Annabeth crossed her arms slowly. The cabin was so still I could practically hear her skin as it brushed against her clothes.

This conversation had reached a closed door.

It's not like I didn't know the answer. There's no way she would have gotten this defensive and silent unless the answer was a yes. I was sitting across from the child of a god.

Frankly, that was at least twice as scary as the snake women. I wondered if she could smite me. She probably couldn't, or she would have probably done it by now and I would be a smear on the ground, but I still figured that it might be in my best interest to make myself seem less smite-able.

"I agreed to explain the world that you had been blissfully ignorant to until yesterday. Not myself." Annabeth said, dangerously calm. Despite that, I could sense a hint of resentment in her tone, originating from who knows where.

"The two seem a bit related to me." I said dryly.

"I'm sorry," She said, though she definitely didn't sound sorry. "but you seem a bit confused as to who's controlling this conversation." She stood up in her seat, leaning over the table, and splaying her hands across it's surface, her whole demeanor suddenly looked eerily similar to a big cat about the pounce.

"It's me. The one who actually knows anything about everything in this room. You don't get to decide what we talk about, I do. Who I am is not relevant to the information that you're looking for, and it won't be a subject of discussion." She leaned further down over the table, her eyes swirling like storm clouds right before a blizzard. "Is that understood?"

I met her glare with something that I'd like to think was a look of equal force. The way she was talking- condescending and oh-so 'in control', it instantly made me pinpoint what it is that I hated about her. She was just like the scores of teachers I'd run through in the past, from the public to private schools, from all grades and all walks of life, that all determined I was a delinquent from the moment they laid eyes on me. They all looked at me the same way that Annabeth was looking at me right now, like I was some long gone, lost cause that should feel grateful for them even speaking to me, let alone trying to explain anything to me. Hell, she even called me impertinent, the only reason I knew what that word meant was because of the countless teachers that had used it to describe me. I clenched my fist over and over to try to simmer myself down a little. It was not a very effective outlet.

"I don't see the problem."

"You wouldn't."

"Yeah, because you never explain anything to me!" I snapped. "Do you expect me to read your goddamn mind and know what I can and cannot say around you? I feel like I'm walking through a minefield every time I open my mouth."

"Well then maybe, you shouldn't open your mouth!" She shot back.

"Like hell I will! What's the big deal anyways?"

"It's none of your-" She started to say, but it was my time to interrupt her.

"So what if you're a demigod? Who gives a fuck? It's not like I'm going to be running around blabbing about how I met this one random girl who was the child of a god. People would think I've lost it and try to put me out of my misery! So what if you're wrapped up in all this greek stuff? Isn't everyone?"

She let out a sharp breath of laughter. "Gods, you have no idea what you're talking about."

"Because you aren't telling me anything." I grit out, running my hands through my hair in frustration.

"Oh, go to hell," She spat. " I've held your hand through this conversation for two days now and you're still bitching and moaning like a baby throwing a tantrum."

"Because you're not answering half of my fucking questions." I snarled back.

"And what, exactly, makes you think I want to? In case you haven't realized, I'm still not taking you up on that ridiculous offer for partnership, so it's not like I'm going to be all buddy-buddy best friends forever with you. As soon as I'm fully mobile, I'm out of this stupid cabi-"

I flew out of my seat and slammed my fists down on the table, cutting her off entirely, and leaving the cabin silent, except for the sound of my own heavy breathing. Anger flared and swirled in my lungs, so much so that it actually felt like my breath had become heated, and the feeling was only multiplied as her cold, grey eyes stared back at me, unflinching.

However, it was short lived. Anger was quick to be pushed over to the side in place of a solid rock of shame that nested in my gut and pumped cement into my veins. I had just pulled a Gabe. I pulled a Gabe in me and my mom's cabin.

A quick word on Gabe Ugliano: He was the first husband of my mom, as much as I wish as I could deny that. He seemed like a decent enough guy at first, but as soon as the honeymoon was over, he dropped that act hard and fast. When I was young, I would call him 'Smelly Gabe', because he reeked about as much fresh out of the shower (not that he showered) as everyone did nowadays; four months without a single shower with essence of corpse cologne. the only thing worse than his smell was how he acted. An alcoholic with anger issues never really screamed 'daddy material', but he made up for that by screaming about everything else.

