THANK YOU ALL FOR YOUR REVIEWS, FAVORITES, FOLLOWS, AND EVEN VIEWS! And I am so, so, so, so, so sorry for not updating sooner; it's been crazy with random interruptions of my internet connection and all my family's cleaning and my babysitting. No excuse though, I know.

Anyway, this, people, is gonna drive you insane! Just read. :P

I DO NOT OWN.

Skydiving

Katie Gardner's POV

The whole thing was Katie's grandfather's idea, after he saw Percy jump off the roof for the first time.

She really didn't know how he could have only witnessed the act just that summer, after all the times that Percy had been at their home since she was seven. Seriously, they were nine now. It took two years to know that Percy had this weird obsession with the sky?!

It was ridiculous.

She groaned and followed the two to her grandpa's home. If only Percy hadn't leapt off the roof… again. If only Pops hadn't noticed it because Percy always jumped off the roof. If only her grandfather did not have his own personal airplane that he could fly.

She might as well write her will now.

"Katie, what's wrong?" her dad, who was behind her holding a video camera, asked.

She turned to face him, walking backwards. "What makes you ask that? And why're you holding a video camera? We'll be up in the sky, ya know."

He furrowed his brows. "Katie, you're avoiding the answer. What's wrong?"

Her nose twitched, and she blinked a couple of times quickly. "Nothing. Absolutely nothing."

Percy bumped her shoulder, an evil smirk on his face—seriously, the smirk would make the devil jealous; that's how evil it looked. "Yeah, Butterfly, what's wrong?" he mocked, fingering the top of his sunglasses.

Katie glared at him. "Okay, ya wanna know what's wrong? Here's what's wrong—I'm about to die because of you."

His smirk only widened. "Now, what makes you say that?" He dashed off when she lunged for him.

Wimp.

She muttered under her breath about death-bringing best friends and stomped after her grandfather, who was opening the garage door. "And presenting… da da da dun!" he exclaimed, lifting the door to reveal one of those old timey airplanes that have a propeller on the nose and only two seats.

Two seats that don't have any way of keeping the riders in, besides seatbelts.

Great.

Katie forced a smile on her face and bumped Percy to gain his attention. She pointed, even though he couldn't see her finger, at the plane. "There's a propeller. It's this weird shade of yellow, almost brown like. The plane itself is red. And—" She looked at Grandpa. "Did you name it?" she asked him.

He nodded. "Irene. Named it like a boat. Painted on its side."

She continued, "Its name is Irene and the name is painted right over here." She dragged Percy over to the left side of the airplane, which had the name painted in a fancy script in gold.

Percy traced his fingers over the name, and then placed his palm on the old, peeling paint. "Let's get this thing up in the air!" A smile broke out on his face, and he leapt up onto a wing before seating himself in the back seat. For someone who was just skin over bone, he had some wicked moves.

Grandpa made a strangling noise in the back of his throat, like this somehow bothered him, but gave a tight smile and pulled up a ladder to the plane for him to use. He pointed at the seat Percy was in. "Katie, you can just sit in the same seat as Percy is. You're both small enough."

Percy winced slightly at the description, and she climbed into the back of the plane, not as gracefully as Percy and not bothering to use the ladder like her grandfather; besides, he was moving way too slow for her taste. "Move over," she ordered Percy. He grumbled to himself, but obliged her order.

It was a nice change, to have her giving the orders instead of him.

Her grandfather finally made it into his seat in the airplane, and he handed her and Percy a pair of goggles, saying they were for safety reasons and that we should not take them off.

"He didn't say we had to actually put them on," Percy muttered to Katie, and he did just as he had just pointed out. He had those sunglasses anyway.

Dad, whom she had forgotten was even in the garage, patted the side of the plane. "I'll be video tapin' the whole thing from down 'ere, guys. And when you get down, there'll be a picnic."

She leaned over the side and gave her father a tight smile, the goggle's suction pulling on her skin. "Kay, Dad. We'll be fine."

Liar. Oh, she was a liar. Nothing was ever "fine" with Percy around.

Her dad gave a smile in return and walked briskly out of the garage door.

Then they were off, speeding down the dirt runway, slowly rising into the air, soaring across the sky.

It was exhilarating. Katie could understand now why Percy yearned for the sky, to be up so high. It was unexplainable, but it was there. She never wanted to leave.

She threw her hands up. "This is amazing!" she screamed, wind whipping at her face. "Really, really amazing!" She laughed.

The words were caught in the wind, but Pops heard her—he turned his head slightly and gave her a thumbs up and sly grin—and Percy heard it.

