way to get behind them the moment Annabeth had pointed out their target. He's itching to go, but this is her mission, and he'll wait for her call.

"If they're moving, won't that mean they don't have any loot?" Percy asks doubtfully, but Annabeth is always shaking her head.

"Monsters have been stealing demigod weapons for centuries now," she grits out. "Most have weapons on them, and some even have armour – cyclopes and telekhines, especially, have the knowhow on how to forge new tools for themselves. Haven't you noticed how monsters these days always have some form of weapon? They don't even need to rely on their claws or – or their teeth – or whatever, anymore. They kill our kind and -"

Percy nods – he had noticed, he'd just never questioned why. He feels a little sick. "And then take whatever they've got on them?"

"Yeah," Annabeth confirms, her mouth set in a grim, straight line. "And now we're going to steal them back."

/

Annabeth slaps her cap on and runs ahead.

She knows the drill, she's done it a million times before – albeit with slightly more seasoned demigods, but Percy's an expert in his own right, even though it's probably been a while since he'd last worked as a part of a team.

It's somewhat of a risk: this is why demigods usually travel in groups of three, because now, if one of them fails, the other will be left alone without backup, but she hadn't wanted to attract more attention to their party – Percy's whole son-of-Poseidon aura will garner enough attention as it is.

The upside to the obvious hazard is that Percy seems more than capable for the job – he hadn't argued with Annabeth's strategy and had set off on his own at her mark without wasting time worrying about her, showing a surprising amount of confidence in himself, as well as in her. Annabeth would be lying if she said she wasn't impressed.

She times her approach with the breeze, which effectively masks any noise from her movements, until she's finally close enough to get a good look at the monsters.

They're cyclopes – three of them. She shudders, remembering her first encounter with the creatures, back when she was eight years old and still on the run with Luke and Thalia. Annabeth's killed hundreds of the beasts since, but the memories still linger, and so does the initial burst of fear and apprehension.

She steadies her breathing, darting ahead of their path and flattening herself against a tree. The cyclopes are armed – one carries a mace large enough to provide weapons for five demigods, if melted – and the cyclops furthest from her wears armor. The one in the middle of their line seems unarmed, which is good – it should be easy for them to take out together.

She takes a breath to slow her heart.

There. A few trees down, she catches the glint of Percy's sword through the foliage– he's positioned right above the last cyclops.

Three, two, one - Annabeth darts into action at once, sprinting towards the lead monster with her dagger held tightly in her hand. The wind shifts, and the monsters must know something is up, because they all stop and begin to grunt, sniffing the air –

- it's too late, though. Annabeth vaults upward, kicking the cyclops in the chest, sending it crashing into the one right behind. It brings the mace up in a large arc, missing her entirely, and Annabeth uses the opportunity to drive her knife into the monster's heart.

At the same time, Percy leaps from the tree, using a jet of water to blind the third cyclops and whipping his sword in a lethal twist of his arm to cleave the monster's head clean off. It turns to dust at once, leaving behind its armor. Good.

The last cyclops, though unarmed, gets to its feet. Unable to stop Annabeth, invisible as she is, it turns its attention to Percy with a deafening roar. Percy, with a flick of his free wrist, conjures up a shield of water – condensed from the air around them, she notes with something like awe, and engages the beast.

Annabeth gets to her feet, hoping to stab the thing in the back, but a flash of gold stuns her.

The cyclops gets out a single gold coin from its pocket, and, with an unmistakeable grin, flips it into the air.

Annabeth sees white, then red.

Midair, the coin turns into a lance, long and deadly, crackling with electricity. Percy's eyes widen, but with a growl of his own he springs forward, and – thank the gods for him, because Annabeth is frozen.

It's not just the weapon – it's the cyclopes, it's everything. Because the weapon – the weapon the monster is using – it had been Thalia's.

It had been Thalia's – who else could make use of the lightning streaking up and down the spear? A single touch of the point would have enemies convulsing in pain, but Thalia could use it to call on bolts from the heavens, frying monsters to a crisp where they stood. She'd used it a million times to defend Annabeth, after all, until she'd lost it during their encounter with the cyclopes on their way to the Bunkers.

Annabeth knows there's no way of knowing if these are the same monsters from back then, the same cyclopes that had plagued her nightmares for years to come, but the sight of the spear brings back memories of the girl Annabeth had considered an older sister, brings back all the pain Annabeth had never had the chance to give into. It reminds her, more than ever, that Thalia had been alive, and real, and that she'd chosen to protect Annabeth over saving a magical item from her father.

"It's just some metal in the right shape," Thalia had told her as they'd run away. "You matter much more to me than that old thing."

She must make some kind of noise, because the cyclops pauses for a split second. It lashes out at Percy, who darts out of range, and then swipes in Annabeth's general direction, managing, by some stroke of luck, to nail her right in the chest.

Annabeth flies backward, the jolt from the lightning rendering her limbs useless. She slams into a tree with a grunt of pain, feeling her cap fall from her head and her knife slip from her fingers, both items dropping to the forest floor. She grunts in pain.

The cyclops advances, batting aside an icicle Percy sends its way with another slash of Thalia's spear. Annabeth tries to reach for her dagger, but her arms flop uselessly at her side. She coughs, gasping for breath, air knocked clear of her lungs.

Despite everything, she's scared and sad – sad that Thalia's weapon, which should have been used to protect, is being employed by the very creatures who had threatened her existence when she was a child.

The cyclops is no more than five feet away. It lifts the lance, and the weapon sizzles with miniature arcs of lightning.

A blur slams into the thing from the left – Percy, Annabeth realizes with a start of hope. He successfully manages to distract the monster with a flurry of jabs at thrusts, forcing the cyclops to defend.

Percy's eyes are glowing. His mouth is drawn back in a snarl so menacing it makes Annabeth flinch, and he attacks with a vigor she hadn't expected. He's so fast it's hard to keep track of his movements, flipping and sliding all over the place, magicking up water shields and icicle spears at random intervals. His fighting style is ceaseless, ever-changing, impossible to pin down. She's never seen anything like it.

To say that Percy's doing water magic seems like a grave insult to his skill. He is not performing magic, he is magic, just as he is water, flowing and fluid and gorgeous. He does not have to speak incantations as children of Hecate do, and yet he pulls liquid from thin air in a never-ending stream, making the water in his hands appear alive.

She had, of course, known he was powerful – Piper and Grover had told her enough times. And yet there had always been something a little off about Percy, something that, if she concentrates on it hard enough, makes her hair stand on end.

She's seen children of the Big Three fight. Thalia had been a force of nature, the very personification of an electrical storm. Jason is a gale, a hurricane, a tornado. He can turn the winds into your worst enemy, can summon winds powerful enough to knock you off your feet, can make the air so solid it feels like brick. She's always felt something watching them fight, but for some reason Percy's particular style is something she can feel – it's sparking some kind of strange reaction in her that she can't understand.

She watches him and it is as though he isn't human at all, but some kind of otherworldly creature that floats on mist, and fights with the elements. Watching Percy battle is like watching the sea on a rough day: she can see the ocean breaking over rocks when he lashes with his sword, and she can see the waves gliding over sand in the way he retreats. It is powerful and terrible and so, so incredible to watch. It might be one of the loveliest things she's ever seen in her life.

Sending a dart of ice into the monster's eye, Percy kicks aside Thalia's spear and uses the last of his strength to cut right into the monster's chest. It collapses, roaring, but crumbles to dust. Percy stands over it, breathing heavily, as the spear, a few feet away, turns into a coin once more.

Percy seems to shake himself back to normalcy, running towards Annabeth at once and helping her up with a touch so gentle it startles her.

"You okay?" he asks, green eyes clouded with worry.

"Fine," she manages with difficulty. Her arms and legs are still numb, so she tries as hard as she can to gesture towards the fallen weapon. Percy seems to understand, and he drags them both to the fallen coin.

He picks it up, running his thumb over the inscription – IVLIVS, just as she'd remembered it. Thalia had spent ages trying to decipher the meaning to no avail. She remembers warm nights spent by a campfire, her and Thalia and Luke tossing out possible details about the name. The thought brings unexpected tears to her eyes.

Percy seems more stricken by her emotion than by the monsters. "Annabeth?"

She manages to close her fist around the coin. "Thalia's," she says.

Carefully, Percy leans her against a nearby tree before dragging their spoils of war – the oversized armor and mace – back to her.

"How the hell are we going to get this back to the Bunker?" he wheezes. "I can't carry you and the Bronze."

Annabeth inclines her head skyward. "Can't be too long before dawn," she murmurs.

"You want to wait?" he asks, horrified.

"I can't move and there's no way you can haul my electrocuted ass and all the Bronze back to Nine by yourself," she points out, taking in just how exhausted the poor guy looks. "Waiting is our best bet."

Percy doesn't argue. He throws himself down next to her so that their shoulders brush, but he's facing another direction. The slight contact makes her shiver.

He roots through their packs and comes up with a couple of apples. "Are you still paralysed?" he says gleefully.

"Percy no," she says.

He throws the fruit at her. Annabeth only just manages to block it from hitting her face with her right hand, which is slowly appearing to regain sensation. The apple drops to her lap. She gazes at it.

Suddenly she is extremely aware of the fact that she had been very close to death today. She'd acted carelessly – her split moment of hesitation had cost her the battle. She'd been overwhelmed with emotion, something she thought she'd taught herself never to give into during a fight. The cyclops had been much stronger an opponent than she'd prepared herself for, and a lesser demigod might have fallen where Percy had stood up alone, facing down the giant with terrifying skill and an almost reckless courage – all to protect her.

She knows she looks exactly like she feels - pathetically grateful.

Maybe it's because Percy doesn't owe her anything. He isn't bound by the same strings of loyalty as the rest of her Bunkermates are: he's tied to her only by choice, and he'd chosen to protect her, and somehow this means a lot to her.

"Thank you," she says quietly, still looking at the apple.

Percy, who's already bitten into his, turns around just enough for her to catch a glimpse of a genuine smile and a flash of green eye. She knows he can tell she's thanking him for more than just the food.

"You're welcome," he replies.

/

It's midday when Jason finally allows himself to worry.

Piper's been freaking out ever since she woke up – after all, monster raids don't usually take this long. Usually demigods make it back by sunrise – delays usually mean deaths, and with someone like Annabeth on the line…well, everyone's a little on edge.

"Do you think Percy had something to do with it?" Travis asks doubtfully. "I mean, we don't know anything about him."

"He's not a traitor," Jason says tiredly – it feels like he's said the phrase over the past month more than he's used it his entire life. "Besides, you like Percy. Didn't he make Leo's crotch permanently wet or something?"

"Great, let's remind everyone about that again," Leo grumbles, shooting Jason a glare.

Travis holds up his arms defensively. "Hey, I don't want him to be a traitor – he seems like a good dude. I'm just saying, we should prepare for the worst, just in case."

"This is Annabeth we're talking about," Piper argues. "Even if Percy is a traitor and decided to turn on her – I'm not saying he is, Jason, gosh –" in response to Jason's look of betrayal – "she can take him no problem."

"Fair enough," Travis says, though he still looks worried. One look around them confirms that several others are also scared for their leader, and possibly even share Travis's doubts about Percy.

Jason massages his temple – he hadn't slept well the night before, roused repeatedly by a vision of the Titan Krios laughing at him before disappearing into a fog so thick even Jason's wind powers did nothing to reveal what lay within.

Leo joins him by the firepit, looking similarly harrowed, and they both watch Piper pace at the entrance. Jason knows Annabeth had been the one to find Piper and Leo roaming the forests by Bunker Six, had been the one to teach Piper to fight with a knife.

"Couldn't sleep?" Leo asks finally, sticking his hand into the dim yellow flames and sighing as though it's brought relief. His hair has grown, dark and unruly, and it curls around a pair of sticking-out ears that should have been awkward, but were somehow charming instead.

When Jason looks up, already a little guarded, it is to find Leo looking at him with sad, wary eyes. He is still wearing the clothes from that morning, now dirty and smudged with grit and oil. Like this, Jason can see hints of the boy who had taken Jason under his wing all those years ago, luring him in with bad humour and incredible tacos. Leo had been shorter back then, a gangly thing with a sharp frame and the kind of hair you could lose a set of keys in. He's filled out since then, grown into his bones and hardened in ways that Jason doesn't like all that much, as much as he knows that it's necessary for them, that it's a part of life.

He can't lie to Leo, even though he's been dreaming of Krios nonstop and it's terrifying him more than he will ever admit.

"No," Jason says. "Nightmare."

"You want to talk about it?"

"No," Jason says honestly, knowing Leo will drop the topic. This is why he appreciates Leo so much – he knows Jason inside and out, and he isn't the type to prod at him unnecessarily. Unlike Annabeth, who will appear to give up on a subject but secretly stew on it for days on end, Leo really will give Jason the time and space he needs, knowing full well he'll tell him when he's ready.

Leo nods, stretching. "Well, in that case, same. I keep getting this one recurring dream."

Jason frowns. "You know what that implies."

"Recurring dreams mean something," Leo nods. Then – "you know the blueprints I showed you once? Of the cannons – the plumbing system – the –"

"Dragon?" Jason guesses, lifting an eyebrow.

"Yeah," Leo says, leaning forward. His eyes are alight with the kind of excitement he usually gets when he talks about building something, or forging a new kind of weapon, or taking apart a gadget of some kind. "Jason – I saw it in my dreams. I've been seeing it for a while – but last night I felt like it was calling to me."

Jason drums his hands on his knee. "You think it's out there? I thought – with the plans we found – I thought you were meant to build it. At some point."

"I thought that too, but I always kinda wondered – where am I going to get that much Bronze from? Whatever we have goes into shoring up defenses and making weapons for all our Bunkers – it's not like we have a lot to spare, y'know? But what if it's already been built? What if it's out there somewhere?" He points at the Bunker doors. "If it's just repairing, I could do it, I could find the metals we need. An automaton like that, Jason – it could change our fortune entirely."

"That would be incredible," Jason admits. "Having a gigantic metal dragon on our side? Huge plus."

Leo leans back against his arms. "Maybe I'll ask for a Quest."

"Sounds worth it," Jason agrees. "I'll come with you."

"Thanks, man," Leo says. "I'll give you extra tacos next time I make 'em."

"You should've been giving me extras all along," Jason counters. "What kind of a best friend are you?"

"Best friend? Who said that?" Leo snickers.

"I hope the dragon sets fire to your ass," Jason replies.

Leo's answering retort is lost in the sound of the doors grinding open. Jason flies to his feet, Leo right behind him, as Percy and Annabeth emerge from the outside, hauling a thick Bronze mace and armor. Leo whistles at the sight of the metal, waving for Beckendorf to join them, as Piper throws herself into Annabeth's arms.

Percy catches Jason's eye and nods – he looks exhausted, but there's no signs of wounds beyond a shallow cut on his arm. Around them, the rest of the demigods mill around Annabeth, inspecting her for injuries and peppering her with questions.

"Nothing out of the ordinary, then?" Butch booms, with a sideways glance at Percy, who, luckily, is regaling Harley with tales of the battle and hasn't noticed. Jason flares up at once, but Annabeth, who seems to have understood Butch's meaning, smiles tiredly and announces, loud enough for even the kids outside on patrol to hear, "No, I was immobilized after the fight and so we rested for a few hours. Honestly, I wouldn't even be here if Percy hadn't saved my life – I really owe him one."

Only an idiot would dispute that, or even begin to mistake the underlying steel in her tone. Percy looks up at her and grins, saluting exaggeratedly and making Annabeth roll her eyes and shove at him lightly.

Piper's eyebrows rise to her hairline; Silena seems similarly interested. Annabeth looks in their general direction and blanches.

"I'm starving," she says loudly. "Leo, got any tacos?"

"I need a bath," Percy declares, heading off towards the tunnel and dragging Jason behind him, ruffling Harley's hair as he passes.

"Do you really think I have nothing better to do than watch you make ponies out of the bathwater?" Jason groans, even though they both know that Jason had been extremely entertained by the display the first time Percy had done it and had even demanded an encore.

"I'll make eagles this time," Percy says in an indulgent tone, throwing an arm around him and covering Jason in sweat and mud.

"There," he says. "now you need a bath too."

They're joined by a few others – Grover, Travis, Jake, and Butch, who probably feel a little guilty for doubting Percy so publicly. Percy scrubs the mud from his face and tells them about the cyclopes – they all wince when he tells them about Annabeth being disarmed.

"It was tough," Percy admits. "If I'd been alone, I probably would've run as fast as I could in the opposite direction."

"Annabeth doesn't like returning empty-handed," Grover informs him.

"Figured," says Percy dryly – and something about his quick response makes Jason suspect that Percy isn't telling him everything about the battle. Percy seems to notice - catching Jason's eye, he winks and changes the topic to "Who wants to see water eagles?"

Post-bath, Jason settles down next to Piper, who immediately stretches her legs over his lap.

"You're heavy," Jason says.

"How dare you." Piper pinches him lightly in the arm.

They sit in comfortable silence, Piper a reassuring pressure against his side. She is grumbling about Annabeth, who had apparently been annoyingly tight-lipped about her (possibly changed) stance on Percy.

"You need a new hobby," Jason tells her, winding an arm around her waist and pulling her so close he can't tell where he ends and she begins.

"There's not much to do here," Piper chides. "Don't deny a girl her small pleasures."

"I thought I was your small pleasure," he returns, grinning when she laughs into his neck.

"You're anything but small," she says, grinning wickedly. Jason squeaks unexpectedly, flailing a little, and Piper's laugh rolls out, warm and rich and silky. The sunlight falls on her and paints her bronze, and she smiles at him, unbelievably attractive and bright, and Jason doesn't even bother to pretend he doesn't want as he leans in to kiss her again.

"Oh my god, I did not need to hear that," Annabeth groans, appearing suddenly at his right. Piper hoots with laughter, turning so that her legs stretch over his lap.

"I need to talk to you, Jason," Annabeth says briskly, in a tone that suggest alone.

"You'll talk to him and not me?" Piper demands at once, sitting up in outrage as Jason stands up and removes her legs from his own. He kisses her lightly, grinning at the grimace Annabeth throws Piper's way. Piper makes an exasperated noise and heads off to complain to Silena: Annabeth nods at a passage and Jason falls into step beside her.

"You okay?" Jason asks her as she leads them down the tunnel that he knows will take them to the outside, to their little farmland that the children of Demeter monitor. "Percy said you'd been disarmed."

She raises an eyebrow. "You sound surprised."

Jason shrugs, because Annabeth is an ace with her dagger, easily one of the most skilled warriors out of any of them, and that includes the demigods in other Bunkers – she had to be to survive so long. She's had the advantage of training for most of her early years at the Bunkers; much like Jason, she's grown up around weapons. "I am."

Annabeth only hums in response as they reach the exit – Jason shoves his hands in his pockets as he and Annabeth settle under a large tree; he waits for her to speak.

"Percy didn't say anything about how I got disarmed?" she asks, and Jason shakes his head no, wondering if this is what he'd suspected Percy of keeping from him earlier.

Annabeth exhales as though steeling herself. She digs something small out of her pocket.

"One of the Cyclopes," she says, "had this."

She holds out a gold coin. It's fairly large, nearly the size of her palm, but small and flat enough to fit into a pocket easily. At her encouraging nod, he takes it: it's heavier than he expected, with a portrait of Julius Ceasar on one face, and an image of crossed axes on the other.

"Ivlivs," he reads. "What does it mean?"

"Don't ask, I've exhausted all my guesses for this lifetime," she says, smiling rather wistfully and turning to face him properly.

"Uh," he says. "Is this yours?"

Annabeth shoots him a small smile. "No. But I've seen it used before, and I thought it was lost forever." She pauses as though letting him prepare. "Jason, this used to be Thalia's."

He lets that sink in, absentmindedly turning the coin over and over again with his fingers as he tries to gauge how he feels.

"Are you sure?" he asks finally. "Didn't Thalia use her shield? Aegis?"

Annabeth rolls her eyes. "She got Aegis from your dad after defeating Medusa, and that was long after we got to the Bunker." She hesitates. "She'd used Ivlivs for about a year when she first found me – she lost it during a battle as we were making our way here."

"And…you're giving this to me?" he asks, astounded.

"You're her brother," Annabeth says, matter-of-fact. "It's only right."

"Annabeth," he says.

"Jason," Annabeth parrots back, and when he looks at her he sees the grief reflected briefly in her eyes.

"I can't take this," he says at once, pushing the coin back at her. "You…you knew her way longer than I did." The truth is bitter, but he knows it's true – when the monsters had chased them from their home, Jason had gotten himself separated from his sister and had been found later by Lupa, who took him to Camp Jupiter. He'd only found her again when he was fourteen or so and returning from a Quest - he'd bumped into her purely by chance (though it had probably been fated or whatever). He'd left Camp Jupiter to stay by her side, but that had been for only around a years' time, before – yeah.

"She'd been like a sister to you," Jason whispers, unable to stop his voice from quavering.

"She was your actual sister," Annabeth counters, laying her hand on his arm. "I loved her, but you guys shared the same blood. Jason, Thalia would want you to have it."

Jason swallows. He is her brother, yes, and they do share the same blood, but he and Thalia had never looked much alike; Jason had been born with a head of golden hair where Thalia's had been black. Jason had grown tall and Thalia slender, and their fighting styles couldn't have been more different if they'd tried.

Their eyes, though, were alike in color and their smiles were identical, right down to the little dimple on their left cheeks. Thalia would whisper lullabies to him during thunderstorms under their blankets and hold his hand as they crossed the street to school.

Their mother had never been good to them. Often in the late hours of the night she would invite guests – male guests - over and lock Jason and Thalia in their room. Jason hadn't understood then, but his mother had been drinking almost daily – a truth Thalia had tried her hardest to shield him from.

When Thalia was six, she had a fight with their mom – Beryl Grace got mean whenever there was a glass of whisky in her hand, but she got honest, and she'd screamed at them both that night, calling them deadweights and cursing their existence, cursing their father who wasn't giving her the attention she deserved. She'd borne his children, hadn't she? She deserved to be treated like the queen she was.

Thalia had cried, and Jason hadn't fully been able to comprehend what was going on, but he'd squeezed her tight anyway, crying a little too because he didn't like seeing his sister hurt. He'd nodded as she'd threatened to burn the house down, burn the world down, and he'd felt like he'd be okay, because Thalia was there, and there were no lengths he wouldn't go just to see her happy.

They had been co-conspirators, each other's' secret bearers in a hostile environment. Thalia had been his safe place every time things got too much in their tiny little apartment that reeked of booze, and he misses her every single day.

If Jason – who had really known his sister for a little more than five years, with more than half of that period spent in infancy, and therefore out of reach in his memories – still can't shake the pain of her loss, Annabeth surely must be having it worse.

There had been times when Jason had been certain that Annabeth was just tired. Of everything. In the early days after the War, there had been a weariness in her too potent to be overlooked, the kind that came after long years of battle with no respite. Jason had often wondered if there were times when they had been at risk of losing Annabeth entirely, if she had ever been pushed a little bit too hard by them all. Jason had certainly been no help, shattered to pieces by his sister's death and his wounds from Krios: Piper and Leo had been there to pick up the pieces, but who had been there for Annabeth?

She had been forced to be strong for them all in the times where most of them had given up on life entirely, where most of them had been convinced the monsters were going to storm the Bunkers and kill them all. He'd always, always wondered the extent of how unaware they've been with respect to how close Annabeth might have been to giving up on their cause altogether. Had she ever considered that her allegiances might be misplaced? Had she regretted the side that she chose?

Jason wouldn't blame her if she had.

Annabeth is the strongest person he knows. Annabeth had followed his sister – her sister – into battle, watched her die, and then stood up alone to keep them all alive. Thalia would be proud of her. Thalia would want her to wield her sword.

"It'll work for you," Jason says adamantly, shaking his head. "And why me, anyway? I thought you didn't even like me that much." He knows he sounds petty. He knows he's bringing up shit that doesn't need to be brought up – even though it's true that Annabeth and Jason had been at odds for months from the moment Jason had stepped into the Bunker and been introduced as Thalia's long-lost brother. Annabeth had been suspicious of him since Thalia had never mentioned him before, and Jason had been jealous of Annabeth to an almost irrational degree, jealous of the easy banter she shared with his sister and how protective they were of each other. In fights they were two halves of a whole, covering each other's backs and executing strategies flawlessly, all the while not even having to exchange a single word. On many occasions, Jason had thought viciously, that should be me at Thalia's side. Annabeth isn't related to her like I am.