My mom married him for his money, not his charmingly repulsive personality. Normally, that would make her an awful person, but Gabe was not normal by any means; he was extraordinarily terrible, which made my mom extraordinarily selfless. I won't go into how bad of a situation we were in before she married Gabe, but there were nights I went to bed hungry, which meant there were probably a lot of nights she went to bed hungry. Gabe was the best option in a terrible situation, as much as I hated to admit it.

When he wasn't drunk, he was usually screaming, and when he was drunk, he was still screaming, but he also tended to forget what he was screaming about a lot of the time, so it wasn't a huge issue. He was a very 'my way or the highway' sort of guy, and the highway in his book meant shouting, making threats, and while I had never seen it personally, I was sure he hit my mom. I was away at different boarding schools more often than not during the school year, so I had never seen it, but sometimes he would do something, like, oh, slam the table for instance, and my mom would flinch. It's not difficult to put two and two together.

He's long gone now. He was killed in a terrible, ah, 'accident' involving a cement mixer, and the usual dose of alcohol in his system. He was not missed, especially not with the substantial life insurance payout he gave us.

But being dead didn't necessarily mean he was really gone. Even years after he died, his presence could still be felt. When my mom had first started dating Paul, I was constantly second guessing him and his intentions. It took me a long time to finally accept the fact that Paul wasn't Gabe, and never would be. It was stupid, I know, but-don't tell anyone- the thought of another Gabe marrying my mom scared me shitless.

But that wasn't the worst of it.

On rare instances, when I was furious, I could swear I heard his voice in the back of my mind, like he was standing right behind me, shooting his usual jeers until my vision was tinted red and I just had to hit something. It was like an infection, and every time I got angry, I could feel it fester and spread.

I felt like I was going to be sick. It wasn't the first time I had done something like this, like Gabe, but it was the first time it happened in the cabin. It was worse than a punch to the gut.

Slowly, I lowered myself back into my chair and swallowed the bile that was rapidly collecting in my throat. "I already told you," I said, my voice rough, "this cabin isn't stupid."

Annabeth leaned back and crossed her arms. She looked almost… disappointed, which didn't help the fact that I felt like burying myself in the sand and waiting for a riptide to pull me to the bottom of the ocean.

"You know, considering the amount of hang-ups you have about a freaking building, I'd think that you'd be a little more understanding of me not wanting to recite my sob stories for your entertainment." She said in a clipped tone.

"Entertainment." I repeated, deadpan. "You think I want to know more about you for my entertainment."

"Well then, what is your goal, exactly? I already told you, it's not relevant."

I squinted at her. "You want me to give you a reason? For what, wanting to know more about you?"

She gave me a sharp nod, her features rock solid with stoicism. "Precisely that,"

A humorless laugh pushed through my mouth and I slumped back in my seat. "Gee, I dunno, it couldn't be that I'm just try to get to know you. That'd be crazy, right?"

She lowered her face down, until she was practically glaring at me through her eyebrows. "Don't bullshit me, Jackson. You've got a reason, or you wouldn't be pressing about me, or trying to force yourself into my company."

" 'Just said it." I sighed irritably slumped back a little further in the chair, feeling caught between petulant and still a bit queasy.

"That doesn't count."

"Well, why not?"

"Because, in case you didn't notice, the two of us don't really fit, you know?" Her eyes flashed, and her mouth twisted to the right like she was trying to hold back a snarl. "Since the moment we first started interacting, we've been at each other's throats-"

"Pretty sure you started that." I injected dryly, but she continued like I hadn't even opened my mouth.

"and the only time we managed to go five minutes without one of us biting the other's head off was when we were fighting the dracaenae, and I think it's safe to say that there were other priorities at the time. You're constantly trying to get me to relay information about my life to you on top of me having to spoonfeed you on basic greek fundamentals, an offer I regret immensely by the way, and when you're not doing either of those things, you're either suggesting ridiculous partnerships, or flipping your lid over a cabin. You want to talk about me being a minefield? Rich, coming from the guy who loses his cool over a cabin. As I've already said, I'm gone in a few days time, and then there's a damn good chance we'll never so much as hear about the other ever again. So why, exactly, would you want to know more about someone that you clearly don't like, and will be, at most, be spending a few days with, or however long it takes for you to grate on my nerves hard enough for me to kick you out, and lock the door on your sorry ass, other than sick kicks?"

She huffed angrily as she finished, leaving me feeling gobsmacked by the sudden angry rant. I didn't want to admit it, but she wasn't wrong. Both of us had not exactly been nice to each-other, for a variety of reasons. In our short time together, we managed to butt heads on pretty much every topic we've covered.