He bumped his shoulder against hers. "Hey, wanna go skydiving?" His mischievous grin was back.

Crap.

She shouldn't have said that.

"No!" she screamed over the wind.

He raised an eyebrow. "Okay, your loss. I'm goin'." He pulled himself out of the seat and crawled over the side, going to the left wing.

She quickly began getting out of the seat as well, her hands clamping onto the side of the plane. "There aren't even any parachutes! How are ya gonna skydive of there aren't any parachutes?!"

Turning to face her from the wing, arms spread wide in a shrug, he grinned at her. "It's my way of skydivin'." His voice was calm, like he knew exactly what he was doing—even though he was on the wing of a plane high up in the air, and if he fell he would go splat! Katie didn't even know how high they were—1,000, 2,000 feet? More?—but she knew that it was not possible to survive a fall that far without anything to slow it down.

It was suicidal.

Katie couldn't help but wonder what made suicidal things so intriguing to Percy.

"Your way is gonna get you killed then," she told him, trying to figure out a way to get onto the wing without, you know, dying.

Death by falling off a plane while trying to save best friend from doing something stupid—only she would get that one in a gazillion possibility.

By now her grandpa had noticed Percy on the left wing, and his eyes widened behind his goggles. "What are ya doin' on there, boy?" His voice was high with panic. "Get down!" The plane swerved slightly, but Percy held his ground, not even swaying.

Stupid, she thought. Don't say down, because he'll get down.

"Watch out, Pops. You don't want me to fall, do you?" Percy asked. Her grandfather quickly straightened out the airplane, not daring to turn.

"Fall to your doom!" Katie shouted, leaning onto the edge, undecided on whether she should stay safe in the seat or hop onto that wing and follow that crazed child.

He began stepping backwards, closer and closer to the tip of the wing. "Okay, Pops. I'll get down. I'll start falling to my 'doom.'" His lips twitched into that totally unbearable smirk and arms spread wide, he started falling, falling, falling down.

That was it for her. She leapt up from the seat and landed on the wing in a crouch. Quickly standing, she balanced her way over to the tip of the wing, where Percy had started his descend into doom. "Katie Gardner!" her grandfather shouted. "What are you doing?! Didn't your teachers teach you anything?! When a friend jumps off a cliff, you don't have to!" He was practically hyperventilating.

She sighed. "That's the thing, Grandpa. When Percy tells you to jump, you ask how high. Anybody who follows him will tell you the same thing." She glanced back at him—his agape mouth and wide eyes. "Sorry, but when Percy does some'in', people follow, even if it does seem fatal."

Katie looked down and noticed a large lake below them. She remembered that if people fall from a really great height, landing on water was like going ka-splat on concrete. Grimacing, she readied herself for the final jump, her final leap of faith. Then, she fell, just like Percy had.

I wonder if I land hard enough, I can literally dig my own grave, she wondered as she plummeted faster and faster. An underwater grave always seemed pretty cool.

Her arms and legs were flailing, and she was twisting and turning and flipping over and over. She knew she should stay still, that she would slow down that way, but her natural instincts were screaming at her to reach out and grab something—anything—to stop her. Wind was sucking the air from her lungs and freezing her skin. Her ears were filled with only the howling of it as she fell. Everything was foggy and her sense of direction was failing her.

Then through her goggles, she spotted a sky blue dot—Percy Jackson's shirt.

He was perfectly still, arms together over his head and legs slightly bent behind him. He easily came to her, or maybe it was she went to him. "Stick out your arm and legs," he ordered her, now back to the usual.

Her brain told her instead to reach out and slap him, but her body followed his orders without her telling it to; it was like he had trained her to do everything he said, which was stupid, because it was bound to be her end. She asked over the wind, "Now what?" Since she was finally gaining control over her emotions, she realized that he was somehow still wearing those wretched sunglasses, and his beanie was clutched in his hand, allowing his charcoal black hair to flow freely in the wind; his chain was trailing him, snapping and clinking every few seconds.

"Dive into the lake!" With that, he turned his head to the ground and began diving to the lake.

What?!

His body sliced through the wind like he was already diving through water. Just to show off, he did a dozen flips in the air, body tightly tucked in, before he straightened out and did a perfect dive into the water.

Katie's turn was approaching like lightning. She wasn't ready. She wasn't ready. She wasn't ready!

Too bad, gravity seemed to say.

