Disclaimer: I do not own Rick Riordan, the Percy Jackson books, characters, series, movies, or anything else you may recognize.

Chapter Twenty-Four

I Almost Die

The plane ride was horrifying. The entire time I was sure I was going to die, and Andee had to keep convincing me that I wasn't. Although, she wasn't doing such a great job when even the pilot said we were experiencing more turbulence than normal.

Just good ol' Zeus, reminding me how easily he could kill me.

Andee had my hand the entire time, but nothing was really working. Actually, after a while, she started to get annoyed by how much I was freaking out so she started telling me to shut up and hit me every time I made a sound.

Very supportive.

About three hours into the almost six hour flight, Andee sighed and turned to me. "What can I do to help you calm down?"

"I don't know, this is just a lot."

She pressed her lips to mine, pulling back after a few moments, just far enough that are noses were touching, and looked at me with her brilliant jade eyes. "Is that better?"

"A little," I said, cupping her face in my hands and stroking her cheek. "I think it will take more than one kiss to keep me fully distracted." She rolled her eyes. "You know, I'm just trying to support you and come with you because I love you, but I'm in a situation where I could easily die and I think you should –"

"Shut up," Andee said, pressing her lips to mine.

"You love me," I said in a sing-song voice.

"Unfortunately."

"There's nothing unfortunate about it! You love me with all your heart and would be devastated if I were to be killed by your grandfather for being in his domain despite his warnings," I argued dramatically.

She sighed again. "Yes, I supposed I would be upset."

"Devastated," I corrected her before bringing her lips back to mine. "I love you so much, Andee le Fay."

She smiled. "I love you too, goofball."

So for the rest of the flight, Andee provided me with a distraction – just not the distraction I had been hoping for. She started teaching me different words in Ancient Greek, with the occasional breaks for kissing. When she could see I was bored with learning more Ancient Greek (we already did enough of that at camp), she moved on to random questions to get to know each other even better than we already did.

"Okay, so if you had to choose one superpower – just one – what would you choose?" she asked, cuddling into me as much as she could over the arm rest.

"One superpower…well, when you look at it, we already kind of have superpowers," I said.

"Something you don't have now and probably never will," she clarified.

"I think flying. That would be pretty sweet," I answered. "What about you?"

"Hmm…Andee said, taking a few moments to think about it. "I think I'd want to be able to stop time, so that when there's that one perfect moment, you could just stay in it and cherish it for as long as you wanted. Or have extra time to finish an assignment for school or something. Many uses."

I gave her a look. "It's summer vacation and we're going into a war, and you're thinking about school and assignments."

"What's wrong with that? I'm a great student and I want to get into an even better school after I graduate!" Andee said defensively.

"Oh? What school?"

"Julliard," Andee said immediately, her cheeks turning a little red. "I know it's super hard to get into, but I figure that I have really good grades and the skills I've inherited from my dad, I have a pretty good chance."

"I think if anyone can get into Julliard, it's you," I told her and she grinned. I loved that smile so much.

"What about you?"

"I don't know," I answered honestly. "I haven't really thought about it, with my life being in constant danger and all that."

"You really should start thinking about it," Andee said. "It gives you something to look forward to, and that's always a plus."

The plane finally landed and I couldn't get off soon enough. The fact that we were finally back on land was so relieving and I knew the day I'd have to get back on a plane would be too soon for my liking.

We got in a taxi and when we finally arrived at our destination, we were in front of a low, one story bungalow. I really didn't expect Andee to live somewhere so laidback. Andee climbed out of the taxi, running around to pay the driver before walking up the driveway. I quickly got out of the taxi with my backpack and duffel bag and followed her down the driveway to the front door.

"VAL! I'M HOME BUT I CAN'T FIND MY KEY AND YOU ALREADY MADE ME TAKE A TAXI HOME SO PLEASE OPEN THE DOOR!" Andee yelled, pounding her fists on the door.

"STOP YELLING, FOR ZEUS' SAKE!" someone yelled behind the door. It swung open to reveal a very pregnant woman with long, curly black hair and grey eyes behind a pair of glasses.

"Hi mom," Andee said before hugging her tightly. Val returned the gesture, squeezing her goddaughter as tight as she could around her protruding belly. After a few moments Val looked up at me, an unreadable expression on her face. I'm sure I could guess some of the things on her mind.