If it wasn't for the snake women attacking us, I would have never given her the time of day, and she probably would have cleared out yesterday if she had a real choice in the matter, but that wasn't the hand life dealt us. But, for the moment, we were just kind of stuck together. She had the answers, and I had questions,

Even still, I had to wonder, if the situation was different, would we really be so opposed to the other? I could hardly deny she was attractive, when she wasn't busy frowning and scowling at least. Annabeth had a weird way about her that made me want to straighten up and prove myself just as capable as she was. Did I have some sort of effect on her? I didn't know exactly what she thought of me, but, I couldn't help but let my mind wander a little, ADHD's like that.

I blinked, snapping myself from my reverie. I don't know how long I had been thinking silently, but Annabeth was still looking at me half-expectant.

"Well?" She breathed at me.

I felt like a total deer in the headlights. So I did what I always do when I'm faced with oncoming death: Open my big mouth.

"Maybe..." I rolled the words around my mouth, trying spit them out, but failing pretty hard. There's a choking sensation in my adam's apple that is all too familiar, and it threatened to crush my windpipe with how oppressive it is. The feeling it only tightened as the words pressed closer to my lips. It was like choking, but worse.

But I've felt a hell of a lot worse than that feeling. I'd been feeling a lot worse than that feeling. It's an age-old uncertainty and it definitely would have left me gasping helplessly at empty words that wouldn't come in the past. But, this was now, and after all this time, I had come to realize that sometimes the regret isn't worth trying to spare my comfort.

"Maybe," I repeated, with more strength, "we don't have to not fit."

Her brow furrowed, like she was lost with a map, but one written in an alien language. It made her look oddly disarmed, and gave me just enough reason to press on.

"Just because we don't get along, doesn't mean we have to stay that way." I looked down at my ratty pants, and started picking at the seams absentmindedly to try to hide the heat on my face. "We can be civil to each other. We've both apologized to each other for things, so it's not like we're totally unable to be decent around each-other."

"You didn't actually say you were sorry."

"You were the one who called it an apology, not me." I said with a raised eyebrow.

She grunted in assent, but didn't sound too happy about it.

"And, for the record, I am. Sorry, I mean. For before, and for now. I've never been good with my temper."

She ignored my apology, and started to tap her finger on the table impatiently as she stared me down. "So, what, you're under the delusion that, somehow, if I tell you my life story, we'll magically become friends?"

I rolled my eyes. I wasn't sure if she honestly thought I was that stupid, or if she was just being sarcastic. "No, I just- I think we should try. That's it."

"Do you now?" She said as she tilted her head back,and looked down at me through her nose. "Why the sudden change of heart? Do I need to remind you that last night you were all closed doors and secrets, too? What was it that you said? 'Maybe I'll tell you if you become my survival buddie'?" She mocked in venomous falsetto, which was weird since my voice was deeper than hers.

"I didn't want to." I blurted on impulse, long before my filter realized words were going to my mouth. Her bewildered look made me realize that, once again, I was not being clear.

"About what you said last night, about how you'd think I would have joined a survival group. I didn't want to join any group, or be around anybody in general. I…" I opened my mouth and closed it again, losing my already loose grip on the words that were coming from my mouth. I hadn't ever tried to talk to anyone about this before, what the hell was I thinking?

Oh, right, I wasn't. I let the word vomit flow.

"My mom, she uh," I wet my lips and swallowed the stone in my throat. "she died. Really, really early into all of this. My stepdad too. All I wanted to be left alone, and by the time I stopped wanting the whole world to just leave me alone, almost everyone had already cleared out of the city. No more groups to join, really, that's all there really was to it."

I rubbed the nape of my neck roughly, looking down as I started to feel the buzzing tiptoe of embarrassment beginning to sink into me. Was it weird that I suddenly just brought it up again? She probably thought I was a baby now, or something. I silently cursed myself for just talking like that.

"Was she killed?"

I looked back up to see Annabeth staring back at me, her expression cautious, but I could see the barest twinkle of dull curiosity in her eyes. I had to wonder if she was only asking that because the silent treatment would be cold even in her book, or some other reason. I had to wonder if she lost one of her parents in the apocalypse too… well, the one that wasn't a god, anyways.

I shrugged a shoulder and looked away again. "Yeah. They both were." A beat. "Is your family…?"

