Percy
I'll be honest, at that point I had lost track of how much we had hugged on that one day and it wasn't even ten in the morning. But hey, that's what relationships are for. "You know, the idea of 'people only like me for what I can give them' is quite common, but I don't think I've ever heard of a situation where that thing one could give was good strategies" "Well, my level of strategizing ability is pretty much unmatched. Mom, that doesn't apply to you" "At least you acknowledge that" "I have to, or my life will be in danger" "Come on, Athena wouldn't kill you. Oh, wait" "Did she actually try to kill me? Am I not remembering stuff again?" "No, I was just referring to your quest for the mark of Athena" "Yeah, sending me on that was not much different from straight up killing me, even if you ignore certain, uh, unforeseen consequences. I've heard that was pretty bad" "Yeah, super cooled misery, rivers of fire, a forest of insect hair…" "Stop, you're gonna trigger me" "Sorry" "You left me" "What?" "Down there, you- you left me. Why?" "I didn't leave you" "I know you did. Percy, why did you leave me?" She sounded genuinely scared now. An emotional flashback? At least this time I was there to help her through it. "Can you hear me?" Obviously she could. We were talking right now. The question was just always my first reaction to a flashback "Yeah" "So, you think I left you. When exactly?" "You just did" "Okay, you're probably having a flashback" "No" I think you are. How can you usually tell when you have a flashback?" "I can't" "Exactly. That's the point of a flashback. You think it's real" "It's real. You just left me" "Annabeth, that was a long time ago. I'm here for you now. Right now, I haven't left you. I am here. Do you believe me?" "Not really" "Can you hear my voice?" Annabeth nodded. "Can you see me?" "I'm blind. But yes" "Can you feel me next to you?" She nodded once again. "So logically, that means I'm there" "I guess so" "So I can't have just left you. That's why this has to be a flashback" "Okay" "That means you can fight it. You can do that, I believe in you" Annabeth reached for my hand. I gave her a few squeezes, she did it back. With a lot of encouraging words, she eventually made it out of the flashback. "Okay, I think I'm somewhat out of it now" Okay, that wasn't Annabeth. The voice was just a bit off, but I noticed. "Who is it" "Mostly Chris. Let's see who else" Slowly, his voice changed to what I was used to. "Okay, Annabeth is somewhat close and looking outside like 'Percy, be nice to him'" "Annabeth, if you hear me, don't worry, I'll be nice" "Thalce is also there, making sure nothing bad happens in the headspace. Our trust for you was essential for our healing, so the flashback we just had had a big impact emotionally. Imagine a false fire alarm except everyone is a stereotypical teenage girl and also the furniture is alive and the walls are alive and the entire building is alive and they are all trying to save themselves from the fire" "I don't think I can imagine that" "I can't describe it any better. Just a bunch of chaos that he needs to deal with" "Oh, I always knew you were afraid of losing me, but I didn't know it was that bad" "Percy, you're probably the most important person in our life. The amount of trauma you've helped us through is just… insane. Without you, well, twenty percent of us were created by your absence, so if you left us… let's just say it would suck significantly" "Would 'life-shatteringly traumatic' be accurate?" "Maybe not quite as extreme. By the way, where are we? I'm pretty sure this isn't my school" "It's mine. Annabeth came here yesterday to talk about pretty much the same thing we're talking about right now, except it was a prophecy rather than a curse. Also, nothing actually happened that time, but that didn't prevent us from independently getting super worried about it, which probably put some serious strain on our forming relationship, but it ended up working out just fine" "Calling that relationship 'just fine' would be the biggest understatement I've heard in my life. To be fair, I'm only two months old, but still" "Yeah, you're right" "Annabeth's telling me we need to get going. Lil dam, are you here?" Seconds later, Annabeth's skeleton cat appeared from the shadows. Chris grabbed all of his stuff before reaching down to Lil dam. "I'll see you eventually I guess. Bye" "Yeah, uh, Bye" We gave each other one last hug before he disappeared. I went over to my desk and tried to continue where I had left off upon Annabeth's arrival yesterday. Just a few minutes later, a rainbow flickered into existence.
Piper
While Percy and Annabeth were probably doing cute couple stuff together, I spent my day a bit… differently.
