Pushing into the house and trying hard not to be an ass, Percy made his way to Chiron's office. The old man was sitting in the same spot he always was. Surrounded by the special books he was always trying to get them to borrow. Like he was untouched from all the mess going on outside the walls of the house.

"Can I go see my mom? I need to see her and make- make sure she's okay." Percy felt his temperature rise as he realized he was crying.

"Mr. Jackson, take a seat." Chiron took in his disheveled appearance and seemingly tried to replicate his usual warm approach. None of that mattered though, because if Gabe was out it meant his mom wasn't safe, so Percy chose to remain standing.

"Chiron- my mom. I have to make sure she's okay."

"And why wouldn't she be ?" Percy didn't respond, figuring that if he said the real reason, that his stepfather was out walking around, they probably wouldn't even let him out of the house. Chiron sighed and continued. "Now Percy, you know things like that take time. They have to be scheduled through Argus and . If you want we can try and arrange something for later this week?"

With a sinking feeling Percy realizied that Chiron was bullshitting him, and wouldn't let him go to the hospital today. He immediately started regretting his cowardice at school, that instead of running he should have booked it to the hospital from the building. And now he was stuck at Delphi instead.

Without thinking about it, Percy cursed loudly and slammed hard into the chair they all usually sat on when talking to Chiron. The chair fell to the ground loudly, the boom enough to rattle his bones and scare him out of his growing thoughts.

Percy tried his best. Really. But sometimes his emotions got the best of him and he reacted before he could think. His mom and various counselors had told him it was a part of his ADHD, but all that did was make him feel like more of a screw up. And it felt embarrassing whenever he let his emotions get the best of him like a spoiled little kid.

"Chiron, wait. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry." He'd realized his mistake at least, and he hoped that would be able to buy him some time before Chiron got really mad. He hurried to pick up the chair. "See, look. I fixed it. There's no reason to-"

"To your room ." The negative emotion in his voice was enough to run chills through his body. Percy knew better than to push his luck with any angry adult and ran out of Chiron's office. None of the other kids could be found either, they'd probably learned it was best to leave him alone when he had an attitude. Struggling to stop his tears he realized that more than anything he felt like a monster. He'd never wanted to be the person in a household that everyone had to walk on eggshells around. All of that didn't matter though, he had to get to his mom to warn her. Gabe was always the worst when anyone else got involved. This was a whole new level.

He figured in order to get a visit through Chiron he'd have to wait and go through a process that was so ridiculously complicated that it wasn't worth considering. They'd probably just been nice when it was the first one. But Luke left Delphi all the time by climbing out of their second story window. Percy wasn't the best at climbing or being sneaky, but he figured it was his best try.

"Did you open this letter?" Luke stood in the middle of their room, moreso on Percy's side with the fancy envelope from Percy's father in his hand. Luke's face was red as he violently waved the envelope in Percy's face. "Are you fucking kidding me Percy?"

Percy stared at the scene in front of him. His desk drawers were open and rummaged through with what little belongings he had strewn about. Even his bed, (which he tried his best to make) had been touched, his pillow thrown on the ground next to the window.

"Did you go through my stuff?"

"My God Percy. Do you want a family that bad? Oh did Daddy say he loved you so much and it wasn't his fault?"

"Who said you could go through my stuff?"

"When are you going to start listening to me Percy. They don't care about you. Never have never will. All they do is lie and do what's best for them. It's all just lies-"

Out of the corner of his eyes Percy noticed that the picture of him and his mom had fallen over through Luke's look through. He couldn't stop the words that spewed out of his mouth.

"Look, I know you have a fucked up family, and no one cared about you, but it's not the same for me. My mom loves me and I'll be back home with her when she's better." Percy reached and snatched the envelope out of his roommate's hands. "Don't get your problems mixed up with mine. And stay out of my stuff."

The last part was said a little louder than he meant for, but it was drowned out by Luke who let his head fall back and laughed, not even stopping when Mr.D burst into the room seething.

"Castallean, Out. Jackson, lockdown." Percy could tell the colorful pot bellied man was actually pissed by the usage of their real names. The man stood between them and herded out a still laughing Luke out the doorway. "And don't go to sleep either, your social workers are on her way to talk to you."

Percy figured he'd done it. He'd wrecked any chances he'd had of seeing his mother and gotten himself kicked out of Delphi. Sure he didn't start the fight with Luke but he didn't start it either. And when had anyone ever cared that he hadn't started a fight before. Trying to calm his racing thoughts and ignore Luke's still loud laughter he focused on putting his room back together and wondering what he'd done to make his good day go to such shit.

still looked the exact same as when Percy met her. Which unnerved him a little bit considering it had been over a month. The only change was the white puffy coat she wore to address the incoming chilly October weather. She gave him a stressed smile and motioned for him to follow back to Chiron's office. Part of him thought about how sick he was of the book filled room. cleared her throat and looked like she was trying to swallow a ping pong ball before she actually spoke.

"Hello Percy, how have you been settling in here?" His social worker had said she'd be back to check on him, but the most he'd gotten was a phone call where she'd apologized for not coming.

"Fine."