"Hi, I'm Percy – Andee's boyfriend," I said, extending my hand for her to shake. "It's really nice to meet you."

She barely glanced at it.

"So I've heard," Val said simply. "Why don't you head inside while I talk to Andee alone?"

Okay, not as bad as I thought. Not good, but not bad.

"It's fine," Andee whispered to me. "You know how children of Athena are. It'll only be a few minutes."

I nodded and she gave me a kiss on the cheek before I walked past the two into the house.

"Just a reminder that Percy is also one of Annabeth's best friends, and she's not only your half-sister, but she chooses good company," Andee said quietly to her godmother. "He knows about the curse/Prophecy and he doesn't want to hurt me. Percy is a genuinely good person and has a heart of gold, and I'm choosing to love him."

I loved when she said that – it was my words and showed that we both felt the same way.

"I'm just worried," Val said, her voice showing her emotion. "I love you so much and I don't want you to hurt. I promised Avalon I'd protect you."

"I know, and you have and still do," Andee said. "Please just love him as much as I do, because he's super cute and sweet and adorable and I really, really love him."

I was grinning when a man approached me inside the house. He was my height – maybe half an inch shorter, with short brown hair, brown eyes and black-rimmed glasses. He was wearing an odd match of a collared shirt with a pair of sweatpants. "You must be Percy! It's so nice to meet you!" he said, shaking my head. "I'm Johnny Collins, Val's fiancé and Andee's…well, her kind-of godfather? It's all a little confusing."

"So you know…"

"About the gods, and demigods, and monsters all being real?" Johnny asked. "Yeah. I met Athena a couple of years ago, and that was pretty cool. Apollo comes by every so often as well."

"You seem to have taken this very easily," I mentioned.

"What else can you do?" he asked with a shrug.

Val and Andee walked in and Andee smiled when she saw me talking to Johnny. "You guys have met!"

"Yes!" Johnny said. "I was just about to show Percy around the house, but now that you guys are done, I'm sure you'd like to do the honor. Dinner will be ready in about two hours, so take your time and relax."

"Thanks, Johnny," Andee said with a grin, taking my hand and leading me down the hallway. She stopped midway and turned to me. "I'm sorry about that. Val's not usually like that…well, she kind of is…but she's just really pregnant and really protective of me."

"It's okay, I get it," I told her, kissing her lightly on the nose. "I feel the same about you. The protective part, not the pregnant."

She smiled more. "Johnny seems to like you!" she said excitedly.

"Yeah, he seems pretty cool," I said. "How did he really take to finding out about our world?"

"He freaked out a little. It took some time and a lot of demonstrations from me, but he gets it now," she said. "He's actually getting better at seeing through the Mist too, now."

We spent the rest of the night hanging out in her room, packing all of her belongings in boxes. Val calmed down a bit by dinner, but she was still on the icier side. I understood where she was coming from, but I did kind of want her approval.

After dinner we went back down to Andee's room, who plopping down on her bed, pulling me on with her. "I'm sorry if this has been awkward for you. I really didn't want it to be."

"It's fine, Sunshine," I said and she gave me a doubtful look. "I'm serious. I don't think meeting your girlfriend's parents is supposed to go super smoothly."

"I'm really glad that you're here, though," she said, holding my hands in her lap. "It's nice to not be at camp and not on a quest so we can just have time to ourselves."

"I agree," I said and she moved over so she could sit on my lap, giving me a peck on the lips.

"I'm so excited – I have so many Canadian things I have to show you before we go back!"

"Canadian things?"

"Yeah!" she said, smiling like crazy. "There's the aquarium, Stanley Park, the Seawall! And there's so many cool little coffee shops and restaurants and cool dessert places that would be cool to go to together."

"So you want to go on dates," I said.

She started blushing. "Well, of course I do, but I also want to show you my home!" She paused for a minute. "It's just…we have this free time now, and we might not later. We're heading into a full-scale war against the Titans, and I just want to do these things and enjoy this time together while we have it."

"What do you mean?"

She rested her hands on my shoulders but wouldn't look me in the yes. "If the Titans succeed…if he succeeds…our world will change completely. What we have now, this freedom, this light, we won't have it ever again if he takes over." She paused. "The Lord of the Titans will destroy everything we have ever known."

"So we have to make the time we have now count," I said.