I could feel her stiffen in her seat. "That's none of-" she started, but caught herself, and my eyes went back to her. She looked like she was wrestling with something internally for a second, but we made eye contact and she shook her head. "It's a complicated situation."

"My dad ditched and I've had two stepdads." I said, my tone just cold enough that it would probably give a social worker heartburn. "I can get complicated. Unless you're talking about the non-human side of your family."

She sent me a cutting look, but it looked like it was out of annoyance more than anger. I could see her mind whirling like it was a machine behind her tempered glare, like she was hastily weighing options and calculating outcomes. Her face cleared and she shot me another warning look before she spoke again.

"The truth is, I have no idea how my family is doing, but…" She bit her lip, "at this point, I doubt they're alive. Who knows. Maybe my dad managed to think up some sort of plan, but keeping everyone safe, that's… difficult." For maybe about a solid second, I could see guilt peeking through her eyes. I had to wonder what, exactly, brought her all the way up this far north, and why she was traveling alone, but those questions could wait.

"Well… I survived," I offered hopefully, "and I didn't even know about the Greek stuff until now, and I'd imagine your dad knows all about it like you, right?"

She gave me an odd look. "He's a mortal who can see through the mist."

I blinked in surprise. "He can do that?"

"Quite a few mortals can, actually. No one really knows why, because it's not hereditary, or have anything to do with experiences. Some are just born unlucky."

"Alright… well, then if I survived, he'd probably have no trouble, as long as he avoided rioters."

"That's a nice thought," She mumbled to herself absentmindedly.

I frowned, unable to shake the impression that there was more on her mind than just whether or not her family was okay. I briefly wondered if I should press the subject, but I figured that I shouldn't test my luck. As… difficult as it may be, I knew I was going to have to share things first if I wanted any chance of her responding to my questions about her. I decided a change in subject was needed.

"I think my mom would have liked you- so long as she didn't know you tried to stab me, then she'd probably have second thoughts." I said as i leaned back in the chair until I was teetering precariously on two legs, trying to keep my posture as light as my voice "You're, well, I dunno, you did ultimately save my life, so she'd definitely like you for that, but, it's more about you. You have this no bullshit attitude that I think she would respect."

I could see her fidget slightly in her seat, her lips turning up just slightly, which made her look wholly smug, but it turned back down pretty fast."Were the two of you… close?"

"She was my mom. Until she married my first stepdad, it was just the two of us. Hard not to be, especially when it's her."

"What was she like?"

"The best," I sighed, "I can count the number of times she was actually mad at anyone on one hand, but, at the same time, she wasn't a pushover, either. She just had her own way of doing things, kinda rebellious, but like, in a quiet sort of way. More like defiant, I guess. She wouldn't let anyone or anything get to her, she could soldier through anything like it didn't even bother her"

I twined my fingers together, squeezing at them and interlocking them over and over as my eyes dropped down to my lap. "She did too. I didn't exactly make things simple for her, since I wasn't exactly what you'd call a 'model student' by any means, but she never complained about it. She worked hard to support me-had to quit college too. She had such a hard life, even before she had me, but you'd never know if you met her. She was always smiling. She deserved a hell of a lot better than what she ended up with in life."

By the time I was finished talking, my fingers were tangled in knots and my throat felt thick. I wasn't all teary-eyed just yet, but I knew that it wouldn't take much for that to happen at this point, which was pretty embarrassing.

"It must have been tough, losing her." I heard her say, making me realize I had gone silent. When I looked up to face her, her expression was oddly neutral. "I'd say I'm sorry, but I know firsthand how pathetically empty that sounds, but I can sympathize, if that's any consolation."

"Ha, not really," I chuckled lightly and shook my head. "that's actually just kinda depressing, Annabeth."

She frowned, and grumbled, "Well, I guess that's why they always had Malcolm be the grief counselor."

"Malcolm?"

She looked surprised, like she hadn't expected me to hear her or something. She shimmied in her seat, like she was having a rapid-fire debate with herself before her eyes turned back to mine. "A brother."

"Oh… did he…?"

"Die? No, not since I last saw him." she said, her voice confident, but she gnawed on a fingernail slightly before she spoke. "He's smart and resourceful. It'll take a little more than the collapse of western civilization or a couple of monsters to take him out."

"Wait," I furrowed my brow. "I thought you said you doubted your family was-"

She cut me off, "Malcolm is my half brother, he's never so much as met my dad."

My my mouth fell open just a little. "Wait, do you mean he's a…?" I gestured for her to continue.

