The first time they'd shown her the shroud, she'd nearly vomited. Then the shroud had spontaneously combusted.

The demigods who'd brought it had walked away silently.

The next time she handled it a little better. Annabeth had stood next to her the entire time, rubbing her back comfortingly, even though the daughter of Athena was crying silently as well. This one was made up of less-flammable materials, but Thalia didn't even have the energy to feel insulted by that.

The entire Athena cabin had turned out to weave the second shroud. It was a work of art, in the end.

Deep sea green, embroidered delicately with black waves around the perimeter. Riptide standing boldly on the center, tip pointing downwards like a soldier's rifle buried in the ground. A small trident hovered above the sword. Along the edge, in the style of old Greek pottery painting, were small accounts of Percy's greatest deeds. Ares knelt in the surf of a beach, bloodied and defeated. Percy at the helm of the Queen Anne's Revenge, Annabeth by his side. His epic battle with the Minotaur, when he was just a scrawny kid, featured prominently alongside his battle with the defective Talos statue. Somehow Thalia hoped Percy could defy death again, as he had then - but it was a hard sell for anyone to defy death twice.

Spread across the bottom third of the tapestry was one final motif. Styled like a Greek frieze, it showed Percy bearing the weight of the sky - and right beside him, though somewhat smaller, Annabeth and Thalia.

This time, Thalia didn't vomit. Nothing caught fire. She just nodded once.

When the shroud bearers walked away, probably relieved to still have all their fingers, Thalia collapsed onto one of the bare beds in her cabin. She felt like she should be sobbing, weeping even. Instead it was all she could do to keep breathing.

Annabeth sat down on the bed next to her, and Thalia could tell that her friend was only holding it together for her sake. "It's going to be okay, Thalia," the blond said softly. "I promise."

They both knew it was a lie.

When she'd staggered into Camp, disheveled and exhausted and alone, Peleus had been the first to notice her. The dragon's scales shimmered copper now, not the gold of just a few weeks ago - but his golden scales littered the hillside, glistening in the sunlight. He'd shed while they were gone, a sign that he was maturing, another year older. Eventually the dragon would darken to a deep red, almost purple - but that was many years away yet.

The guardian lifted his head and long neck to look at her, snorting blue flame gently into the air as he chortled a happy greeting-bark. He twisted his head from side to side and Thalia knew somehow that he was looking for his friend who knew just where to scratch - but when she shook her head, the dragon's wings slumped to the ground, and he hung his neck low with a long keening whimper. Could dragons look depressed?

This one sure did.

The news didn't get any easier to deliver the second time around. Beckendorf had been standing on the Big House porch, leaning against the railing and watching the world go by with Silena by his side. The pair had rushed over, eager to welcome the returning heroes. Their steps faltered when they registered that the daughter of Zeus was traveling alone, though they tried not to let it show, uneasy smiles attempting and failing to put her at ease. Again, she shook her head.

Silena rushed forwards and enveloped Thalia in a hug. Despite herself, she hugged the beautiful girl back - human contact felt surreal, almost unknowable, and at the same time was the only thing in the world that was real.

Thalia's mind had been unmoored for what felt like weeks now, ever since she'd burst into Hephaestus's shop just before the Labyrinth tunnel behind her collapsed. She'd disassociated for more than an hour then, only brought back to the world when the God of the Forge had gently placed his hand on her shoulder and offered her a cold glass of lemonade.

In Thalia's mind, she was locked in a tiny box, watching the world pass by her on a TV screen. She honestly didn't remember how she'd gotten from Washington State back to Camp Half-Blood, only that Hephaestus had paid for it. She hadn't slept, hadn't eaten. She had drunk some water in Wyoming. Was that recently enough? Probably not. She didn't care.

But now Silena pulled her out of that box in her head, forced her to take possession of the meat puppet she called 'Thalia,' and she didn't know whether to be grateful or angry. She still felt hollow, blown about and drifting away into the empty skies, but - Silena's arms squeezing the breath out of her - Beckendorf's massive, calloused hand gently placed on her shoulder - the scent of ocean breeze and pine trees - these anchors pulled her back down to Earth.

