Firstly, sorry for the super duper late update!

Things have been so so so hectic these few weeks with all the tests and innumerable assignments coming in. Dying dying dying.

Enjoy the chapter!

~Kuntakintae

Annabeth's POV

I was stunned. Completely and utterly stunned.

One moment, I was walking along with Percy, chatting with him normally as we always did. The next moment, I was on the ground with a sprained ankle, and Percy was standing above me, his blade- Riptide- drawn and clashing against another blade.

When my eyes finally travelled to the attacker, my heart stopped beating for a full second and I felt like I had just been hit by a tsunami.

Luke. Luke was clashing swords against Percy. The very bane of my existence, the guy that had humiliated me, tore my entire well-being into thin, painful shreds and thrown all the scattered and crushed pieces of me into a rubbish bin was going against the guy who had done the exact opposite to my life.

When Percy shouted for everyone to get away, I knew that things were going to get serious. The atmosphere had changed drastically right after he had said that. Fear started to penetrate into my being as a cold, chilling air settled upon the entire area, causing violent shivers to go down my spine.

The adrenaline that came from the fear drove me to stand up despite the extreme pain that was constantly attacking my nerve system from my ankle and straggle away as fast as I could. My vision blurred as tears of pain started to flow out of my eyes. Panic and desperation started to invade and cloud my mind as I felt my legs giving way. The pain was too great, and my ankle wasn't exactly helping.

Relief flooded into me as I felt two people grab my arms and wrap it across their shoulders, supporting my body weight and carrying me away from the raging battle that was happening behind me.

"We're gonna bring you to the infirmary. Just relax," I heard Thalia's soothing voice through the fog of derision and pain that blanketed my mind.

"Nico, walk faster. I have a feeling we'll be needed very soon," Thalia said. I felt a shift from the person supporting me on the opposite side from Thalia, and made the connections.

Nico and Thalia. They were probably the next two strongest people I knew after Percy, and the fact that they were on both her sides now, supporting her-literally- calmed her down significantly and a slight sense of peace and calm descended upon her.

The feeling of exhaustion from what I had done hit me like a stampeding elephant, and darkness crawled into my vision like a parasite, until all light was snuffed out and my mind spiralled into unconsciousness.

A conversation was going on as I shifted in and out of consciousness.

"Tartarus? W...you...Luke...relation?"

Tartarus? What Tartarus?

"Underground...battle...survive..."

Underground? Like literally? Battle to survive?

"Luke...are...killed?..."

Luke...?

Slurred words and broken speeches seemed to be randomly registered in my mind. Frustration swelled up in me as the more I tried to hear, the further away the voices sounded.

What was Tartarus? What about underground battling? Luke killed?

I felt myself losing whatever consciousness I had, and desperately fought back against it, but to no avail. Slowly, I fell back into a blank, dark void of nothingness once again.

Silence.

That was the absolute first thing I noticed the moment I started to wake up from my deep slumber. Nothing could be heard except the extremely faint cries of the crickets from the outside of the room I was residing in.

The next thing I noticed- or felt, in more specific terms- was the throbbing ache I felt at my ankle. I winced as a sharp twinge of pain travelled up my leg as I tried to move my sprained ankle. It was really bad.

The third thing I realised was that my hand was holding something, Or rather, something was anchoring itself onto my hand. I tried to gently remove my hand from whatever was holding onto it like a lifeline, but to no avail.

"Annabeth?" A sleepy, tired but worried voice floated through my ears, causing a warm, fuzzy feeling to spread across my being.

"Percy?" I asked cautiously. My mind was still a bit slow and I didn't trust myself to identify anything correctly, judging by my current state at the time.

The grip on my hand tightened and I heard a sigh of relief escaping the person's mouth. A small smile brightened up on my face. If there was one thing I recognized out of everything about Percy, it was his sigh.

I chuckled mentally at that fact. It seems like I've caused Percy to sigh more than anything else the past two years I've known him.

"Yea. You feeling okay? Let me go and turn on the lights first. Get ready," He informed me before he let go of my hand and walked towards the light switches.

I winced in slight discomfort as the bright rays of light pierced my bleary eyes painfully. Quickly, I raised my hand and blocked the direct rays of light into my eyes.

"Sorry," Percy said as he sat back down on the seat beside me. I shook my head and slowly retracted my hand as my eyes slowly adjusted to the brightness.