They'd made their peace long ago. Annabeth had learned to accept Jason, even trust him, and Jason had discovered that while Annabeth might've taken his place for a while, he'd never been replaced, not really.

And, long after Thalia had died, it had been Annabeth Jason had come to for solace, because she was the only one who loved her just as much – if not more – than Jason had. It had been Annabeth who told him all the stories of how brave and loving (and sometimes incredibly frustrating) Thalia had been, and it had been Annabeth who Jason had cried to about her death for the first time.

They'd both sobbed like children that day, he recalls, with their arms thrown around each other and tears dripping down their chins and into their clothes. It had been the first time he'd seen her cry – and much later Annabeth had told him he'd done her a favour by coming to her, because she'd been bottling everything up inside of her in an effort to keep herself – and hence their alliance – together.

Annabeth had admitted, in a whisper, "Thalia took me in as her kid sister, but I know – I know that she was always, always thinking about you." She'd pulled back from their embrace with a defiant light in her eyes.

"We're never going to forget her," she'd vowed. "And by the gods, Jason, we're going to live every day and make her death count."

Jason had looked into her eyes. They were still welling up and her entire body was shaking, but in that moment he swore to himself that he'd never stop believing in Annabeth Chase.

He looks at her now and sees the frustration in the set of her lips, and it occurs to Jason that Annabeth would love nothing more than to have a piece of Thalia for herself, but she's here anyway, offering it to him.

"Sorry," he says timidly, dropping his gaze.

She shoots him a halfhearted glare. "Good."

He takes the coin.

"It's a magical item," she tells him, "so you can never lose it. And don't start thinking that you're less worthy than I am, because it would never work for me the way it could work for you." She taps the face of the coin with her finger. "Tails and it gives you a spear. Heads and it's a sword." She smiles. "Try it."

Jason stands and flips the coin uncertainly, half expecting it to not even work and deeming him worthless on the spot, but to his surprise the coin shifts form in midair, and he catches a pleasantly heavy sword in his hand.

"Oh," he breathes. It's perfectly balanced in his palm and feels so much better than his old gladius ever did. He'd never known a weapon could feel like this.

As he runs a finger down the blade, sparks trail down the path of his touch, and he gasps. Annabeth grins.

"The lightning - that's pretty standard," she says, "for any user, I mean - the damn cyclops could paralyze me with the lightning, but I'm sure you could learn to direct the lightning any way you want it to go. Its true use, though, is actually summoning lightning from the sky." She points upward unnecessarily.

"Thalia could do that?" Jason asks, his excitement dropping a notch. His sister had been a master at using lightning, while Jason's comfort zone lay in manipulating winds – he could even fly with a little concentration, something Thalia had admitted she never dared to try because of her fear of heights.

"She could," Annabeth confirms. She stands up next to him and places a comforting hand on his shoulder. "She was great at it. And you can be too, with a little practice."

"I've never been good at the whole lightning thing," he admits.

"You can be," she persists. She twists her body to gaze at him head-on. "Finding this sword now – it can't be a coincidence. It was meant for you, Jason. Maybe it's a sign."

"I don't think so," Jason says doubtfully.

"Would you trust me," Annabeth says, rolling her eyes, but she's smiling. "I know your theory about the Greek and Roman gods and their spheres of control, but it honestly doesn't make sense. Just because Thalia never used the winds like you did doesn't mean she couldn't. And you can definitely use lightning if you just opened your mind to the possibilities. I'll help you train, and so will Piper. Percy will, too – I hear lightning and water go great together-"

He huffs out a laugh, tossing the sword in the air and catching the coin easily in his open palms.

"I'm not sure," he says again, closing his eyes.

"Thalia would want you to use it," Annabeth says again. "I know for a fact that she wanted to teach you to use lightning one day - she never got the chance to do it because of the War." Something painful swells up inside him at her words, at the hope he's once had of having a life and a family – a real family – after the fighting was done. One look at Annabeth confirms she's struggling with similar thoughts.

"You remember our promise, right?" she tells him seriously. "Don't give up."

He swallows thickly. "I won't."

"And besides," Annabeth continues, her voice going soft as she pulls him into a sudden hug, "I think you're a lot more like Thalia than you give yourself credit for."

/

Piper wakes up with a strangled scream.

It takes her a whole minute to calm herself – she's used to the nightmares, but they're mostly stuff about people around her dying – Jason, Annabeth, Silena, Lacey, Leo, even, on rare occasions, her father. Which she knows can't be real, because Piper sees his movie posters every time they head to a town on a supply run. She'd even once risked charmspeaking a random mortal into Googling Tristan McLean just for the confirmation that her father was alive and well.

This nightmare had felt more real, more ominous, than anything had in a long, long time.

Piper's faced a lot of monsters. Hell, her Biology teacher had turned out to be a monster – had chased her and Leo out of class (and the school) when she was fourteen. The only good part about that traumatic experience had been finding out that the Wilderness School was shockingly close to Bunker Six – Annabeth had found them wandering the woods and she and Piper had become fast friends. In the years that had followed, she'd been on several Quests – both successful and unsuccessful – and more supply runs and monster raids than she could count. So yes, she'd faced a lot of monsters.

When the War had finally rolled around, she thought she'd been prepared for it. Annabeth and Thalia had drilled into them the possibility of facing a Titan on the battlefield, but nothing – nothing – could have prepared her for the real thing.

The Titan Krios had loomed over them like a very large, very armed thundercloud. He'd radiated a dark aura the likes of which Piper had never felt before – she'd never met a god, after all, and the closest thing she'd felt to real godly power was the kind she'd sensed from Thalia and Jason. That was different, though – Thalia and Jason both had power, but a kind power nonetheless. The type of power meant to save, not kill.

The Titan's aura, on the other hand, screamed for blood.

Jason had stepped in to battle the Titan and then – for the first time ever, her mother had spoken to her.

This is your moment, she had said. I do not bless all my children with charmspeak. Distract the Titan. This is your destiny.

Which – honestly, what the fuck? Piper had never heard her mom before. She didn't even know what her mom looked like, even though Thalia, the only one out of all of them to have visited Olympus, had told her that her mother was beautiful. But Aphrodite had never even attempted to make contact with her, as far as Piper knew. Why the hell was she putting her on the spot like this – and why now?

Despite everything, though, Piper had been filled with a sense of pride. If her mother said her destiny was to distract Krios, then she would do it.

Her charmspeak back then hadn't been as powerful as it is now. She'd had less than a year to practice it – she'd been doing it for years on mortals without really knowing it, and she could charmspeak most demigods now (save for Thalia, Annabeth, and Silena) and monsters were easy targets: they'd stab themselves if she told them to persuasively enough. Charmspeaking a Titan, she'd known, was way out of her league.

Even so, she'd tried as hard as she could. She'd filled her words with every ounce of emotional power she could muster, but her voice was drowned out by that of Prometheus, who had shown her up massively by charmspeaking Jason into dropping his weapon, giving Krios the opening he needed to stab him. Piper had never felt like a bigger failure – she hadn't even had the presence of mind to get Jason the fuck out of there. That honour had gone to Leo, who had shot a fireball in the Titan's face and rushed Jason to a healer.

She hasn't thought of Krios in years. She tries not to, really.

The clock mounted on the wall says that it's nearly midnight, which she supposes is alright, given she's next on the night shift. Percy, who's supposed to be on watch duty with her, is muttering distractedly in his sleep a couple of beds down. He's going to be a bitch to wake up.

Piper drinks some warm water from her flask and tries to focus.

The Krios in her dream had been scarier than the real-life Krios. He'd been laughing, saying something unintelligible, surrounded by a thick fog – the Piper of her dreams had ordered him to show himself, to appear before her, but nothing had happened…at least until she'd felt a sword at her throat.

She watches the clock until it strikes twelve, and, right on cue, Jason and Annabeth push open the doors and walk towards the bunks, talking softly. The sight of them together – her best friend and her boyfriend – makes Piper both happy and proud: she remembers the tension-filled months where the two blondes had been at each other's' throats for the most part. They've come a long way since then.

Annabeth smiles tiredly at Piper as she passes by on her way to wake Percy; Jason opts to sit at her bed and lean in for a kiss. He tastes like springtime, even though it's the dead of winter, and it's hard to pull away.

"You okay?" he asks.

"Nightmare," she murmurs. "Krios."

He stiffens. "What?"

"Yeah," she says, and then relays her dream to him. Jason's back has gone straight as a rod, and when she meets his eyes, they're wide and full of dread.

"Jason?" she whispers tentatively, holding his hand. "You okay?"

He snaps out of it. "I'm good." He relaxes slightly as she palms the back of his neck, pulling softly on the short strands of hair there.

It's taken Piper a while to learn to understand Jason, because his language is so different from hers. Piper – Piper uses her words. She's always been good at talking, even before she knew it was mostly the charmspeak doing all the heavy lifting in matters of persuasion, and she has no trouble speaking her mind. With Jason, the words I love you had flown easily, like water in a stream. Jason had had more trouble saying it – which she'll admit had upset her quite a bit – but then, slowly, she had realized that Jason talks through touch. He isn't the type to say cute, affectionate things – he just shows it in a different way. Trained by New Rome's finest and raised to be a praetor, Jason's spent most of his life being told to keep a level head. He's been taught to bite emotions back and it's left him without words to explain himself whenever he wants to express the simplest feelings, like aggravation and relief and sadness and love. And so his passions have been channelled into his sword, into bonding with his cohort-mates, and touch has become the way he says what he feels in whatever way he can.

It had driven Piper crazy at first. During their weird I-like-you-but-I-don't-know-if-you-like-me period, she'd gone crazy at every glance. He'd always looked like he was on the verge of saying something, but he'd never breathed a word. And then she'd noticed the touches.

Jason's physical. He slaps and punches and hugs and shakes hands and squeezes, and his touches had always been rough with the others, but so, so gentle with her. Piper had learned to read each lingering finger, spelling out cheer up and I was worried about you and I'm hurt and I don't want to talk right now and I'm in love with you, too.

It's been years. Now she can read him like her favorite book.

"You sure?" she asks.

"Sure." He kisses her again, which she isn't complaining about, and he really does seem to have loosened up some. Piper doesn't push the topic – after all, Jason had nearly died at the Titan's hand. No sense in bringing up those sorts of memories.

Annabeth's having trouble rousing Percy – Piper's about to suggest charmspeaking him awake when Percy flails himself into consciousness, yelping "Bianca!" and punching Annabeth in the nose.

Annabeth begins to swear – she lets out a string of hushed curses in both Greek and Latin that has Percy gaping and Piper smothering her laughter into a pillow. Annabeth whacks Percy on the head when she's run out of insults. Percy responds, "Potty mouth," which sets Piper right off again.

Feeling considerably lighter, Piper stretches and clambers off her bed, snorting again as Annabeth throws herself onto the adjacent bunk, massaging her nose and muttering more profanity. Percy's gulping water when Jason says, "I'm not sleepy. I can join you for a while on your shift, to give you guys company."

She squeezes his hand. "That would be great."

The three of them take their place at the gates – Percy slumps against the cave wall, boneless and yawning. He's got dark circles under his eyes. She wonders what he'd been dreaming about.

Piper slides down next to him, dragging Jason down with her and settling against him. He makes a good pillow, she thinks hazily, struggling to keep her eyes open.

Percy, who can't seem to go anywhere without a bottle of water, takes a swig and then flicks a few droplets over her face. Piper splutters.

"Stay awake," he warns.

"You don't want to get chewed out by Annabeth in the morning," Jason reminds sleepily. Piper pinches his chin.

"If I'm forced to be awake, so are you," she snaps.

"This is so unfair," Jason whines softly.

"You volunteered for this, if I'm not mistaken," Piper responds primly.

Percy coughs out an, "Idiot."

Piper yawns. "Who's Bianca?" she asks Percy.

Percy freezes. "Uh, that's a conversation for another time. Later. Much later."

"Boo, you're so boring now," Piper says. "What happened to the fun Percy?"

"Oh, fuck off," Percy shoots back easily.

Jason snores. Piper hits him in the chin again. Percy chuckles as Jason jerks awake.

"Don't make me use the lightning on you," Jason threatens, which is enough of a warning for Piper to scoot a little further from her boyfriend.

It's a new – and rather thrilling – development. Piper remembers Thalia using static electricity to electrocute her lightly whenever she attempted to hug her: she'd been so in-tune with her lightning powers that it had come as something of a shock (haha) when Jason had shown up, who couldn't so much as create the tiniest spark, went around generating gales powerful enough to knock over trees and lifting himself a couple of feet off the ground like some kind of superhero.

Now, though, Jason's learning to call lightning from the skies. He's gotten quite adept at shooting thunderbolts from his new sword-slash-spear over the past month or so: the first time he'd managed it successfully was against Percy, who'd created his water shield, only to nearly fry the air off himself when Jason redirected a streak of lightning at him. Percy had run away with what he said was a 'manly grunt' but what Annabeth had described as 'the squeal of a trodden-on pig.' Nevertheless, Jason's efforts had definitely paid off.

Every day, Jason is getting better at it – there had been a couple of rough days in the middle where he'd been so charged up with electricity that it had been impossible for her to even give him a hug without getting shocked, but he seems to have it under control now.

Piper's really, really proud of him. It also doesn't hurt that he looks sexy as well.

She kisses him lightly. "I'm sure you're making Thalia proud," she whispers. Jason beams in response.

"I would have liked to meet her," Percy says unexpectedly.

Piper and Jason stare.

"What?" Percy asks defensively. "She seems like she was a cool person."

"She was cool," Piper agrees fervently, and Jason barely manages to conceal a snort. Piper flushes and elbows him in the ribs, because her boyfriend should not be laughing at Piper's old, old crush on his sister. It's weird. It's so weird to think about, especially now that she can't imagine herself with anyone other than Jason – but yeah. Thalia had been her Great Bisexual Awakening. That had been a thing, a short-lived thing for sure, a thing which faded naturally, but Piper's type now apparently ranges from tall boys with well-defined arms and soft smiles to scary, heavily-eyelined girls with midnight hair.

Still, she gazes at Percy and thinks privately that he and Thalia would've definitely butted heads if she was still alive. "She was kinda the coolest. Like, you know how just being around some people makes you feel safe? Like, you know they know what they're doing. They're powerful, and they know it, and they're confident in themselves. That was what Thalia was like."

"So she was like me, is what you're saying," Percy cuts in with a smirk.

"Bitch, you wish," Piper says, laughing.

"She was a good sister," Jason says quietly. He points to the scar at the corner of his lip. "She stopped me from eating a stapler."

"She didn't stop you fast enough, in my opinion," Piper grumbles.

"You're kidding, right?" Percy says incredulously. "All this time I thought it was a cool battle scar, or that maybe Piper had given it to you during one of your, uh, amorous moments–" he shields himself, cackling, as Piper aims her foot at his face.

Jason smiles, but it fades quickly. He thumbs at the scar. "I don't know if I'm allowed to think this, but sometimes…" he takes a deep, shuddering breath, smiling at Piper when she laces her fingers through his. "Sometimes I wish that the Prophecy didn't exist, you know? We'd all be much happier. Thalia might be alive."

"In a much happier place," Piper murmurs wistfully. "Did you know, apparently there used to be a camp for Greek demigods on Long Island Sound? Like New Rome…but not as rigid – the Titans burned it to the ground when they started gaining power, supposedly killing Chiron, who trained all the demigods there. We've been stuck in these Bunkers ever since."

"A beachside camp? Sounds amazing," Percy sighs. "I don't even know how long it's been since I've been to a beach."

"It all comes back to the Prophecy," Jason says. "If it weren't for the Prophecy, the Titans wouldn't be going around killing every demigod ever." He pauses, then says quickly, "I hate it."

"Nothing wrong with hating the Prophecy," Percy says easily, crossing his arms behind his head and leaning backward, the picture of a lazy college student avoiding a buttload of assignments. "Fuck the Prophecy."

"I know that prophecies are made for a reason, and this one is the most important one of our time, and foretells the rise of the gods and all that, but fuck the Prophecy," Jason agrees, sounding like a great burden's been lifted off his chest.

"No offense to your sister," Percy says with feeling, "but holy shit am I glad that it wasn't me that was the hero of the Prophecy. Can you imagine the pressure of it?"

"Thalia dealt with it well," Jason says, "but yeah, I get what you mean. I would've crumbled. I don't – I don't like to lead."

"Where'd you learn about the Prophecy, anyway?" Piper cuts in, looking at Percy curiously. "It passed through word of mouth around here – every demigod was told about it at some point, but you said you got to New Rome just in time for the War. Did Reyna or someone teach it to you?"

Jason recites in a monotone, "A half blood of the eldest gods, shall-"

"Shall come of age against all odds, and see the world in endless sleep, the hero's soul, cursed blade shall reap, a single choice shall end his days…I know it," Percy says offhandedly. "Lupa drilled that shit into me until I could recite it in my sleep." He meets Jason and Piper's stricken gazes. "What?"

"You said come of age," Piper says slowly.

"Yes," Percy says, like it's the most obvious thing in the world, "because that's the line."

"Not the version we all know," Jason says, his eyes wide. "We all learned it like: Shall reach sixteen against all odds."

"Sixteen, come of age, does it make that big a difference?" Percy asks nonchalantly.

"We have to tell Annabeth," Piper hisses in a frenzy. "We've all been waiting for signs of a new Great Prophecy, but what if. What if the Prophecy was just – read wrong or something- oh my gods I sound insane -"

"Percy, other than Lupa, do you have any proof that it's come of age and not reach sixteen?" Jason sits forward, desperate.

"Uh, yeah." Percy quickly recounts a long-winded tale of meeting some kind of genius harpy in the Multnomah County Library. She'd memorized just about every book in there, but she'd also known several prophecies, old and new – "and she said the same lines I did," he finishes.

Jason and Piper stare.

Percy squirms as though readying himself to flee. "You guys are freaking me out."

"Lupa never told you this version?" Piper asks Jason in a low voice.

"I was five," Jason hisses back, "and I was with the wolves only for a couple of months before they took me to New Rome. Lupa taught me the basics of the gods and monsters, a bit of hand-to-hand, and that's it."

Piper's heart is racing. She meets Jason's eyes and sees her own disbelief written plainly across his face.

"Percy, if you're right…" Jason murmurs.

"It could mean everything," Piper says, leaning forward and placing her hand over Percy's. He looks at her like she's possessed. Piper feels like she's possessed – a conglomeration of complex feelings are rising in her chest, but she's in no state to pick them apart.

Could it really be true? Could the answer have been right in front of them all this time? Could they have lost the War – attacked too early, just because of a misinterpretation?

"Wake Annabeth," she instructs Jason in a daze. "And get…get Leo, Silena, Beckendorf, and Travis, too. We've got a lot to talk about."

/

They end up talking about it while Percy's doing the laundry.

Some genius had figured out that hey, since they had a demigod with water powers now, he should, in theory, be able to wash all their clothes faster. It had turned out to be true – during those first few days at the Bunker, Percy had been embarrassingly eager to prove his worth as a member of their camp, and he'd done a stellar job with the clothes, lifting the entirety of them in a giant sphere of water and proceeding to swirl them inside it, kinda like a no-machine washing machine, as Leo had dubbed it.

This act of benevolence had landed him on permanent laundry duty.

Annabeth paces right under the globe of clothes, ignoring the drops that pelt down onto her hair, biting her lip and wringing her hands together – Percy hadn't known people actually did that. The rest of them are gathered around them in a haphazard circle, watching Percy jiggle the clothes around in an effort to mix the soap in.

"And you're sure about this," Annabeth says for the millionth time.

"Yes," Percy stresses, his eyes still on the churning ball of water he's holding midair. He twirls his free hand, gathering up the soapy water and extracting it from the bigger sphere and dropping it into a bucket. He rinses the clothes in the clean, de-soaped water for a minute, and then he separates the rest of the water from the clothes, which drop to the grass in a heap. Percy gathers whatever water he can from the pile, drying them instantly, before pushing the watercloud right over the crops the Demeter kids are planting – at their signal, he spreads the water into a thin sheet and dumps it unceremoniously over their heads.

Billie spits out a mouthful. "Thanks, Percy!" Percy gives him a thumbs up.

Piper and Silena begin to fold the clothes, organizing them by name. Beckendorf lounges lazily on a rock, gazing up at the sun, and Jason snoozes, his head on Piper's lap. Leo is tinkering with some wires, watching Annabeth uncertainly, waiting for the verdict.

"Lupa told you," Annabeth says tersely.

"Lupa told me," Percy confirms. "It was literally the first thing she taught me, right after the whole orientation-to-being-a-demigod thing."

Annabeth raises an eyebrow at him; he mirrors the motion. He wants to take offense at the interrogation, but he can't complain, though, not really. Since their raid together, things between them have improved significantly. Apparently, Percy's act of stepping in to fight that last cyclops had led Annabeth to the decision that this made him worthy of her friendship. She'd started ordering Percy around the Bunker and even inviting him to spar, often offering him tips during their matches.

At first, Percy had been confused by the sudden turnaround, but Piper had set him straight.

"It was bound to happen at some point," had been her reply, watching as Jason led the younger demigods through drills.

"Huh?" he'd asked, glancing at her warily. He liked Piper, of course, but the way her mind worked was frightening.

"Annabeth really does care about what people think of her, despite how cool she acts otherwise," she'd explained. "She's self-aware, but a lot of the time her pride gets in the way. You called her out for being a dick to you, and it got her attention." She'd smiled. "Maybe she saw that everyone around her liked you, and decided that maybe she was the problem, not you."

Being an A-grade idiot, Percy had believed it at the time. He regrets it now; Annabeth's staring at him like she wants to extract his brain and study it herself.

"Demigod orientation," she says sweetly, her lips stretched in a sarcastic smile now. "That's nice. Was there a short PowerPoint presentation? Is it PG-13?"

Piper pinches Jason's cheek to rouse him as Travis raises his hand and nods at Percy. "Okay, question. You fought on the Roman front, right? Didn't you hear the Prophecy from them at some point? Wouldn't you have realized something was wrong?"

"When we – uh, I got to New Rome," Percy says, coughing quickly to conceal his slip-up – though, by the shadowy look that passes over Annabeth's expression, it hadn't gone unnoticed – "they were already preparing for the War. The most I got out of anyone was that there was a daughter of Zeus who had turned sixteen and that the time for the fulfilment for the Prophecy was here. I didn't ask questions…" He bows his head a little sheepishly. "I was just glad it wasn't me."

Silena looks up as Annabeth resumes her pacing, muttering something about stupid sons of Poseidon and their brains made of seaweed.

"But didn't you figure something was wrong when some of the lines of the prophecy didn't add up?" she questions. "Like seeing the world in endless sleep, and the hero's cursed blade-"

Percy shrugs. "We were all kinda hoping that stuff was happening on your end," he admits. "You guys were where the fighting was hardest – I mean, Kronos wasn't defending Othrys, he was attacking Olympus." He pauses. "Actually, shouldn't you have noticed if something was amiss?"

Annabeth stops pacing, and she exchanges a frantic look with Piper. "We did notice," she says in a low, disturbed voice.

Leo grimaces. "A lot of things weren't adding up. The whole and see the world in endless sleep bit – the monsters were going around killing demigods as well as mortals. The streets were full of the fallen. We lost nearly 65 percent of our people – we kind of took the endless sleep to just mean…death."

Annabeth looks like something inside her is breaking. "I guess we were – trying to make our circumstances fit the Prophecy when they really didn't."

Jason looks like he's at war with himself. "And we took the cursed blade to mean Kronos' scythe – oh gods -"

"Annabeth," Beckendorf rumbles, in that low, deep voice of his, "the hero of the prophecy is always referred to as a he."

Annabeth looks sickened. "But that – that's the only part of the prophecy that does fit. Thalia lost the battle –"

"Doesn't necessarily make it a choice," Jason points out.

"And that meant the end of her days," Annabeth ploughs on. "And Olympus was razed after."

"I don't know," Beckendorf mutters. "I'm just saying, the hero is always called he, and that maybe just is a general term that encompasses, uh, both genders, but-"

Annabeth's eyes cloud over and she leans heavily against a tree.

"I know," she says, defeated. "I know."

Piper runs a hand through her hair. "I get how we could've fit some things into the Prophecy that didn't really work, but how could we have stood by? Kronos had come back. Othrys was rising. Thalia had turned sixteen. We couldn't have delayed it any longer. We shouldn't be beating ourselves up about this – we didn't have a choice."

"Which brings us back to our original theory," Annabeth replies. A thick lock of blonde hair falls into her face and she blows it out of the way, annoyed. "Things were destined to happen this way. We were meant to lose that fight. The only thing that changes, if Percy's really right, is that instead of getting a new prophecy, we have to let the old one play out, for real this time."