Beckendorf was crying.

Grover didn't get a shroud. Instead, Juniper and Grover's satyr friends held a quiet party in the woods, singing songs and celebrating life. It was a simple affair, really, and filled with joy for what had been rather than sorrow for what was lost. Thalia couldn't help but admire the philosophy - a dozen satyrs and nymphs dancing and singing and laughing even with tears in their eyes as they remembered their nervous friend, so dedicated to the world he had left behind.

Beckendorf and Silena had brought Thalia to see Chiron pretty quickly. The immortal trainer of heroes had listened silently as Thalia did her best to recount the quest's events up to that point, considering every word with care and attention, but by the time she was finished she was almost certain that the centaur had tears in his eyes.

Chiron shook his head slowly. "This is all very troubling," he admitted. "It seems that the Labyrinth is more intelligent than we expected, and much more developed. Finding Daedalus at all might be near-impossible." He paused for a moment. "Which, on one hand, might be beneficial - after all, if we cannot navigate the maze, it will be difficult for an invasion party to do so as well. However, if they can manage it, then we have little recourse."

Thalia nodded slowly. It was hard to do much else. Mr. D. was staring pensively at a can of Diet Coke, swirling it around like it was whiskey on the rocks.

"We will have to double the guard presence on the entrance," the centaur decided. "But I am not convinced that the quest is over yet. The prophecy seems remarkably unfulfilled. Furthermore, though the situation looks bad, we have no proof of the deaths of any of your fellow quest members - and I know that they are all tenacious warriors."

That made sense, too. Sure, children of the sea had been lost from the land - Tyson and Percy were both missing, essentially presumed dead - but there had been no Dead, no Traitor, no Lost One, no Architect. But… prophecies had gone unfulfilled before.

Chiron nodded. "We will wait. We will not lose hope. And perhaps our prayers will be answered."

Thalia didn't like that idea, but she didn't have much alternative.

Tyson's shroud was made by the Hephaestus cabin out of respect for their gigantic, one-eyed friend, but it was surprisingly intricate. An animated hippocampus breached a gentle sea repeatedly. A forge breathed, tools set carefully beside it, but the glowing workpiece set on the anvil was abandoned. Finally, a simple picture, laid on top of the shroud - Percy and Tyson, facing the camera in front of a chariot, a first-place ribbon held aloft over their heads. Each had one hand on the ribbon and a silly grin on their face. Between them stood a similarly smiling but substantially smaller Annabeth.

Thalia hadn't known the big guy that well, but Annabeth seemed to take it pretty hard. She'd spent nearly an hour staring at his shroud on its pyre before the funeral was set to start.

Thalia knew better than to ask if her friend was okay.

News, even secret news, traveled fast through Camp. By the campfire that night, everyone had heard that the quest had failed, that Percy had died a terrible death. The Campers huddled together for warmth, the bonfire little more than embers on the cold ground. Nobody made any attempt to roast marshmallows or sing songs. Instead, they sat nervously, searching for someone to tell them what to think and how to feel. Some looked to Annabeth, who was playing with the trident bead on her necklace. A surprising number watched Thalia as she sat in her usual spot. Many of the older campers simply stared at the empty spot on Percy's log.

Even Mrs. O'Leary was sad, curled up at Quintus's feet with her chin on her paws. She whimpered softly every so often, as though she felt the need to be heard to be sad.

Eventually, everyone turned to Chiron. The centaur sighed.

"I do not know what you may have heard," he began. "And I wish that I knew better what to tell you." His words lingered in the air, heavy on Thalia's mind. "There is much that I still cannot say. What I can tell you is this. When times seem dark and difficult, that is when it is most important for us to protect each other. Hold your friends close. Support them. Train with each other, look after yourselves and your family. If you do these things, we cannot be defeated."

As one, the group turned to Dionysus and waited for his (probably inebriated) words of wisdom.

