tw: grief
xvi.
"Annabeth, are you alright?"
She nods.
But the daughter of Athena is not , in fact, "alright" by any means. How can she be?
Yet, facing the two Praetors (Frank, whose eyes are rimmed with red, and Hazel, whose hands are shaking more than her own), Annabeth just simply can't bear to speak the truth. The crickets outside stop chirping for a second. It is as if nature itself is holding its breath in observation of this lie.
"Do you want some time, 'beth? We don't have to do this right now." Hazel asks, and Frank puts a tired hand on the daughter of Pluto's shoulder. These two make a great pair of leaders for Camp Jupiter, Annabeth notes, wincing when she remembers that's how she and Percy used to look together at Camp Half-Blood.
"No, I'm good." Annabeth lies again. She doesn't exactly remember how she made her way to the Principia from Neptune's temple this morning, or better yet, how she was able to register Hazel's request to meet on the way back yesterday, but she is here now. And Annabeth isn't going to run away from this new reality.
"Do you mind telling us what exactly happened, then?" Frank asks, his brow crinkling.
Hazel swats at his arm. "Annabeth, he didn't mean to be rude. Only tell us if you want to."
"We just want to help," Frank nods.
Annabeth resists a slight urge to laugh. How can they help ? They can't help . They can't help because Percy was fucking ripped apart by a monster in front of her eyes and the gods were too lazy in hauling their sorry asses to their aid until it was most likely too damn late.
But she swallows that urge politely, and she expresses her appreciation for her friends' concerns before recounting the incident yesterday. She carefully leaves off her conversation with Hermes, just in case that it was nothing but false hope.
That little memory is starting to feel a lot like her imagination.
xvii.
The chatter stops when Annabeth steps into her classroom in New Rome University. All eyes are trained on her as she approaches her seat. Quickly, gossip bursts out like loose cannons.
...did you hear about Jackson...?
...There was an accident and she was there…?
...Lucas said she glared at him like she was going to murder him...
...Isn't that what happened to Octavian…?
...I heard that Octavian's death had nothing to do with her though…
"Miss Chase," Professor Nagy says, surprised. He is too polite to say it but she sees it in his gentle tone: we aren't expecting you here today. You should be resting.
"I'm okay," she asserts quickly before her professor has a chance to ask if she is alright. Everyone wants to know if she's alright. It's a dumb question.
Maybe she should curse that loud-mouthed Lucas. Hazel should have sworn him to secrecy. Maybe she can get Frank and Hazel to exercise their Praetor rights to exile that stupid son of Mercury.
Pulling her focus back to the present, the professor thankfully does not say anything else and turns his attention back to his writing on the blackboard as he prepares for today's class.
But the murmurs around her do not relent, and some start to extrapolate when the weather will let up because otherwise, they'd have to cancel their precious intramural meets.
Well, maybe it wasn't even that Mercury boy's blabbing that alerted everyone to her tragedy after all. All-day today Annabeth has been feeling some slight tremors from the Earth, and beyond the protective barriers of New Rome, she knew that storms and winds had plagued the entirety of the West Coast.
She wanted to brush those phenomena off as normal California things, but Annabeth knows that it isn't. It's Poseidon, or it's Neptune, or it's the Nereid and other creatures of the seas.
A part of her is surprised that tsunamis and more severe natural disasters had yet to descend upon them. But then again, Poseidon had become more mellow over the years from Percy's influence, and maybe the god is quieting his grief on his son's behalf.
Still, there's been a distinct change in the air, in the sea, and on the hairs of their arms. It probably also did not take very much for other demigods and legacies to guess what had happened when Hazel and Lucas dragged her back last night, bloodied and nearly unrecognizable, without Percy by her side.
Another snicker passes around her - some annoying classmate compares her with Wanda, saying some nonsense about preserved love and grief. Annabeth grits her teeth.
She grabs her backpack's strap with a tight grip and turns around before even settling into her regular seat.
xviii.
Next, Annabeth sends an email to her professor at UC Berkeley to apologize for skipping yesterday's class, and to let her know that she will be absent the remainder of the week. There isn't a good explanation (because an architecture-loving mortal isn't about to believe her real reason, unlike the professors at New Rome), and she doesn't want anyone else's pity, but fortunately, Annabeth has had a spotless record in the course so far and the professor is quite lenient.