Several moments hang heavy and silent above them following this announcement, broken only when Jason wobbles to his feet.

"I'm really tired," he murmurs. "I'm gonna-" He jabs a thumb towards the tunnel entrance and walks off toward it before bothering to finish the sentence.

Piper grabs her pile of clothes and follows him. "Percy told us the story, let me know what you decide," she says, and hurries to catch up with her boyfriend.

Annabeth looks at Jason with something like protectiveness in her gaze. For a second, Percy wonders if she's going to go after him, but she only sighs and watches him go.

"What do you think?" Silena asks finally, directing her words at Annabeth. "Do you think we misinterpreted the Prophecy all along?"

"I have a theory," Annabeth says mysteriously.

"Care to share?" Leo raises an eyebrow.

"No," she says shortly. "I don't want to spread any rumours, cause mass panic – or, even worse, get people's hopes up. If I'm wrong, this'll be hard to bounce back from. You all know what it was like after the War."

Travis, Leo, Beckendorf, and Silena exchange forlorn looks. Percy tries to imagine fighting to his last breath, watching his friends and comrades die around him, all the while hoping and praying that their hero would pull through. He tries to imagine watching Olympus fall, being chased from New York, and coming to terms with the fact that they would be living in hiding with the last of their kind – possibly for the rest of their lives.

He feels empty at the end of it. Annabeth meets his eyes and shakes her head slightly.

"We should call for a Council meeting," Leo says. "In Bunker One."

"We'll do that once we confirm that we're right about this," Annabeth responds. "Percy – you talked about the harpy? In the library?"

"Ella," Percy specifies. "She memorized some ancient book, apparently –"

"Gods," Annabeth murmurs, crossing her arms. "If I'm right about this, you guys, it could mean everything." She pauses. "Where was the library?"

"Portland," Percy says.

"And this harpy will recognize you?" Annabeth says doubtfully.

"I mean, if she can recite ancient prophecies from long-destroyed books…"

"Point taken," Annabeth says. "Just making sure."

"An Oracle would be real handy right about now," Leo grunts.

"We don't even know if one even exists anymore," Silena says, frowning.

Annabeth scowls. "I might have an idea about that, too."

Leo sits up straight. "You know where the Oracle is? But the Quest to find her turned up nothing!"

"Not the Oracle, exactly," Annabeth says, deep in thought. "Luke told me once that his mom would terrorize him about his future – stuff about him dying and all that. We know the Oracle was cursed – but she was a mortal. Her spirit must've been passing from one person to the next all these years – and I have a feeling it might have found a home in May Castellan."

The mood's turned oppressive, almost ominous. Leo's eyes are wide, and the others are watching Annabeth with rapt attention. For his part, Percy's intrigued. Luke is a name that he's heard only a few times since becoming part of the Bunker – and everyone's seemed to mention him only when Annabeth is nowhere near the vicinity. The most Percy's gathered is that he and Thalia had been the ones to find Annabeth, and that he had disappeared before the War was lost. Annabeth never talks about him, but Percy isn't sure what it all means. Is he dead? Is he a traitor?

"Luke made her sound unstable," Annabeth continues. "That's why he ran away from home – because she had these bouts of random visions about him dying. He considered her fortune-telling faulty – but what if it wasn't?"

"Have you met her?" Silena asks, frowning.

"Just once. Luke took me and Thalia there when we were still on the streets. We had a Fury after us, Luke said we didn't have a choice, but his mom seemed okay, just a bit overbearing." Annabeth shrugs. "We didn't stay long, though. Luke dragged us out within, like, fifteen minutes, so I've never seen one of her…episodes."

"You want to see if she knows anything about the Prophecy?" Percy speaks up, because the rest of them seem frozen into utter inaction.

"It's our best bet," Annabeth shrugs. "She lives in Connecticut – we could get there via the Labyrinth."

"Quest?" Leo asks, finally returning to his senses.

"Quest," Annabeth agrees. "I know I was supposed to send you on one, too, Leo, but you might have to wait a little while. I'm sorry."

"It's okay," Leo replies, though he does look a little bummed out about it. "I can do some more research."

"Travis, I'll need you to run to Bunker Eleven in a couple of days, get some of your siblings and spread word about the meeting," Annabeth orders. "Beckendorf, Silena, you'll have to take care of Nine while we're away." Annabeth gestures to Percy. "And Percy…"

"What do I do?" Percy asks, a shiver running down his spine.

Annabeth smirks as Silena tosses one of his own t-shirts at him.

"Well, Percy," Annabeth drawls, as though the answer is the most obvious thing in the world, "I'd suggest you get packing."

/

They set off two days later at dawn. Percy is still yawning, and Grover is testing out his reed pipes. Piper waves goodbye to Jason – Annabeth knows her friend is loathe to leave him behind, but Annabeth needs her to determine if May Castellan is telling the truth, or possibly charmspeak a prediction out of her if it comes to that. Annabeth would bring Jason along as well, but having two Big Three children in one place had seemed like a horrible idea, and besides, Leo had requested Jason to accompany him on his Quest to find the Bronze Dragon.

Annabeth exhales and massages the bridge of her nose with her fingers, tossing Percy an apple as she passes him by. Percy fumbles with it, but manages to hold on. He takes a bite, shooting her a grateful little smile.

Grover plays a lilting tune on his pipes. The four acorns he'd set on the ground shudder violently, then begin to roll down a tunnel to their right. Grover pockets his pipes, looking pleased. "That way."

Still fuzzy from the lack of sleep and all the information she's been forced to process over the past couple of days, Annabeth is in a foul mood, and her headache isn't helping matters. She's tempted to snap back with something rude about Grover's poor directional skills, but she holds her tongue. Grover's grown a lot since the time he'd first found them, she reminds herself. He's become a respected member of their alliance and one of their most adept at using nature magic – he won't lead them down the wrong path this time.

Their send-off is brief and unspectacular. Not many of their campers are awake – Silena and Leo had taken the night shift and are still in bed, but Beckendorf and Travis join Jason in saying goodbye and good luck.

"Keep practicing," Annabeth tells Jason when he comes to hug her. She glares halfheartedly at Travis. "And don't let Travis steal too much on supply runs."

Jason chuckles and Travis places a hand over his heart. "Would I ever."

"You would," Annabeth grumbles. "And don't forget, in two days or so –"

"Run for Eleven," Travis completes, saluting smartly and making Percy smirk. "Gotcha."

"Stay safe," Beckendorf rumbles.

"Come back alive," Jason jokes, but there's real worry in his eyes. Piper leans over for one last kiss, and she whispers something in his ear that makes him sigh and smile.

As they turn towards the Labyrinth, following Grover's enchanted acorns, Percy asks, "You think we'll only be gone a week? Portland is on the other side of the country."

Grover runs a hand over the walls. "The Labyrinth is…strange with time."

"Used to be a nightmare to navigate," Piper adds. "Used to lead us all over the fuckin' place before we had Ariadne's string – we'd be trying to get to Bunker One and end up in Dallas. We had to get to other Bunkers overland most of the time, too, and we wasted so much time on the journey."

Annabeth exchanges a look with Grover, remembering the Quest to get the string – the first one she'd led, their first successful Quest in years. The race to get to Daedalus and retrieve the string had been one of the most stressful experiences of her life, and she briefs Percy about the Quest, feeling proud and warm at the impressed look he shoots in her direction when she describes Daedalus' workshop.

"We were just in time, too. The enemy killed Daedalus when they realized he didn't have the string," she explains, "but with his death, the Labyrinth lost most of its, uh, more malicious nature. It doesn't shift around anymore – if you learn the paths, as we've done, you should be able to get from A to B pretty safely, although it still is confusing if you don't know the way. My siblings in Athena and the demigods in Hermes don't even need the string anymore. But the warpy time stuff is still a thing – we should get to Connecticut in a few hours through the Labyrinth, but much more time would've passed in the overworld."

"If there are so many routes to the overworld, what's stopping the monsters from getting in here?" Percy grips his sword tightly as though readying himself for a fight.

"I told you, all the paths leading to and from the Bunkers are shielded by magic," Annabeth says. "The Hecate kids piled upon layers of diversion spells, so monsters won't even come close, but even if they do, they won't be able to pass the barrier – they'll need a password, and our Hecate half-bloods reset it fairly often."

"We should be nearing the borders to the outside world soon," Piper agrees. "You'll see then."

Percy hums, still chewing on the apple she'd given him before. He glances at Grover. "So how are you navigating through the maze if we don't have the string – and wait, where is it now, anyway?"

"Bunker Eleven. Hermes has some of our best runners," Grover responds, his eyes on the acorns rolling steadily ahead of them. "Eleven carries most of the messages between the Bunkers, that's why every Bunker has a couple of Hermes kids, like how we have Travis back in Nine. For a while after the War, we spent a long time mapping out routes to other Bunkers – Eleven and Six took care of most of it."

"Hermes, the messenger god," Percy says, looking enlightened. "So that's why Travis is so fast."

"I told you not to challenge him to a footrace," Piper grins.

"You're an idiot," Annabeth deadpans. Percy colors.

"Anyway, I'm using a simple tracking spell to get us to Connecticut," Grover continues. "I anchor my magic to the nature magic from the destination, and so the acorns are pulled in that direction."

Percy whistles under his breath. "You can sense it all the way from here?"

Grover nods. "It's taking all my concentration, though. Nature magic used to be stronger before," he says, and his lips tighten.

Annabeth recalls the years before the War – where they used to have hundreds upon hundreds of nature spirits on their side. Satyrs and dryads and naiads and aurae that had been driven to near-extinction by the Titans and their allies since the battle. The aurae were banished to the higher, colder skies, unable to come down to earth – the naiads were confined only to their respective waterbodies, and the dryads were all but lost. The Titans couldn't wipe out every tree in the continent, of course, instead choosing to administer a poison – possibly through the air - that would keep the tree alive, physically, but immobilize the dyad within. They haven't seen a single dryad since the War – and Annabeth knows how hard Grover's taken the blow. Besides the severe dip in his nature magic, his girlfriend Juniper had been one of the victims.

Annabeth had liked Juniper, a spunky nymph with pale green skin and fiery hair, and she'd felt her loss, but more than ever, though, she felt sorry for Grover, who had dedicated his life to Pan and the god's mission of restoring wildlife, and again she curses the Titans for the corruption they've brought to the world during their reign. She can't imagine what it must feel like to be a satyr - their source of strength comes from flora and fauna in and of itself, and to have it cut off must be terrifying. The forests around Bunker Nine, which had once seemed vibrant with life, have now faded into something that even Annabeth can tell holds a darkness within that wasn't there before – Grover had told her that it felt like the earth's heart had stopped beating.

A couple of minutes pass in total silence, during which Annabeth forces her mind to focus on the task at hand.

She hasn't thought of May Castellan in years. Not since the dark nights she'd spent with Luke and Thalia as a runaway, huddled in an alleyway with only each other for warmth, company, and comfort. Luke had admitted to being terrified of his mother and her sudden, unpredictable bouts of what he used to call madness – he'd never wanted to go back to the place, but –

But something inside her is hoping and praying that maybe, just maybe, he'll be there. That he might have wanted to check up on his mother after the War. Which is a stupid, stupid hope, she knows. Luke disappeared the eve of the final battle – she doesn't even know if he's alive, and even if he is, he definitely wouldn't be at home. He'd hated the very thought of the place.

He must be alive, though – maybe she's overthinking this, but her dagger, strapped to her belt, still feels warm when she touches it, lit up with the faintest hint of the magic of his promise. Surely it would go cold if Luke were dead, right?

She traces lightly over the letters of his name carved into the hilt – Λούκα, in Greek, and looks up, only to find Percy gazing at her with an odd expression on his face.

She raises an eyebrow at him and he just shrugs, still looking much more thoughtful than she'd like. Annabeth's been blessed with the true Athena trait of curiosity, but people like Percy and Piper are just plain nosy, and she doesn't feel like answering his questions right now.

She slows her steps to match Piper's, who seems lost in her own thoughts, but the other girl manages a smile.

"You okay?" Annabeth asks.

"Nightmares," Piper confides, stifling a yawn. "Just your typical Krios memories, nothing new."

Annabeth holds back a grimace with difficulty. She hadn't had the pleasure of facing the Titan of the South during the War – she'd had her plate full in dealing with Hyperion – but she'd seen the aftermath of the battle etched forever into Jason's skin: it still makes her shudder.

"We'll take a break once we get aboveground," Annabeth says.

Piper keeps her gaze focused on Percy, who is now having a whispered discussion with Grover.

"It had just begun to seem like things were settling down," Piper says, sounding at once both regretful and nervous. "Hard to believe one guy's walked in and stirred everything up."

As if proving her point, Percy walks right into the invisible magic barrier, ricocheting from the wall and yelping loudly. Annabeth snickers. Percy glares at her.

"This is the wall we were talking about," Grover says, maybe a little too late, a teasing lilt to his voice.

"Thanks for the warning," Percy grouses. "What's the password, then?"

Pushing past him, Annabeth pierces her finger with her dagger just enough to draw blood, places a hand on the magic barrier, and feels it hum with energy, responding to her demigod blood.

"Thalia," she says, and the blockade melts, granting them passage. She shoots Percy a smug look.

Piper knocks into her side with her elbow as they resume their walk. "I bet he's stirred you all up, too."

Annabeth sends her a halfhearted glare before her attention is stolen once more by Percy, who is complaining loudly about his shoulder and accusing the rest of them of letting him bump into the barrier on purpose. Grover is patting him consolingly on the shoulder, Piper is giggling, and Annabeth – Annabeth can't help but smile.

Ever since the raid they'd gone on together, Annabeth's been forced to re-evaluate her initial impression of him. Percy, though occasionally unbearably brash at times, really is far more down-to-earth than she'd expected. He knows Ancient Greek as well as she does, and once you get him talking about swordplay, he'll never stop. On one occasion after a spar with Jason, Percy had spouted so much weapon-related babble that even Leo had found it hard to keep up, and it had left the rest of them cross-eyed.

He often sits next to Annabeth during meals – where, after complaining loudly about offering part of their meal to the gods, he eats fast and messy as though afraid someone will steal it away.

Annabeth also knows his laugh, which travels loud and free across the Bunker, and even though Annabeth may not be in his vicinity some of the time, she can imagine him laugh with his head thrown back, his eyes sparkling, his cheeks flushed, hands wrapped around his sides.

There are times, though, when she can see something else lurking beyond his usual affable expression. He has nightmares the same as the rest of them, and she catches his hands trembling in his sleeves, once, after a particularly restless sleep. There's the matter of the mysterious Bianca, as well. Annabeth has a hunch, but oddly enough, she doesn't want to confront Percy about it, which she normally would've done to anyone else without a moment of hesitation.

There's something about Percy, she decides then. Something about him, almost magnetic, that draws people right into his orbit, but there's still no ignoring the fact that he's a son of Poseidon and could wipe them all out with a swift wave of his hand. He's easy to be around, easy to talk to, easy to listen to, and – yes – easy to look at. He seems to be a bit of a people-pleaser, which she figures is some kind of side effect of being alone for so many years, but he's loyal and brave and almost deceptively smart, and Annabeth can even admit he would make a great leader if he put his mind to it – a leader that even she would follow without hesitation.

He meets her eyes and grins, but in turning back around to the front, his foot catches on a bump in the ground and he goes crashing to the floor. Piper bursts into laughter, not even bothering to help him up.

Then again, she thinks ruefully, offering him her hand and smiling at him when he grasps it, if he really is their supposed saviour, they all might be doomed.

/

Piper is shaken awake at the asscrack of dawn by Grover.

They'd reached Connecticut just after midnight, and, after raiding a small convenience store and taking all the perfume they could find, they'd retired to a storm drain for the night. It had stunk, but Percy had emptied half his can of deodorant in an effort to get rid of the smell, sparing her nostrils for at least a while.

Grover pulls on his fake feet and hands her a granola bar as she hurriedly brushes her teeth and washes her face, flipping Percy off when he instructs her, in a self-satisfied voice, to not waste water. Annabeth gives her a look that Piper takes to mean I've got your back, and she chucks an apple at Percy's head.

It's cold when they climb back up to the surface, although it's not as unbearable as the weather in the mountains. Piper spies fresh green grass growing on the ground and realizes, with a start, that the equinox is upon them. If all goes well with their quest, they could even hold their meeting with the other Bunker leaders on the same date.

Equinoxes are sacred to the gods, particularly to Apollo and Artemis, but it's a good day for all the gods, a good day for magic. Piper glances as Annabeth, who is berating Percy for something or the other, and wonders briefly if she'd planned it, knowing – and hoping – that they would have something of worth to relay to the others on a day of auspicious energy. Piper's long learned that her friend is always several steps ahead of everyone else in any and every task she puts her mind to – she wouldn't put it past her.

Percy empties the remainder of the deodorant over them, which should not only throw the monsters for a loop, but also actively repel them. Piper gags. Grover isn't doing much better, coughing and batting the air about them in an effort to dispel the odor.

"There," Percy beams. "Now we all smell like douchebag white boy."

"Explains why you've always smelled like this," Annabeth sneers under her breath, but she darts away, huffing out a laugh, when Percy lashes out at her with a well-aimed kick.

Still following the acorns from a respectable distance, Piper takes a look around the city. It's been a while since they've come to a big one – everyone's been sticking to the smaller towns, where the stores are easier to break into and there aren't that many monsters. It had been a rude awakening to find out that New York City had been pretty much overrun with monsters, with fake metal detectors at the entrance of nearly every building in the city that really detected the magical aura of demigods and alerted every monster in the vicinity to the spot. They'd all assumed most of the big cities had been similarly taken over – New York and California for sure, at least – and so had avoided the larger districts on principle, but as they pass by a shopping complex, Piper stares wistfully at the racks of clean, pretty clothes, and wonders if they'll be able to make a stop on their way back.

Turns out that the acorns are unnecessary after a while, because Annabeth remembers everything about the place, despite the fact that it's been more than a decade since her last visit. Percy, who is unlucky enough to comment on the reliability of the directions she's providing, ends up getting an entire lecture from Annabeth about just how reliable children of Athena could be, blessed as they are with inhumane memory, among other things.

"Never bet against a child of Athena," Piper advises, when Annabeth takes a breath.

"More like never bet against Annabeth," says Percy, which he'd probably meant to come out meaner than it had, because his words are tinged with just the slightest hints of respect and – dare Piper hope? – fondness.

Piper and Grover share an exasperated look, as Annabeth, who'd clearly been gearing up to defend against an insult, flushes red from her neck to her hairline and quickens her steps so that they can't see her face.

Piper grins beatifically and changes the topic.

They pass a KFC when Percy, quite shamelessly, asks them if they want him to steal anything for lunch. Piper, who has no problem with stealing, agrees fervently, and even Grover – the vegetarian – says he wouldn't be opposed to a milkshake, or just a can of soda, or even just the can.

"How would you manage to steal anything?" Annabeth asks doubtfully.

"I could call Blackjack," Percy says offhandedly. "We've kind of become experts at stealing food from drive-thrus."

"Excuse me?"

"Oh, it's really easy once you get the hang of it," Percy explains, eyes sparkling in excitement. "You need to time your descent just when the waiter dudes are making the handoff – in that split second when they're handing the food over to the customer, you gotta swoop in, like BAM!"

"Descent?" Annabeth says, perplexed.

"Who's Blackjack?" Piper cuts in.

"Oh, my pegasus," Percy says, the way a normal person would say, I have a dog, or It's a nice day today.

They all stare at him in shock for a minute before Annabeth leaps forward and wallops Percy over the head so hard that he bends over, and Piper's own skull throbs in sympathy.

"A pegasus?" Annabeth hisses. "You have a fucking pegasus? And you haven't thought to mention it before?"

"I did!" Percy gasps. He pauses. "Oh, I didn't, did I? My bad."

"Yes your bad," Annabeth growls.

"Where is it?" Grover asks, looking around as though expecting a large winged horse to canter up to them from behind a tree or something.

"Roaming the skies somewhere, probably," Percy says. "I swear!" he adds, at Annabeth's menacing look. "He shows up when I summon him, but otherwise he stays out of the way. Most pegasi do, really – they stick to the clouds to hide from monsters, and only come down to feed."

"Like how Jason calls Tempest," Piper says.

"Jason has a magic horse too?" Percy's smile turns competitive. "Can we race?"

"You are a child," Grover marvels, sounding fascinated.

"We've all established that Percy's an idiot, but the point here is do you know how useful a pegasus would be?" Annabeth moans, scrubbing a hand over her face. It's a good thing she doesn't try to run it through her hair, Piper thinks, because her hand would most likely get stuck in her curls – Piper's so buying her some smoothening shampoo after they're done with this. "We could probably carry way more supplies on a pegasus, or even use them to survey the area for monsters – the possibilities are endless!"

"I know," Percy says, sounding guilty for the first time. "I'm sorry, it really did slip my mind. We can probably get to Portland on pegasus, if you want – I can't promise that we'll be any faster, but the view is way better."

Piper, who's been on planes as a kid while travelling with her father, perks up despite herself. "Like when you're in an airplane?"

"I wouldn't know," Percy says honestly. "I've never been in one – my mom always said it was dangerous." His voice trails off. "Her family was killed in a plane crash – she was supposed to be on that flight, too. I always figured that was why she never let me on a plane, but now I really know why."

"Your mom was smart," Annabeth agrees. "The sky is Zeus' domain, right? You'd probably get fried in an airplane, but since pegasi are, essentially, horses, they come under Poseidon's circle of protection." She looks excited at the thought, and Piper can imagine she's constructing a Venn diagram for it in her head.

"I still don't fly too high," Percy admits.

"Please let's take the Pegasus Express to Portland," Piper begs. Annabeth hmphs, but if there's one thing Piper knows about her friend, it's her thirst to experience the unknown, and she knows Annabeth hasn't been on a pegasus before.

"Let's meet May first," she says.

Piper hadn't noticed, but the acorns have led them to a residential area. It looks like a good place to live, she thinks offhandedly – she'd been brought up in a lonely mansion in LA, with only her father's personal assistant for company, and this neighbourhood looks like the kind of place that would have a lot of kids. She spots a park with a little playground and even a small swimming pool, and Piper decides she would like to settle down somewhere like this one day – preferably with Jason.

It's a hope nestled deep within her heart, one that she'd never voice aloud, because – well, they're demigods. They're being hunted by monsters and Titans and god knows what else: even when the Titans hadn't been in power, the average demigod wouldn't be alive past twenty-five.

Not for the first time, she feels envy for mortals. Sure, they're so blind to so much that goes on in the world, but she can't help thinking that maybe it's a blessing, in a way. They're born, and they lead their own lives, and then they die. They don't have to worry about gods and Titans and monsters – they get to live and laugh and love without worrying about dying every other second of the day.

If she and Jason were mortals, Piper thinks, she'd like to live in a quaint little neighbourhood with a park and a playground so their kids could play –

She shakes herself. Kids? What is she thinking? She's not even twenty years old.

Looking at her friends, though, Piper can see that they're plagued by similar thoughts: Grover, who Piper knows had had a girlfriend, looks particularly affected at the sight of the picture-perfect houses and happy families. Percy merely looks pensive, and Annabeth's jaw is clenched, though maybe she's thinking of Luke.

Luke.

Piper hadn't known him well, despite having been around him for nearly a year, but he'd been renowned for his skill as a great swordsman, rivalling even Thalia in that particular ability. Like other children of Hermes, he'd been blessed with atypical speed, but Luke's agility far surpassed most of his siblings'. He'd been handsome, too, with a crooked smile, sandy hair, and blue eyes – Annabeth, for sure, had definitely been enamored with him.

Piper had never liked the dude.

She still doesn't have the guts to say it, to be honest, but Luke hadn't given her the good vibes Piper had felt from the others, even the Ares kids. He'd been shifty on far too many occasions for her to trust him completely, and Piper'd often caught his expression sliding into one of bitterness when he'd thought nobody was looking. When he'd vanished the night before Thalia's final battle, he'd pretty much confirmed Piper's theory of him being a traitor, a spy. Secretly, she hoped he was dead, but she'd never say it to Annabeth, who had hero-worshipped him to a point where it had become unhealthy.

She knows the story – every demigod does, but Piper's been privy to a lot of the details because of her friendship with Annabeth and Jason. She knows how Luke had saved Thalia, how they'd both saved Annabeth. How they'd been each other's family, lived on the streets for nearly a year, with nobody to guide them or train them before finally being found by Grover. Luke is the reason Annabeth's alive, and for that Piper will be forever grateful: she loves her friend.

