Chapter 3

Percy felt horrible after the crash. He blamed himself for the entire thing, he was supposed to check on the condition of the chariot to prevent that type of accident from happening, yet he clearly didn't check as thoroughly as he should've. Now Annabeth was in the infirmary.

Malcolm had left the infirmary after a few hours, his broken arm was the major injury that he had gotten in the crash. He had a concussion but after a few ambrosia crackers, it was gone.

Percy had tried to talk to the son of Athena, mainly to find out what had caused the crash. He wasn't sure if combat wear had done that or if he had failed to check it. Instead of getting an answer, Malcolm all but told him to go screw himself. He tried to get Malcolm to talk to him but after being yelled at enough times, he figured he'd just wait until Annabeth came out of the infirmary.

Now he was waiting near the armory for her. She'd have to pass the armory to get to her cabin and that's when he'd ask her about what happened.

Percy's brain went through every possible reason for the crash. He'd done his walk around and found nothing. Hektor had even tightened a loose bolt, which was the only thing that Percy could think of that could cause such a catastrophic failure. That was the reason they had decided to go with celestial bronze reinforcements in the first place since the design's critical weak point lied in the bolts. If a bolt was loose, this type of thing could very well happen.

Percy's thoughts were broken when he heard the sound of footsteps. He looked over and found Annabeth walking towards cabin six, she looked okay, and she was walking fine. Malcolm had a cast wrapped around his arm, but Annabeth looked like a million drachma.

"Annabeth!" He said excitedly as he swiftly made his way over.

Annabeth looked over at him and stopped for him. He was just about to ask her what happened when she grabbed him and judo-flipped him.

Percy's back hit the ground with a thud, the air was knocked out of him as he did so. He gasped, partially out of pain. He looked up to see Annabeth glaring down at him, her gray eyes full of fury aimed at him.

"Annabeth—"

"Shut up!" She said, "I don't want to hear a word out of you. You caused this whole thing because you decided to be lazy, I could've gotten hurt because of you, no, I did get hurt because of you!"

"Annabeth, I didn't—"

"You didn't what?" She asked angrily, "I'll tell you what you didn't do. You didn't check the chariot correctly!"

"I swear I did!" He said as he got to his feet, "I did everything, I checked the bolts and the wheels!"

"Oh, so an Eidolon must've just swooped in with a wrench and loosened one of the bolts then, right?!" She exclaimed, "Stop lying to me and just admit you messed up!"

"You have to believe me, I didn't do anything wrong!" Percy pleaded with her.

"Percy, you're asking me to believe you after you and Hektor were the only ones in the stables. I know those bolts didn't become loose on their own!"

"Then ask Hektor, he tightened one of the bolts!"

Her eyes grew angrier, "Yeah, because you missed it! Seriously, Percy, you need to go look in the mirror and think long and hard about what you're doing because this is ridiculous. This entire thing should've never happened, we both should've been laughing at Piper and Jason when I beat them but instead, I ended up in the infirmary because of something you did!"

At this point, Percy was distressed. He hadn't done anything wrong, he'd done his very best during chariot inspection. He'd tried his best and now he was being told his best wasn't enough.

The pain of losing the race was nothing compared to being accused of negligence by his own girlfriend. She didn't believe him at all. Yes, he understood how suspicious this whole thing looked, he was the last one in the stables after all, but he had no reason not to check the chariots to make sure there were working correctly.

"Malcolm can't even train for weeks now because his sword arm is busted." Annabeth said, "He's pissed at you. Do yourself a favor and don't come around my cabin for a while."

Percy watched as she turned and walked away from him. For the first time in a while, he felt tears rising up in his eyes. It had been so long since he'd actually cried but now, he just had to. He was so overwhelmed and distressed that his emotions came bubbling to the top in the form of warm sad tears.

He walked away, wiping his eyes as he did so. He didn't want anyone seeing him crying, they'd probably just use it as a joke against him.

He knew he should talk about his emotions with someone, but he didn't want to. He didn't want to look weak, he didn't want to burden anyone. After all, how could he be crying when it was Annabeth and Malcolm who took the fall for his mistakes?

He made his way to his cabin, a horrible feeling creeping into his stomach. He'd given up on wiping away the tears flowing down his face and dripping onto the grass below. He just clambered up the steps to his cabin door, opened the door, and silently shut it behind him before sinking to his knees.

Percy didn't know what constituted a mental breakdown, but he was certain that was what he was experiencing at the moment. His emotions ran wild as his tears kept coming. By now, he'd started to openly weep in the lonely solitude of his cabin. The cabin itself seemed to share his sadness, as if it understood his pain. The walls grew dimmer, the fountain was quieter in its gurgling, and the temperature dropped drastically.

