Life of A Young Demigod: Book 1 (Percy Jackson reader insert)

I Get Philosophical

The ride was quiet for the most part. Me and Andromeda finally talked a bit about ourselves, since we hadn't had much of a chance to talk before this. As I suspected, she plays the flute, and quite well at that. She blushed a bit when I complimented her on it, and tried to dismiss it by saying it was just a talent she inherited from her father. I told her about myself. She doesn't quite have the same appreciation for history that I do, if I recall correctly, her specific words were "it puts me to sleep", but I didn't mind that too much. Annabeth, on the other hand, perked up when I mentioned that, and we spent twenty minutes or so discussing Imperial Rome. It was... strange, hearing the other side of things. The demigod side. It threw a ton of things I had taken as fact into question, but I found it rather interesting. Andromeda listened too, but I felt like she was just being polite, even if she was smiling the whole time. After about two hours of driving, we made it to the Port Authority terminal and got out, waving goodbye to Argus.

On our way there, I saw Percy shoving a poster with his face on it into the trash. Ah. I hadn't thought about that yet. People were still looking for us, I assumed there were posters with my face on them somewhere too, but maybe my parents had somehow convinced the police I was fine.

My parents...

How could I have forgotten? My parents still thought I was at camp, perfectly safe. I didn't know if they even knew I had discovered who my mother was. I was starting to panic, and Andromeda, who was walking next to me, could tell.

"What's wrong, (Y/N)?"

I turned to face her. "Just thinking about my parents. Whether or not I should tell them what's going on. I don't want to worry them, but I feel like they have a right to know if I'm going on some massive dangerous quest."

She thought for a moment. "Surely Chiron has already considered that. If they should know, they probably have already been told."

I sighed. "Yeah, you're probably right. Thanks 'Meda."

She blinked. "Huh?"

My eyes went wide as I felt blood rush to my cheeks. "Oh gods, I'm so sorry Andromeda. My mind is a mess right now."

She laughed a bit. "Don't worry, (Y/N). I actually kind of like it. Rolls off the tongue a bit easier I think." She said this last part with a wink.

"Uh... sure. Ok." My mind was spinning.

Great job, (Y/N). Very smooth!

Percy's voice broke me out of my daze. "Guys, we're here."

I looked up, there was the Port Authority terminal, where we would hop on a Greyhound over to Jersey. We went in, bought our tickets, and managed to make the next bus, which was just leaving.

As we drove through the city, I looked at all the familiar landmarks, which all seemed somehow smaller to me now, not in size, but in significance. My entire world had changed in the past week or so. Would I ever be able to see a Rangers game at Madison Square Garden again? Would I be able to just walk through Central Park and relax? Would my life ever be anything close to normal again? I didn't know, and to be entirely honest, that scared me. It was cool and all to have the powers and stuff, but the more I thought about it, I had lost just as much as I had gained. My life wasn't necessarily better or worse, it was just so, so different. Change had always scared me a bit, on account of my anxiety, but this time it felt... different. Chiron had said something the day we met, when he was explaining what being a demigod meant.

"You are a bridge between two worlds."

I realized what he meant now. I was mortal, but I was not. I was immortal, but I was not. I got some good things from each side, but some bad as well. More than anything, I had to think about both, and that meant I had a lot more to think about.

I turned to Percy. "You feeling a little overwhelmed too?"

He looked at me, and I could tell he was having similar thoughts.

"A bit, yeah."

I sighed. "Well we don't have time to get existential right now. Bigger things to worry about at the moment."

He laughed a bit. "Yeah, you're probably right there."

Andromeda turned to me, and squeezed my hand a bit. "You're having that moment aren't you? Where you realize there's no going back to how it was before?"

"Yeah. I am."

"Don't dwell too much on it. All you can do is adjust."

I knew she was right. It's not like I could change who I was. Still, this was a hard thing to come to terms with. Ultimately, I decided to just put it out of my mind for now. Like I had told Percy, there were bigger problems, and in just a couple minutes, one of those problems would be staring us in the face.