Her jaw set, and I was sure that she was going to give me the silent treatment again, but she heaved out a heavy sigh and gave me a somewhat defeated look. "Yeah, maternal half-siblings."

"So then the two of you have the same mom, right?"

"That's what maternal means," she muttered under her breath.

"Annabeth, you know what I mean." I said, starting to feel the frustration tinge my words after dancing around the topic for so long.

"That doesn't mean I have to answer your implied question." She said dryly, her eyes wandering the room, like she was looking for some sort of escape route that wouldn't make her leg an issue.

"Why? Annabeth, look," I made a hopelessly vague gesture with my hands, and froze halfway, leaving them hanging in front of me, which probably made me look like an idiot. "I know you're a demigod. You've told me your dad is a regular…-ish guy, so that really only leaves one thing for your mom to be. I already told you, I'm not going to go and just tell anyone about you, so you don't have to worry about your secret, so what's the issue?"

"Percy, we've talked for a grand total of two hours," She stated it like it was a fact, which, well, it kind of was. "and I'm not exactly vying for someone to vent to about my problems, especially not when it's someone I barely know."

"Then think of me as unbiased," I snapped irritably,and we traded glares. I sighed, breaking eye contact first and running a hand down my face. No fighting, I reminded myself, not after I finally started talking to her properly. More diplomatically, I spoke, "Look, I'm not going to screw you over, or anything. I said we should take a crack at being something other than at each-other's throats, right?"

She shook her head. "That doesn't mean I'm going to tell you everything about me. Most friends don't even do that, so can we just drop it?"

I opened my mouth to argue, but just before the words made it out of my mouth caught a tired look on her eyes, and the words fizzled into nothing. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, to steady my thoughts.

The goal: Don't be an asshole. If I can remember how to actually be nice, then act that way.

"Alright, fine, you win." I held up my hands in surrender.

Her mouth may have dropped just a little, and that reaction may just have been worth it. Seeing Annabeth caught off guard was actually pretty gratifying, especially since I was the cause.

I rolled my eyes at her. "You don't have to act so surprised."

That seemed to snap her out of it. Her grey eyes glinted with curiosity, which made me wonder if she was trying to figure out if I was trying to get something out of her with the move. I can't really blame her for thinking like that, for all my talk about trying to actually be decent people to each-other, it was still just talk.

"I just thought you'd put up more resistance, after all that talk about being determined yesterday."

"I told you, I'm not that determined, just more determined than most looters." I said with a shrug.

She hummed, her expression still skeptical, but it was slowly becoming a little more smug. "I guess so."

"You say that like it's a bad thing."

"Don't be ridiculous." She teased.

Whatever," I grumbled, "where were we anyways?"

She slumped over the table with a small sigh, and propped her head up with her hand. "I don't know. I think I was explaining the fluid nature of the gods before you started talking about half-bloods."

"Half-bloods? You mean-"

She held up a hand to quiet me. "Same thing. Just safer."

I gave her a confused look, "What?"

She grunted, straightening her posture up a little. "Words are powerful. When you speak them, you invoke the presence of whatever it is you're talking about. When it comes to being a half-blood, saying the proper term for half-blood has a quality of being an open invitation for every malevolent supernatural entity within ten square miles rushing to your door looking for the chance to disembowel you."

I nodded slowly at that pleasant thought, as my blood slowly turned to ice as I counted up the times I said demigod in the past few minutes. I think it was four. Four public invitations to disembowel me. I'm gonna sleep well tonight.

I must have looked pretty freaked out, because Annabeth's brow furrowed at me and she gave me what she probably thought was a reassuring smile. "Don't worry about you saying it. You're mortal. A lot of monsters don't view you as important enough to listen in on, so you have some leeway where I don't." A beat, "you should still probably stick to half-blood from now on as a precaution."

I shot her a dirty look, and she held up her hands innocently. "Didn't you use the name of those snake woman earlier?"

She frowned, like she wanted to correct me on the whole snake woman vs. dracowhatevers, but instead she just waved me off. "Nonspecific terms. The more unique a name is to a concept, the more dangerous it is to say it. There are thousands of 'snake woman', it's more like a species name than anything, so unless one was actually close, it's fairly safe to say it."

"You didn't say it just now."

"Precaution."

I mouthed 'right' down at the table, shaking my head slightly. I'd honestly bet she was too wrapped up in trying to correct me earlier to remember the chance of summoning more scimitar swinging maniac snake women while she was injured and I was still pretty sore myself.