I was walking around the school grounds when I heard something. Maybe heard wasn't the right word. A few years back, my dad had taken me to London. Okay, maybe "my dad had gone to London and his assistant had taken me with her" would have been more accurate but that's beside the point. In London, we had used the Tube a lot. The first time I had witnessed the train arriving at the station, I hadn't just heard it. The sound had been so powerful I could feel it in my entire body. What I heard now was almost as loud. When I looked to where the sound was coming from, I noticed it was actually a cargo train. It must have had somehow escaped its rails as it was now driving along the street, seemingly out of control. But something about it felt off. It didn't seem all that physical. I looked again and realized that I had been tricked by the mist. The thing that was making its way through the streets of Manhattan wasn't a derailed train. It was a massive drakon. Based on its eye color, it was probably Percy's brother, which was becoming a worryingly common trend with monsters. Based on Annabeth's post-Tartarus trauma dumping, it was a Maeonian drakon. That wasn't relevant in any way, I just felt like pointing it out. Gods, I really spend too much time with Annabeth. Okay, there was a drakon charging towards the school. That… sucked. The annoying things about drakons is that they tend to come with annoying fate stuff like 'Only a child of Ares can kill this one, cosplaying as one doesn't count, the fates can tell the difference' I didn't really have a plan on what to do now, but standing here probably wouldn't help, so I made my way back to my room. When I arrived, I saw that Annabeth had returned. "Hi, how long have you been here?" "I'm not sure. I just came out of a switch, but since I'm still holding my stuff, that probably started right after I arrived" "Okay, small problem. There's kind of a drakon here" "A drakon?" "Yes, a drakon. Probably Maeonian" "We should probably, like, inform some people. Percy is the closest" I got the prism out and Annabeth called Percy's name. "What is it?" He asked "Piper apparently just saw the Maeonian drakon heading for our school" "Oh, I should probably help you with that. Uh, see you at the main entrance" He ran out of his room. Annabeth and I took Lil dam outside to the gates where Percy arrived just seconds later on Mrs. O'Leary's back. Okay, where is that-" He was interrupted by a flying car almost decapitating him. "Ah, there he is. Last time I saw him, I think I was trying not to die from curse-induced gorgon blood poisoning" "Please don't remind us" "Sorry. Um, I guess we should try to not die. Get on here girls" I don't think I've ever been so happy to follow a man's instruction to get onto a… vehicle I guess. The drakon had almost reached us, but a shadow jump down the street bought us a little bit of time. "Okay Annabeth, strategy time" "Okay. Strategy. That's something I can do. I'd say we first get it away from people. Central Park should be the closest location" "That's not exactly people-free" "It's better than this. Also, there's a lake so Percy home courts" "Good plan" "I know. I made it" "Then stop talking and start executing" "Right. Over there" Once again, the drakon had caught up far enough that only shadow traveling away saved us. Mrs. O'Leary then started running down the street, staying just out of range of the drakon's mouth. Luckily, this one didn't seem to be able to spew acid at us nor paralyze us. After about a minute, Annabeth shouted "To the left" Percy turned Mrs. O'Leary around, such that we were now heading straight towards the reservoir, the drakon right behind us. We kept going until we reached the shoreline, where Mrs. O'Leary jumped up and shadow traveled to the other side of the lake. The drakon was too fast to stop and splashed down in the water, creating a large wave.
"I can't believe that worked" Percy laughed. "What worked" "Look at the lake" When I looked, the drakon was barely keeping its head above water. "Drakon's are too heavy to swim. I knew because, um, sometimes I know stuff, especially when it's water related" "Like when you knew our exact location and speed in the sea of monsters?" "Exactly" "So, now it'll just drown?" "Most monsters are immune to certain causes of death like a lack of oxygen for example, but this will slow it down significantly so Annabeth has more time to plan" "Because that's what I do. I just make plans" "It's your biggest talent" "True that. How much time do we have?" Percy took a step into the water. "It's gets deep quite quickly, so the drakon will have to get really close to shore before it stops being almost completely immobilized. It's not moving very quickly, so I'd say maybe ninety minutes" He summoned a wave that pushed the drakon further back. "Now it's two hours" Annabeth put on her strategizing face. "If we're unlucky, this drakon can only be killed under specific circumstances, like only by a child of Ares. That's kind of how your sister died" "But she got to see her boyfriend again and also I wouldn't have become head counselor" "Whatever. Since this is a meaonian drakon, it is possible that Damasen has to kill it, which would be kind of bad since we have no idea where he is" "What even happened to his hut?" Percy asked. Didn't that land on the foot of half-blood hill? Where is it now" "While you two were celebrating your approximate birthday, the Hephaistos cabin added gimbal to the engine, such that they could land at a more suitable location. Only a few campers know where they live now, because no one really cares. We haven't seen them outside that one game of capture the flag" "Okay, in case we need him, that's bad" "You'll need a child of Gaia" I said. "What?" "Rachel told me I'd need a child of Gaia to defeat 'it'. She didn't specify what that was, but if there's anything currently in my life that you'd need a child of Gaia for, it's this drakon." "This would just confirm that we need Damasen or Bob, both of which are likely far away" I was about to accept how much my life sucked when I remembered something else. "So, once a prophecy is spoken, it will definitely come true, right?" "Correct" "But how it comes true isn't set in stone and can go a number of different ways" "Yeah, why?" "I was just thinking, Hyperion is also a titan and he's here, in the park" "Since when" Percy asked "Since you, seaweed brain, helped to turn him into a tree" "Right, that happened. If the Terminus statue counted as a good, I don't see why the tree wouldn't count as a titan. I mean, he was technically absorbed by his physical form, but let's just hope for the best. Just one thing: how do you kill a drakon with a tree? I mean, Damasen could do that, but he was strong enough to just rip the entire thing out of the ground. I'm pretty sure we can't do that. Annabeth?" "I guess you could take a branch and turn it into a javelin. I'd say we check out that tree for ourselves"
From afar, Hyperion looked like a regular maple tree, but as I got closer, I felt warmth. And by warm I don't mean cozy, like under a blanket but more the Texas-in-the-Summer-with-no-air-conditioning kind. Putting my hand against the trunk, I felt the immense power of a first generation titan. "I'll be honest, I might not be the oracle, but if you cut off a branch from this tree, I have a prophecy for you: you'll die" "Yeah, you're probably right" Percy admitted. Annabeth began planning again. "Okay, we need to use the tree against the drakon without damaging it. Maybe we can get the drakon to destroy it. Okay, here's the plan. Percy, you go back to the lake and release the drakon, then lead it here. Piper, you take small Damasen and climb into the tree. When the drakon attacks, you shadow travel away and the drakon destroys itself" "Sounds like a plan. Lil dam, are you here?" A few seconds later, the half skeleton cat appeared. I took him and climbed up the tree as Percy called for Mrs. O'Leary and climbed onto her back. They disappeared, then came running towards us a few minutes later, the drakon chasing them. Right before reaching the tree, they disappeared once again. The drakon now directed its attention at me. I knew I had to get away, but its sea green eyes seemed to paralyze me. It was too late to do anything now. The drakon would kill me.
Once again, I know how much you all love cliffhangers, so I'll leave it at this