PJO #4 : The Battle of the Labyrinth - MISSING SCENES

It Doesn't All Rest Exclusively On Your Shoulders (Between Chapters 18 & 19)

As everyone began to head back into the main part of the camp, Annabeth tapped Percy on the shoulder, wanting to keep him back for a moment. He supposed that was reasonable- They hadn't really been able to have a one-on-one conversation in a while. Even when they had, Annabeth hadn't exactly been in the kindest of moods. But, Percy cared about her. He understood she got like that sometimes and he was working on not taking it as hard. It was just a thing she had to work on and, considering how bad her life had been, it was honestly wild that there wasn't more.

"Yeah?" Percy said as he stopped. Grover glanced back at him with an understanding nod before continuing into camp, leaving the two of them alone. "Are you okay?" she asked, and the question surprised him. He wasn't even sure how to answer it. Was he okay? Obviously not, but that wasn't important at that moment. What was important was getting everybody back into camp so they could count their dead and begin repairs. Not his feelings. Those weren't important. Besides, he was pretty sure that if he really let the weight of everything that had happened sink in, he would start crying. And he did not feel like breaking down in front of her.

"Obviously I'm not fine, Annabeth" he responded, maybe a bit more hostile than he intended, but Annabeth just nodded. She knew that he wasn't mad at her, even if it still kinda hurt to hear. You haven't exactly been the kindest to him either a voice in her head said, and she knew it was right. She really had not been nice to him, not since he came back from the island. A part of her probably deserved his anger, even if he refused to actually be mad at her. "Kronos' army just came out of an underground Labyrinth, nearly set the whole forest on fire, killed Hades knows how many campers, and I just..." his voice broke slightly. "I need to go help people"

"Hey" Annabeth said gently as he tried to turn around, placing her hand firmly on his shoulder to stop him from leaving. "You don't have to put the weight of everything on your shoulders, you know that?" she asked him. Percy didn't respond, instead just avoiding her gaze because he knew he would cry if he looked her in the eyes. "You've already done that- Both literally and metaphorically- More times than I can count. So have I. So has Grover, for Titan's sake. It's not all on you, Percy"

The boy looked her in the eyes and the dam broke. She sighed and hugged him. He was a little taller than her, but that didn't really matter. He needed a shoulder to cry on for the time being, and that shoulder just happened to be hers. He'd been hers more times than she could count. The least she could do was return the favor, especially considering how cold she had been to him during their quest.

"It's not on you"