Mr. D. looked around and sighed. "Children," he began, taking a deep swig from his Diet Coke can and draining it in a single go. "Life sucks. People die."

There was a long, lingering silence, and some of the younger Campers began to cry. Chiron glared at the back of Dionysus's head, as though he could telepathically possess the god into making a better speech.

"But," the god started again. "Our dear trainer Chiron is correct. If you allow these things to tear you apart, to drive you mad, they will only happen more and more. So by all means, be sad - but then, be strong. Come together. Be a family like you have so often proved yourselves to be. We may yet come through this."

On that optimistic note, the bonfire adjourned.

The day of the funeral was beautiful. It was maybe seventy-some degrees, a gentle breeze blowing in off the Atlantic. The kind of day where, any other day, you could have walked on the beach with some friends, flirted with some cute swimmers, and spent the evening relaxing in the surf. The kind of day built for eating ice cream in the sunset.

Nobody would do that today.

Camp was silent. Over Long Island Sound, a gentle white mist crept slowly back and forth, shrouding the waves as it trailed along their peaks like a bridal veil. Even the Ares cabin were being uncharacteristically calm and reticent.

Rachel had made brownies.

She and Thalia had made some strange form of peace. They'd sat on the beach for a while and eaten the brownies, which - though Thalia wouldn't have admitted it - were heavenly. Rachel was beautiful and kind, and Thalia hated her for it. But she knew that wasn't right.

The waves lapped on the shore all the same.

Thalia's dreams weren't much more pleasant than her waking hours.

At night, many of the same dreams as ever haunted her. The last fight of her life, facing down hordes of monsters as her friends ran to safety. The first morning after, staring up into sea-green eyes. A new dream visited - Percy's charred corpse, sinking through dark water, staring at her lifelessly.

Tonight, for the first time in weeks, a new full-blown vision arrived. Thalia was almost happy to see it. In the dream, Luke was furiously angry, storming around a throne room and bellowing at various attendants.

"What the hell do you mean, 'the forge is gone?' It's a fucking forge for a god, not a garden shed! How can it not be where it was?" The telekhine in front of him, kneeling down in subservience, whimpered. "At least you damnable fools managed to save the blade. Get out of my sight and come back when this isn't a problem any more." The seal-dog-thing scurried away quickly, as though Luke would have killed it if it stuck around any longer.

Behind Luke, slouching in a chair next to a large gilded throne, was an empousa dressed like a cheerleader. With a start, Thalia realized she knew the face - Percy had put his fist through it when she'd picked him up from school. Gods, that felt like forever ago now. "You know, sweetie, it's not really their fault. The kid is kind of a badass. Shame about the girl though."

Luke turned his glare onto the redhead, who sent him a simpering smile. "Enough, Kelli," he barked. "Someone who actually matters is going to be here soon." The empousa's smile dropped instantly and turned into a sour glare, but Luke wasn't looking. He'd turned to the massive steel doors to the room with an expectant look. "Enter!" He roared.

Through the doors strode the hooded figure Thalia remembered - the agent within Camp, or at least, one of them. Thalia swore mentally, but surprisingly enough, Luke said the same words - just out loud. "Mother fucker!" the demigod exploded. "Do you have any idea-"

"Oh, shut up," the cloaked figure said. Luke looked like he wanted to push the person into the nearest incinerator, but managed to hold himself back. "We have more important things to deal with."

"You have it?" Luke demanded impatiently. "The thread - the string - whatever. You have it. I need it." The surfer boy paced back and forth, like even normal human conversation was too slow.

"Calm down. It'll take me a few days to collect it. In the meantime - you'll need to pass the arena." The figure picked his nails calmly. "It's impossible to get anywhere in here without finding it, eventually. You'll have to make a deal with the owner, but he's… a fellow who would find you agreeable."

"This is excellent news," Luke said. He looked genuinely pleased. It was an alien emotion to his face, and it felt wrong for Thalia to see it on this new hateful Luke. "Anything else?"