She just wishes her friend wasn't still in love with Luke after all these years – it's something Annabeth doesn't need to say aloud. Piper's a daughter of Aphrodite. She knows these things.

So no, she's not particularly interested in learning about Luke's sad backstory – she doesn't want to feel sympathy for a traitor. She doesn't care about him at all, really, but she does care about Annabeth, who looks close to tears when they finally stop in front of a dirty smudge of a house with a crumbling picket fence and a sign that says Castellan in both English and Greek.

Grover stops short at the gate, and he runs his fingers lightly over the dull metal. "Do you guys feel that?"

Percy frowns, but Annabeth nods. "Magic."

Piper makes a tiny noise of agreement – she hadn't quite been able to put her finger on it, but magic is the only explanation for the slight tingling in her gut. This place, unremarkable though it may seem, has a distinct magical signature similar to the kind the Bunkers radiate, albeit on a far smaller scale.

It feels ominous.

The acorns roll past the gate and stop right at the front door. Piper slips her hand into Annabeth's and squeezes, because Annabeth is pale and trembling slightly, possibly lost in some horrible memory from her days on the run.

Percy bites first, vaulting over the gate and walking cautiously up to the house as though expecting monsters to pop up out of the grass. The front lawn looks overgrown and dry, a stark contrast to the neighbouring houses, which are almost fairytale-like in their cleanliness.

The rest of them follow – Annabeth knocks on the door thrice and steps back. Piper holds her breath.

After a painful moment of total silence, there's the pitter-patter of footsteps from inside the house, and the door is wrenched open to reveal a painfully thin lady with Einstein hair and deep bags under her eyes. "No," she says in a tremulous voice, "he's not here-" and then she catches sight of Percy and stops mid-sentence, her pale blue eyes widening. Her shaking hands cover her mouth as she releases a loud sob.

"Oh, Luke," she whispers, and a single tear grazes her cheek and falls to the floor. "Is that you?"

She reaches a hand towards Percy as though he's the most precious thing in the world. Percy shoots Piper a what the fuck look and points to himself. "Me?"

May Castellan ignores him. "Look at how you've grown up, Luke. You're so tall now. So handsome. You take after your father."

"Um, yes," says Percy intelligently. Piper lets out a snort at this, which is a bad idea, because Luke's mother whips her head around to stare at her as though just noticing her for the first time.

"Oh, Lukey," she breathes, "you've brought your girlfriend!"

Piper chokes, and behind her, interestingly enough, so does Annabeth. "Oh no, ma'am," Piper says quickly, "you've got it all wrong-"

"Of course she's my girlfriend, Ms Castellan – um, Mom," Percy cuts in smoothly, slinging an arm around Piper's shoulders and raising his eyebrows at Piper in a way that very much means we have to do whatever we can to make the crazy lady talk. "I really wanted to introduce you to her, isn't that great?"

"Of course it is, sweetie!" May's face, which had drooped with disappointment at Piper's words, now brightens up considerably at Percy's. She pinches Piper's cheeks; the pads of her fingers are rough, as though she's never been near a bottle of lotion in her life. "She's a real beauty, too. You both go very well together."

"Don't we?" Percy says, sweet as honey, and thank the gods for him, because Piper's been rendered speechless. "Can we come in now, Mom?"

"Of course, darling!" May trills. "Oh, to see my son again, what a wonderful surprise! I can fix you some breakfast, I might have some peanut butter, your favorite-"

She turns around and walks back into the house without waiting to see if they've followed. Percy removes his arm from Piper's shoulder and mutters an apology.

"It's okay," Piper says. "At least we're in now. Better than me having to charmspeak her, I never like enchanting the pitiful ones."

"She seems…unstable at best," Grover murmurs. "If she thinks you're her son…Percy, you look nothing like Luke."

Piper nods her agreement. Luke resembles Jason more than Percy in appearance – Percy, with his black hair and glowing green eyes, might as well be his complete opposite. She turns to face a strangely mute Annabeth. "Do you think she knows anything about the Prophecy?"

Annabeth snaps to attention. "Uh, yeah, probably. Let's see."

The house is dark and musty – it's a good thing they've decided to visit in the daytime, because a lot of the lights don't seem to be functional anymore. May seats them all at the dining room, then runs about the kitchen, muttering to herself nonsensically and occasionally looking at Percy as though afraid he'll disappear if she moves her gaze elsewhere.

"You okay?" Piper murmurs to him, noticing how he clenches his fist every time he's forced to call May Mom.

"I'll be fine once we're out of here," Percy whispers back.

May sets items on the table – a plate of moldy bread, and a jar of crusty peanut butter that is probably several years past the expiry date. Percy swallows. "Thanks, Mom."

"Anything for my baby," May coos, running her hand over his cheek. "Oh, Luke, I've missed you so. Your friends have been searching for you, you know – I keep having to tell them you weren't here, but I knew you'd come home, sweetie." She gulps, more tears pouring down her cheeks. "I knew you'd come."

Piper recalls the manner in which May Castellan had opened the door to them. No, he's not here, she'd been saying in a resigned voice, as though someone had been coming around, asking about her son.

Annabeth sits up. "Which friends, Ms. Castellan?"

"A man in a suit," May recalls after a moment of hesitation. "He had many scars, even on his face. I wondered why he was looking for you, Lukey, I knew you weren't the type to mix yourself in with all that riffraff." She leans over to pat Percy's cheek.

"And when was this?" Grover asks delicately, leaning forward and bracing his elbows on the table.

May bats her hand. "A while ago. Maybe a few months? It was a stormy day, I remember. Lots of thunder."

"But no lightning?" Annabeth whispers.

"No lightning," May confirms. "I'm a bit terrified of it, you know this, Luke, of course, you remember all the times your silly old mother would pull the blinds during a storm…"

She looks at Percy soppily, who nods, mute.

Annabeth runs a hand over her face. May, completely unaware of the darkness of the mood, continues, "In fact, he only missed Luke by about a week or so! Luke, you'd come to visit me then, didn't you? Your father was here too, it was lovely."

Annabeth jerks so hard she's nearly thrown from her chair. Piper's heart begins to race.

"Hermes?" Grover balks – and with good reason. If Piper's following the conversation correctly, Luke – the real Luke - had visited May Castellan sometime before, on a stormy day – a day with thunder, but no lightning. That meant he'd visited right after Zeus' lightning Bolt had been stolen – and he'd met his father here. It had been years ago, before the War – but he'd met a god. A god! The gods hadn't been seen in the mortal world all that often – only Thalia had had the honor of going to Olympus.

Luke had met his father…and he hadn't told anyone, judging by Annabeth's broken expression.

And then another man had dropped by – a man with scars all over his face. Prometheus, Piper thinks in horror. What was a Titan doing, looking for Luke?

A horrible thought forms in Piper's mind. She glances at Annabeth, whose hands are shaking. Grover grasps her shoulder.

"But…oh no, wait, my mind's cheated me again…you met the scarred visitor as well!" May says, clapping her hands as though just remembering. "You didn't stay long enough to say hello to your poor mother, did you, you naughty boy-" She smiles indulgently at Percy, who is beginning to look mildly sick – "you didn't even come to the door, you were hiding in the shadows of the trees, you always did like hide and seek –"

"And what did he – uh, I say to the scarred man?" Percy urges soothingly, casting a nervous glance at Annabeth, who is practically frozen in her seat.

"The man was saying something in a different language," May recalls, her face taking on this faraway look that makes Piper wonder if she's here at all. "And then you, Luke, you gave him something like a motorcycle helmet, don't you remember? Although it wasn't a conventional colour, it was very shiny."

"Shiny?" Annabeth asks, gulping visibly.

"And then what happened?" Grover breathes.

"You both left," May says sadly. "I couldn't open the door, but I had hoped you would come in. I was hurrying to make you some tea, I didn't even see you go."

Percy, who looks worried at their reactions, turns back to May and asks lightly, "And how often does dad come here?"

"Oh, you know he comes to check on me whenever he can, although it's been a while, he must be busy," May says, smiling unfocusedly at Percy. "Brings me gifts, too, all the time! These wonderful drinks–" She points at a bottle full of green liquid on the side. Grover grabs it and gives it a tentative sniff.

"Valerian root and lavender," he says, "to ensure sleep and calm. But why-"

"Oh, he brought me this wonderful cutlery set as well!" May says suddenly, pushing back her chair and hurrying to the kitchen again. "Let me show you-"

She returns with an armful of spoons, and forks, and knives – Percy rises to help her, gathering the silverware from her hands gently and placing them on the table.

Piper stills.

Among the cutlery is a dagger of Celestial Bronze, so beautiful and clear that Piper can see the reflection of the ceiling. Annabeth's breath catches, and even Percy, who had admitted to disliking knives, looks tempted to pick it up. But what's strange about it is that Piper feels a strange pull towards the weapon, almost like it's calling her.

Percy picks it up and examines it, brows furrowed, and something like possessiveness takes a hold of her heart, which she suppresses with difficulty.

She wants to grab the dagger. She wants to hold it in her hands. It's hers, she thinks. It's hers.

"And…dad gave this to you?" Percy asks, sitting back down again and passing the blade to Piper.

May says something in response, but Piper hears nothing. The minute she takes the knife a warmth floods into her system and she sighs. The dagger fits perfectly in the palm of her hand like it's been customized just for her, and she turns it around to read Katoptris engraved into the hilt.

She looks into the smooth Bronze surface, catching sight of her own reflection for a split second before the image shifts, showing her once again the dense fog she's been seeing in her dreams for the past fortnight. She sees herself trying to navigate the mist – only this time, the silhouette of her morphs into something else, and then she sees Jason fighting his way through the clouds, swinging with his sword as the Titan Krios laughs, and laughs, and laughs –

She gasps, letting the knife fall back onto the table. Her breathing turns laboured, and she finds herself doubled over.

There's a scrape of chairs, and Annabeth's arms circle her body, and Percy's large, warm hand rubs circles on her back. Annabeth makes soft, soothing noises as Piper fights off the shock – the vision had looked so real.

Grover fetches her a cup of the weird concoction May had mentioned Hermes giving her. "It'll help," he says, and Piper takes a sip. It tastes like cold medicine, but she can feel her body go loose with relief.

"Thanks," she whispers.

"What was it?" Annabeth murmurs.

"Jason," Piper says, and her body begins to tremble all over again – is he okay? Has he left the Bunker? Is he fighting the Titan as they speak?

Annabeth takes the knife and frowns. "I don't see anything," she says, before passing it to Grover, who shakes his head no.

Piper rubs her wrists as May shakes her head dejectedly. "Your father bought that for you," she tells Percy, "but you took one look at it and decided you didn't want it. Your father tried so hard to convince you, he said you'd seen wrong, that things were not always what they seemed-"

Piper takes hold of the knife again, but this time she doesn't see anything. The same warmth grips her hand, though, as she grasps the hilt, but she can't help but be wary of it now.

Annabeth exhales, long and hard. "Did Luke's father mention anything special about the dagger?"

May ignores the question entirely. She squints at Annabeth for a long time before she says abruptly, "I know you."

"Uh, yes," Annabeth replies, somewhat uncomfortably. "I'm Luke's friend."

"The small girl, yes!" May crows, reaching across the table for Annabeth. "I remember you! You and the angry girl!"

Grover's lips twitch at Thalia's demotion to the angry girl; Annabeth extends her own arm to touch May's, smiling slightly.

"Yes," she says. "I visited you years ago, with Luke."

"You left quickly," May says. "Luke didn't want to talk to his father even then, I've never understood-"

"What?" Annabeth looks aghast. "Hermes was here? On that day?"

"Why, yes, of course!" May smiles. "He had just arrived, and he was waiting in the sitting-room." Piper glances at the room behind Percy. "Luke must've talked to him for less than a minute before he was all in a huff again, and then he left. He must've had a disagreement with his father, but what can you do? Boys will be boys." She tuts, shaking her head, not noticing how pale Annabeth has gone.

"Mrs. Castellan," Annabeth tries again, touching the other woman's arm, "Could you-"

Her words fall flat: the moment her hand makes contact with May's skeletal one, Annabeth's eyes widen and she collapses onto the table. May's eyes are glowing.

"Annabeth!" Piper yells, shaking her friend's shoulders. Percy stands, grim-faced, trying to pry away Annabeth's fingers from May's, but he stops suddenly as soon as he touches Annabeth's skin, looking oddly blank. Grover grasps his arm and falls into the same trance - Piper, desperate, tries to move Percy's hand off Annabeth's, but then she finds herself somewhere else entirely.

It's a dark night in the woods when she opens her eyes. The moon shines in a crescent above her, and the trees cast eerie shadows around her.

She looks at her own hands: they are translucent, which makes Piper realize she is nothing more than a shade in this world.

She is pulled from her reverie at the sound of a voice – a young girl's, laughing and shrieking. Piper follows the sound, passing through a tree just for the hell of it, and emerges into a small clearing where a much younger-looking Thalia is attempting to light a fire. Next to her sits Luke, who is grinning at a tiny girl in his lap – Annabeth.

Annabeth squirms, giggling as Luke's fingers poke her sides. Piper tenses for a horrifying moment before she realizes he's only tickling her – and for all her struggling, Annabeth's not making a real effort to get away. Luke ruffles her hair, looking fond, and Annabeth gazes up at him with shining eyes.

The Luke of the past carries none of the angst he had when Piper had known him. His hair is longer and shaggier, there is no scar on his face, and even though he is pale and gaunt, his expression is one of genuine happiness. Piper wonders, with some sympathy, what had changed him so much.

Thalia finally manages to light the fire. "Luke, don't terrorize the poor girl."

"I would never," Luke says, mock-affronted, poking Annabeth in the stomach, and Annabeth lets out a high-pitched giggle.

"Quiet, you two, or we'll attract all the monsters in the area," Thalia chides, though she's fighting a smile. She leans against Luke's other side, reaching into her pack for a couple of oranges and a bottle of water.

Even though it's dark, Piper can tell she hands Annabeth the biggest fruit, lets Annabeth drink her fill before she and Luke get the chance, even though they must be just as tired, just as hungry. The three of them huddle together, as close to the fire as they can go without getting burned, and Piper finds herself smiling and the soft, familial picture they portray.

Annabeth munches on her orange. Even young, she looks intelligent, even though her body looks too thin and her cheeks are hollowed out. She holds a knife in her hand, the same one she still uses, Piper recognizes, and Luke is teaching her how to hold it right, how to deal a killing blow.

"Are you ticklish, Thalia?" Annabeth asks, when Luke's done with his explanation.

Thalia smiles. "Nope."

Annabeth wrinkles her nose like she finds that answer unacceptable, and then with no warning she leaps from Luke's lap and throws herself over Thalia, tickling her in the stomach. Thalia shrieks, writhing with laughter. "Annabeth- stop – oh my gods – ahahaha, stop-"

Luke picks Annabeth off of the daughter of Zeus like she's no more than a kitten and sets her back on the ground. Thalia sits up slowly, spitting leaves from her mouth and glaring, though her lips twitching, barely holding back a smile.

"I know when you're lying," Annabeth sings. Thalia tries to glare but fails spectacularly at the sight of Annabeth using Luke as a shield, poking her face out from behind his legs and making silly faces.

"We've created a monster," Thalia tells Luke solemnly, who huffs out a chuckle.

He rubs Annabeth's hair again, and the action draws Annabeth's attention back to Luke. "What about you, Luke?"

"What about me what?" Luke asks, his voice playful.

"Are you ticklish, too?"

"Nope," Luke says, pressing his palm over his heart. "I am a stone wall. I have no weaknesses."

"Everyone has a weak spot," Annabeth says seriously, displaying a wisdom far beyond her years, at least until she begins to circle Luke the way a lion surveys its prey. Occasionally, she pokes out at him – his knees, his stomach, his spine, his sides. Thalia is grinning, but Luke, throughout it all, maintains a perfect poker face.

Annabeth, clearly growing frustrated at her failed attempts, jabs a finger just under Luke's left shoulder, close to his armpit.

Luke's lips twitch for the tiniest of moments before he quickly schools his expression back into one of stoicism.

It's too late, though - Annabeth's entire face fills with light. "I found your weak spot!" she yells, triumphant, and she begins to tickle the older boy under his armpits as Luke thrashes about, laughing wildly. He nearly crashes them both into a tree, and Thalia laughs so hard she nearly falls into the fire.

The vision fades with the sound of their dying chuckles, and Piper comes to with a violent jerk, her knees nearly buckling. She has to grasp the edge of the table to keep herself from falling to the floor – Percy's been unsuccessful in this regard: he's fallen to his knees, shaking his head as though trying to clear his brain.

She meets his eyes, and he looks awfully guilty – Piper winces in silent agreement. She feels as though she's intruded on something pure and untouched and happy, one of Annabeth's most treasured memories. Piper wonders if she'd been judging Luke too harshly, for the boy in the vision had been kind, strong, and fiercely devoted to his little family. Annabeth had clearly loved him – she's not sure in what way anymore – and Piper thinks she understands, now, just how much her friend has lost, and why she's so desperate to find him again.

Grover's whispering something in Annabeth's ear. Annabeth nods, her gaze fixed upon the table. When Piper sits back in her chair, she catches a glimpse of Annabeth's eyes, and they're full of tears.

May is rocking back and forth, her hands wrapped around her own middle, lost to the world. Percy reaches towards her, grimacing. "May?" he says. Then – "Mom?"

May's eyes glow an alien green. "Oh no," she whispers in resigned despair, "it's happening again-"

"What is?" Piper asks, but May does not appear to hear her. She sits up straight, giving her a height and presence Piper hadn't believed the old woman capable of.

Her eyes are still growing that supernatural green when she turns to Grover, who cowers under her gaze.

"The Lord of the Wild awaits you deep under the earth," she informs him, and Grover's eyes widen.

"Pan?" he whispers, but May disregards him, turning to Annabeth.

"You shall lose a love to worse than death," she says, and her voice sounds ancient and gloomy. Annabeth blanches further, opening her mouth to speak, but the woman's gaze has already turned towards Piper, who finds herself unable to move.

"It is you or him," she tells Piper, and her words make Piper feel faint. A million possibilities flash through her mind, but Krios' cruel laugh rises above every other thought and fills her body with a cold, quiet dread.

Percy grasps May's hand when she turns to face him. In a strong voice, he commands, "Tell me about the Great Prophecy."

May Castellan stiffens, then begins to recite in Greek –

"A half blood of the eldest gods – shall reach sixteen against all odds –"

"Not that one," Percy says coolly, and it's a good thing he still has his wits about him, Piper thinks gratefully, because the rest of them are frozen stiff. "Ancient Greek. Not the Modern."

May nods. "A half-blood of the eldest gods," she repeats, and this time her words and tone are slightly different, ever so slightly more formal. "Shall come of age against all odds –"

"Oh my god," Annabeth breathes. "All this time-"

"Somehow it got lost in translation," Grover continues, running a hand through his matted curls. "From Ancient Greek to Modern…"

Percy puts his head in his hands.

May completes the Prophecy – there are no mistakes in the rest of the verse, thank the gods, because Piper doesn't think she can deal with any more surprises – before turning back to them with that same blank look.

"You must find the next one," she rasps. "You must find the next-" and immediately she crumples to the floor. Percy manages to catch her before she hits the groudn, and when her eyes blink open, they're back to their normal colour.

She gazes up at Percy with wonder.

"Hey, Mom," Percy says softly. "You back with us?"

"Oh, Luke," May whispers, and she says the name like a prayer. "Is that you?"

The rest of them exchange horrified looks. Piper's heart throbs with sympathy, because this poor woman is not evil. She's just - she's been cursed, cursed with the Sight, but all she really wants is her son to come home to her again.

Annabeth chokes back a sob, turning away from May.

"Yeah. Yeah, it's me, Mom," Percy says, and his voice is uncharacteristically soft as he embraces May's near-malnourished frame. "I've come back. I've come home."

/

Annabeth's head is still pounding as they take their leave.

If it had been up to her, she would've bolted the moment May returned to her senses, but Percy had shot them all a look that clearly meant stay put or I kill you, allowing May to feed them old plum cake and bread with fungus on it.

"Oh, I've always been so bad at cooking," May says, smoothening her nightgown over her knees, flustered.

"That's all right, Mom," Percy says kindly, pouring her a glass of whatever calming brew Hermes had left for her. "I'll cook for you next time I visit." He smiles warmly, leaving the rest of his food – the last of Leo's tacos and a couple of pears – on the table for May. Annabeth is well aware that this means they'll definitely have to go through with Percy's plan of stealing from drive-thrus, but, strangely touched by the gesture and looking once again at the rotten bread on her untouched plate, she hesitates only slightly before emptying her bag as well, and Piper and Grover follow suit.

"Oh, you will visit, won't you, Luke?" May asks him, throwing her arms – which look no healthier than bones – around Percy's shoulders. "I know you have important things to do, but I do love it so much when you come home to me."

Grover unlocks the door and ushers them outside. May still holds onto Percy's hand like it's a lifeline.

"I'll visit," Percy promises, though his voice sounds strangled, and Annabeth, who remembers Percy mentioning his own mother during their first supply run together, suspects that he's about to reach his limit.

She cuts in. "Thank you for your hospitality, Mrs. Castellan." She tries to put in as much warmth in her voice as possible.

"Anytime, darlings!" May pats her head. "Any friends of Luke's are welcome here. I'll buy more peanut butter next time."

Out of the corner of her eye, Annabeth sees Piper looking into her new knife. Annabeth had forced it into Piper's hands as they'd been leaving: she knows a magical item when she sees one, and if it had responded to Piper, that was as good a sign as any for her to keep it.

"Just one thing, Mom," Percy says quickly. "If anyone else comes looking for me, don't tell them I came by."

"Oh, of course, dearie," May says, and Annabeth feels a stab of sympathy for the poor woman. "Anything for you, Luke."

"Thanks, Mom," Percy says, relieved, allowing her to hug him one last time.

She watches them the entire time they make their way out of the gate and back up the main road, smiling and waving, her eyes full of tears. Annabeth pretends not to notice Percy brush away a couple of his own.

Her body sags with relief as Grover leads them to the park they'd seen on their way in and deposits them at the nearest bench. Percy throws himself to the ground and tilts his head backward, closing his eyes, a frown marring his features. Grover leans against a tree and slides to the grass, breathing hard, and Piper unsheathes her new dagger, gazing into the metal as though willing it to show her more.

Annabeth isn't sure what to feel. Her head and her heart both seem to have given up on each other – and her – entirely. May's practically outed Luke as a traitor to their cause – Annabeth hadn't missed the knowing looks on Piper and Grover's faces, as though May had just been confirming what they'd probably been thinking for a long time now, but Annabeth's finding the news a little harder to digest. Maybe that just makes her the blindest bat on the planet, but she's finding it impossible to equate the two images of Luke his mother had unwittingly made her become aware of – the Luke of the past: a kind, protective boy who had done everything in his power to keep her safe, and the Luke of the present, who had apparently never been on their side at all.

It doesn't make sense. Luke had been his same cheerful self even after their initiation into the Bunkers – in fact, he'd been pleased, even, to discover he had siblings. Even back then he'd been one of the older ones, and a lot of the little kids had looked up to him, gifted as he was with the sword.

No, he'd begun to change shortly after he'd returned from his first solo Quest. Luke had come back with a scar running down the side of his face and a lot of anger in him. He had refused to take another Quest after that, instead choosing to bring in more demigods, like Chris – another of their lost comrades - and Silena. Annabeth's heart sinks as her mind begins making connections of its own accord – Luke had been on another one of his trips when Zeus' Bolt had been stolen. He'd met his father, argued with him, and met up with a Titan shortly afterward.

It's near-incriminating evidence. Annabeth pushes it out of her mind, not wanting to deal with it right now, even though she knows she'll have to at some point.

While the rest of them have gone boneless with relief to be away from Luke's house – Percy in particular has spread his limbs as though imitating an octopus, probably still disturbed after having to put on the doting son act for May – Piper's body is still taut, her expression still anxious. Annabeth takes a deep breath, weighing her options, and comes to a decision.

"You saw something about Jason in the dagger?" she asks.

Piper nods, her brows pinched together. "Yeah. And I've been having these dreams, too. Annabeth, I-I'm worried that –" She can't finish.

Annabeth knows. She's seen how fiercely she loves Jason, even before they'd officially gotten together. Maybe falling in love so hard and fast is an Aphrodite thing, but Annabeth knows that it's real, that Piper would throw her own life away if it meant keeping Jason safe – nobody doubts it. Annabeth can't blame her – she closes her eyes and remembers holding Thalia's broken body and remembers her last words to Annabeth, and she remembers, clear as day, her own voice making a vow in response.

