"Well, here you are, Building 3." Annabeth said as she stopped in front of the third building in the row of buildings.
Percy looked up at the building, he noticed all of the windows were dark. When he looked at the other buildings, he noticed the other buildings had their lights on, plus he'd seen a few people come in and out of those buildings. Building Three was quiet and he was pretty sure it was empty.
He looked over at Annabeth, he knew she didn't have a hand in assigning him to Building Three, it was all Chiron's idea to stuff him in the creepy ass building that happened to be in the darkest part of Camp Half-Blood. Even the guards avoided the place, the few times the guards passed near there, they were always in groups of four, never less. He didn't even blame them, he felt like Building Three was supposed to house all the psychos and monsters that just so happened to be on humanity's side in this clusterfuck of a situation.
"Couldn't I move to one of those buildings?" He motioned to all the other buildings. He noticed Building 1 and Building 2 were empty as well but they were in a lit-up part of camp so they didn't look anywhere near as scary as Building 3.
Annabeth shook her head, "Sorry, Chiron put you in Building 3 for a reason. My building is full and we can't share a room, Chiron's a huge stickler on making sure no one gets pregnant around here."
Percy nearly turned bright red. Even if he had to share a room with Annabeth, it wasn't like the first thing he was going to do was try to bang her or anything. Yes, she was beautiful, but he had more important things to worry about.
"So, this training," He was eager to change the subject, "Is it hard?"
Annabeth shrugged, "Not too hard. Just pay attention in class, practice, and you'll be fine."
"Class?" He raised an eyebrow at her.
"Yeah. What, did you think you were just going to put rounds down range the entire time?" She asked, a humorous tone in her voice.
"Kinda, yeah." He said, "Where exactly do I go tomorrow?"
"I'll come and get you." She said, "Technically, I'm your teacher now."
Percy stared at her, dumbfounded, for a minute. Annabeth couldn't have been any older than him, all his teachers were usually wise old people, not blondes who looked like they could've starred in a movie.
"Don't look so fucking shocked about it." She slugged him on the arm.
"Ow." He rubbed his arm, "I thought Chiron was supposed to teach me?"
Annabeth scoffed, "He will but he can't teach you everything. Trust me, just pay attention to what I tell you and you'll be fine. I don't bite, promise."
He tried not to throw the fact that she'd just punched him in her face. Yeah, he was totally convinced that Annabeth didn't bite, she definitely seemed like the soft forgiving type. Not.
She looked down at her watch, "You should get some sleep, we have to be up early tomorrow."
Percy watched her figure as she walked off. He wasn't going to lie, seeing her walk away was like watching a friend leave him at a lunch table in high school all by himself. He turned his attention back to the scary ass building in front of him, there were no words that could describe how much he did not want to go in there. He felt like he was going to walk in and get sacrificed or something in the middle of the night.
"Get it together, Jackson." He scolded himself, "We aren't five, we're not scared of the dark."
Percy steeled himself as he walked up to the door and opened it. Almost instantly, a rush of freezing air hit him, it was like he was walking into the middle of Siberia or something.
"Now who's the dipshit who decided to keep the lights off?" He asked, his voice echoing in the empty hallway as he fumbled around for a light switch. He had just found the switch when the door slammed behind him, making him jump so hard he almost hit his head on the ceiling.
Percy didn't care anymore, once he saw Chiron tomorrow, he was asking if he could move to another building. He totally understood that he was the new guy and all but this, this was cruel. This was against the eighth amendment for sure.
After turning on the light switch, he started to move down the hall. His footsteps and his heavy breathing were all he could hear as he walked. The lights were…absolutely useless. Either they'd gone bad or someone really hated whoever lived in this building because the lights were so dim, he minus well have just left them off. They made the place even creepier if anything.
Thankfully, his room was on the first floor. There were stairs that led to the second and third floor but luckily, he didn't have to worry about going deeper into the building. In his honest opinion, this building would've worked wonders as a prison. No need for the bars, you could practically terrify someone into being good.
Percy paused outside his room. He was a big boy, there wasn't anything in his room that he hadn't faced before. That still didn't stop him from barging in like the FBI, his fists raised ready to sock anything and anyone in his room.