"Once you get through the arena, I'll meet you with the thread. However," the figure cautioned. "Jackson's little stunt with the forge leveled nearly a quarter of the maze. It might take extra days or weeks for you to push any major force through. So I'd get started now, if I were you." With that, the man spun on his heel and marched towards the door.

"Wait!" Luke called. "What of my agents?"

"They're your problem now," the figure called over his shoulder. The dream ended when the gigantic steel door slammed shut behind the figure.

When she woke up, Quintus was gone. She told Chiron about her dreams, and he nodded solemnly. That was it.

The hardest part by far had been visiting Sally Jackson.

Chiron had given Annabeth and Thalia special permission to leave Camp and deliver the news in person. He'd even let them borrow one of the Camp vans - the very same one, in fact, that they'd used to travel to D.C. on the quest to save Artemis. Thalia could tell because it was still beat to hell from its trip into the subway system, the bumper ripped clean off when Zoe had driven it down the stairs to the station.

Driving in Manhattan was hellish, of course. Being a demigod didn't make Thalia any better at parallel parking, and the drivers around her were not interested in being charitable with their time. Not without stress, they arrived at Sally's door just before noon.

When she saw their faces, the woman knew something was wrong. She opened the door wide and stepped back, inviting them in wordlessly. Annabeth stepped in first, and Thalia followed after just a second's hesitation. Could she really tell this woman her son was probably dead, and that it was essentially Thalia's fault?

"He's okay," Sally said once they had all taken a seat on the furniture around her charming coffee table. On the table was a typewriter of serious vintage, sheafs of paper and used-up ink ribbons scattered around it. Percy's mother set about tidying up the mess as Annabeth and Thalia sat silently, searching for words that wouldn't come. "He's okay," the woman insisted again. "Mothers know these things."

Thalia bit her lip. Part of her felt like saying that no, some mothers knew those things, and some didn't - but Sally wasn't trying to be rude. "Sally," she managed eventually. "You know what happened on the west coast? Mt. St. Helens's eruption? That was Percy. He was in it." Thalia gestured helplessly. "I…" words failed her again.

Finally, Sally sat down opposite them, behind the typewriter. "Tell me what happened," she said. Her voice was slightly choked, her eyes brimming over with tears, but she met Thalia's gaze fiercely. "Tell me why you think my son is dead."

Annabeth started the story, and Thalia took over about halfway. Everyone in the room was crying by the time she got to the end - but Sally's posture never wavered, and there was a fire in her eyes.

"Percy will be okay," she said, her voice steel. There was no room for argument. "My son will be back."

Thalia really hoped she was right.

Nico had not taken the news well. Which wasn't a surprise - nobody in Camp had, really, not even Clarisse - but the kid had a sort of hero worship complex going on with Percy, so it seemed to hit him especially hard when Chiron made his first speech around the campfire. The kid had managed to puzzle out what was being implied fairly easily.

When Thalia had visited him in the Hermes cabin, the kid was doing pushups.

"Hey, bud," she began awkwardly. "Uh… do you want to talk?"

"Can't," the scrawny boy panted out. "Gotta… do more."

"C'mon," Thalia said. "Let's talk." Her voice told him she was serious, and he scrambled to his feet.

They ended up sitting on the pier in the lake, kicking their feet in the water. Thalia tried to ignore the last memory she had of being here - a red bikini - and focused as best she could on being there for a kid who just needed some guidance.

"So," she began awkwardly. "I figured, uh… Well. I thought you might want to sit down and talk about it. Will Solace tells me you're not hanging out with your friends anymore."

Nico shrugged. "I need to get tougher," he said. "Percy showed me that the best way to protect your friends is through strength. I'm not very strong right now." He said it so matter-of-fact that Thalia almost accepted it.

"I'm pretty sure Percy would tell you that there's no point in protecting your friends if you don't hang out with them," she tried gently. "And besides - there are lots of other Campers here. You can train a little less. You're not the only one here to defend this place."

Nico slashed his foot through the water, sending up a violent spray. "Percy can't tell me that, can he?" he said.

