Hello guys HAHAHA Okay I admit the only reason why I even write now is because I just enlisted and have a whole lot of nothing to do in camp(okay not true but like here it's so restricted I mostly just stay in bunk and use this tablet they give to watch vids so there's nothing much else to do in bunk since I can't even charge my phone here)

Anyway I think you can look forward to a but more frequent updates since this time I'm really forced to find something to do in bunk so yeaaa the story is probably gonna proceed fast now cuz i wanna move on to harry potter story and maybe the percy jackson idea i had a while back(go look at my profile i think its called humanitys last stand or sth)

I'm warming up to writing again so pardon some of te spelling mistakes and a whole lot of repeated vocab. I'll try to improve overtime. In the meantime, enjoy! and pls R&R to let me know you still exist.

~Kuntakintae

Percy's POV

It felt strange. For years, nothing had managed to shake me much. Tartarus had taught me almost everything about the darker and more morbid side of human nature, to the extent that I rarely felt anything even in the face of a murderous killer or a ruthless rapist.

Yet, there I was, heart palpitating at an astonishing rate while nervousness and anxiety seemed to conquer every strand of emotion I could feel in me.

I knew it was a dangerous question to ask. . The question itself could cause whatever relationship I had with Annabeth to be completely torn apart. While perhaps not as violent, Annabeth's past could probably be as emotionally traumatising- or maybe even more traumatising- compared to mine, and that thought scared me.

Perhaps it was the new feeling of freedom that instigated me to question her- or maybe it was the profound sense of a huge burden being relieved off shoulders. Either way, I knew that I couldn't just leave her be anymore.

For years, I had resigned to the fact that no one would ever accept me wholly for who I am. I had lived for years thinking that no one would ever be able to accept me or stay by my side if they found out about my past. This mind set had strengthened when Rachel 'cheated' on me even before I could tell her about it- though she hadn't actually done it.

Yet, the past few days had completely destroyed all these walls I had built around my heart and mind. The friends whom I thought would not stay with me after they found out about the truth had stayed-even if it was only a part of it- had stayed. I had watched them closely –and secretly- when I was telling my story, and it genuinely surprised me that while there was a little horror that showed in their expressions, there was lots of sadness and pain as well as- surprisingly- a little bit of kindness.

It had warmed my heart to know that even after knowing that I had went through that hell called Tartarus-which anyone will automatically think that I had killed someone-, they hadn't immediately assumed that I was a killer. I could tell they were still sceptical about me being a killer, about me actually killing someone in the past.

But it was also exactly that that caused me to flee to my training room. I was a killer. I had killed before, and I couldn't bear to imagine the utter looks of horror and disgust and disappointment that may appear after finding out that their hopes were all in vain.

Yet, Annabeth, even after hearing that I had killed before, didn't show me any of those emotions. She hadn't looked at me like I was some kind of monster, some kind of failure. Unknowingly, the heavy weight of possible rejection had been lifted off my shoulders.

She had helped to free me from the invisible cage that had entrapped me tightly for so many years. I couldn't just sit back and do nothing while knowing that she herself suffered from a similar case.

I waited as patiently as I could, using all the mental strength that Tartarus had forcibly built up in me to stay quiet and give her time instead of bailing out and excusing myself.

I carefully studied her facial expressions, watching as emotions of shock, fear, uncertainty and then tentative resolution fleeted across her face. Finally, she took a deep breath and looked up, shifting her eyes towards my face.

"Don't worry. I know how it feels like to be scared of being rejected. I'm pretty attuned to it actually. In fact, the last time I felt that was around…three minutes ago?"

I gave the most natural smirk I could give while letting my mouth spout out any words that came across my mind. Apparently it worked as an uncontrolled chuckle rang through the air.

"Your face is kind of amusing," Annabeth said with a small smile after recovering.

"Ouch," I replied, my face contorting into one with obvious mock pain, causing her smile to widen a little more. It lightened my heart to see her smile, as she rarely did these past few weeks.

Her smile slowly slid off her face, and I immediately became more serious.