And Katie dove into the stinging water, the warmth it gained from the summer sun a relief from the bitter, biting cold of the sky. She opened her eyes to the strangely clear water of the lake. For a short while, she just sat (floated—whatever) there, at the bottom of the lake, before her lungs began burning for oxygen. She kicked off the bottom, gasping and coughing as she surfaced.

Dad was waving from the edge, body soaking from his dip in the water he had taken to search for his daughter… and Percy. She gulped in breaths of air and began swimming toward her father, clothes weighing her down.

Upon arrival, her father and grandfather, who had landed the plane as soon as she jumped, had yanked her out of the water. "Katie, what were you thinking?" her dad shouted at her, clutching at her shoulders.

She shrugged. "That I had to follow. It's what I do."

"You could have died!" His face looked more bewildered than worried now.

"Yeah. And so could have Percy. But we're fine." Percy. Where was that maniac anyways? She shoved off her dad's hands. "Hey, speaking of Percy, where is he?" She scanned the surface of the lake, which was much bigger than it had seemed from thousands of feet in the air. "Percy!" she called, hands cupped around her mouth.

Grandpa walked up to her, placing a gentle hand on her shoulder. "He—he hasn't surfaced yet. We don't think he… made it. I'm sorry."

She made a face at him. "Well, that's an idiotic notion. Of course Percy made it. He wouldn't just experience one of the most amazing things ever and not make it. He's gonna show up and rub it in my face that I was scared, and as it turns out it was for nothing, because that was awesome." She meant it, too. The whole free falling thing—she would never be able to call it "skydiving"—was fantastic. Once she got over the whole I-am-going-to-die part, which was when she hit the surface of the water, she realized that it was, to put simply, epic; it was epic.

E-P-I-C.

Katie plopped down on the edge of the lake, basking in the sun, awaiting her best friend. Everyone was silent. The only sounds were those of birds chirping and the occasional fish darting in the water.

For a whole minute and a half it was like this.

She began to worry. Surely not even Percy could hold his breath this long, especially not after having the wind steal his breath away?

She began to panic as the minute grew.

"Honey," her father started, but she was already off, surging through the water, calling his name over and over.

"Percy! Percy! Percy, where are you?"

"Katie, get back here," someone sighed, and then there were arms around her waist, dragging her out of the water.

"No! I have to find Percy!" she screeched, turning on the person, fist ready to strike. When she finally saw the person, all she could say was, "Oh."

He was crunching an apple, propping his sunglasses up higher onto his nose. "Yeah," he said "'oh,' to you, too. Don't you remember your dad mentioning a picnic?" He waved the apple around. "I've been sittin' over there, waitin' for you guys to come over 'nd eat, but no, I have to come and get you guys. And look at you—screamin' and all in the lake. Get out." He waved his hand and headed for the red and white picnic blanket.

She didn't understand the look bit, but she followed him anyways, passing by her wonderstruck father and grandfather. "Yes, Percy." She turned to the wonderstruck duo. "Told you." Then she muttered to herself, "I can't believe I actually got worried like that."

Katie's punishment was Percy constantly teasing her about being scared to skydive and then being scared that he was dead.

After that little incident with them falling from a plane and all, the guardians didn't allow Katie and Percy to even get close to the airplane. It was against the rules—seriously, there was a sign and everything.

But that didn't stop them.

Percy, using that insanely big brain of his, had built a remote control to the airplane so it could fly, like it was on autopilot; he had her help, of course—for her eyes.

And when her grandpa and dad left, even for only a short while, they would sprint to the garage and switch on the engine. Percy would set the remote control on the ground, and the plane would lift off.

Then, at the right height and over the right place, they would fall—first Percy, always Percy, and then Katie.

She was learning, too. That moment, before you jump off the diving board for the first time since the summer before, where your heart rate speeds up slightly and you tuck your arms in, was disappearing for her. She would hesitate at first, but only at first, because then she would be falling, falling, falling. She would flip and twist because she wanted to, and she would scream with exhilaration every single time.

She even began to do free falls where she didn't dive into the lake.

But the feeling was always electric, whether she landed in the water or onto trees. With her blood pumping and wind tearing every single worry from her, it always seemed so perfect.

And Katie kind of, sort of, maybe understood Percy's pull to these suicidal things now.

Explanation: Okay, if you cannot tell by now, I love loopholes. In The Lightning Thief, Percy said he had never been on a plane because his family didn't have the money. Well, I took that and made it to where he had been on a plane without the need for money, but his mother never knew. And the whole sky thing? You'll see.

Peace and all that other stuff.

~XxxXGreek GeekXxxX