"You sound like you have a lot of experience with monsters."

"Whole life, remember?"

"Yeah, but," I tapped a finger loudly on the table. "You can see them, right? Couldn't you just avoid them?"

She laughed humorlessly and a tired look took over her face again. "If it was that easy, I wouldn't be in this mess. No, monsters seek out half-bloods to try to kill them from an early age, because half-bloods are the most capable of fighting back against monsters. Better to go after your predator while it's still your prey, right?"

"What?" For a second, the sickness I felt from earlier was renewed. She said it so casually, like monsters attack her was almost a joke to her. It seemed wrong. "Annabeth, that's…"

"Life?" She completed sardonically.

"I was gonna say awful." It was no wonder she had that tired look about her. I'd only had one encounter with a monster and I already wished I never had to see a snake woman or any other evil Greek demons ever again. The thought of them chasing me around my entire life, it sounded exhausting at best and more likely fatal.

She shook her head at me, her ponytail swaying urgently as she did. I stared a bit. "It's survival, Percy. It's what everyone is doing nowadays, but unlike everyone, I've been preparing for this for years. In a way, I guess I can be thankful."

I pursed my lips, unable to find a response to that. She certainly had a point. Annabeth was like a spring-loaded machine, toned and ready for action at the drop of the hat. Before the end of the world, while I wasn't really out of shape, I was certainly a lot more fit now, if a little bit skinnier than was really needed. I had to learn a lot about fighting from bad experiences of being on the wrong end of a knife more than once. If someone tried to jump Annabeth in an alley, I would fear for what Annabeth would do to them more than I would fear for her safety. But still, was that preparedness worth a life of being chased by monsters?

"Pensive isn't your best look."

I startled. Annabeth was staring at me, just the slightest bit amused.

"I was just thinking."

"That's what pensive means."

"Thank you, Miss SAT vocabulary." I scoffed.

She raised an eyebrow at me, and tapped her foot, like she was waiting for me to continue.

"Do you ever wish you had been born… I dunno, normal?"

The question seemed to surprise her, but more so that it was coming from me than the question itself. Still, it seemed to throw her off enough for her to start shifting her weight around in her chair. She folded her arms tightly, almost like she was trying to give herself a huge but forgot how to do it properly.

"It would have been easier, definitely," She said slowly, "but I can't confidently say I would rather have been mortal. My life would be far too different. Hell, I'd be too different." She adopted a faraway look, like she was thinking about someone else entirely when she said that. I figured that I should probably leave it at that.

"Alright," I breathed, "Sorry for hounding you about the half-blood stuff."

"It's fine."

Annabeth didn't look like she wanted to talk anymore. I kind of felt bad, to be honest, even if she did offer to explain everything to me, having to explain things for so long to someone who barely understood must have been tiring. On top of that, she was injured. The air was rapidly becoming as awkward as the silence, and I shuffled my feet against the floor for a few minutes before eventually deciding that the whole atmosphere was probably shot for the day. Annabeth looked like she was borderline catatonic with how unfocused her gaze was, and I was probably going to explode if I didn't stop sitting down soon.

"Look, if you want, I can-" I started to say, but was cut off from a sound coming from outside.

It sounded like the engine of a monster truck revving to life after years of disuse combined with nails on a chalkboard somewhere in the background. It sent chills down my spine, made my breath hitch, and tied an anchor of dread to my stomach. I gave Annabeth a panicked look, and found her reaction was similar. She was stiff as a board.

"Oh gods," she whispered so quietly I could barely hear her voice under her breath. "that couldn't have-"

She was silence by another growl, this time, somehow, deeper and more angry-sounding than the last.

I felt like I had been frozen to my chair, and my lungs had fallen out of my chest. Annabeth gave me a warning look, as if to say 'don't make a sound.'.

I gulped, and sucked in a haggard breath as quietly as I could. I nodded my head toward the wall and mouthed to her, 'monster?'.

Her eyes darted from side to side, before she nodded and mouthed back a 'Yes.'.

As if on cue, the monster growled again.

AN: Uh-oh, spaghettios. These two can't catch a break.

Three weeks and 2 days. Improvement. not two weeks, but an improvement. Hopefully once school dies down I'll be able to actually follow my schedule. Also, I'm currently looking for a beta-reader! If you're interested in Beta-ing this story (or any of my pjo-related filth) don't hesitate to shoot me a PM.

I hope you enjoyed the chapter, and have a wonderful day.