"No, kiddo, I guess not," Thalia admitted. "But I can."

Nico considered that.

On the way back from Sally's house, Annabeth started a fight.

"This is all Hephaestus's fault," she said bitterly. "If he hadn't forced you both to take that deal, Percy would be here right now. This wouldn't be happening." For some reason, that really rubbed Thalia the wrong way. Even if Annabeth wasn't technically wrong, blaming Hephaestus felt like a cop out. It had been Percy's choice in the end, after all - pretending like it wasn't almost reduced his sacrifice, made it some pointless act in service of a god instead of a selfless choice to protect a friend and, on a larger scale, humanity itself.

"Percy made his choice," Thalia bit out. "He knew there was a good chance he would die. For Zeus's sake, it's right there in the prophecy - Children of the Sea be lost from the land. He did it to protect us, Annabeth," she said, getting more and more worked up with each word. "He did it to protect you. To protect me. Don't pretend he didn't have a choice."

Annabeth slammed her fist on the dash. "Don't you think that's the fucking problem?" She exploded, with a fury in her voice Thalia hadn't heard in a long time. "Percy died to protect you the last fucking time, too!"

Thalia slammed on the brakes and brought the van to a screeching halt on the side of the road. "You did not just fucking say that." She locked eyes with Annabeth, feeling the air around her spark with electricity. The energy in the air made the van's electronics go haywire. The hazards came on and off, the radio jumped between channels like it was in a disaster movie, the windows rolled themselves up and down and sideways. "You didn't mean that."

Annabeth paled.

"What I mean is," the blonde began again. Her voice trembled with anger, but she took her time, picking the words she wanted carefully. "Percy made his choice. But there wasn't really a choice at all. You and I both know that he would never… never take the alternative."

Thalia stared dead ahead. To the north, a storm cell was building steam, heavy black clouds looming ominously.

"That's my problem. We get put in impossible situations at least twice a year, and they never stop asking for more." Annabeth's voice steadied slightly, but the steel remained. "We're toys to be thrown away. Just child soldiers who carry the world and when it breaks us, we've already been replaced or killed. Percy's the kind of guy who doesn't question that. He just goes ahead and saves the world. When he dies, he's okay with it - and the rest of us get left behind to miss him."

"Annabeth," Thalia answered finally. "What are you trying to say?"

Her oldest friend sighed, blew a tuft of gray-blonde hair out of her face. The radio stopped jumping stations. "I'm don't know. I'm angry," she admitted. "I hate that I've lost you and Percy so many times. I don't know what to do about it, how to fix it, and that pisses me off too. I just… I wish we didn't have to. I wish we were all just normal high schoolers. I wish things were fair."

Thalia nodded, staring off into the distance to collect her thoughts. She felt the same way, from time to time. She remembered late-night arguments with Luke when they were both angry at the world. There had been times she'd sobbed into her pillowcase or whatever she was sleeping on that night, desperate to wake up from the horrific nightmare she'd been plunged into for years.

"Life sucks," she eventually said. "You get fucked over and then you die. It's never going to be fair." Thalia thought of Prometheus in the maze, how he'd managed to put the existence of humanity itself onto Percy's shoulders. "But these are the cards we drew. The things we have to carry. If we let them make us angry, we might end up doing the wrong thing."

She turned to Annabeth, and the blonde was chewing her lip nervously. "I don't like the gods very much either. Hera killed my brother. Zeus is a fuck-awful father. What Athena did to you, leaving you alone with a father like that… But at the end of the day, they're better than the Titans. In the maze… Prometheus came. He offered Percy a choice. Give up and let the Titans take what they wanted, and save humanity - or fight, and doom us all."

Annabeth exhaled. "He chose to fight."

"Of course he did. Because like you said - there was never really a choice at all."

The van's electronics finally settled completely. Thalia pulled back out onto the street slowly.

"He still has dreams about it, you know," she said softly. "About you falling off Mount Tamalpais. About not saving you."

In the passenger seat, Annabeth turned back to face the road. Thalia ignored the tears running down her face.