Annabeth knows Jason can take care of himself. But if that dagger can really show the future, if Piper is this worried –

"You should go back," she says with finality. "You can tell the other senior members what we've found out – send Travis to Eleven so they can spread word. On Equinox day, take Jason, Beckendorf, and Silena and go to Bunker One for the assembly. We'll meet you there."

Piper lifts her head from her hands. "Annabeth…are you sure about this?"

"I know you're worried about him," Annabeth responds, her mind already made up. "I am, too. And if we're right about this – which I know we are - we need Jason to be safe."

"Annabeth," Piper says, her voice choked.

"Besides," she continues, trying to lighten the mood, "I know how you get when you're distracted. You'd be useless in a fight, you'll probably get us all killed."

She isn't fooling anyone. Percy opens an eye and smirks at her, and Piper picks herself off the bench to give her a hug.

"I love you," she says earnestly.

"Get outta here," Annabeth says, with an air of fake indifference. "Go and give your boyfriend a big fat kiss-"

"I'll give you a big fat kiss," Piper says with glee, managing to land her lips with a smack on Annabeth's right cheek.

"The Labyrinth might be dangerous to travel alone," Grover says.

"I won't be alone," Piper says confidently. "I'll have your acorns."

"I can't control them from Portland," Grover protests. He glances at Annabeth. "Maybe I should go back with her."

"There's no need for all that," Percy says, yawning. He stretches, and then sits up. "I've called four pegasi, they should be here in – oh no –"

Piper screams as a dark shape descends from the trees with frightening speed, breaking through the branches with a massive crack. A cascade of leaves pours down around them as the pegasus whinnies, flapping its wings slower and slower as it makes its (rather clumsy) landing. Three more follow, using the opening the first one had made to glide down to the ground, making their own descents far more smoothly.

"You are an idiot and a show-off," Percy tells the first pegasus, half-irritated but mostly fond, standing up to stroke its mane. Annabeth vaguely has the wherewithal to register that Percy is talking to the damn thing, so enraptured is she by the sight of it. The pegasus neighs enthusiastically, rubbing its nose into Percy's neck, and Percy says, "Yeah, yeah, I missed you too, you stupid horse," and laughs.

Annabeth stares. The pegasi are – "They're beautiful," she says in a daze. Percy beams at her, pushing away the one nuzzling him. It's pure black, almost like a raven, while the others are varying shades of grey and brown. One walks up to Piper and whinnies curiously.

"Oooh, Guido likes you," Percy grins.

"What is that supposed to mean?" Piper asks, sounding suspicious. "Is that a good thing?"

"It's a good thing," Percy confirms, still trying to push himself away from the black pegasus, who seems reluctant to let him go. Despite its size, it is very much like a puppy in demeanour, she thinks, and against her better judgement, Annabeth grins.

Percy finally manages to free himself. "This is Blackjack, my partner in crime," he introduces, patting the black pegasus on the nose. "And this is Guido-" he points at the tan one, "Porkpie-" he gestures at the light grey one – "and Minerva." The dark grey one bounds over to nose at his open palm. Percy meets Annabeth's gaze and winces. "Don't ask me, this is what they wanted to be called."

Piper giggles as Guido sniffs at her hair. "He's friendly."

"They're all good boys," Percy fusses, pressing his forehead into Blackjack's. "Except for you, Minerva, you're a good girl." Minerva whinnies, pleased.

Grover's having no trouble communicating with them, using his satyr senses to greet them calmly and make his approach: Annabeth watches him enviously, wondering where to begin, when Percy beckons her over and nudges Minerva in her direction.

"You match," he says playfully.

"Oh, you do," Piper agrees, petting Guido, who preens under her touch.

Annabeth's never seen a pegasus before, much less been near a tame one. She holds a cautious hand Minerva's way she might do to an injured dog or cat and waits, maintaining eye contact with the horse. The pegasus is a beautiful grey, the shade of a newly-laid road, but not quite as dark as Blackjack. She still doesn't get what Piper and Percy mean when she says they match, though, until it hits her that the pegasus' fluffy down closely resembles the shade of Annabeth's own eyes.

Annabeth tries to smile encouragingly at her, and slowly she moves its nose towards her palm until they touch. Annabeth sighs and pets it lightly, and Minerva breathes out softly, sending a warm rush of air down her arm.

"Minerva is Athena's Roman name, right?" Percy says, evidently pleased. "I thought you'd be a good fit."

Annabeth runs her fingers down the horse's long neck, marvelling at the softness of the fur. "They're nothing like what I expected."

"They're just horses with wings, nothing too spectacular," Percy says. Blackjack steps on his feet at once. Percy squawks. Blackjack must be saying something very rude in horse-speak, because Grover covers his mouth before letting out a loud guffaw.

"Just for that, no donuts for you," Percy warns. Blackjack looks at Annabeth like, Can you believe this dude?

"So, plan of action," Annabeth says. "We get food, then Piper goes back to Nine, and we head on to Portland."

Percy raises his hand. Blackjack boops it. "If we've already pretty much confirmed what we came here to find, why do we need to meet Ella? Can't we just go meet up with the rest in Bunker One or whatever?"

"I was thinking we should try and convince Ella to come back with us, at least for a while," Annabeth admits. "Plus she lives in a library – maybe she has some solid proof."

"Trust me," Piper adds helpfully, "if we go back to the meeting with the words of a mentally unstable old woman, everyone's gonna raise objections – especially your siblings, Annabeth."

Annabeth sighs noisily. "I know." She loves them all, but she also knows them, and she knows how vital it is for them to get some real, solid facts before arriving at a conclusion. It's what she'd been taught by her older siblings at the time, and it's what she, in turn, had taught some of the younger ones – including Malcolm, who leads Bunker Six in her absence.

Besides, having another person second May's words wouldn't hurt, she figures. The more the facts that point towards her vague theory, the better.

Percy shrugs. "I'm in. Can we go get lunch now?"

Stealing people's food from drive-thrus turns out to be just as much fun as Percy had described it, flying even more so. Annabeth has to keep a tight hold on Minerva, who keeps making impromptu dives and loops in midair, which Percy assures her is the pegasus's way of showing off. Annabeth's sure they'll be spotted, but Percy assures her the Mist will probably turn them into a skateboarding teenager with mad skills – or something.

"Consider me impressed," Annabeth yelps, as Minerva, who has really taken a shine to her and seems determined to prove that Annabeth's made the best choice in pegasi, puts on a sudden burst of speed, "but it's getting really hard to keep a hold of my burrito, so could you slow down for a minute?"

They part ways with Piper after lunch – Percy assures Piper that Guido will figure out where they need to go. Pegasi have the same magical senses that most demigods do, only theirs are far superior, he says. Although he does caution Piper to keep a tight hold of the horse. Guido tends to get showboat-y with new riders, and if Piper falls off it's not Percy's fault, because he's warned her, okay?

"Thanks, idiot," Piper says, releasing Annabeth to give Percy a hug.

"Tell Jason to stay safe, and to try frying off his eyebrows next," Percy says, hugging her back. "Advanced training."

Seeing them together makes Annabeth feel a little uneasy, and she doesn't know why. It's the same feeling she'd got when May Castellan had assumed Piper to be Percy's girlfriend – something that shouldn't have upset her as much as it did. Especially since it has nothing to do with how Percy had wrapped his arm around Piper's shoulders afterward, seemingly intent on keeping up with the act.

Still, though, she scowls and looks away.

She pushes the thought from her head as Percy signals for them to mount their steeds. Minerva whinnies lightly as Annabeth climbs on, and she winds both arms around the pegasus's neck.

"Let's go," Percy says, and they rise into the sky.

It's the perfect mixture of warm and cool – the combination of the sun beating down on her skin and the rush of icy breeze is Annabeth's favorite kind of weather. Percy leads their pack: Blackjack seems the most confident with a passenger onboard by far, and she hears Percy communicating with the horse softly as they fly, asking him how he's been, if he's gotten a hold of any sugar cubes recently. Annabeth chances a glance downwards, trying to spot the park they'd lounged in during lunch, or even May's house, but everything seems tiny from the height they're at, almost like they're children's' toys.

The sight before her is magnificent. All above and around them there is only the empty blue of the heavens, bigger and wider and more endless than she had ever imagined it to be from the ground. The horizon stretches into a thin, hazy divide between earth and sky, impossibly far.

It's beautiful up here. She extends an arm upward as they fly higher, imagining touching the clouds. Minerva, who seems to understand, extends her wings to full capacity, slowing their pace into a seamless glide. Annabeth smiles openly, giddy, as Percy turns around to catch her gaze.

"Isn't it incredible?" he calls. His black hair whips around in the wind and his eyes crinkle around the edges and his skin is warm and - it really is a sight to behold.

"It's amazing," Annabeth gushes back.

Their pegasi start a spontaneous race that has Annabeth and Grover shrieking, but when Blackjack has won, they all slow down again.

"How'd you manage to meet a pegasus?" Annabeth asks Percy, who grins, rubbing his thumb on Blackjack's head.

"I'd just left New Rome," he says, and when he doesn't offer an explanation, Annabeth adds it to her list of shit she needs him to tell her, like, stat.

"I was taking up odd jobs, trying to earn whatever mortal money I could," he continues. "I worked on this farm for a while-" which she recalls him mentioning to her on their first supply run together – "and I asked the owner to let me take care of the horses. So I go to the stables, and there's Blackjack, chillin' among all the real horses and stealing all the sugar cubes." He laughs. "I've never been more surprised in my life – the only pegasus I'd seen before was Scipio – Reyna's. But Blackjack and I got along great."

"So he left when you did?" Grover asks.

"Followed me when the monsters found me, as they always do," Percy responds, his eyes on the clouds. "I finally convinced him to go be with other pegasi, I mean, travelling with a giant black winged horse attracts all the wrong kind of attention. But he still comes when I call him – we've had some insane, uh, escapades together." Blackjack neighs in agreement.

"That means you've stolen a lot of shit and nearly been caught," Annabeth interprets, and Percy grins.

"Guilty," he says. "We mostly got fast food – though there was a really close shave with another demigod."

"Do I wanna know?" Annabeth asks, rolling her eyes.

"Probably not," Percy chuckles.

She drops it, diverting her attention, again, to her surroundings. She gazes below, the drop frightening in how tangible it feels, and once the ground turns into nothing more than a canvas of brown and green, she settles back down against Minerva and thinks back to May Castellan and Luke. She thinks of the vision May had forced her into and her eyes almost prickle with tears again, but she holds them back lest Percy sees.

She knows that a lot of what May Castellan had said was damning evidence that Luke had definitely not been telling her everything. He'd even met Hermes the night he'd brought Annabeth and Thalia home – and that was the least of her worries. Luke had visited May twice – once before the Bolt had been stolen, and once after – and Annabeth remembers, now, with a grim kind of certainty, that he'd been in New York, too, during the time the Bolt had been stolen – he'd been on a supposed scouting mission that had ended in the demigod's death. Or so he'd said. He'd returned back to the Bunker before Annabeth, Thalia and Grover had come back from their failed Quest, and he'd looked so downcast and angry that Annabeth hadn't even thought to question his story.

But now…

But now, there's so much that doesn't make sense. Prometheus, the Slimy Titan himself, had come to get something from him. Why? And what was the helmet Luke had given him? A spoil of war, or something more?

Something in her cracks painfully at the thought of Luke as a traitor, because, in spite of everything, he had been – no, he is still her family, the boy who'd taken her in when her own father had turned his back on her, the boy who'd given her her first weapon, then taught her to use it. Everything she knows today, as a demigod, a warrior, a survivor – they are all the direct results of Luke's teachings. He has made her who she is today.

When Luke had disappeared during the War, Annabeth had still held onto the slimmest thread of hope, perhaps largely against her better judgement, that maybe he had been kidnapped, or taken by the enemy, possibly to be used later as bait of some sort, but today's revelations paint an entirely different picture. The portrait isn't even complete yet, and Annabeth isn't sure she wants to see the finished image – she's terrified of what it might show.

The very thought that Luke might have been working for the enemy – the evil, vile monsters that caused Thalia's death – it breaks her heart.

Worry and despair overtakes her until she finds herself snivelling quietly into Minerva's neck. The pegasus, probably sensing her emotions, slows even further so that Grover and Porkpie overtake her, and Annabeth has the chance to mourn in peace, alone.

"Thank you," she tells Minerva. The pegasus snorts in response.

Turns out a good cry had been just what Annabeth had needed – she lets her tears leak down along the side of Minerva's mane and she shakes silently as she watches them drop, one by one, down to Earth. Offhandedly she wonders where they'll land – maybe on a tree, or even a person. She imagines her teardrops falling on someone's head, imagines them looking up at the sunny sky, bemused, wondering if it might rain.

She thinks more than ever about Luke and whether he had meant to betray them all along. Luke had been a brother to her, one of the only people she'd trusted for years. He'd promised her that he'd be her family, and he'd saved her life on many, many occasions. The fact that he'd been keeping secrets as big as meeting his father from her, even a couple of years before the War had begun – it hurts her much more than she'll ever let on.

When she's all cried out, Annabeth finds herself drained beyond belief. She struggles to keep her eyes open and barely manages to conceal a yawn.

Grover's already fallen asleep, his arms circling Porkpie's neck, but Percy's eyes are wide open, if a little red around the rims.

He slows Blackjack the slightest bit and draws level to her.

"You can sleep," he says. "I'll catch you if you fall."

"I won't fall," Annabeth murmurs, so softly that the wind nearly steals the reply. "And I won't sleep."

"We'll stop at one of my old hideouts in the Tualatin Mountains," Percy says. He points, and there in the distance, rising from a patchwork of trees and fields, is a hillock that must really be a towering highland. "We should get there in a few hours. Do you think you can hang on till then?"

"I can take anything," Annabeth boasts, rubbing at her eyes.

She must fall asleep, then, because the next thing she remembers is Percy's arms, strong and comforting, lifting her from Minerva and laying her gently on the ground. Annabeth tries to sit up, and her hands come into contact with something far softer than whatever she'd been expecting. It feels so comfortable that her resolve drains almost immediately.

"You're safe," Percy assures her gently. "Sleep, okay?"

"Okay," Annabeth agrees easily, and she's out like a light the minute her head touches the soft, slightly crunchy bed of leaves under her aching body.

/

Piper spends the ride back to the Bunker lost in thought.

She thinks of Jason, and Krios, and her mother. Her mother, who had once told her that defeating Krios was to be her destiny.

Those words hadn't come true back then – but maybe they weren't meant for that moment five years ago. Maybe they are meant for the war to come, and the thought of facing down the Titan again scares the pants off of her.

She isn't quite strong enough yet, she knows. Her charmspeak has become her most relied-upon weapon: its strength has grown in leaps and bounds since the early days when she was living with her father, back when she just assumed she was persuasive when she tried.

Tristan McLean had never been a bad father to her. He just never had the time to be one.

And it sucks, because Piper had loved – and still loves – her dad. He used to sing her to sleep, teach her about their shared Native American heritage. He taught her about the Cherokee gods and the tribes and the wonderful, rich culture, and he promised to take her to his old house in Tahlequah.

Then a small indie film he'd starred in blew up. Tristan McLean began to get offers pouring in from Hollywood proper, from directors who wanted him for his roguish, youthful face and exotic skin tone. Even in his forties, he looked as youthful as a twenty-year-old, and he emitted a kind of magnetic radiance that Hollywood loved. He snagged the role as the protagonist in King of Sparta, and life would never be the same.

Piper had grown up alone, pretty much. She'd had a nanny at some point, who was kind of a pushover and had gotten her whatever she wanted if she asked nicely (now, of course, she knows why). Her dad was never around – he was always off somewhere shooting for a movie, or a TV show, or a commercial, or a magazine cover. He gave her freedom, and too much of it – it probably was not the best idea to leave a seven-year-old in charge of her own life – and so Piper spent her time getting out of school and roaming the city.

When she was ten, she started shoplifting.

She isn't proud of it – she had flat-out refused to go on supply runs when she'd first joined the Bunkers, and it had taken a lot of convincing from Annabeth and Silena to make her realize that the demigods had to steal for their own survival, and they never stole any more than what they really needed. Piper still doesn't overly enjoy doing it and always tries to leave something behind as payment; it reminds her of her early teenage years where she stole – first for the thrill of it, then for attention, and finally…just for fun, really. She doesn't like to think of herself as someone so shallow and petty.

She'd started small, with items that could easily fit in her palms. Erasers and scrunchies and little boxes of lip balm. She grew more confident with each theft, and she became almost cocky when she passed by the cash registers unnoticed, waving goodbye to the store staff with a little smile.

She never did it because she was poor – in fact, her father was obscenely rich. They lived in a gigantic penthouse in Los Angeles and she could summon a helper with a single call. And Piper never used what she stole – she just stashed the stuff away in a drawer. But stealing gave her a rush, and it was so much better than feeling empty, so much better than sitting pretty in their big, empty house. And so Piper took more, and more, and more.

Soon walking away red-handed began to annoy her. It wasn't quite as much fun when she got off scot-free, so she allowed herself to be caught once - and then she talked her way out of it. Irate store managers, who caught her taking ridiculous things, like suitcases and cushions and, once, an entire coffee machine, would stand down at a single word from her. It had been bizarre, but it had been thrilling.

The real problems began when she got older. At age ten she saw her first monster, a shop owner who was unfazed by her attempts at charming herself out of custody. The monster attacked Piper, who managed to run, leaving behind a wreckage of a shop and several eyewitnesses, who didn't hesitate to report her to the police.

Her father paid the cops in exchange for silence, and that night he sat her down and had a long talk with her, about why stealing was bad and why she should never do it again. He didn't believe her about the awful creature the shopkeeper had turned into, but it didn't matter.

It wasn't like he turned his sunny smile on her, the smile that had charmed all of America. In fact, he made it a point to tell her how disappointed he was in her. But it didn't matter.

It was the longest he'd talked to her in years, and she wanted more.

She became daring. She stole expensive things she had no real use for – but they were things that made her father sit up and take notice. And the bigger the burglary, the more powerful her charmspeak got, and after a while there was no denying that something in her voice was different, magical. She didn't even have to do the stealing herself; people would do it for her if she made sure to use her magic voice, and it thrilled her and terrified her in equal measure.

During one of her father's lectures, she tried to tell him, but he brushed it off and told her to stop making excuses.

When she was twelve, Piper had her dad's agent steal her a car. It was a stunt big enough to bring her dad home from Mexico, where he was filming for the new James Bond film, but instead of giving her his usual talk, he snapped and sent her away to boarding school. And for some reason, no amount of pleading would talk him out of it, even when she used the magic voice.

The only upside of going to the Wilderness School was meeting Leo, who Piper literally noticed on day one. He set fire to Isabel's hair without matches, and when he noticed Piper noticing, he avoided her for a week straight. Piper had finally revealed her own magical powers to him to get him to stop running away, and they'd become friends.

Leo had this insane idea that this – them stuck in the goddamn Wilderness School – was somehow their superhero origin story, and before long he was dragging Piper out of her bed in the middle of the night for what he called a training montage. They didn't really end up doing much; Piper would make Leo do stupid shit like dance around in his underwear in the freezing cold and Leo would try to set fire to some trees, but Piper had had fun. She'd loved being stupid with her best friend.

Coming to Six had been a whole adventure in itself. Finding two powerful, teenage demigods had cause quite a stir in the Bunkers, and Piper still remembers catching sight of Thalia during their first meeting and having a minor crisis, because oh no, she's hot.

She hadn't even known she was into girls at that point. Hell, she'd had zero sexual experience until then. She'd been too busy trying to get her father's attention to even attempt to hone in on a boy her age, and her sexuality? Please. She'd just found herself gazing nonchalantly at a cute boy and assumed she was straight.

But apparently she was not. Apparently she was super, super bi.

She'd had a minor freakout, of course, and it had been Lacey who had found her staring into the fire one night. One word from her younger sister had had Piper spilling the beans, and – phew. She's glad she did.

Lacey had explained that it was perfectly alright to be bi. The campers didn't really judge people, and besides, most of her half-siblings were out and proud about it. Lacey herself was pansexual, which Piper thought was really cool of her to say.

"It isn't about which gender you love," she'd told Piper wisely. "It's just about love."

Coming out hadn't been as momentous an event as she'd built it up to be in her head. Piper had told Leo first – he'd been overjoyed, because "Now I can talk to you about cute girls and you can agree with me instead of calling me a perv!" It hadn't been much of a big deal, really, but it had definitely felt good to come out and say it, and have others nod like, Cool. She felt confident in herself and her sexuality. She felt good to be herself, even If she wasn't even fully aware that she had hidden a part of herself before, and by the time Jason arrived at Camp, she had no qualms about saying the fact out loud.

She's learned a lot since coming into her own as a demigod. She's the only one able to use charmspeak in all of the Bunkers, but her siblings, blessed naturally with a natural aversion to any form of seduction magic (while simultaneously being able to seduce effortlessly) had accepted her with open arms. They allowed her to practice on them, and later Piper trained with Annabeth and the rest of her siblings in Bunker Six, where she perfected her skills and learned how to really get into people's heads. Charmspeaking, Annabeth told her, wasn't just making people do whatever she wanted. It's reaching into their hearts and their minds and bending them to her will. If Piper can train her voice enough, she can turn a foe to a friend if she so wishes, because it's one thing to be physically strong, but having the prowess to ward against a mental attack is another thing entirely.

"Even strength can bow down to wisdom, and cleverness, and charm, sometimes," Annabeth had advised, and Piper had taken those words to heart.

Now her charmspeak is more powerful than it's ever been before. Piper can just about make anyone do anything for her at this point, but her charmspeak had done nothing to Krios last time, and she'd crumbled in front of Prometheus and his silver tongue. The fight – ending with Jason bloody and unmoving on the ground – keeps her awake at night. She can't let Jason die.

And now it's apparently her destiny to defeat the Titan, and Piper isn't even close enough to being ready.

She's half-afraid to tell Jason. Jason's still got a grudge against Krios, and she knows her boyfriend would like nothing more than to drive his sword through the Titan's heart. Piper would do it, but she isn't sure if she can – and she isn't sure if Jason will let her.

They're at that place in their relationship where it feels so wonderful and special: they've been through so much and Piper knows that both of them would rather die than see the other in danger. If she tells Jason about Krios and her prophecy, he will be sure to do everything he can to keep her safe, but it's Piper's duty, now, to face the Titan, just as it is Jason's to face Kronos.

Her heart sinks. She'd be lying if she said she was glad to know about the changes in the Prophecy. It puts Jason right in the middle of it, right where he doesn't want to be. His sister had died, after all, and this will put him in her shoes.

She isn't sure how she's going to break the news to him.

Sighing, she leans on Guido's long neck. The pegasus whinnies.

Piper extracts Katoptris once more and gazes into the face of the blade. She thinks she spots the same mist as before, the same flash of blonde from Jason's hair as he fights Krios, but then she blinks and it's gone, and she is left staring at the shiny Bronze.

The dagger is really exquisite. Even Piper, who isn't a child of Hephaestus like Leo and who hasn't grown up around weaponry the way Annabeth and Jason have, can tell that Katoptris is one of a kind. It is smaller than the traditional Greek dagger and the blade itself is flatter, with a wooden hilt that seems designed for her hand. The Bronze is shaped like a long triangle and seems to emit a soft glow – it is so spotless, almost mirrorlike to the point where she wonders if the knife has ever seen battle. Piper can see her own eyes reflected in it, wide and confused and ringed with dark circles.

More than anything else, it feels magical, the same way Jason had described Ivlivs. Piper had taken a risk and let it slip from her hands while she and Guido had been crossing some farmlands, but the knife had reappeared in his scabbard after a few minutes anyway.

She supposes she ought to feel honored. Magical items choose their wearers, and once they find them, they will not work for nobody else until their wearer passes away or relinquishes their ownership willingly. Most magical items are hidden all over the world, lying dormant, waiting for their bearers to be born. Some go centuries without being found: Ivlivs accepting Jason, as far as she knows, had been nothing more than a stroke of luck.

Still, though, Piper doesn't want to see the future. She's a firm follower of taking things as they come – her time as a demigod has taught her that what will be, will be, and this seems like an unfair, unwanted life hack that's given her nothing but an extra dose of stress.

She wants Jason with her right now. She wants to hug him and make him laugh – she delights in making him smile, because it had taken her and Leo a long time to get him to loosen up a little. She wants to kiss him and lean into him and make best use of his neck, where she likes to hide her face when she's feeling overwhelmed.

