WORLDS BEYOND ( pjo )

𝐱𝐢𝐢𝐢. what we do to survive

Percy had a bad feeling.

It seemed pretty normal nowadays, considering he was, well, a demigod and all, but this feeling was really bad—like disaster kind of bad.

He had gone to the ranch and cleaned up the shit of fire-breathing horses (literally) and met one of the most unpleasant people (Or some of the most? Did Geryon count as three people or one?) ever and had only slimly survived the encounter because of Apollo's slight not-hatred towards him and maybe Artemis' also. He had found Nico as well, and Percy found out he had been summoning King Minos' ghost to help him raise Bianca.

Then Percy met Bianca. She forgave Percy—thanked him, even. Percy kind of wished that Kia had gotten to see her.

After all that, laying on his back on the couch in Eurytion's barn, there was a calm. That was almost never a good thing, because his idle body almost never followed his brain. His thoughts were plagued by something else entirely—Kia and Annabeth.

It had really hurt Percy that Annabeth didn't think he knew how fucking awesome she was, but his mind was also stuck on where they might be right now. Their last conversation didn't end the best, per se, and he wasn't sure if that ten second hug (he hoped no one noticed that it was actually ten seconds) removed most of the tension as he had hoped for it to. Because of this, they didn't end up deciding on any kind of relief or rendezvous point—and Percy was really starting to regret being so difficult now.

Don't even get him started on how rude he'd been. Ever since they split up, he had felt terrible for the things he'd said to Kia and how he acted, and especially about how he made Annabeth feel like he didn't trust her—let's get one thing straight here; if Percy were falling off the edge of the world to be swallowed by the pit of Chaos, there was no one—not a single person—he would trust more to pull him back up than Annabeth. They had been best friends for the past three years and he already knew that there was not a single person in any world or universe or reality that he would put faith in the powers of more than in Annabeth—and to think, that she had felt at all like Percy didn't believe in her skills was heartbreaking.

He hated himself for making such a big deal now, late at night, curled up on the couch in Eurytion's barn. Percy couldn't sleep, so he stayed up, staring at the boarded ceiling just thinking. He didn't like when his thoughts got to him.

Still, he was worried. These were the two girls who he cared about most in the entire world, and they were in gods-know-where, with gods-know-who, doing gods-know-what. Percy had faith in them—of course he did—but it didn't stop him from worrying about when he'd see them again.

Percy closed his eyes, and he prayed to every god he knew, even the ones he didn't like. He just hoped they were safe.

Kia tensed, trying not to look away as the deformed baby floated up from Eris' arms and off along with the miscellaneous objects in the air. Eris had this demented grin on her face as she looked at her and Annabeth, gauging their reactions from the baby.

She spread her hands. "Welcome! Tea?"

Kia has a feeling the tea here wouldn't actually be tea. Annabeth said tightly, "No, thank you."

"What are we doing here?" Kia said, getting straight to the point. She didn't want to be here longer than she had to.

A rubber duck floated in between her and Annabeth as the latter shot her a glare for being so cutthroat. Eris only laughed crookedly, as if finding merit in her disorderliness—which Kia supposed was very on brand for her.

"What's the rush?" Her bat wings extended fully, and Kia and Annabeth took a step back at how large they actually were. It felt like a threat, like they were closing in on them to keep them here.