Even if that is not the case, there is still no way that Annabeth can go to class the rest of this week - at UC Berkeley, at New Rome, or really, anywhere else. It occurs to her on the way back to her apartment that she needs to go somewhere as soon as possible.
Taking out her notebook, she flips through a few pages before digging out what she wants: the Blofis' address.
She takes a photo of it with her phone.
Fumbling, Annabeth takes out her suitcase from her wardrobe. The Delphi Strawberries and other Camp-related stickers are almost painful to look at, but she endures it. Endurance - that's one thing that demigods are taught to have from a very young age.
The whole apartment hurts if she were, to be honest. Annabeth hates the oven because that's where Percy and she spent the past few Sunday afternoons baking, just so that they can attempt to replicate Sally's recipes for her delicious blue cookies. They haven't quite gotten there yet, but it came close to perfection that most recent try before they ran out of food coloring.
She also hates the bookshelf, because all she remembers is how she demanded the HETTEL instead of the BILLY at IKEA and how Percy had to spend that whole Tuesday night building it because she had been busy with her internship, only for them to realize that he built it completely backward because dyslexia and instruction manuals don't mix. So, of course, they had to spend the whole Wednesday morning skipping class fixing it. They fell asleep at some point, listening to Vance Joy, and woke up when the sun started to set as they marveled at the beginning of their forever together in the shadows of their pitifully small window panes.
Needless to say, Annabeth hates that damn bedroom more than anything, and there is no way that she'll step foot in that anytime soon. Fuck, she's not that big of a masochist. Not yet, anyway. But she does resign to taking a quick shower after thinking over the decision twice.
The hot water on her skin is pleasant, more calming than she deserves.
So Annabeth turns the heat up, the water almost scalding.
Every time her mind starts to wander to what happened, she redirects it. Instead, she thinks of the summers spent in those strawberry fields, the countless cabin inspections and the chaos those brought, and the memories she made with her half-siblings by the campfire, steps away from the Hearth.
But then there's Percy at 12, unconscious and drooling, hands grasping the horn of a monster who would ultimately be the death of him one day.
And there's Percy at 16, guiding her hand to his Achilles heel, begging her to understand that she was his tether to this mortal world.
Then there's Percy at the edge of 17, holding her, cliff-side, swearing to never let go.
Percy at 19, putting a warm rag to her forehead when she tossed and turned in their bed, plagued by nightmares of the worst place in all planes of existence.
Percy at 21, tentative, hope swelling in his eyes, putting out feelers for her thoughts on marriage. She remembers that he asked her if she was really sure about giving him her forever as they joked about taking out the "'til death do we part" from their vows, because how could they not when they know that Elysium and Isle of the Blest are both real?
These memories are so delicate and Annabeth feels like she is treading softly on an ocean of their dreams.
The water of the shower feels overwhelming now, and for the first time in a long time, Annabeth fears the idea of drowning.
So she turns the water off, shampoo still spilling from her curls, and cries.
Maybe he isn't dead, even though she saw his heart-stopping. And maybe Hermes and the other gods were able to revive him; whatever happened does not matter: Annabeth knew that they can never have the normality that they both dreamed of since they were children now.
xix.
She takes more time than she thought she needed, but Annabeth is still able to get to the airport at a reasonable time.
Feeling grateful for the Chase family fortune, Annabeth books a last-minute red-eye flight from SFO to LGA. She could have asked Nico, or maybe even Blackjack (though it's definitely a stretch for the Pegasus to travel that far in one night), but she didn't want to face anyone else before reaching where she needs to be.
Annabeth rests her carry-on suitcase in the overhead bin and tucks herself closer to the window. Fortunately, no one is sitting between her and the tech bro in the aisle seat. Breathing in deeply, she puts on the complimentary headphones and throws on a sci-fi movie.
The reflections of city lights grow fainter as the plane lifts off uneasily in the strong wind, but soon, the space voyages on screen blend in with the steady hum of the plane, and the daughter of Athena falls into an uneasy sleep.
xx.
He came to her in a dream.
A/N: Would super appreciate any reviews!