"Dad, help me." He pleaded to the ceiling, hoping his dad would come and help him out of this situation.

Poseidon never came.

Ω

Days had passed and Percy only fell deeper and deeper into depression. He was alone, none of his friends seemed to want to talk to him. Jason always tried to end their conversations as quick as possible, Piper was the same way, Leo was always too busy, and Annabeth was still angry at him.

He'd tried to talk to her, he'd even apologized for the accident despite the fact that he wasn't even responsible, yet she still gave him the cold shoulder. She wasn't yelling at him anymore, but the silence was just as deafening.

He tried to keep an upbeat attitude about everything, eventually all this would be behind him. Someday, he'd look back at this as just a bad stroke of luck that he'd be able to laugh about. Yet every time he was alone, he found himself either becoming numb to everything around him, or letting a couple of tears fall.

Percy wasn't afraid to admit it, he felt broken. He felt alone, tired, and lost. Picking up the pieces of himself was starting to grow harder by the day. His heart felt like it was being stabbed each time he heard someone mention his name and the chariot race in the same sentence, no one knew how terrified he was when he saw Annabeth disappear under that chariot.

By now, he'd tried calling out to his dad, mainly for some help. Even if his dad just came to give him a hug or something, he'd be happy. Yet despite all his calls, his dad never answered. He'd tried calling Tyson and he did get an answer, but after only a couple of minutes, Tyson had to hang up.

At this point, he was heavily considering going to his mom's place, maybe he'd ride out the summer there. If he was there, he'd have a great support system with his mom and Paul, all the while managing to stay out of everyone's way here at camp. Yet he didn't want to bother her, she'd just had his baby sister, Estelle, and the last thing they needed was for him to show up and cause trouble.

If Percy had to describe the feeling, it was like sinking into the ocean with a cement block tied to your feet. Everything around him felt dark and depressing. He wasn't sure how much he could take before he decided to call it quits. He was already considering resigning as cabin three's head counselor, once he did that, he'd be free to leave camp.

Camp Jupiter was an option, maybe he could head there and ask Frank and Hazel for a place to stay. He was welcome there after all, he was a former member of the Legion. He'd be seen as a war hero, as a veteran of the Giant War. Yet the thought lingered in his mind that his presence would only cause trouble for everyone involved. He wasn't willing to bring any trouble to anyone he cared about.

On about the fourth day of silence, Percy's morale took yet another blow.

He was just walking back from the armory, he'd offered to hand in some Ares kid's sword after a lesson. He'd dropped the kid off at his cabin, the kid was about eight and wanted to know how to better improve his sword skills, something Percy was all the more willing to help with.

After returning the spare sword to one of the sword racks, he was planning to head to the canoe lake for a relaxing swim, he needed to do something that would put him at ease, something that would sooth his tortured mind.

Yet that plan was definitely going to have to wait. He stared at Clarisse as her eyes locked onto him before she started stomping towards him. He prepared himself for the harsh words he inevitably would have to take.

"You are a piece of garbage, Jackson, you know that?" She said in a matter-of-fact tone while pushing his chest with her finger.

"What'd I do this time, Clarisse?" He asked in a numb tone.

"Oh, don't play dumb, no one believes the act!" Clarisse dismissed, "You know exactly what you did. You broke my spear, again!"

"You're not going to want to hear this, but I didn't do it." He said, attempting to push past her.

Clarisse shoved him back, "Then explain why the hell someone said they saw you walking out of my cabin just before I went in there and found my spear broken in half!"

"They were lying." He said simply.

"Or maybe you're lying!" She countered, "You've been doing stupid crap all day, Percy. I don't know what's gotten into you, maybe Tartarus really fried your brain, but you need to get your shit together."

Percy shrugged, her words weren't as harsh as he expected, but they still sort of hurt. He figured he'd just add her name to a growing list of people who disliked him, not that she didn't already hate his guts.

"Fine, sorry." He said, "What do you want from me?"

"Someone needs to pay for my new spear." Clarisse huffed, "Ten drachma."

He shrugged and reached into his pocket and took out his wallet. He'd had the Hephaestus campers make a compartment for drachma, he always kept at least thirty of the golden coins just in case he needed them for an Iris-message or some other godly transaction.

He took out twenty and dropped them in her open hand, "Take it." He put his wallet back into his pocket and started walking away.

"Hey, wait, this is twenty!" She called after him.

