A Little Ambrosia For Your Day (Percabeth One-Shots)

Spiders Are Kind of Creepy

Annabeth's POV

There was almost nothing Annabeth hated more than the sound of the bell ringing throughout the playground at the end of recess.

Almost.

She found herself taking tiny steps back into the school building, trying to get as much fresh air as she possibly could. Today's recess was better than it usually was, with jump rope and running games and even helping a friend overcome his fear of heights. Annabeth's chest swelled with pride.

The other children ran as fast as they could toward the school building, showing off their speed to each other. Annabeth always itched for competition, but she was smart enough to realize that she got to spend more time outside and less in the classroom.

Bozos, she thought to herself.

It wasn't that Annabeth didn't like school. In fact, she loved it. The thrill of knowing the answers and learning new things everyday made her heart burst with happiness. However, recess was the only time where she could talk and play with her friends.

As she reached the building, the children filed back inside their respective classrooms. There were a few stragglers — Annabeth amongst them. She recognized some of the kids —Thalia, Frank, Percy, Dakota, etc. She thought of running to catch up with Frank and Dakota or Thalia and her other friends, but Annabeth preferred to save her energy.

The kids entered their classes, except for Percy. He walked straight past his classroom, heading for the bathroom with a bored look on his face. Annabeth giggled. She wasn't even a bit surprised. It was common knowledge that Percy wasn't the biggest fan of learning. He was the boy she had helped on the slide earlier during recess. Her face glowed with satisfaction.

Percy was nice enough — both as a person and to look at. His black hair was long and floppy, in desperate need of a haircut. He was always smiling, except during lectures and tests. Then, he would furrow his eyebrows and chew on his lip. Annabeth knew he was smart though; maybe he wasn't a fan of school, but there were many kinds of intelligence.

Annabeth had been so distracted by her own thoughts that she had forgotten to open the door to the classroom. And she would have, if not for the enormous black spider on the handle.

She shrieked, backpedaling so fast that she almost ran straight through the wall on the other end of the small hallway. Her breathing grew heavy and erratic.

Oh no.

Saying that Annabeth hated spiders was an understatement. She knew they were supposed to be good for "insect control" and whatnot, but she didn't care. Annabeth would single handedly wipe out every spider on the planet if she had that power. She'd even tried to create special technology for that purpose exactly, but fell short of the funding to follow through with her design. Annabeth swore that machine creation would be her backup plan if being an architect wasn't possible.

Annabeth tiptoed forward to see if the spider was still there. Sure enough, the big hairy black beast stared at her in all its glory, making Annabeth gasp and jump back. How no one had heard her scream earlier was beyond her.

Her options were limited. She could brush it off with her hand, but Annabeth almost laughed at how ridiculous that was. As if she would touch that. Her other option was to smush it with her shoe, but her shoes were muddy. Plus, she didn't exactly want spider goop on the bottom of her shoe.

Blow it away!

Annabeth grinned. She was brilliant, really. Staying a safe distance away from the spider, Annabeth summoned as much air as her lungs could carry and used it to blow the spider to the ground. The beast hung on for dear life, refusing to move.