Disclaimer: I do not own Percy Jackson and the Olympians or Heroes of Olympus

I'm really really sorry! I hope none of you are mad, and I know it's been a week(?) since I updated the story, I've just been swamped in school. I had a ton of PreCalculus homework that I needed to catch up on, finals to study for, and just a lot of stuff to do in general to get ready for the new trimester that started yesterday.

I hope all of you are understanding about this, and I hope you'll forgive but here's Chapter 11 Branch 1!

Percy's POV

For the first time in weeks, I had a dream, or more accurately, a nightmare. A really, really bad nightmare, even by my standards

I was in the air. Nothing was under my feet supporting me, nobody was there holding me, I just… was.

I couldn't see anything around me, except dark fog, as if I was in a stormy night sky.

I looked around, frantically. I knew I shouldn't be in the sky, it was never a good thing for a child of Poseidon to be in the sky, but I had no way to get down.

The wind was ripping at my clothes, and skin, the cold biting at my exposed skin.

Suddenly, I could hear voices, taunting me. I couldn't figure out where they were coming from, and they didn't sound anything like anyone or anything I'd ever encountered.

They were just whispers, quiet, but they sounded like they were cutting into my consciousness.

"Son of the Sea" I heard, "you are not wanted anymore. Your friends aren't loyal to you, they only treated you as a friend until you were no longer needed for their survival."

"No!" I yelled back, "That's not true, my friends still care, they didn't let me die!"

"You know that isn't true, the only person who did anything to help you was the son of Hades, and you know now why he did."

The voices seemed to be swirling around my head, coming from every direction.

"They wouldn't miss you if you were gone, they only needed you as a weapon, and as such, now that you are no longer needed, they only need to discard you."

"I can't- The voices intensified immediately cutting off my own thoughts "No! You aren't needed, wanted, or useful for anything or anyone! You're "friends" don't care, they have no feelings for you. Your fellow campers have lost their need for you, and your own father hasn't contacted you in any way for over a year."

I collapsed to my knees, clamping my hands over my ears, trying to block out the voices, but they were still there, repeating over and over the same message. No one needs you, no one wants you.

I fell to my side, hands over my ears, eyes shut tight, muttering to myself "They care, someone cares, anyone…"

I woke up back in my bed, muscles tight, flinching from the fear and tension of the dream. My hands were gripping my sheets so tight that my knuckles were white, and my pillow was damp where my head was lying.

I let go the sheets and tried to stop shaking. I couldn't get what the voices had said out of my mind. No one needs me, no one wants me.

I could feel the depression setting in again, worse than it had ever been before.

I got up and walked to my nightstand. I pulled open the drawer and pulled my journal out, and went back to my bed, sitting on the edge.

I stared at the cover, unable to straighten my thoughts out.

No one cared for me. I didn't have any purpose any more.

I opened my journal looking at what all the stories and adventures that I'd written down.

There was still a tinge of red at the edge of a couple of the pages. I must've dropped it onto the floor the last time.

It was still the night when I finished reading the entire thing again. I was going to put the journal down, but the pages shifted over a bit and I saw the edge of something written on the next page. I knew I hadn't written any more than what I was already looking at, and it wasn't in my handwriting.

I flipped the page over to see notes written in it. Was that why Nico had set it by my bed while I was in the infirmary? I started reading the notes.

They were similar in how they were written, words of encouragement from my friends, although they had personality in them. Leo's had some humor in it, Jason's was very straightforward, Nico's was more understanding because he had been through the same thing when he lost Bianca, the girls' were more emotional.

I finished reading through all of them and got to the last note, and was surprised to see that I was familiar with the handwriting.

Annabeth had written a note?

I read it, and found that I was smiling when I finished it. It was filled with emotion, I could tell that immediately. She apologized for breaking up with me several times through it, told me she still cared, and that she was wrong thinking that I didn't mean very much to her. There were also some water spots on the page that I suspected were marks left by tears dripping onto the paper while she had been writing it.

It made me smile to read the notes, but I didn't know how I felt about Annabeth's note. I was happy that she felt the way she did, but I don't know how I still feel about her. She hurt me when she did that to me, and I couldn't forgive her for that. I wanted to, but it hurt to think about that day.

I put the journal away in the drawer and went back to bed. The last thoughts going through my head before I drifted off were of my friends, and that they hoped I knew that I was still wanted here.

That's it! I hope you forgive odd writing, or spelling errors, I'm very sleep deprived right now and finishing this in school, so I hope you enjoyed this! I hope that you forgive me for taking so long to update. I'll try to update more quickly now that I'm not as busy. Please review, and I hope to see you all in the next chapter!