Ironically, Piper had never believed in love. She hadn't even had crushes before the moment of clarity with Thalia – she'd just appreciated attractive people. It's just that she'd seen her dad act in about half a dozen romantic comedies, spouting cliché dialogues and kissing his co-star thoroughly at the end of the movie, and that had ruined the entire concept of love for her. Love seemed like such a sham when she knew how detached her father had been behind the scenes – and she definitely hadn't expected to fall headfirst herself.

All of that had flown right out of the window when Jason walked into the Bunker, trying to hide himself behind Thalia even though he was way taller than her. She had taken one look at him, him with his long legs and sinuous arms, his pale skin and full, pink lips, and his sharp cheekbones, and fallen hard. He'd looked her way with the bluest eyes Piper had even seen, sharp and bright and deep.

She still isn't quite sure how she managed to get by without making a complete fool of herself. She had barely been able to talk to him at first because she'd been so astonished at the fact that someone who embodied her exact type could even exist - a type that, until two minutes before, she hadn't even realized she had. But apparently Jason had been it, despite looking like a jock – he looked like the kind of guy who dated the head cheerleader in high school, and besides, Piper had had the worst experience with the so-called jocks in the Wilderness School.

"Do you think he's a nice jock?" she'd whispered desperately in Leo's ear, and he'd laughed at her for hours.

Luckily, Jason had been the nicest jock to ever exist. He had been so gentle, even then. So gentle and so kind and so lonely. More than anything, she'd wanted to be his friend, and now that they're dating she often finds herself thinking, during their most stupid, mundane moments, I'm the luckiest girl in the world.

Jason makes everything better. She can't let him face Krios, not again – she has to take control of her own destiny. She is going to face the Titan, and she has to be ready for it.

Is this what May had felt like? If she'd foreseen the fall of the gods and the deaths of everyone she knew and loved, well, Piper can see clearly how she'd ended up going mad.

She sheathes the dagger, feeling resolute as she spots the familiar rock formation in the distance and feels the wash of magic from the borders.

"Let's land," she tells Guido, petting his neck.

Piper's writing her own future now – and at the end of her story, she's going to be a Titan Killer.

/

Jason wakes with a start.

He scrubs his face with his hands, turning over in his bed. He doesn't have a shift until later today, so he really should be getting some rest while he can. He wants to sleep, is the thing - he just can't. Stupid demigod dreams.

His blanket falls off of him, and Jason claws at it clumsily – it's a really cold night. The open roof is a blessing in the summer, but even with the extra layer of leaves the children of Demeter had grown over the ceiling, the cold air still manages to seep through, and the natural insulation that comes from the stone walls of the Bunker never seems to help. The Hephaestus kids manage to sleep through it, born as they are with fire and oil in their veins - though maybe not as obviously as Leo - but the rest of them have to suffer through the winter, and it's not always pleasant.

He looks quickly at Piper's empty bed next to his and finds himself disappointed when he realizes she's still not back and that there are still four days left for them to return, if not more. Piper's bed is usually pushed up right next to his so they can cuddle without having to squish on either one of their cots, but Jason had moved her bed back to its original position after she'd left for the Quest – he'd felt much too alone sleeping in a bed meant for two.

He used to think missing Piper when she was away – off on a supply run or a monster raid or whatever - was a sign of weakness, but now he has no problem admitting it, whining about it, even. He misses Piper's warm presence next to his, he misses her smiles, the light kisses she'd drop on his forehead absentmindedly, and he misses the way she'd always just – be there, a silent pillar of support for him to lean on should he need it.

Piper and Jason hadn't been friends for a long time before she'd asked him out – Jason had come to the Bunkers, after all, just to be with Thalia, and it had taken weeks for him to finally notice the people around his sister. Chief among them had been Annabeth – who he'd immediately butted heads with – but Piper had stuck out to him immediately, of course. Only a fool wouldn't fall for Piper in some fashion – she had a beauty that radiated power, and even though she was short – tiny, even – she could command the attention of a room, albeit in a different manner compared to Thalia or Annabeth.

Jason had only interacted with one other child of Aphrodite – Drew Tanaka, who had, almost within the second of meeting him, attempted to flirt her way into his pants. Needless to say, Jason had been wary when Piper had first approached him, but he'd never been more pleasantly surprised in his life.

Piper had been easy to talk to, funny, insightful, and so emotionally mature Jason often felt like a bumbling cow in comparison. She'd introduced him to Leo, her oldest friend, and the three of them had become a trio of sorts, Jason's go-to people aside from Thalia.

Jason had never really felt attraction to anyone – he'd liked Reyna a fair amount back in New Rome, but what he felt for Piper was so strong and so different and so new that he'd freaked out a quite a bit (okay, a butt-ton) before Piper had decided to take matters into her own hands.

She'd led him through a lesser-used passage to what she told him was her favorite spot at the top of the Bunker, and after listing a surprisingly well thought-out (he's still fairly sure Piper had been inventing most of her arguments on the spot, though she will forever deny otherwise) list of reasons why they should date, she'd thrown caution to the winds and kissed him right there, and Jason had responded eagerly, the breeze raising them a couple of feet above the mountaintop and the stars twinkling above them like little diamonds.

It had been his first kiss. He hadn't really had the time to go around finding a love interest before, but being with Piper felt right.

He'd been honored. He still is honored, really. Piper is kind of the total package – she could very well have anyone, and still she chooses to be with Jason – Jason, who still second-guesses himself on a daily basis for the stupidest things, Jason, who is kind of a hot mess, like, all the time.

Which leads right into these – uh, frankly really terrifying dreams, which are dangerous because he keeps having them, he keeps having these stupid dreams with Krios and the fog, which is okay, it could mean anything, but Piper is having the same dream and he's not sure what that's supposed to mean.

Sometimes it's him going through the fog. Sometimes it's Piper – those dreams are worse.

It's you or her, Krios's voice whispers through the mist. You or her.

All Jason knows is that he's got to keep her safe.

He should tell her about his dreams. He knows he should, but Piper will only worry, and Jason doesn't want that. He wants to be someone she can rely on, not someone who gives her even more stress.

Even, so, though – he misses her. He really, really does.

Giving up on his sleep entirely, Jason sits up in his bunk and makes his way to the hearth, where Leo is sharpening a hammer. He barely looks up when Jason joins him.

"Fancy seeing you here," he says in a strange tone of voice.

"Is that an accent?" Jason asks, interested.

"Yeah, dude, oh my god. It's British – haven't you watched Harry Potter – never mind," he says quickly, waving a hand. "I forgot that you're a poor sheltered child with no knowledge about pop culture."

"I thought we agreed that that isn't my fault," Jason says weakly, because he knows just how bad his knowledge is at anything modern, really, and he doesn't need a reminder. He'd been able to manage in New Rome just fine, where they got in a lot of demigods really young, but when he'd first gotten to the Bunkers, he'd had to deal with all these new teenagers who spoke incessantly of Star Wars and Star Trek and superheroes. Someone had called him Thor, which didn't even make sense, because Thor was a Norse god and Jason was Roman, and it had taken him months before he put it together that a Vulcan was an alien species of some sort and not just the Roman form of Hephaestus.

Leo had tried to educate him, but nothing really stuck in Jason's head, even though he can now recite a couple of spells from Harry Potter and some of Tristan McLean's most iconic dialogues, which he mostly uses to make Piper cringe.

Leo sighs, abandoning the accent as well as his hammer, which he sets beside him on a clean cloth. Leo, Jason has learned, can be awfully tactless most of the time, and an even worse flirt, like, all the time, but damn the boy can make a periscope from nothing but a tree branch and a pair of scissors. He's incredibly talented with his hands, and is gifted with a ridiculous sense of both situational awareness and adaptability, which makes him the best guy to get you out of a sticky situation. Annabeth had once commented that he is logical and solves problems in the way most kids of Athena would be envious of, and he's the Bunker's best builder, even though Beckendorf has seniority.

More than anything, though, Leo's a good friend. Jason had confided a lot of his doubts to Leo in those tense moments before the battles, and Leo had shared with him his own hesitations in using his fire, even though so many were counting on him. In those days, Leo hadn't had the control over his flames that he does now, and he'd been terrified of causing damage to their own people even as he'd boasted of his abilities. Hiding the fear behind a mask was something Jason had understood, even though his mask was one of calm self-assurance and Leo's was one of exaggerated swagger.

Leo glances up at Jason and seems to understand him, because he sticks his feet into the campfire and says, "She'll be okay." He's come a long way, Jason thinks – Leo had once admitted to him that machines were easier to understand than people, but he always seems to get what Jason's saying (or not saying, as is usually the case with him).

"I know," Jason replies, embarrassed. "Just…"

"She's with Annabeth," Leo says, which should be enough, but Jason can't shake the strange feeling from his chest.

He gazes into the fire, and thinks once again of his dream – if he looks hard enough, he can see himself running through the fog, fighting the Titan who still refuses to show himself. He shudders, breaking free from the hallucination and focusing on Leo, who seems similarly lost in thought.

"If Percy's right about us having misinterpreted the Prophecy," Leo says, "you know what it means."

Jason's been avoiding thinking about it just to avoid this painful, painful conversation, but he'd rather talk about it to Leo than anyone else.

"I hope he's wrong," Jason admits in a small voice. He almost doesn't want to say it because it sounds treacherous – after all, it could be the break they'd been looking for all this time.

However, it also puts Jason's head back on the chopping block, along with Percy's, and oh gods with all his heart Jason doesn't want to be the hero of the prophecy. He doesn't even want to be any kind of leader at all – as the son of Jupiter, the title of praetor had been as good as his the moment he'd been old enough to wield the power. Leadership has been thrust upon him far too often for his liking, and Jason doesn't have the head for it, like Annabeth, or the confidence for it, like Thalia. He just wants to be normal for once – is that such a crime? He just wants to live a simple life with Piper, with Leo as their slightly eccentric neighbour who makes them tacos whenever he's in the mood.

Leo shoots him a look of pity, which should aggravate Jason, but he's too tired to do anything more than sigh. The sympathy is nice, actually, he decides after a while, because he knows Leo really means it. Being a demigod means being ready for death, but it also means being ready to possibly see your friends and family die. Leo probably doesn't want him to be the hero of the Prophecy any more than Jason does, and the thought gives him heart.

"Gimme your sword," Leo says after a while, thrusting his hand out. Jason flips Ivlivs – which, to his pleasure, is really beginning to respond to him the way he's heard most magical items do, even returning to his pocket automatically - and hands it to Leo in spear form. It crackles with lightning, but Leo slips on a pair of rubber gloves and begins to polish it with a grubby little sponge.

Jason wonders what it must be like to have such steady hands. His own are scarred from many battles and still fumble when he holds Piper's between them, but Leo's are solid, possibly due to the delicate nature of his work. Jason looks at him, impressed, as he wipes down the javelin, fearing neither the sharpness of the blade nor the electric currents running up and down the weapon.

Leo himself has changed over the years – he used to resemble a shrimp and he wouldn't shut up even if you paid him to (he'd sometimes even just switch to Spanish just to annoy people further), but now he's grown into his gangly frame. His cheekbones jut out of his face, giving him the impression of being far more mature than the total idiot Jason knows him to be sometimes, and if he tried, he could almost pass off as intimidating.

Leo notices him staring and raises an eyebrow. "What?"

"You've grown," Jason says simply.

"The fuck," Leo says lightly, although his neck has turned scarlet. "You high? You inhaled some weird fumes in the bathhouse?"

"Fuck off," Jason says easily, leaning backward and hugging a pillow to his chest.

Leo grins, brushing away the beads of sweat from his forehead, and hands Jason back his weapon. Jason flips it again so that it comes back as a sword, and Leo polishes that up, too.

A while later, Leo stands and yawns. "I'm going to sleep. You comin' or-?"

"I'll stay up for a while," Jason says.

"I could push my bed next to yours," Leo snarks, making a kissy face.

"Tempting, but not a chance in hell," Jason grins back. "Good night, dipshit."

"You know you want a piece of this." Leo smacks his own bony ass before walking off in the direction of the bunks. "Don't stay up too late."

"Okay, mom."

Jason stays up far longer than he should, even offering to take Silena's spot during the night patrol. Silena thanks him profusely, telling him she owes him, and then goes right back to burying herself in Beckendorf's massive arms. The sight makes Jason feel sad and lonely – and then kinda stupid.

He makes his way to the Bunker gates, relieving Nyssa, who looks dead on her feet. He hangs around the gates for a while, playing a tune on the metal bars, before deciding what the hell and making his way to the Bunker entrance proper.

He cuts into his finger and traces out the Eta, shivering from the cold when the rocks split open. He tries for a while to remain standing as a vigilant guard would before giving up entirely and sitting right there in the entryway, silently manoeuvring the winds to skirt away from him, before he hears the sound.

He's on his feet at once. The sounds get closer, and Jason flips Ivlivs into his palm. He holds the spear out, heart pounding.

"Who's there?" he asks, throwing all caution to the wind. Annabeth would kick his ass for being so thoughtless, but the presence Jason feels isn't one of malicious intent.

"It's me, you big idiot," comes a disgruntled voice, and to Jason's complete shock, Piper appears from the trees, looking windswept and covered in large feathers.

"What the hell, Pipes," Jason says in wonder, even though his entire body has slumped with relief at the sight of her and is already moving to gather her in his arms, weapon discarded on the ground.

"You're a grade-A buffoon," Piper grunts into his chest. "Don't just leave your spear there, you dumbass. What if I was a monster just pretending to be me? I'd have killed you by now."

"A monster would probably take one look at me and say, Oh Jason, you sexy beast, come here and give me a kiss," Jason says cockily, though he releases Piper from his hold and bends down to pick up Ivlivs.

"Sexy beast?" Piper laughs. "I'm glad that's the impression you have of me. Really sweet of you." Then she frowns, a little confused. "What are you even doing out here? It isn't your patrol night."

"I took Silena's," Jason tells her. He isn't sure if he should add the part about him being unable to sleep without her, but she seems to get it anyway.

"That's sweet," she smiles.

"That's the second time you've said that," says Jason, amused.

"Oh, I'm sorry, does the word sweet mess with your masculinity?" She rolls her eyes. "Let me switch to some more butch adjectives. That was very macho and badass of you, Jason."

Then – finally -she kisses him, and it's almost too good, the contrast of her soft lips and his rough evening stubble. Piper's kisses are always capable of doing this to him, of unwinding the tension that's been coiling through him ever since the dreams began.

Together they walk back to the Bunker doors, where Jason takes a seat against the wall. Piper bitches and moans about how she'd wanted to come back to her nice, warm bed, and her nice warm boyfriend, Jason, come the fuck on, why the hell is he taking other people's patrols? But she ends up snuggling close to him anyway.

"I missed you," Jason says into her hair. "How'd the Quest go?" He pulls back from her. "Actually, why the hell are you even here? Where are the others? Are they okay? Why are there feathers in your hair?"

Piper raises an eyebrow and removes a feather from her head. "Damn, I just got back. Chill with the questions."

Jason merely raises an eyebrow right back and repeats them.

She sighs. "The Quest isn't over yet. We met May Castellan and she told us pretty much what we'd been suspecting – I'm sorry –" because of course she's guessed that Jason had been hoping otherwise. "The prophecy was kind of lost in translation when it was adapted to Modern Greek, so when Percy asked her to recite it in Ancient Greek, she said the lines Percy told us and not the stuff about reaching sixteen against all odds. The others are fine – they'll be back by equinox day for the meeting. I've got feathers in my hair because I asked Guido – Percy's pegasus friend, which is a whole other story, by the way – to land us two miles away by mistake, and I'm here because – uh." She flushes, pausing as though struggling with what to say.

"What is it?" he asks, squeezing her hand. "Is everything okay?"

She exhales through her nose, then takes two sure steps to stand right in front of him. She lifts her arms to circle his shoulders as she pulls him down to her, and he's waited too long, and Piper is kissing him like she is afraid Jason will slip away. What else can he do but kiss her back?

She pulls back but still lingers. Jason can feel her trembling and he runs a hand through her hair, which he knows soothes her best.

"Pipes," he says quietly – the nickname is also another bad-day treat – "if you don't want to say anything, if you're not ready-"

"I had a vision about you in a magic dagger and I had to come and make sure you were okay," she says in a rush, biting her lip.

"What?" Jason's heart warms at the thought of Piper ditching the Quest just to come see him, but another part of him freezes. "What vision?"

"The dreams again," Piper says reluctantly, "but this time it was you fighting Krios in the fog, not me." She pauses, then says quickly, like the words are being forced out of her, "May also told me something. She said it's you or him – meaning me or Krios. I think I'm supposed to face him this time, maybe? Since I failed so epically last time." She squeezes Jason's hand. "Jase, promise me you won't go after him. If May is right, this is my fight."

And here it is. This is the opening Jason's been waiting for – all he has to do is open his mouth. He should tell her everything about his dreams, and his worries, and his fears, but suddenly the words you or him is ringing in his head, and he thinks of his own dreams, the warning of it's you or her, and he understands now what Piper has no way of knowing - he knows it means Piper and Jason, not Piper and Krios.

His head spins out of control and every ounce of happiness he'd felt at seeing his girlfriend drains out of him.

This is why Krios has been laughing in his dreams. He knows that he will only face one of them, and he knows that the one he ends up fighting will die. Piper has accepted the fight, maybe, but what she hasn't counted for is that Jason will die before he lets Piper go.

He can't tell her. He can't. She'll just stop him. She'll go herself, and he can't afford to lose her.

The future probably cannot be manipulated any more than it can be avoided. This fight is Jason's – and if he has to hide the truth from the person he loves most to keep her alive, then that's what he's going to do.

"Jason?" Piper grasps his hand again, and oh – she is so beautiful and so soft and so full of love that it is oozing from her every pore, and Jason is – Jason is so unworthy of her.

"Promise?" Piper asks again, and Jason hugs her to his chest and mumbles out something that he hopes sounds like an affirmative, hoping beyond all hope that she won't see it for the lie it is.

/

Oddly enough, Percy doesn't find it hard to stay awake.

Grover and Annabeth are both passed out on the leaves behind him – Percy occasionally looks back to check on them, choosing to sit at the mouth of the cave, where he can both remain hidden and spot an intruder, should it come to that. Percy traces his fingers lightly over the words PERCY WAS HERE which he'd carved into the stone years ago, just after the War. Hideout is too strong a word for the little cave, near-invisible to the untrained eye, but it had been his base for a long time, and he'd never been searched out by any monsters.

He hears the soft trickling of a nearby stream and resolves to get them all some fresh water when the day breaks. He's too tired to summon any right now.

Letting out a puff of air that fogs up from the cold, Percy observes the stars, trying to spot the ones his mom had taught him, and, when that fails, the ones Lupa had pointed out to him all those years ago. He spies a dark shadow darting through the clouds, maybe a monster, or maybe just Blackjack, but nothing else bothers him out here.

The icy breeze makes his teeth chatter, and Percy pulls his hoodie tighter around himself, grateful for the warmth. Annabeth had told him that Bunker Six took care of most of their winter clothing needs, weaving extra layers of cloth -sometimes even wool if they could get their hands on it - into their jackets and such. Percy hadn't thought it was that big a deal at the time, but now he sends a silent thanks to Annabeth's siblings in Six for their hand in keeping him warm.

Annabeth makes a soft noise behind him in her sleep. Percy turns around, wondering if he should wake her, but she only sniffs and turns over, so he decides to stay put.

She's probably had a rather emotionally taxing day, he reflects, what with hearing about Luke's whereabouts and such. Percy hadn't followed a lot of what May had said, but the reactions of his friends had told him most of what he needed to know, even though he hadn't been privy to some of the finer details.

Piper had looked as though her suspicions had merely been confirmed, Grover had looked disappointed, but Annabeth had appeared shattered. The vision May had shown them had merely confirmed his doubts about Annabeth being – or at least having been, at one point – in love with Luke. He'd seen the hero-worship in her eyes as a child and the heartbroken expression she'd tried valiantly to hide as they left the place. He supposes her reactions were justifiable – the boy had taken care of her as a child, for gods' sake – but there is no room in Percy's good books for defectors.

He knows he has no right to worry about Annabeth. Especially since he's only known her for about three months and she would probably kick his ass for it. And Percy is well aware that she's got a good head on her shoulders, but something about her reaction to Luke had seemed off to him. He's fairly sure that the loyalty that Annabeth felt towards her old friend/flame is on par with, if not greater, than her allegiance to the gods. Call it a gut feeling, call it a baseless hunch, but Percy feels as though Annabeth would throw all caution and logic aside if it meant getting Luke back – and since they don't really know what the fuck is up with the dude, that makes Annabeth dangerous.

He watches her thoughtfully for a moment. Well, it might be too early to tell.

Percy goes back to studying the trees.

He's freezing and warming up a couple of water droplets in repetitive motions to keep his hands busy when Grover plops down next to him with a small yawn.

"You don't need to stay up," Percy assures him. "I'm not sleepy at all, I don't mind keeping watch."

"It's okay," Grover says, shoving his beanie – knitted by Annabeth, apparently – over his ears and hugging himself round the middle. "I'll probably go back to sleep again, don't worry. I just thought I'd give you some company, at least for a while."

Percy thinks back to long nights on the run when he'd only had himself to rely on, and feels touched. "Thanks, man."

They're silent for a time. Grover plays a soothing note on his pipes that Percy thinks makes the trees around them stop swaying in the wind, but he can't be sure in the darkness, and he doesn't want to interrupt the melody.

Grover lowers the instrument from his lips. "By the way, you handled yourself really well today. With May."

"Oh." Caught off-guard by the compliment, Percy rubs the back of his neck, trying hard not to make his slowly-growing smile too obvious. "Thanks. Any of you guys would've done it if you were in that situation."

"I mean, depends," Grover says thoughtfully. "You were really put on the spot, and you did great. Don't sell yourself short. I mean…" and here he hesitates, glance flitting quickly from Percy's face to the forest. "Anyone could see that it was hard for you."

So this is what he'd been aiming for. Percy picks at the grime on his jeans, trying not to give away too much from his expression.

"Is this what you came to give me company for?" he accuses, though he can't quite muster up the bite in his words. Grover's been nothing but kind to him since Percy's met him, and somehow the thought of being mean to him makes Percy feel like the worst kind of bully.

Grover has the decency to look sheepish. "I mean, no, but…well. Satyrs can sense emotions, and yours were all over the place, so I thought you might wanna talk about it. Sometimes just airing out all your thoughts – good or bad – can do wonders for your stress levels."

So, regardless of how hard Percy had been striving to keep his face blank, Grover would've figured it out anyway. Percy relents, sighs, and pinches the bridge of his nose.

"It was hard," he admits lowly, hating how his eyes prickle with tears the moment he lets his carefully-constructed mask fall. "It was hard to act like she was my mother."

Grover waits. Percy fixes his gaze on a tuft of weeds growing at his feet, watching as they flutter in the wind.

"I don't really talk about my mom," Percy finally chokes out, because he doesn't. He had allowed himself about ten minutes to cry his eyes out before he'd had to pick himself back up and continue away from his home. The events leading up to his mother's death, and her death itself – these are things he doesn't even think about, even though they are frequently featured in his dreams.

Grover touches his arm, and he doesn't know if it's some satyr emotional magic or whatever, but Percy bursts as quietly as he can – he doesn't want Annabeth to see him like this, too, after all. He sobs into his knees, tears seeping through the fabric, through the many rips in it, and running down his calves.

Somehow his tears are dredging up old, old memories that Percy had pushed from his head for years and years – he and his mom packing up their suitcases for a rare weekend trip to Montauk. His mother had been dating someone – a nice man called Paul – for about a year, and now that she was pregnant with Percy's new half-sibling, it was rare for just her and Percy to take a trip, especially with her wedding on the horizon. Percy had been really looking forward to going – he loved Montauk, he loved the beach, and he loved the little cabin where his mom had met his dad for the first time.

She'd made her special seven-layer dip and had even packed some of their favorite blue candy. She'd kissed Percy goodnight, told him she wanted to tell him something important once they got to the beach - which only could've been about Percy being a demigod - and was just leaving the room when the monsters burst in through the front door.

Sally had shoved Percy down the fire escape first. They'd made it down two floors, hand-in-hand, when the Minotaur had grabbed his mother by the neck – Percy had been lifted up, too, but Sally had dug her fingernails into his palm so tightly he'd been forced to let go of her hand, crying and screaming. He'd looked just in time to watch the Minotaur rip Sally Jackson apart and toss her broken body aside like his mother was nothing more than a rag doll, and Percy had run as fast as his legs could carry him, replaying the scene in his mind again and again and again – her face as she'd died, her last scream echoing in his ears, her eyes bulging as she mouthed a single word to him.