"When I was around eight to nine years old, my mother died," Annabeth's voice was so soft, it barely qualified to be considered a whisper.

"No one knew who or why, but someone had assassinated my mother in the middle of a business trip she went for in Vietnam. A quick death, they said. One bullet straight between the eyes in the head. Didn't make it any easier for me though," Her voice cracked a little at the end, and I could see small droplets of tears starting to seep out of her eyes.

"Take it slow and easy," I whispered as I steeled my heart and went to put my arm around her shoulders. A slight sense of nostalgia hit me.

It felt like a long time ago, when life was much simpler, when the biggest problem for me was simply a lost girlfriend and the biggest problem for Annabeth was simply a bully.

I closed my eyes and made a promise to myself-one way or another, I had to end this soon. To Luke, to end Kronos, to end Tartarus once and for all. Not only for myself, but for all my friends.

My identity would sooner or later be exposed. Kronos knows that not just anyone would be able to stand up to Luke in a swordfight. With his connections, as long as he paid a little more attention to our area, he would surely find out about me, and when that happens, Thalia, Nico, Silena, the closest people to me...Annabeth…would be endangered

I knew all too well how ruthless Kronos could be, and also how vengeful he could be. My 'betrayal' to him would implicate everyone around me.

"After she died," Annabeth continued after a few seconds of taking deep breaths. "My father went on to marry another woman. That woman already had two children which were spoilt brats. She hated me as well, and my dad-always the submissive side of any relationship- didn't dare to help me."

"She mistreated me a lot. No beatings or whatever, but she always gave me the smallest portion of serving, forced me to clean the entire house and even forced me into a smaller room so that her kids could get the bigger ones. I managed to get by though-barely- and life carried on like that till I was twelve."

I had a bad premonition that this was when Luke stepped into her life, and I prepped myself mentally for what she was about to say.

"When I was twelve, a new student came into school. He was known as really good looking- with smooth blonde hair and bright blue eyes."

"Everyone was attracted to him, even though his personality was as cold as ice, it didn't manage to stop a huge load of twelve year old puberty-stricken girls from chasing him every second of the day, even me."

I couldn't see any embarrassment on her face- only disgust and regret and especially grief- as though having fallen for him was the worst choice she had ever made in her short life.

In my mind, I kind of agreed with that. Luke wasn't exactly the nicest guy in town.

"One day, I bumped into him when walking to class. Literally bumped into him. All the books I was holding all spilled across the hallway and made quite a din. Just my luck that Luke decided to make me his target of 'affection'," She gave a sickening, self-depreciating look that tore at my heart and caused me to tighten my grip on her shoulder and pull her closer to me.

"Before that day, I was a nobody. Just a simple girl who studied hard and scored good results. After that day, however, my life started spinning into hell. Luke knew how I felt towards him, and as 'payback', he decided to play with my…emotions," Annabeth's voice started to waver as she continued.

"He first treated me like a true gentleman, helping me pick up my books, walking me to class, getting my number and all that. We started dating, and he…exposed me to many things that a twelve year old never should see."

By that time, her eyes were already tightly closed, and her voice was shaky and soft, as though she was afraid of something.

"I understand, and I don't blame you," I said with a comforting but firm voice to let her know I meant what I said. She had accepted me for what I did and who I am, and to hell with me if I don't return the favour and more.

I could feel the tension flowing out of her body as soon as she heard those words and quietly sighed in relief. All this was so new- not the comforting part, but the part where I suddenly have someone I placed so much importance on.

It was different from how I was with Rachel. While she and I stuck close, she didn't have a very terrible life, nor did she know anything about my past. She was someone I held dear, but not someone I would imagine staying by me through every thick or thin situation.

For Annabeth, she had stayed even after knowing I was a killer, even knowing fully well the danger of Kronos and how dangerous I was. It was the first time I ever placed so much importance on someone ever since my parents.

"He kind of dated me till thirteen years old," Annabeth said, leaving what Luke had exposed to her unknown. I didn't need her to explain- I knew Luke better than almost anyone else except Kronos, and I knew perfectly well what he could have exposed to Annabeth.

