Fall (Percy Jackson x Reader)

sixteen

The next day, in the early evening, Percy walks up to Camp Half-Blood's storehouse of herbs and remedies. He crosses his fingers for a brief moment, hoping for good news and helpful answers to his questions after a day's worth of anxious training and pacing without (Y/N), Annabeth, or Grover there to help him relax— in the midst of the camp's newest dilemma, all were busy with their respective preoccupations.

Forced to by her friends, (Y/N) was resting because of the fourteen hour-long shift she volunteered to take on for guard duty the night before (an incredibly stupid decision by Annabeth's standards), and although she kept insisting she felt fine, the others wouldn't budge about it. Under much duress, she obliged to lie sprawled-out on the floor and complain about how "I really don't wanna do this, guys," along with: "Can I please just make a new sword? Those idiot Basilisks destroyed my other ones!".

To which Grover responded with a tangent about how 'They almost destroyed you, too, so shut up and stop moping for five hours and then you can do whatever you want, okay?'.

Annabeth was researching solutions to cure the damage made by Luke's poison in case Chiron's antidote didn't work, resorting to emptying every bookshelf in the Athena cabin and reading the volumes from cover to cover (her siblings were glad to help, but that was only until everything that initially seemed promising came up short of a viable solution). She eventually settled on very carefully reading through a demigod-friendly, online site that (Y/N) found and told her to use mainly in scenarios that needed a last resort. Despite advertising itself as 'friendly', the site proved itself to be full of extremely dangerous information about where to find similarly-dangerous artifacts that would surely get said demigods killed.

Grover was flitting between the girls, helping Annabeth with her efforts and checking on (Y/N) every hour to make sure she was resting before he let her leave. He earlier had to forcibly remove Percy from the Persephone cabin, saying that his constant worry and concern about (Y/N), along with the fact that she just wanted to keep talking with him, was keeping her from much-needed rest.

Hence the worsened anxiety, as Percy now had nothing to do that would effectively take his mind off things because he couldn't find (Y/N) and the others were busy.

"How's the antidote coming?" Percy asks, and Chiron responds with his back turned.

"Slowly." He adds another ingredient to the mortar on the desk before looking over a bubbling concoction in its small pot.

Percy sighs, looking down at his feet before speaking up, "Look, I- I know this probably isn't the best time, but, uh... there's something I have to ask you."

Chiron doesn't turn around, setting a small vial down on the desk while answering. "What is it?"

Percy folds his lips inward with contemplation before stepping forward, "It was something Luke said? About a prophecy?" The centaur pauses at the boy's words, looking up from the mortar as Percy continues: "Specifically, how I'm mentioned in it. Do you know anything about this?"

Chiron slowly takes off his spectacles, turning around to face the son of Poseidon. "Knowledge isn't always power, Percy," he walks up to the boy, noticing his face fill with frustration. "Sometimes, it's a burden."

"I- I know that," Percy responds, audibly trying to calm his annoyance. "But, like you said, I've been pretty unexceptional lately." Chiron lets out a quiet sigh at Percy's next words. "It's got me wondering if I'm, you know... prophecy-worthy."

The centaur doesn't meet his eyes, his words carefully considered, "They say that when the gods wish to torture us, my friend, they answer our prayers."

Percy contemplates the words before internally groaning.

As Percy trails behind Chiron on the journey to the Big House, they pass the stream near the camp forge. Sounds of machinery working, crackling fires, and hammers on metal grow louder as they walk by, and Percy's eyes are pulled to one of the demigods drawing out their sword.