Go, she'd rasped.

He'd been twelve years old.

He'd been a coward.

It had occurred to him much, much later, that he hadn't even been able to bury her.

He doesn't say any of this. He can't, so he just cries quietly into his own arms and feels Grover's warm fingers rub soothing patterns into his back.

It had hurt, he realizes. It had hurt to act like the strange lady's son, and it had hurt to see her in such a neglected state – no parent who loved their kids so much deserved to be just…left like that. It made him angrier at Luke, who he doesn't even know, for gods' sake – although he does understand why Luke had been terrified of his mother as a child – her sudden seizures would've terrified any child.

It had hurt to call May Castellan his mother. It had hurt to have her hug him and ruffle his hair and call him all those endearments. It had hurt because, in her more lucid moments, May had reminded Percy very much of his own mom.

PB&J sandwiches had been his favorite, after all - seeing May struggling with her crusty jar of peanut butter and the old bread had touched his heartstrings, had filled him with a sudden desire to protect the poor woman.

He isn't hurting only because of the façade he'd had to put up for May's benefit, he realizes. He's also hurting because he'd liked doing it – he'd missed having a mother who loved him, and even if his encounter with Luke's mom had all been an act to get information - even though he's rapidly figuring out that very little of that had been an act from his side – he'd missed it, he really had.

Percy's been alone for a long, long while. He'd had Bianca and Nico, for a time, but he'd gone and fucked that up, too – either way, he hasn't had anyone to talk to about this kind of stuff.

He's probably been bottling up a lot of shit up, and even though he feels a bit like a washcloth now that he's done crying, he has to admit he is lighter than he's ever been.

Grover is smiling when Percy finally lifts his head. "I feel like you've cleared up a lot of stuff," he says, proud. "Your emotions feel a lot more settled."

"What'd they feel like before?" Percy wipes at his face with the sleeves of his hoodie.

"Swirling and cloudy and generally a mess," Grover says. "But do you feel better now?"

"Much," Percy admits. "I hadn't realized how much this stuff builds up."

"Nobody does," Grover says. "I've seen it often-" his eyes dart quickly to Annabeth's prone figure before fixing back on Percy. "-uh, often, with demigods. So many half-bloods experience some kind of emotional trauma at such a young age, and during times of war like these, they're rarely allowed to really feel, y'know? It's like you guys are so busy trying to stay alive you don't get the liberty to do things like – like get angry or hurt or sad the way normal humans do. And so it just piles up over time, one on top of the other, and one day it just –"

"Explodes?" Percy asks, and Grover smiles a little, nodding in agreement.

"It's important to let yourself indulge in your own emotions once in a while," Grover advises. "Trust me, bottling it up is the wrong way to go."

Percy considers this and chuckles. "I think I have a lot of indulging left to do, to be honest."

He just might continue now, get it all off his chest at once. It's tempting. He feels as though he'd been sealing a lot of his more painful experiences away, somewhere deep inside him, obsessed as he'd been with survival. Now it's like the seal has melted away, filling his entire being with – with every possible emotion known to him. Sadness and shame for losing his mother. Anger at himself for letting so many people down. Guilt, harsh and acidic, for allowing Bianca to die, and then for losing Nico even though she'd told him with her dying breath to take care of her little brother. Joy at his newfound friendships with Grover and Annabeth and Jason and Piper and the rest of Bunker Nine. Fear for his own future, fear of what they've found out about the Prophecy and what it could mean for him. Fear that he might have the world shoved onto his shoulders, fear that he might have to face a destiny he's been actively trying to avoid all these years.

"Are you having second thoughts about the Prophecy?" Annabeth's voice cuts in as though she's read his mind, and Percy and Grover turn to find her sitting up and rubbing the sleep from her eyes. Percy hopes she hadn't seen him cry – he knows there's nothing wrong with crying, of course: it had just been kind of embarrassing for him. Even though he knows for a fact Annabeth had cried on her pegasus on the way here.

Annabeth fishes a pack of Oreos from her bag. Percy and Grover stare.

"Where'd you get that?" Grover asks finally, as she hands them each a cookie.

"You think Percy's the only one who can steal? I got this off some random lady's shopping cart when you guys were arguing about which drive-thru to attack," Annabeth says casually, getting out her Yankees cap and slapping it lightly against her thigh, and Percy has to remind himself that Annabeth's probably a shoplifting pro with that thing. It strikes him as being kind of funny, because Annabeth seems very much like the kind of person who'd be a stickler for the rules.

Percy nibbles at his cookie as Annabeth settles down on his other side. Her shoulder bumps his, maybe an accident, maybe her way of showing companionship, but either way it warms him up to have two people on either side of him, willing to listen to stories about his miserable life.

"So?" Grover prompts. "The Prophecy?"

"I dunno," Percy says. "It's kind of a bummer, to be honest. When I got to New Rome and Reyna told me Thalia was the hero of the prophecy – you don't even know how relieved I was. It was bad enough that Lupa kept hinting at – at this important destiny I had to fulfil. First I thought my destiny was getting to New Rome in one piece, and that ended up being hard enough. At that point if I'd been hailed as the Chosen One or whatever I think I might've lost my last few braincells and given up entirely." He sighs. "When I killed Iapetus – which really was more of a fluke than actual skill – I thought, okay, that's it. There's my destiny fulfilled. And then-"

"Thalia died," Annabeth says quietly.

"I honestly thought there was another Great Prophecy out there, same as you." Percy reaches out to pluck a leaf that had been caught in the laces of his shoe. He lets it go and it flies off into the gloom. "Knowing that this Prophecy hasn't even come about yet…"

"You don't know that you're the hero of the Prophecy, though," says Grover, with the kind of desperate, blind optimism Percy wishes he would muster. "Could easily be Jason."

"Or it could be another child of the Big Three," Annabeth throws in casually, shooting him a sharp look. Percy stiffens and stays silent.

"Percy, who is Bianca?" Annabeth questions, and he almost laughs, because of course she'd put it together even with the minimal evidence he'd let slip. Of course she had, even though he'd tried his hardest to keep it guarded, out of respect to them.

"A travelling companion of mine," he says evasively.

Annabeth plants her arms behind her and leans back, looking up at the sky. "I mean, I'm going to figure it out eventually, so you don't really need to tell me," she allows, and to her credit she does sound willing and ready to drop the subject, but Percy exhales in exasperation.

"I think you've pretty much figured it out already," he tells her, and she grins, slowly.

"I have a hunch," she says. "And my hunches are usually spot-on. Not to brag, of course."

"Oh, of course. Who would say you were bragging?"

"You two are going to give me a migraine," Grover complains, and Annabeth laughs, bright and happy and intoxicating.

Percy grabs another Oreo before speaking. "Bianca - is. Was. A daughter of Hades."

Grover lets out a satisfying gasp, but Annabeth just nods like she'd expected it.

"It wasn't just her," Percy continues. "I found her and her brother Nico on the roads just outside of Las Vegas." He breaks his Oreo in half. "Okay, I dunno if you'll believe me about this. It took me long enough to wrap my head around – but Bianca and Nico, they aren't from our time."

Annabeth cocks her head at him. "Meaning?"

"They were born in the 1930s," Percy explains, wrapping an arm around his knees.

"What the fuck," Grover says.

"The 1930s…" Annabeth's curls fly out of its ponytail from the force of the winds. Percy notices a few leaves stuck in her hair and suppresses the sudden urge to pick them out. "That was around the time the Titans began to gain power, right? They used World War II to gain power in a lot of European countries."

"The Great Prophecy suddenly became relevant again after the Second World War," Grover tells Percy. "The Big Three, probably wanting to get the War done with quickly, sired a bunch of kids – but they were all killed really young, and over the years the gods kept losing their strength. The breaking point was when monsters finally broke their way through the main Greek demigod camp in Long Island Sound – we call it the demigod Purge – and forced most of our predecessors to retreat to the Bunkers.

"The Big Three didn't have any kids for a while after that, but apparently, around the time Jason and Thalia were sired – nobody knew about you yet, of course – there was a plan to remove them both to safety," he continues. "But Jason and Thalia's mom didn't allow it. She was – let's say crazy, and she refused to give her kids back to Zeus unless he promised to marry her for real."

"Hera loved that," Annabeth mutters darkly.

"Anyway, the monsters came after Jason and Thalia. Jason was found by Lupa, and Thalia eventually made her way to the Bunkers…you know the gist of that story," Grover says. "My point here is that your friends Nico and Bianca were probably born right before shit hit the fan hard. How the hell did Hades manage to freeze them in time?"

Percy shrugs. "They said that once their mother died, Hades had them taken to some random hotel in Vegas, and that's all they remember before being escorted out. I didn't wanna go check it out, I was too freaked out."

"Waiiit wait wait," Annabeth says, sitting up straight. "The Lotus Hotel?"

"That's the one," Percy replies, surprised. "You know it?"

"I told you I felt something strong in there!" Grover gasps. To Percy he winces, "We're familiar with that place."

"We wasted a week in there," Annabeth groans. "During our Quest to get back Zeus' Bolt, I told you about that, remember?"

"It felt only like a few hours," Grover recalls. "But before you know it…" He shudders.

Annabeth curses under her breath. "I hate to admit it, but that was well played by Hades. Stowing not just one, but two of his kids in there for more than seventy years, slowing their aging – and the Lotus Hotel is close enough to the Underworld Entrance for him to keep a special eye on them, even though he had lost his power in the mortal world –"

"How old was Bianca when she got out, Percy?" Grover asks, leaning forward.

"Older than me by several months," Percy says.

Annabeth and Grover exchange incredulous looks.

"Close to Thalia's age, then," Annabeth whistles. "Damn, Hades isn't my favorite god, but he's got balls."

"Yeah," Grover agrees fervently.

"I don't get it," Percy says, confused.

"Percy, you gotta understand that the successful completion of this Prophecy would bring about a New Age of peace and prosperity for another century, or even more," Annabeth replies patiently. "And none of the fake New Golden Age the Titans bullshit about constantly. Titans aren't regular monsters – if defeated, it would take them centuries to regenerate in Tartarus. The demigod responsible for vanquishing them would not only bring about an era of harmony, they would also bring glory to the gods – and, most importantly, their godly parent."

"The Big Three have been competitive enough over the eons, comparing air disasters to sea disasters and whatnot," Grover grunts. "The Prophecy just made it worse. Imagine being the god who sired the demigod who brought peace for a hundred years."

Percy holds up a hand, processing all this. He swallows, trying to feel anything other than disappointment.

Annabeth takes pity on him. "The gods have always had, uh, rather skewed priorities. They were never paragons of virtue or anything."

"So why are we fighting for them?" Percy asks moodily, stabbing a blade of grass with a twig.

"Because the world was a far better place with them at the helm," Grover says simply. "They might have seduced mortals left and right, but they never actively terrorized or enslaved them, nor did they stir unrest among them and pit them against each other as the Titans will no doubt do. In general, the gods promoted and appreciated art, and culture, and learning. And, well, there's also the fact that they weren't trying to exterminate all of our kind – the gods need demigods if they want to survive. Why do you think they lost so much strength during the World Wars? Demigods made up most of the armies, and if demigods die out, so will the gods. It's kind of a symbiotic thing."

Percy runs a hand through his hair, possibly messing it up even more, if Annabeth's smirk is anything to judge by. "So what does all of this have to do with Bianca's age at the time?"

"So after their many many many attempts to have kids after World War II, the Big Three stopped having kids for a while," Grover says. "Maybe they were hoping for some kind of miracle, maybe they were waiting it out, but the fact of the matter was that the monsters were only growing in number, and the gods' strength wasn't making a comeback."

"Piper and Jason told me that Zeus sired Thalia and Jason when it was clear there was no other choice," Percy says. "They said Zeus must've been desperate."

"Exactly," Annabeth interjects. "So my guess is that as soon as Hades learned Thalia's age – which might have been the minute we stepped foot into the Underworld, Grover, fuck – he sent a servant to get Nico and Bianca out of the Lotus Hotel, so that they would start aging normally again."

"Fuck," Percy says, as the gravity of it all hits him. "Fuck. But how didn't he know about Thalia before? He could've easily let Bianca out when Thalia was a baby or something, given Bianca a good head start."

"Remember when I told you Thalia went to report to Zeus after our Quest?" Annabeth reminds him. "It was because Zeus was so weak by that time that he was practically confined to Olympus. You know the Big Three's spheres of control – the seas, the skies, and the Underworld, right? Your dad must've been fighting his own battle in his palace in the ocean, and Hades was probably so feeble at that point that he didn't even know about Thalia's existence until she stepped foot into his domain during our Quest."

"And besides, is the secrecy of her birth that hard to believe?" Grover asks Percy, raising an eyebrow. "I mean, we didn't even know you existed until you showed up near Bunker Nine. We might've heard that you killed a Titan, but we definitely didn't know you were a son of Poseidon, and you would've been able to keep it a secret even longer if Annabeth hadn't, uh, exposed you."

Annabeth grimaces. "Sorry for that. Again."

"So," Percy summarizes, "Hades figured out Thalia and Bianca were probably around the same age, and so he let Nico and Bianca out of the Lotus Hotel."

"It would give Bianca a chance to become the hero of the Prophecy," Grover finishes. "All Hades had to do was pray – kind of ironic, haha – that Bianca would stay alive long enough."

Percy swallows down the lump in his throat. "Well. Obviously that didn't happen."

Annabeth shoots him a sympathetic look. "No, I guess it didn't."

"If there's one thing we've learned," Grover murmurs, "is that things will happen when they're supposed to happen. If Bianca was meant to be the hero of the Prophecy, she would've been. If Thalia was the real hero of the Prophecy, we would've won the War. You can't force these things to happen. You can't force fate. If something is meant to happen, it will – but only at the right moment, and no sooner."

Percy is suddenly hit with the fear of Nico being the true child of the Prophecy, and he blanches.

"Could you guys…keep Nico and Bianca a secret for a little while?" Percy says quickly, suddenly afraid for the son of Hades. "Nico's younger than me, so he's safe from the Prophecy for now – I just. I ruined that kid's life. The least I could do is leave him alone." Like he wanted me to, he doesn't say, though the memory stings.

Annabeth looks like she wants to say something, but she's quelled by a look from Grover. They both nod, and Percy breathes out with relief.

"Thank you," he whispers.

Luckily, they don't ask for the gory details of Bianca's death – Percy's too worn out to wade through those memories, and he's already reeling under the onslaught of new data Annabeth and Grover have piled upon him.

After a while, Grover falls asleep right there, his head leaning against the cave wall, but Annabeth stays awake next to him, pinching her brows together as though she's thinking hard. She traces over the PERCY WAS HERE sign on the wall distractedly.

"You okay?" he finally asks, if only just to break the silence. Annabeth had looked lost in her own dark thoughts, and for some unknown reason he hadn't liked seeing her that way.

She smiles at him. "I dunno, honestly. There's a lot to consider."

"No shit." Percy takes Grover's uneaten cookie and shoves it into his mouth with so little finesse that Annabeth looks disgusted. "I've never been more confused in my life."

She laughs. "I don't even know what to digest first. The Prophecy? Luke? Your friend Nico? It's too much for one night, even for me, and that's saying something."

"Focus on the Quest," he suggests. "Let's just go to Portland, grab Ella, take her to your fancy meeting –"

"It's not fancy-"

"-and once we have everyone convinced about the Prophecy, then we focus on – Luke and Nico and whatever." Percy tries really hard not to think of Nico and the way he'd glared at Percy, the harsh tone of his voice, the missing gold from New Rome, and how he'd faded into the shadows right before Percy's eyes. He doesn't even know where the poor kid is now, but he knows that the last thing Nico wants is to be found, least of all by Percy.

He doesn't want to barge into Nico's life again – the son of Hades had made it very clear that he'd never wanted to see Percy's face again, that he'd never forgive Percy for letting his sister die. Percy's terrified of the thought that Nico might've been taken down by a monster, but he's even more scared at the possibility of facing him again, because Nico di Angelo will always remind Percy what a huge, colossal failure he is.

Percy slants a glance at Annabeth through his lashes, who has grabbed her pencil to sketch a rough outline of a building, which he's noticed she does whenever she's built up too much nervous energy in her body. They sit for a while in comfortable silence and Percy thinks of Luke and Nico and Jason and Thalia and Annabeth and Bianca and loses track of the plot so quickly his head spins.

Prophecy first, he thinks, deciding to take his own advice. Prophecy first, everything else later.

"Did you hear me? Before?" he asks, mostly because he knows she must've. "About my mom?"

"A little," she admits. "Sorry."

"It's okay." He scuffs the ground with his shoe. "Saves me another explanation, at the very least."

"You would've told me?" She sounds surprised.

"If you'd asked," he shrugs. "And you seem like the kind of person who would ask."

His tone must reek of bitterness, because she winces at it. Slowly, carefully, she places her hand over his fists, not holding, just letting him know she's there. "I really am sorry," she repeats. "About…Bianca. And asking about her. It wasn't my place. I shouldn't have put you on the spot like that."

"Maybe it's for the best," he says. "I trust you two – I might've told you both anyway, in time. Plus, maybe with the three of us keeping an eye out for Nico…I dunno. Maybe it's better this way. It's really okay," he assures her, catching sight of her shamefaced expression. He can't help the burst of fondness that shoots through him: Annabeth's forlorn, sheepish mien makes him ache the same way he had when he'd heard her crying softly on her pegasus. "I don't blame you for wanting to know more. It's in your blood."

"I don't want to make excuses for myself, but it really is," Annabeth agrees. "All my siblings are like this. We get it from our mom."

"Have you ever met her?"

"No," she says quietly, disappointed. "Thalia saw her, on Olympus. Said she was beautiful…grey eyes, like all of us Athena demigods, and dark hair."

Percy tries to conjure an image of the goddess, but comes up with a brunette Annabeth instead. Somehow she looks weird with dark hair, so Percy pushes the picture from his head.

"And your dad?" he asks, genuinely curious.

She fixes him with a look of disbelief.

"Hey, I think that after all that, I get to ask some questions, too," he complains, watching her mull over likely endlessly clever escape routes. "Nothing seems to throw you, and I think I've discovered that I have around fifty mental complexes that I didn't even know about. I need a break."

At the very least, he makes her laugh, although the sound dies quickly.

"He never wanted me," Annabeth whispers. "When I was born, Athena left me on his doorstep and fucked right off, as the gods do. My dad…he was a college professor, didn't have time for kids. I had to raise myself, pretty much, but when I got to age seven, these huge spiders started attacking my house. My dad and his new wife blamed me. I ran. I think I did them a huge favor by it." She chuckles sourly. Percy can tell she's abridged the story for his sake, but she's also obviously still pained at the thought of her father, and so he keeps his mouth shut.

"He's still alive, as far as I know," Annabeth murmurs. "Which makes me feel all the worse for your mom, really. She…must've been a great mother, if you miss her so much."

He nods mutely, and, mostly because he doesn't have any tears left in him, anger, hot and mortifying, bubbles up in his stomach, the likes of which he hasn't felt since Bianca's death. He hates that Sally Jackson is dead. He hates that he'd left her. He hates that he'd lived instead of the best person on the planet - god knows he's caused enough pain for the people who had trusted him, and god knows how much more he'll cause before – before all this is over and done with.

"Thanks," Annabeth says suddenly.

He blinks at her. "What for?"

"May's house," she says abruptly. "Towards the end, you really covered our asses by asking May not to tell anyone that we'd stopped by. The scarred man she mentioned – I'm not sure he's who I think he is, but if I'm right, he's bad, bad news." Her eyes soften and her tone is one of respect when she continues, "That was some quick thinking. I owe you one."

"Oh," he says, embarrassed. "I just felt like – I mean, you all seemed pretty out of it, y'know? I didn't know what was going on – so like, uh, anything I can do to help."

"I'll explain it to you once we get the Quest out of the way," Annabeth assures him. "But I'm just saying, it was a smart decision – one I should've taken. So."

"I just. Wanted to help. Y'know?"

She studies him for a long moment, even halting the scratching of her pencil. Her face is grimy but Percy can spot, even in the low light, what looks to be freckles spanning from one cheek to another. Her hair falls to her shoulders, tangled and curling in a way that reminds him of Bianca's when she woke from a nightmare. Her grey eyes turn liquid silver and the split ends of her hair shine gold, and Percy blinks at the sight – she looks like someone touched by Midas – before it hits him that the sky is brightening. They've been talking all night.

"I was wrong about you," she says then, plainly, so matter-of-factly that Percy finds himself blushing all over, because he can tell that Annabeth is rarely wrong about anything, and it shows real strength of character to admit her shortcomings so easily. "You're a good guy, Percy. And you'll be a good hero one day, too." She grins. "If you do everything I tell you to, of course."

Percy, abashed, scratches his nose and avoids her gaze. "What's brought this on? I mean, I'm glad you don't hate me anymore, but what happened to Athena versus Poseidon?"

She chuckles lightly, a sound more air than laughter. "That was before we were friends, Seaweed Brain," she says, in a tone almost affectionate. "Keep up."

"We're friends?" he asks dumbly, even though his body tingles with pleasure at the sound of it.

Annabeth looks up at the ceiling of the cave as though willing her problems away. Percy copies her in case it works.

"Well, what?" Percy demands, when she doesn't answer.

"You can be incredibly dumb sometimes," she declares, going back to her drawing. "Yes, we're friends, you twit. Any more stupid questions?" she adds, for good measure. Percy, already shaking his head no, grins and bumps her shoulder.

She laughs shortly and splits the last Oreo, and they tap their respective halves together in a silent cheers as the sun rises over the treetops.

/

The library is beautiful.

Annabeth's a big fan of structures. Skyscrapers and temples and churches and arches – she loves anything that is built beautifully, with a bit of history behind its flair. She likes the fact that architectural wonders are permanent in a way most things aren't – they withstand the onslaught of time, carrying with them tales of beauty and wonder and splendor and glory of the people living there at the time and the empires those people had been a part of. Monuments like – like the Parthenon, like the Taj Mahal, like the Great Pyramids, they're not just old temples or palaces or tombs. They're works of art that tell a story of the history and culture of the period in which they had been built.

In her opinion, the only thing that can be done to improve upon an already beautiful building is to fill it up with books.

Which is why she loves libraries – her first week when she'd left home she'd camped out in the alleyway behind her local library during the nights and ventured inside the establishment itself in the daytime. The librarian – a rather perky middle-aged lady called Mrs. Kerr – had always welcomed Annabeth with a smile and helped her get the books she wanted. Back then, of course, Annabeth had stuck to Roald Dahl and Enid Blyton because the stories were fun and the vocabulary not too intense. Mrs. Kerr must've figured out Annabeth had run from home, given that Annabeth had showed up in the same, increasingly grimy clothes every day, but she never said anything after the first day, especially when she spotted the scratches on her arms, which Annabeth had acquired whilst fighting the spiders. She just helped Annabeth read the words Annabeth couldn't – the dyslexia had been a bitch to overcome - and explained the meanings in great detail. From the second day onward, she started bringing extra lunch to share with Annabeth. She even offered her a place to stay, but Annabeth refused every single time.

After that, Annabeth had become a voracious reader. She'd devoured all the old books stored in Bunker Six (the first thing she'd successfully managed to read in Greek was a faded inscription on the Bunker wall that read Plan twenty-three), pored over every ancient scroll on the art of automaton making in Bunker Nine, and on her very first supply run, she'd nearly jeopardised the entire mission by robbing a bookstore and stealing a copy of The Eyes of the Skin – a book that is tucked under her pillow in Bunker Nine at this very minute.

The pegasi drop them on the rooftop of the building where Percy says the harpy lives, even though Annabeth doesn't see any sign of it anywhere. She's about to ask Percy if she can possibly visit a lower floor when there's a flutter of feathers from above and a wisp of a girl with auburn hair and matching wings drops down a short distance from them, clutching a paper bag in its claws.

The harpy hasn't noticed them. It's muttering to itself rapidly, ruffling its feathers and making small cawing noises. It's only when Percy steps forward that it seems to become aware of them, and it cries out in fear, scrambling backward and behind a dilapidated pile of bricks that barely covers half of its body.

Annabeth is stunned. Percy had mentioned the harpy being distinctly un-monster like, but to be honest she hadn't entirely believed him. After all, the harpy is just that, a harpy, with sharp talons that could rip her skin from head to toe. She'd resolved to remain on her guard, but seeing Ella tremble on the ground before them makes her feel almost compassionate for the creature, something she'd never thought she could feel for a monster. Drawing a weapon would seem cruel.