"It's okay. What happened? All I remember is that you were fighting Luke and…" Cold shock spilled all over me as my mind registered the words that had inadvertently babbled out.

"Percy! Are you okay? How did the fight go? Did you get severely injured?" A thousand questions flowed like a raging river from my mouth and crashed into Percy. Percy immediately raised his hands in surrender and backed away a bit with his usual goofy grin.

"Chill there, Wise Girl. One question at a time. Don't be such an old grandma," He said, his tone teasing. I glared daggers at her and huffed in annoyance.

"Just to reply your question, yea I'm fine. We didn't fight long enough for either of us to injure each other. Thalia and Nico stopped us before things got too serious," He tried to hide it, but I could tell behind his seemingly genuine grin, there was a hint of sadness and worry.

"What happened?" I pressed forward, looking at him straight in the eye as I asked.

"What do you mean what happened? I just told you everything there is to know," If I hadn't been stuck to him for the past two years of my life, I probably wouldn't have detected the almost impervious façade that he had put on.

"Percy," I prompted relentlessly.

He had always been the one that supported me. He had always been the strong pillar of strength and courage that everyone relied on. He had always been the one that chased after the helpless and the unloved and saved them from their slow descend to hell.

He had never been the one that had been saved. He had never been the one that had been helped or supported.

I had no doubt that even if we hadn't been there when Rachel finally woke up with her loss of memory, Percy would have somehow gotten over it and resolved the whole issue. All we did was to resolve the situation earlier.

I wanted to, for once, be someone he knew he could rely on.

He stared at me, his grin slowly sliding off his face as he realised that I had seen right through his façade. Shivers ran down my spine as his swirling, deep sea-green eyes seemed to stare right into my soul.

He looked contemplative for a moment, as though he had some amusing debate that was running through his mind. There was a faraway look in his eyes as he seemed to think through a thousand and one things.

Finally, after a few seconds, the fog cleared from his eyes, and he focused back on me once again.

"I…I'm sorry Annabeth. There are things in my life that you should never be involved in. It's too dangerous. All I can tell you is that I lost control of myself," He told me, his voice filled with sombreness and grimness.

"What do you mean?" I inquired further. I wasn't about to give up just like that. He gave me an exasperated look and sighed.

"Annabeth…please. Don't question about this entire matter. It's…not a safe topic to discuss," He implored.

A sharp pang of hurt and pain hit my chest as his words registered in my mind.

"Why can't you just trust us, Percy? Why can't you trust me?" I whispered, grief and sadness saturating my voice. Tears started to prickle my eyes and my vision started to blur.

Couldn't he just let me be there for him once? Was it too much to ask for him to share his problems? I had entrusted him with so many of my deepest and darkest secrets, and yet he had never shared anything about his own secrets to me before. Was I that incapable and useless, that untrustworthy that he would be so unwilling to share the burden of his secret problems with me?

"Annabeth…" His tone was tentative and unsure. I didn't respond.

Silence reigned in the room, occasionally broken by the frequent sniffs I produced as I tried to stem the flow of tears. I knew I was being unfair to him- after all, he was only keeping his secrets to himself because he was worried and concerned for my safety.

"I'm sorry," I apologised in a shaky voice, staring at my quivering hands. I didn't want to see the expression on his face- I was afraid that all I would find was disappointment or hurt.

I heard him shuffle a few steps before a sudden warmth enveloped my upper body. My eyes widened as I realised that he was embracing me gently, his strong, firm arms wrapped around me like a protective cocoon. Suddenly, I felt light-headed.

"I'm the one that's sorry, Annabeth. I would trust you with my life, but I don't trust myself to be able to protect yours," His words floated through the air.

I don't trust myself to be able to protect yours.

His words hit me like a ton of bricks, causing my mind to freeze for a second. Then, after my mind finally managed to catch the meaning of his words, millions of questions started to pour into my mind like a flood.

"What do you me-"I halted in mid-question as I realised the warmth that I had been feeling was no longer there. The protective cocoon that had been wrapped around me had shed and disappeared.

I was the only one left in the room.

My eyes landed on the door as a soft "Click" echoed through the room. In that split second of shock, Percy had managed to exit the room, leaving me to deal with the insatiable, burning curiosity I was feeling towards what he had meant by his ominous words.