He didn't stop or respond as she called after him. He could care less about the coins at this point, he just wanted to find some place to be alone, some place where he could actually relax and not have to worry about some crap that he didn't do.

The beach was starting to seem more appealing to him, the idea of being able to relax in the surf or just chill at the bottom of a coral reef sounded amazing. There was no way someone from camp could come and bother him when he was in the middle of the ocean.

He turned away from the canoe lake, which was dotted with the canoes of the Aphrodite cabin. He started making his way towards one of the various trails that led to the beach, only to see Annabeth in the distance.

As he looked at her, he realized she must've been coming back from archery practice. A bow was slung over her shoulder while she played with one of her armor straps. Her brand-new dagger, a gift from him a few months ago, was strapped to her waist. He'd spent a couple dozen drachma to get it made by some of the best blacksmiths in New Rome.

Next to her was some son of Ares Percy had seen around camp a couple of times. He didn't know his name, but he had seen him sitting at the Ares table during dinner.

Percy watched as the two talked about something, archery if he had to guess. He would've walked off if it weren't for the fact that the son of Ares seemed to try to get closer to Annabeth, even as she made distance each time, he got closer.

Then he watched as he wrapped an arm around Annabeth's waist and pulled her closer, a yelp tearing out of her mouth as he did so. He could see the shock on Annabeth's face as she got pulled. By now, Percy was starting to walk over there, his hand drifting into his pocket to draw Riptide.

Smack!

Percy's temper went through the roof as he watched the son of Ares smack Annabeth's rear. He drew Riptide and nearly sprinted over there.

He was stopped when Annabeth gasped, her face quickly went from shocked to angry within seconds. She hauled back and punched the son of Ares right in the jaw, sending the demigod to the ground. She walked along his side and kicked him in the ribs. Percy winced at that, that had to have hurt.

"Pervert!" Annabeth shouted angrily before stomping off. Her face was flush and red with anger. He could hear her panting as she stomped off. He knew she saw him since she glanced at him for a moment before continuing on her way.

Percy sheathed Riptide, he shook his head and walked off, he wasn't going to hurt the guy any more than he'd already been hurt. The last thing he needed was for word to spread around camp that he ended up attacking some camper. Knowing his luck, it'd be framed as him attacking some defenseless camper.

No one seemed to notice as Percy disappeared from the campgrounds, or at least, almost no one.

Ω

When Percy finally came out of the water and onto the beach, he felt way better than he had before he'd left. He felt relaxed enough to actually attempt to show up at dinner. He was dreading doing that since everyone was either ignoring him or giving him dirty glares during lunch and breakfast.

He knew that something had to give eventually, there was no way things could keep going like this.

As he walked back to camp, he couldn't help but wonder where everything had gone wrong. He almost felt like someone was doing all this on purpose. It just seemed odd to him that every single mistake or accident that was happening at camp happened to be his fault. He knew he was innocent, yet no one believed him, not even Annabeth.

Annabeth accusing him hurt the most. He'd been there for her every single time she had a nightmare that threatened to wake her from her sleep, he'd been there when she fell into Tartarus, yet all of that seemed to mean nothing now. He wondered if their relationship was even anywhere near as strong as it used to be. He was sure that he being overdramatic, but the thought still lingered.

The second he came out of the woods, he found Chiron waiting near his cabin. The Centaur had a stern look on his face, his eyes were irritated as his mouth formed a straight line. He looked around before spotting Percy.

Percy let out a sigh as Chiron clopped over to him. He doubted anything good could come out of this, nothing had been going his way recently so there really wasn't any point in expecting anything good coming his way.

"Perseus." Chiron said, "I knocked on your door a dozen times, where have you been?"

"I was swimming at the beach." Percy said, "What happened?"

"I've come to give you your punishment. You and Hektor were supposed to check the chariots so an accident wouldn't occur."

"We did." Percy said, "I don't know how the chariot just broke like that."

"Regardless, someone needs to be punished. I've given Hektor a week of kitchen duty. You have two weeks of stable cleaning duty." Chiron said, "I was going to give you four weeks, but Annabeth intervened on your behalf."

Percy wondered why she'd even done that. She had no reason to try to lower his punishment.

"Why didn't you give Hektor the same punishment? He was with me in the stables." Percy said.

"Hektor has only been at camp for a year, you've been here longer, you know the rules. I expect all counselors to be competent with their chores." Chiron said, "I do not mean to be harsh to you, my boy, but this matter is a grave one. If Annabeth or Malcolm were to perish, Athena would be calling for your head. I'm sure you understand."

Percy shrugged, "Alright, I'll start tomorrow."

Chiron nodded, "Very well."