One night, for some reason, she had a dream about the past. The night before they'd left for the quest.

She had been venting some frustration in the arena, hacking some straw dummies to death, when a deep voice startled her from her combat. "Damn, Thals," it said. "What did they do to you?"

She whirled around, spear at the ready - but it was just Percy, leaning against the arena door. His hair was even messier than usual, and his white T-shirt clung distractingly to his chest in the moonlight.

"They didn't do anything," she bit out. Percy raised an eyebrow in response, cracking a smile - but she could see he was worried.

"Was it something I said?" he asked. "I mean… I can't really think of anything, but I say stupid stuff all the time. If I did say something, I'm sorry." He really did look clueless. Thalia hated that she already felt bad for being angry. Fortunately, she was still pretty angry.

Thalia shook her head. "Just come spar with me," she said. "I need to kick your ass a few times."

The sparring had lasted for hours under the stars. By the end, they were both panting, but smiling. Eventually, Percy had laid her flat on her ass with a beautiful kick to cut her legs out from under her - and then he'd pulled her up with a smile. "Feel better, Thals?"

"Much."

Chiron's eyes were misty and slightly red. "After such a long absence, we must assume the worst," he said. "And so we gather to remember those we have lost on this quest. Perseus Jackson. Grover Underwood. Tyson, son of Poseidon. We all give something to the future. It seems these brave souls have given their all." The centaur couldn't bring himself to look up at the gathered demigods, instead simply staring at the ground in front of him.

"Tyson was… a character," Beckendorf began. "The biggest, nicest Cyclops in history, I'm sure. And he could make just about anything." Beckendorf looked down at his massive hands. "I'm gonna miss that kid, for sure. He helped a lot."

Juniper was up next. "Grover was the bravest satyr out there. He's gone now, I guess. But I'm never going to forget him. He fought for the wild, and for his friends. I'm going to do my best to do the same." She spoke with a steely determination, like she was about to get into a fight. "I hope he's a nice bush now."

Annabeth wasn't entirely certain how to follow up on that. So she didn't. "Tyson saved my life a few times," she admitted. "Grover… more than a few. Percy saved my life more times than I can count." She fingered her hair, still heavily streaked with gray. "They were all the kind of people to carry the sky next to you. The world is worse off without them. I'm going to miss them." She choked up a little, trying to force something more out, but eventually she gave up and gestured wordlessly to Thalia.

"Percy carried… the weight of the world on his shoulders," Thalia said, finally. "Without him, our burdens are going to be heavier. Each of us is going to have to do a lot more, if we want to come out of this on the other side." She breathed heavily, ignoring the way her throat seized itself closed for a moment. "So. Let's make his sacrifice mean something."

Shockingly, Mr. D. decided to follow it up with some words of his own.

"Percy Jackson was… an antagonist. A fool, in many ways. But he was equally a leader and a friend to you all." The Wine God's purple eyes stared around the campfire with a piercing gaze, locking particularly onto a few targets - Thalia, Annabeth, Beckendorf. "I expect that you all remember his contributions. It is not often that a role model comes along. It would be a shame to waste this one."

When Thalia touched the torch to his shroud, somebody coughed. "That's a beautiful shroud," a deep voice called. "You might as well save it for next year."

Well. I don't know if I'm happy with it, and it's shorter than most other chapters. But I think it's worth getting it out there, out of the way even. 4,810 words.

I hope you liked it - it was a lot more interesting to write, structure-wise, than most chapters. I think because I didn't really have to go anywhere with it, or have big segments. It's not going to be a template for future chapters or anything - I just think that the switching back and forth between "funeral" and "everything else" modes helps convey that this is actually kind of a big deal for Thalia and Annabeth and the Camp at large. It also let me sneak in a few smaller moments that I didn't really know how to add without these big disjointed time jumps.

Anyways - next chapter shouldn't be quite as heavy as these last two, with any luck. However, it will probably be a while away. Sorry - I'm just even more swamped than usual. As always, thanks for reading and reviewing - it does mean a lot.