Instead of finding some super scary mutant zombie or anything like that, Percy found himself staring at an actually nice room. His bed was right next to the window, which had blinds in the event the searchlights outside became too much. The room wasn't freezing cold like the hallway was, it was actually the good kind of cold, the kind that made sleeping in feel so good.
There was a door to his right, which he figured must've been the bathroom. He'd taken private bathrooms for granted before, there was no way he was going to do that now.
The room wasn't completely bare, Percy noticed. There was a wardrobe next to an empty desk, one of the doors sporting a long mark left by a knife. He walked over and opened it, finding absolutely nothing inside. That was when he realized something. There were two. Next to the wardrobe was a metal locker. He scratched his head, he'd never heard of a room having two wardrobes unless there were two people living in the room.
When he opened the locker, he was a tiny bit surprised to find it wasn't meant for clothes. He'd stumbled upon a gun locker. Granted, this one was empty, save for a few empty shell casings left on the shelf where the ammo should've been. He figured whoever lived in his room prior to him probably didn't care about cleanliness all that much.
Percy sighed as he closed the locker and turned to his bed. At least he had a half-decent bed now. He could still feel the back pain from sleeping in that sleeping bag on the floor. As soon as his body hit the mattress, he nearly let out a groan at how good it felt to lay in a bed that didn't feel like a slab of concrete. The pillow felt downright heavenly on his head, he had a feeling he was going to have trouble getting up in the morning.
He tried to ignore the smell of detergent, it was obvious they'd cleaned the bed for him. He couldn't help but wonder what happened to the other guy who used to live in this room. He'd figure it out later in the morning.
As soon as Percy closed the blinds, he practically passed out in the darkness.
Ω
Percy was perhaps the groggiest guy in all of Camp Half-Blood when Annabeth woke him up. It didn't help that she slapped him awake, he usually wasn't a heavy sleeper but apparently, she'd yelled at him to wake up and it took her barging into his room and slapping him to wake him up.
Now here he was, sitting in the mess hall at HQ. The former mess hall, the one he went to when he was in the quarantine building, had been torn down and now they were building something new in its place. He wasn't sure what they were building there but he was able to catch a few hints from some of the engineers, something about anti-air missiles and a tracking system. He wasn't sure what good an air defense system was for a zombie apocalypse, unless the zombies suddenly grew wings. Yeah, winged zombies, that sounded like a fun time.
One thing Percy noticed when he first walked into the mess hall was that the tables were split up into sections. All the guards sat together in one area, technicians in another, and then guys like him. Percy really wasn't sure what he was. Special ops? Moron? Guy who was in a desperate situation?
Whatever he was, he really wished he didn't have to sit alone because of it.
He wasn't sure where the rest of his colleagues were. Annabeth had walked with him to breakfast but before she could sit with him, she got a call from Chiron. Now he was all alone. He saw Clarisse sitting with her men but there was no way he was going to waltz on over there and strike up a conversation with her.
Despite being alone, Percy couldn't complain. He looked down at his tray, breakfast was definitely a step up from what he used to get. He had a plate of over easy eggs, a preheated waffle, and one of those little plastic bowls with cereal. He wasn't sure where Camp Half-Blood got their food from but he could tell they didn't have a problem with getting it.
It was about five minutes later when he finally saw Annabeth walk back into the mess hall. He watched as she walked over, a troubled look on her face as she did so.
"So, how'd your meeting with Chiron go?" He asked as she sat down next to him.
"Okay, I guess." She said, stealing his bowl of cereal and his spoon, "He said he doesn't have a good lead on where Luke is. That can't be good, Luke rarely ever goes silent like this."
"You think he might be dead?" He asked.
She shook her head, "I doubt it, Luke is an ex Green Beret, guys like him are used to being alone without support. I mean, it doesn't mean he can't die, but he'd have to be in a really bad spot for that to happen."
Percy nodded as he dug into his breakfast. He'd never been around Green Berets but he had met a few Force Recon guys and those guys were hardcore. He swore a few of them were actually crazy. All he could say was that there was a reason he didn't go for special forces when he joined the military.