Percy is approaching the harpy as though it is a wounded animal, making soothing comments and dangling the fish he'd caught from a stream in the forest in front of him like bait. Slowly, the harpy pokes its head from above its arms and trembles a little less alarmingly.

"It's me, Ella," Percy says. "Percy. I visited you a couple of years ago, remember?"

"Percy," says Ella, recognition dawning in bright brown eyes. Then, in Ancient Greek - "A half blood of the eldest gods shall come of age –"

"Yes, we got that." Percy's smile grows strained. "Listen, I've brought some friends. They're really nice, they won't hurt you. They just need to ask you some questions. Is that okay?"

Ella hesitates before taking the fish and nodding. It sits cross-legged in front of Percy, who sits down as well and casts his sword aside. He shoots Annabeth and Grover a look.

Grover shrugs. They both make their way over to the harpy carefully so as not to startle it, and Annabeth drops her own dagger next to Percy's. Ella nibbles the tail of the raw fish (Percy looks pained – apparently he avoids catching fish as much as possible because he can hear them crying out in agony) and looks around them nervously as though expecting to be attacked.

"Nobody'll hurt you when we're around, Percy assures it. Ella sniffles and runs a talon down its leg, which is covered in soft-looking feathers but does not hide the long scar running from the top of its thigh to the knee.

"Other harpies did this to you?" Grover asks, frowning.

"Ella is weak," Ella says, forlorn. "Other harpies take my food, hurt me. Ella is fast but the others are too many to hide from."

Percy shoots Ella a sympathetic look. "We're sorry, Ella. Is there anything we can do to help?"

"No." The harpy shakes its head, expression brightening. "Tyson takes care of Ella. He got her bread, see?" It gestures at the brown bag in its lap. "Tyson gets Ella food when Ella doesn't have any. Tyson fights off the other monsters to keep Ella safe."

"Oh, Tyson's still around, then?" Percy smiles. "That's good. That's really good, actually."

"Tyson takes care of Ella," Ella repeats.

Percy glances at Annabeth in a go ahead kind of way. They'd decided that she'd take the lead in the questioning because her knowledge of the Ancient Texts was second to none. Annabeth clears her throat lightly, and Ella snaps its gaze her way, stricken.

"I have a few questions I want to ask you, Ella," she says, in what she hopes is an encouraging voice. It must work to some extent, because Percy nods in approval and Ella relaxes. "You know about the Great Prophecy?"

"Yes," Ella says at once. "A half -blood of the eldest gods, shall come of age against all odds. And see the world in endless sleep, the hero's soul, cursed blade shall reap. A single choice shall end his days, Olympus to preserve or raze."

"You know Ancient Greek," Annabeth observes.

"Ella taught herself to read long ago," Ella says.

"And you read this Prophecy from a book?" Annabeth asks delicately.

"It was an old book," the harpy recalls. "Smelled nice."

"Smelled musty?" Annabeth says despite herself, almost smiling, because everyone knows old books are the best books. Give her a secondhand over a new one, any day.

"It is Ella's favorite smell," Ella says, and the harpy actually smiles back at her.

Annabeth feels a rush of sudden warmth for the creature. "What was the book like, Ella?"

"Old," Ella repeats. "Latin, but some of the verses were in Ancient Greek. It took Ella a long time to read." It fixes large beady eyes on Grover. "Beneath the earth his spirit wanes, the key to all of nature's pain."

"What?" Grover questions, troubled. "May mentioned that, too – is it really Pan who's waiting for me underground? Why would he be underground? I hate the underground. Too many monsters." He waits anxiously, but Ella only scrapes the ground with a talon, already distracted.

"Ella, when is the last time you read these books?" Annabeth asks.

"This morning," Ella replies casually, and Annabeth's stomach bottoms out.

"What?" she rasps.

"Ella keeps all her books safe," Ella nods. "Ella doesn't mind if the other harpies come and take her food, but she doesn't let them take her books." The harpy pauses, tilting her head at Annabeth questioningly. "Would the daughter of Athena like to see them?"

"Yes please," Annabeth whispers, her heart in her throat. If this isn't a trap – or some colossal joke – this could be it, she thinks, suddenly feeling feverish. This could be all the proof they've needed and more.

Ella scrambles away, gesturing for Annabeth to follow, and reveals a well-hidden, rather flammable-looking nest hidden away in the corner of the roof, shielded well by a half-built wall of bricks and placed right behind a large water tank. The nest isn't very impressive in itself, put together with bits of cloth, a great many twigs, and several torn sheets of paper, cushioned in the middle by a pile of leaves.

Ella looks at Annabeth, then removes several bricks just under the nest.

"Good job," Percy raises, and Ella flushes at the praise as she removes several more loose bricks from the floor before finding what she'd been looking for – several large books barely held together by well-worn golden thread. The paper, Annabeth can tell, isn't the commercial variety made today – no, this is thick papyrus made from the plant of the same name back in the old days, and the sight of it, the sight of the tiny Greek characters inked into the sheets, makes her heart race.

She holds out her hand. "Can I see them?" she asks, her voice catching, but Ella hands over the book without argument.

Calling it a book is a bit much. It's clearly many pieces of many books stuck clumsily together, the overall result is somewhat booklike, even though it looks like it might fall apart with the slightest touch, or perhaps a light breeze. The first page details some kind of document about plumbing, which, on further detail, greatly resembles the system that the Bunkers use – the rest of it shows notes on the casting of widespread magic that might be useful for the Hecate demigods, and there is a large portion dedicated automaton construction which Annabeth resolves to study with Leo, who might find it useful. She even catches an intricate diagram of a sphere that catches her attention, but she keeps flipping the pages.

There are a lot of loose papers – half-burned pieces of parchment that look older than the rest of the book. These pages are in Latin, and Annabeth's fingers eyes linger on the text, unable to believe what they are seeing.

"These are excerpts from the Sibylline books," she says in awe. "They…they were said to have been burned up when the Roman Empire fell."

Percy lets out a cackle and he swiftly covers his mouth with his hand. "Sorry, sorry, it's just that…in New Rome, Octavian, the augur or whatever, would keep pestering Reyna to send him on a Quest to find them, but she kept telling him they didn't exist. I can't believe that nutjob was right, oh my gods -"

"There are Greek translations!" Annabeth crows, poring over the next page. "Here it is in black and white – shall come of age against all odds." She looks up at Percy and Grover. "It really just – must've gotten lost in translation, from Ancient Greek to Modern, from Modern to English." She snaps the book shut. "This has everything we need, guys."

"Why the hell would people translate it differently?" Percy groans, closing his eyes. "I mean, did they just figure it rolls off the tongue better? A half-blood of the eldest gods, shall reach sixteen against all odds – shall come of age against all odds…what's the difference?" He pauses. "Actually, shall reach sixteen sounds kinda better."

Grover looks at Ella uncertainly. "Will she let us take the book, though? I mean, she said that her books were very precious to her. I'm not opposed to taking her back to Bunker One, but you know Clarisse – there's no guarantee that she won't just…kill her on sight, y'know?"

"There's no real need for us to bring Ella back now that we have the written prophecy," Annabeth agrees. "But…" Suddenly she remembers Ella saying Ella keeps all her books safe in that plaintive voice and her heart scrunches up with guilt. She doesn't want to take these precious treasures from the harpy, especially since they're all the poor girl's got. Annabeth had had to leave behind a lot of her favorite books when she'd run from her home – granted, they had been only battered copies of Nancy Drew, but it had hurt nonetheless. She doesn't want to do the same to Ella, but they don't have another choice. It's not like they can just – steal a smartphone and snap some pictures, y'know?

"Ella?" Percy crouches down to Ella's level. "Uh…these books you've got? They're really important. We might…have to borrow them for a bit. Is that okay?" He flinches when Ella makes a small whining noise; her eyes fill with tears.

"It's just for a while," Annabeth soothes at once. "Or – would you like to come with us? To a new home, where you can be safe?"

"Does it have books?" Ella asks hopefully.

"Uh, maybe around ten," Annabeth admits. Ella sniffles, a clear no.

"I don't wanna drag her from here," Percy says uncomfortably. "I mean, it's not the best life, or the safest, but it is her home."

"How about this?" Grover cuts in, kneeling down. "We'll keep the books for ten days. I swear. And I'll come back and return them to you myself. Is that okay?"

"You can trust Grover," Percy seconds at once, placing a hand on Grover's shoulder. "He always keeps his word."

Ella sniffles again, looking between the three of them. "Ten…days?"

"I swear it," Grover says again.

"You trust me, don't you, Ella?" Percy looks at her imploringly. "Last time I met you, I promised you I'd get you a friend, and I found Tyson, didn't I?"

Ella nods, her expression clearing. Annabeth wonders who Tyson is, and she vaguely thinks that Percy really has had the wildest of adventures during his travels.

"Ella likes Tyson," Ella says, her face bright. "And Tyson likes Percy, so I will trust you."

Not the best occasion to apply the transitive rule, but Annabeth will take it. She beams at the harpy. "Ella, you're the best. We really owe you one. We'll – we'll buy you all the bread you want."

"A sandwich," Ella says quietly. "But no cheese. Ella doesn't like cheese."

Percy, who hadn't known this, apparently, jumps into a spiel about the merits of cheeseburgers as Annabeth takes off her hoodie and wraps the book in it - she doesn't mind freezing if it means the book will be safe. She stores it carefully in her backpack, her mind still racing at the possibilities, at their luck. They've found a book – or at least several pages – of real prophecy! None of them have ever really seen a prophecy before – the Great Prophecy itself had been passed down by word of mouth over the centuries, after all. Nobody really knew for sure what had happened to the Oracle other than the fact that she was out of commission - May Castellan seems to be all they have for the foreseeable future, and she isn't the most trustworthy, especially in the state she's in. Quests, which, once upon a time, had involved a sacred ritual and used to have special prophecies issued by the Oracle before being embarked upon, are now just kind of…thrown together by each Bunker when the need arises. Annabeth wonders if there are more prophecies in the book that can be pieced together by the children of Apollo – she'll have to remember to ask them what May might have meant about her final statement, that eerie order to look for the next one.

A sudden thought occurs to her. "Percy, what if the Titans find out we have the books? What if they find out about the changed Prophecy?" She doesn't say, what if we have spies in our camp? because even though she doesn't really know if they have a snake in their midst, she has a bad feeling there might still be double agents in their Bunkers. And there's no way they can keep the matter of the Prophecy a secret for long. It's bound to spread throughout their ranks, which means that if there is a spy amongst them, they will be sure to relay the information to Kronos.

Surely their victory at finally being ahead of the Titans will be short-lived, and they have to be ready for it.

Percy considers this. "I have an idea." He whistles once, a piercing sound, to summon the pegasi. "We'll make a stop on the way back."

"Thanks for everything, Ella," Grover says, patting the harpy gingerly on the arm. "I'll get you the books back in ten days. Along with a really great sandwich."

"No cheese," Ella reminds him, but she sweeps her hair from her face and shoots him a genuine smile.

"No cheese," Grover says.

Annabeth shoulders her back and, in a fit of both gratitude and pity, gives Ella a quick hug that has Ella blushing and Percy beaming. Ella feels painfully thin, and Annabeth suddenly wishes they'd brought her more fish, even though, by the way Percy had described the experience (involving an insane koi that thwacked him in the nose when he'd managed to catch it), getting the one had been hard enough.

"Stay safe," she says. "And thank you."

"We'll see you soon, Ella," Percy says, as Blackjack lands dramatically on the rooftop and lets out a loud neigh as if to announce his presence.

Percy has the pegasi drop them into an alleyway behind a restaurant next, where Percy says Tyson usually hangs about, where everything smells like curry. Annabeth's stomach grumbles, but even she's above dumpster diving, unlike Grover, who spots a pile of empty soda cans and goes to grab a bite.

"Okay, so," Percy says. "I should warn you, about Tyson. He's – uh, big, but he's harmless, just promise me that you won't freak out, or draw your weapons-"

"Why would we do that?" Annabeth asks, bemused. "If he's your friend-"

"Didn't I mention?" Percy replies, slapping his head like he's playing a ditz. "Tyson's a-"

A large figure appears at the end of the alley. "Brother!" booms a voice, and the ground actually shakes when the person runs towards them, wasting no time in gathering Percy in his large, hairy arms and squeezing the breath out of them.

Percy chokes, gasping for air. A can drops from Grover's hand, but he scrambles to pick it up at once, holding it aloft like it's a weapon, even though he's shaking so hard that he probably won't even be able to walk.

Nonplussed, Annabeth stares back at the big dude. He's larger than Clarisse – larger than Beckendorf, even – but he doesn't seem to be actually hurting Percy. Percy, in fact, is smiling even as he begs to be let go. Annabeth smiles. The newcomer must really be happy to see Percy – his eyes are welling up.

Eyes?

Eye.

Annabeth gasps, drawing her weapon at once. "Get away from him," she commands in her most authoritative voice. "Get away from Percy, now."

The big guy – no, the normal-sized monster – drops Percy, eye wide at the sight of the Celestial Bronze. And then – questionably, somewhat hilariously, and quite unsuccessfully – he attempts to hide behind Percy, whimpering and snivelling, even though Percy is less than half his size and makes a supremely ineffective shield.

Percy groans. "I told you not to draw your weapon!"

"Percy," Annabeth says slowly, for surely this boy must be crazy, "that is a cyclops."

"He's harmless!"

"He's still a cyclops, Percy!"

"He could squash me flat in two seconds," Grover whimpers, and a nervous bleat escapes him. The sound makes Annabeth realize she hasn't heard one of those in a while, and it occurs to her how much braver the satyr has become.

Still, though – she understands his sentiments, his fear, in this moment. She's never quite gotten over her hatred for cyclopes – and Percy had been there during her last encounter with one. He'd seen the moment she'd frozen, he'd seen her nearly die at the hands of a cyclops, and suddenly she feels irrationally angry at him.

Percy seems to have followed her train of thought, but his chin juts out in defiance. "Annabeth, put down the weapon."

She tightens her grip. Percy's eyes flash.

He turns to Grover. "Look – do you trust me?" he asks.

"I mean. Um. Yeah," Grover says nervously, "But-"

"I don't trust you," Annabeth growls, which is a lie – something deeply caring in her had stirred last night when she'd heard Percy cry, and whatever barrier she'd built up in an effort to keep him at arms' length had promptly crumbled away. She knows, now, that someone who'd lost all he ever loved to the monsters would never be tempted by the enemy and the darkness - but in her defense, her emotions are running rather high at the moment.

"Look, you trusted me about Ella," Percy continues, as though she hadn't spoken. "Can't you trust me about this? I mean, for gods' sake, look at him!" He turns slightly sideways to look at Tyson, who does cut a kind of pathetic figure in the rags covering its body and a worn tool belt circled around its wrist like a bracelet. The cyclops mimics Percy's movement as though scared he'll get hit if Percy isn't there to shield him.

"He's harmless," Percy stresses again. "He's good. Didn't you hear Ella? Tyson's been taking on the other harpies single-handedly just to get Ella some food." He gazes back at her unflinchingly. "Put your knife back. You're scaring him."

Annabeth wants to argue that the cyclops is scaring her, but something hard and cold in Percy's eyes makes her hold her tongue.

Neither of the break eye contact. Annabeth doesn't like the situation they're in – every instinct she'd built over the years has taught her to never trust a monster – but Percy's gaze is icy and unrelenting and so unlike anything he's ever shown her before, and she doesn't like it.

She sheathes her dagger, telling herself that she's not yielding, she's just choosing the path that will not lead to her gutting Percy like a fish. Grover follows, dropping the can, though he still trembles. Annabeth moves closer to him and holds his hand.

"You better have a plan, Jackson," she says harshly.

Percy glares at her again, but his face softens when he looks back at Tyson, who seems to have relaxed some, even though his one large eye is still full of tears.

"This is Tyson," Percy introduces. "I met him a couple of years ago in this same alley – he was holding off three larger harpies to protect Ella. I helped him, and now, well. He's kind of adopted me."

"He called you brother," Grover says in horror. "Is he really-"

"I don't know." Percy runs a hand through his hair, turning it into something attractively mussed, and Annabeth has to look away. "There's no way of knowing, but – maybe."

"Percy is good," Tyson says in the tiniest voice, and Percy smiles up at him.

"Tyson is good, too," Percy says with conviction. "He's never killed a demigod - kept the monsters off of me while I was here, even, and he's still here, helping Ella – that should tell you enough about him, really."

Tyson nudges him. Percy rolls his eyes. "Tyson is also a big fan of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches," he adds, Tyson smiles, wide and toothy, and it throws Annabeth so off-guard she actually feels her head spinning. She's never seen a monster smile, she thinks, unless you count the wide, mad grins during battles where they knew they were winning. Tyson smiles differently, innocently, like a little kid. His arms are strong enough to squeeze the breath from her, but he'd used them to give Percy a hug, of all things. He's been gathering food for Ella – real food, not demigod food, if Percy's telling the truth about that. And he's still hiding from them, from Annabeth. He's scared of her, she realizes, but oddly enough, it doesn't give her the same heady rush of pride she usually feels when she's gained the upper hand in a fight against a monster. It makes her feel small.

Between Tyson and Ella, Annabeth's going to have a brain aneurysm. She knows that some of the gods had used monsters – the cyclopes and telekhines in particular – in their armies, and to build weapons, but seeing a good monster these days is like finding a diamond in a pile of shit. It just. Doesn't. Happen.

"Tyson can help us," Percy says confidently, making eye contact with her, and Annabeth is relieved to see that most of the anger has seeped away.

'How?" Grover asks. He still seems distrustful of the cyclops – possibly because he can actually smell the monster, and Annabeth squeezes his hand.

"Well, Tyson blends in," Percy says, smirking almost evilly, his green eyes glinting. "He can keep an eye out in case the Titans send anyone after Ella, or after information in general." He turns to Tyson. "Could you do that for us, big guy?"

Tyson nods. "I will keep Ella safe," he says with determination.

"I need you to get all the information you can if you get any news about a Prophecy," Percy explains. "Don't be too obvious about it – just keep an ear out. Find out who wants it, what the reward is, stuff like that."

"I will do that, brother." Tyson's eye crinkles as he smiles.

"And – uh, also, let us know if you see a demigod around," Percy says in a rush, looking Annabeth's way guiltily. "Blonde hair, blue eyes."

"Scar down the side of his face," Grover says, running a finger down his cheek.

Annabeth flinches violently. It's a smart decision, she has to admit, and one that she currently doesn't have the heart to take. Keeping tabs on Luke is their best plan of action right now – but she's not sure whether to feel annoyed or relieved that Percy seems to have already branded him as the enemy.

She's always got the feeling he was much, much smarter than he let on. His quick thinking at May's place, the presence of mind he's displayed just now – Percy Jackson is clearly not just the happy-go-lucky, human-contact starved demigod he's been demonstrating without a hitch at the Bunker. He's a puzzle with about fifty missing pieces – and Annabeth loves a good riddle.

Either way, she's indebted to Percy once again. The fact makes her uneasy, though the feeling probably stems from the pool of gratitude settling in her chest. Annabeth isn't used to relying on others in matters of plans and the like.

"Thanks, Tyson," Percy continues, with obvious relief. "Grover will be back here in a week or so – I'll send some peanut butter sandwiches with him, how's that sound?"

Tyson claps, and the sound echoes through the narrow lane. "Thank you, brother! I will not let you down!"

Grover looks ill at the thought of having to meet Tyson again – and alone, too – but he doesn't argue.

Tyson gives Percy another bone-crushing hug before they leave, and Percy does seem genuinely distressed at having to go. He's silent as they rise back into the skies on the pegasi, and Annabeth is hit with the thought that with his mother dead, Tyson is really the only family he has.

"You're insane," Grover says after a while, in a voice half-terrorized, half-impressed. "I can't believe you actually have friends who are monsters!"

"They're not all bad," Percy says, frowning. "I mean, I've killed enough monsters – but everyone deserves to be given a fair chance, I think. I mean, Tyson got beat up so much for trying to keep Ella alive. And he looked at me like some kind of hero when I helped him. Kept following me afterwards and leaving me stale naan from the restaurant. I was like you when I met him, I was prepared to have no sympathy for him and Ella, but they're just trying to do what they can to survive. Made me realize we've all got it rough. Even monsters." He pauses. "But if the bad ones come to kill me, I'm not going to ask them for their life story, y'know?"

Annabeth huffs out a laugh.

Percy brings Blackjack closer to Minerva: the two's wings nearly collide, and Minerva lets out an angry snort.

"Thanks for keeping an open mind," Percy says. "I could tell that was tough for you. Just – thanks."

"You're welcome," Annabeth replies, shocked, unable to tell him that Annabeth's mind hadn't really opened because of her benevolent nature – no, Percy had opened her mind, introduced her to a sideways world where even monsters could be good.

He's changing her, she realizes, trying to muster up displeasure but finding only intrigue. He's changing her, and the weirdest thing is that she's not totally against it.

/

They touch down near the main entrance to Nine the evening before the equinox. With the sun falling beneath the horizon, the stone of the Bunker is cool, and by the time they enter through the doors, Percy is cold.

Piper, Leo, and Jason haven't left yet. They inform Annabeth that Travis had left two days ago to spread news of the meeting, and Beckendorf and Silena had left only a few hours prior. Percy's glad to see the son of Jupiter – he really had been worried about him – but Jason's smile is a little strained, his expression slightly withdrawn. Percy figures it's because Piper had told him about May and the Prophecy. News like that would make anyone – well, any child of the Big Three, at least – want to run for the hills.

"So?" Piper asks. "Did you find any proof of – anything?"

Annabeth pats her backpack, where he knows the book is carefully tucked away. "Yep."

"And?" Leo asks.

"It's true," Annabeth confirms, and Percy notices Jason's face fall. "We've been interpreting the Prophecy wrong ever since – since only the gods know when, since the first time the Ancient Greek was translated into the Modern."

"What do you mean?" Grover asks, because although Annabeth had mentioned nursing a theory, she hadn't shared it with them.

She laughs. "Kind of ironic, really. The coming of age part was understood and assumed to be age sixteen." She looks around at the rest of them as though shocked they haven't put it together yet. "Think about it! In Ancient Greece, girls came of age at fifteen, which is when they were considered fit to be wed." She pauses, silently disapproving, before carrying on. "Boys in Ancient Greece came of age at seventeen, which is when they were old enough to enrol in the army." She spreads her arms out. "What's the average?"

"Sixteen," Piper says, wondrous.

"Exactly!" Annabeth slaps her hands together. "But that was Ancient Greece, and we're in America."

Something heavy settles in Percy's gut as it hits him. "And here…"

"Children can be considered to come of age at eighteen," Annabeth says, and her voice is hushed as she looks between Percy and Jason. "But obviously, both of you are over eighteen. And then it hit me. Eighteen is the age where most minors are considered to be adults, it's the voting age, but it varies from state to state, anyway." She lets this sink in. "There's another official coming of age for minors in the U.S., the age where a person is really considered an adult. You can buy alcohol, drink it – you are no longer considered to be dependent on your parents when you hit age twenty-one."

Percy had known it was coming, but hearing it said aloud makes the entire situation feel real and concrete, and it feels like a horrible blow to his abdomen. He steadies himself against the wall and tries to breathe normally - out of the corner of his eye, he sees Jason cover his face with his hands, Piper rubbing her hands over his back.

Knowing that soon every Titan in the universe will be out to kill his ass – it's not a nice feeling. Percy fixes his eyes on the campfire and watches the flames – purple tonight – lick at the night air.

Annabeth won't meet his eyes. Grover lets out a low moan and grasps Percy's shoulder, and it is nice to have something solid holding onto him, keeping him from falling to the floor.

Another horrible thought occurs to him. "I turn twenty in August."

"July for me," Jason says, his blue eyes traumatized.

"Great," Annabeth says, gritting her teeth. "Great. This means that –" Her voice cracks, and she has to clear her throat.

She finally fixes her gaze on Percy, and a shiver runs through him at the deep sorrow concealed behind her carefully-emotionless face. "This means that in just about a year and a half, one of you will have to make a decision that could save or destroy our world." She hesitates. "Again."

/

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a/n: drop a review if you can! any and all criticism will be appreciated. for anyone confused, feel free to contact me on my tumblr!

i will be publishing a timeline and a list of easter eggs for this fic when it ends. also pls gimme motivation i need to finish this thing i can't let it hang skskkskskskskksksksk

stay safe, everyone!