"Thinking back, I was really lucky," Annabeth gave a wry smile. "I hadn't lost my virginity to him, though what he did after…I-I wish he just did it and left."

The hardest part was coming. Her body was tensed up like a bowstring being pulled back to its maximum stretched length, and her stuttering had returned. The silence in the training room was only broken by frequent sniffs and constant deep breaths from Annabeth.

"One day, he had convinced me to have s-sex with me, at the ripe age of thirteen. Sick, right? The worst thing was I actually agreed to it." Shivers wracked through her body-as though she was stuck in the middle of a cold, cold winter.

I could relate. Everybody had things they deeply regret doing, but the nature and seriousness of said 'thing' could vary from person to person.

For me, for Annabeth, the severity of our past regrets surpasses many others, and that usually makes the regret more 'tangible'.

I'm all too familiar with the cold, biting, chilling and suffocating feeling of deep regret and emptiness that constricts my chest like a boa.

After that feeling of regret comes another excruciating feeling- possibly even worst that the painful regret- loneliness.

Not everyone would feel this because whatever regrets they harboured usually weren't severe enough to stick with them throughout their lives. Only people like me- whose regrets were so extreme and frightful- would experience this emotion.

It stemmed from the fact that the traumatic experiences that we had to go through caused us to sub-consciously create and fall into the jaws of a very pessimistic and cynical way of thinking- that the harrowing and horrendous actions we were forced to embark on were unforgivable and unpardonable, and that we would forever be unaccepted should the people around us find out about what we did.

"He brought me to a small apartment- his temporary house at that time- and there were stacks of beer on the table. He convinced me to drink, and after a single long swig, I was out like a short-circuited light bulb."

"The next day, I woke up with a terrible aching headache in a place I wasn't familiar with. I was lying on the cold hard ground in some remote alleyway with all the stuff I brought to Luke's house the day before. I didn't feel anything weird so I knew he hadn't ...done that," Annabeth's face scrunched up as she thought about sex, and she seemed to be at the apex of her struggle in telling this entire story.

"It took me around two hours to find out how to get home, and when I did, my stepmother used the opportunity to 'reasonably' punish me- which meant beating me up. She didn't hit me up too badly, but it revealed the depth of how much she hated me. The worst part was that my dad didn't do anything about it. That was the end of any hope I had in having a family," I felt her body start to shiver and shake even more vigorously as before.

She was starting to sob. I didn't do anything to stop her though- she had been storing and enduring so much pain and grief and loneliness for so many years, and I knew she needed an outlet for all those emotions. That outlet was through the tears that spilled out of her eyes.

"When I reached school the next day, however, I knew something was wrong immediately. People were staring at me with a sharp glint in their eyes-which now I recognize as malicious as well as scorn. Apparently Luke h-had taken a f-few photos of me…"She didn't manage to choke out the last few words, but I didn't need her to tell me.

Luke had stripped her and taken naked photos of her. True, he didn't rape her-I'm guessing he thought she wasn't worth his time-, but public defamation wasn't much better.

The shame she had to go through, the mental torture and the breaking down of every piece of self-esteem and confidence she had, it must have been the most terrible point of her life.

The very fact that she was here instead of being with her family told me enough of how her family treated her after they found out about the incident.

After that, she must have tried to build a new life at different places across USA. I knew she had moved a couple of times for the past few years, and I could guess how it was like in those other schools too. If the way she acted when she first met me as anything to go by, she must have been ostracised for being a weirdo and mentally ill kid.

Her sobs was the only sound that could be heard in the training hall. It ricocheted against the walls of the room, echoing gloomily across the room and leaving a heavy atmosphere in the air.

Anger would come later-anger at Luke, at Kronos, at the world for causing such a precious girl to suffer so unjustly, but as of that moment, the only feeling I could feel was the need to just hug her close and pull her tightly into my embrace and just be there for her, to let her know that was someone who finally accepted her for who she was after so many years of rejection from her family, from her peers and from the World.

So I did.