Thinking of Luke dying wasn't a pleasant thought. He didn't know him personally but if he was some sort of super soldier like Annabeth made him out to be, it would take a lot to bring him down.
"So, what are we doing today?" He asked, changing the subject to something slightly less depressing.
"Well, first we need to get your stuff from the armory. I know you had that rifle but I really think you could do better with the stuff we have, there's plenty of options anyways." She said, "Trust me, the armory is stacked right now."
Percy had to admit, he kind of missed his rifle but it definitely wasn't the best. It was a bit on the heavier side, maybe a new rifle could do him some good.
"We'll have to fast track your training." Annabeth said as he ate, "Chiron told me he wants you ready as soon as possible so we can start tracking down Luke. The faster we find him, the better. We need his research."
Percy looked over at her, "Annabeth, he could be anywhere. Do you even have any clue where he might be?"
She lets out a sigh, "No, I don't. That's the issue, we'll have to do some digging ourselves to find him. Chiron has a list of places for us to look but there's no guarantee that Luke was or is there. I just wish he'd check in so we know he's alive."
"And if he isn't alive?" He asked.
"Then we have to hope his research is still around." She said, "That, or the world is screwed."
Ω
Percy smiled sheepishly over his shoulder at Annabeth, who stared wide-eyed at him then the target in front of him or rather, the giant hole in the target next to the one he was trying to shoot at.
"How-what the fuck?" She stammered, "How did you miss so bad that you hit a completely different target?!"
Percy sighed and lowered his weapon, "It's not my fault, this gun feels weird."
Annabeth sighed and walked over, taking the gun away from him and laying it on a table next to all the other guns she'd had him shoot. So far, they'd gone through countless shotguns, machine guns, rifles, and pistols. There were only a couple that he had decent luck with and even then, his accuracy was worrying with them.
He leaned against the shooting booth, watching as Annabeth walked over to the table of guns that he had yet to try. He had to admit, he was running out of options. He had a feeling she was about to offer him a sword next.
He glared at the group of marines who'd come to watch him shoot. They were practically howling with laughter, especially after they watched him dump a machine gun into the dirt. Annabeth nearly knocked him out after he'd done that.
He really wasn't sure why his accuracy had taken a nosedive. Part of him chalked it up to nervousness, especially since Annabeth was looking over his shoulder constantly like an owl. At the same time, some of the guns he'd shot just didn't feel right to him. Either they were too heavy or too light, none of them felt right.
"God, I don't know what I'm going to do with you, Percy." Annabeth said as she walked over with another rifle and handed it to him, "Here, try this one."
Percy glanced down at the rifle with an interested gleam in his eyes. The rifle looked like your stereotypical AR15 but longer and with a smaller magazine. He noticed this one had a bipod and a scope, like a sniper rifle. He hadn't had any luck with them, especially after he nearly broke his shoulder with the 50 cal Annabeth had given him.
"What is this?" He asked while pulling the bipod down and setting up to shoot.
"That's an AR10, think of an AR15 but chambered in 7.62. You can modify it depending on what you need to do." She explained, "It should still work just like any other AR out there."
Percy nodded and took the safety off. He could hear the marines snickering behind him as he took aim. He ignored them and took a deep breath, waiting until the crosshair was right over his target. He ever so slowly pulled the trigger.
Then, as soon as he released the breath he was holding, the gun went off. Thankfully, he was wearing ear protection otherwise he would've been deaf by now. He was just able to see the hole in his target through the scope, not exactly a bullseye but pretty close.
Annabeth tapped him on the shoulder. When he looked back at her, she was smiling.
"Good job." She said, "I think we found a rifle that you can use well."
Percy looked down at the rifle, she was definitely onto something. This rifle actually felt right, it wasn't too heavy but it wasn't too light either. He also liked the way the trigger felt, some of the other guns made him feel like he had to put more force into pulling the trigger than he would've liked to. He could see himself using this rifle for a long time.
"So, do you want to try the other ones?" She asked as he put the rifle on safe.
"No, no, this one feels fine." He said.
"Good." She placed a hand on his shoulder, "Now, let's get you a pistol."