"Has everyone been treating you well? School okay?" Percy just stared at her, knowing she was beating around the bush to whatever she was really there for. seemed to appreciate the straight approach too and cleared her throat for the third time. "Percy, well, there's no easy way to say this, but your mother's husband was released this past weekend. The court decided there wasn't enough evidence to hold him any longer.

There were a million ways he could have reacted, each with language he was sure his mother or wouldn't appreciate. The thrumming in his body reminded him of how it'd felt when he'd just gotten out of a guy talk with Gabe. And how likely it was that someone had already told Gabe how much Percy had run his mouth about what really went on in the New York apartment.

"Now, there are other charges pending, and he'll have to face trial for those, but it might have to wait until your mother wakes up. But they can't hold him until she has her own testimony."

"He's gonna kill me." Percy hadn't meant to say it outloud but it escaped his mouth before he could control it. Surprisingly, he felt calm about it all because finally it all made sense. Realistically, his mom was likely in the safest place for her, and Gabe had already found him.

"What makes you say that Percy?" leaned forward like she actually cared and not like she hadn't basically told Percy he had a couple of days before they found his body somewhere. "You know, you only told us about what your stepfather had done to your mother, but if he hurt you in any way you need to let us know."

She wasn't wrong. When the police had first come to take Percy's statement he'd been so focused on his mom. So he'd only told them about what he knew his mom went through from Gabe. Which wasn't much, seeing as she did a good job at hiding it. He'd only found out after coming home from school on a day when both had forgotten he'd had half a day. None of that mattered, and he just stood up to leave the room. His social worker didn't seem happy about his behavior, but Percy just figured she could join the list. He only half heard her usual dismissal reminding him to call her if he needed to as he headed back up to his room. It wasn't like he had a phone anyway.

That night Luke only waited a couple of minutes before hopping out the bedroom window. Percy didn't even roll over to be nosy as his roommate left. He was surprised a few minutes later by a short head poking through the door.

"Psst. Percy. Are you awake?" Annabeth hurriedly closed the door behind her when she noticed his upright form.

"Annabeth? Oh my god. You have to-. I'm already in enough deep shit-"

"Is Luke here?"

"Annabeth, you're gonna get me in trouble. Oh my god-"

"Calm down Jackson, everyone sneaks around here. Piper, Leo, and Jason have midnight uno matches all the time."

Even though deep down he knew he wouldn't hear anything, Percy held his breath waiting for Mr.D or Coach Hedge's thundering footsteps. When he didn't hear anything he took a deep breath and took in his friend's appearance. Annabeth, in her gray owl pajamas, creeped over to his desk chairs and relaxed in it like she owned the place.

"Besides, it's not like it's my first time sneaking in here. But you're a heavy sleeper and Luke's always with Thalia so." Percy was beginning to realize that his housemates really didn't understand the concept of personal space.

"He goes outside, not Thalia's room. That's why the windows open like that." Percy had half a mind to move the stack of worn textbooks his roommate kept crammed to open the window, but he didn't want to risk Luke running his mouth about his hidden candy stash.

Annabeth just hummed after finding out Luke's outdoor activity, and they sat in silence for a while listening to the muffled whispers of what he now knew was an uno round.

"I heard about what happened. Y'know, with your stepfather."

"He's not my stepfather." He honestly expected Annabeth to argue back with him, but she just stayed quiet.

"Well, I'm sorry all of that is happening to you. It's a lot." Percy didn't know how to respond to that. He knew that she meant it. Annabeth only really said what she meant, which is why she spent so much time in trouble in their history class.

"Thanks." She just hummed again, like she knew what he was going to say. They were quiet again as she entertained herself with the few items he kept on his desk. She even took special notice to avoid coming in contact with the blue envelope.

"I opened it. The letter, I mean." He nudged the paper to her. Would Gabe get to him before he got a chance to meet his father? He pushed the paper toward her and watched her eyes scan it. Even though she was dyslexic too Annabeth was still able to read twice as fast as him. Usually it annoyed him but now he was grateful he got to hear her thoughts sooner.

"I'll be right back." Annabeth said after a minute. She gave him his letter back and rushed out the room. Moments later she returned with a big gray laptop with a glowing triangle on it.

"I thought we weren't allowed to have laptops-"

"Not the point, Percy." The screen lit up her face as she typed loudly. "Here."

It took his eyes a couple of moments to adjust but Annabeth had gone and pulled up a blank email. She'd already put in the other information, his fathers email and Percy's own name as the subject line.

"Oh." Annabeth let her face fall for a second before covering it up and reaching for her laptop. Percy learned to keep it out of her reach. "No no, it's just not what I was expecting. I thought you'd agree with Luke and think I should leave it alone." Annabeth wrinkled her nose.

"I can think for myself. And there are two sides of every story, and that you should find yours out."

Together they leaned over the keyboard, bouncing out ideas of the perfect message to send. After typing and deleting at least a dozen messages he decided on a simple, "Hey, it's Percy, see you when you get back." Sure it was informal, but after Annabeth's insistence he even added some punctuation.

Sending the email made Percy feel uneasy but the thought of pissing off Luke more helped fuel him through it.

~~~~~A/N~~~~~

my fault yall

for the record I am a college student

But yk next chapter you meet Poseidon and then we'll be at the Big Event of part 1. Y'all get one more chapter, the prequel, and then you will have to wait like ao3 did (they had to wait months one time whoopsie)