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

She's Like The Sunrise, Outshines The Moon at Night

Heading back to camp was... weird. Argus picked us up from the front of the Empire State Building, so we didn't have to go far, and we were perfectly safe, but I was still on edge. I guess it had been so long since I was actually fully relaxed that I didn't quite know what to do. Andromeda eventually had to calm me down.

"(Y/N)... it's ok. We are safe now. You can relax."

That broke me out of my daze a bit. I realized that my hands were shaking.

"Thanks 'Meda. Sorry, it's just been a long few weeks."

She smiled. "Yes, but it's over now. We did it. Don't get all panicky on me now, we've got a date to plan!"

That broke me out completely.

"Oh gods. When do you want to do it? What do you want to do? I... I've never done something like this before, what do we even do?"

"(Y/N), I've never done this either. Lets just pick something out the two of us will enjoy, and we can do it tomorrow. Gods know we deserve something nice right now."

I laughed.

If this is how she makes me feel just planning our first date...

We spent the rest of the ride back to camp planning what to do. Percy, Annabeth, and Grover kept giving us weird glances, but we didn't care all that much.

We arrived back at camp around 8 PM. Chiron was waiting for us next to Thalia's Tree.

"Welcome home" he said, smiling. "Come now, the others are waiting for you.

We went down to the dining pavilion, where the rest of the camp was waiting. Apparently, they made burial shrouds for us while we were gone. I'm not sure how much I liked that, but we got to burn them now, which was fun. Annabeth's was a dark grey, with a silver owl embroidered into it. Grover's was apparently made by some naiads, and was more akin to a flat basket than an actual shroud. Me and Percy's had been made by the Ares cabin. They had drawn a crude image of our faces over two bath towels and painted red Xs over the eyes. It got a bit of a laugh out of me, but Percy was less amused. Andromeda's though, was beautiful. It was a golden brown, with a glittering gold sun embroidered into it. I kind of felt bad about burning it, but it was the tradition so I didn't exactly have much of a choice. The rest of the night was spent partying. At one point, Annebeth came up to me to inform me that the Athena cabin had decided to offer me a spare bed they had if I wanted it. I gladly accepted. No more sleeping bag for me!

Around 11 PM, Chiron shut things down. I guess even demigods have a bedtime. I gave Andromeda, Percy, Annabeth, and Grover a hug, and followed Annabeth to the Athena cabin, where my few belongings had already been moved. I fell asleep very quickly. I didn't realize how much I missed sleeping in a proper bed.

The next morning I woke up early, around 9 AM. I spent the next hour or so getting ready. I was never really fussy about my appearance before, but with my first date with Andromeda later on, I decided I ought to take extra care. After breakfast, we met up near the archery range. We had decided to spend some time there, where she would teach me about archery, since she thought I should know how to use a bow.

She grinned as I approached, and ran to give me a hug. "(Y/N)! Was worried you'd chicken out on me for a minute!" She smirked and stuck her tongue out after saying the last part.

"Cmon 'Meda. I went down into the underworld the other day! A first date is hardly that much scarier."

She smiled, and dragged me over to pick out a bow.

We spent the next three hours practicing archery. I wasn't terrible at it, but I was nowhere near as good as her.

"No, (Y/N), not like that" she said, adjusting my stance.

"'What? That's exactly how you showed me!"

"Your feet are too close together."

I looked down and sighed. She was right.

Finally, I managed to start consistently hitting the target. I wasn't exactly fast, mind you, and did not have the pinpoint accuracy she did, but I was miles better than I had been when we started.

She gave me a big hug. "Great job, (Y/N)! My dad would be proud!"

I blushed. I still hadn't really decided what I thought of him knowing about us, but he seemed to generally like me, so I was coming around to the idea.

"Cmon now. Time for part two of our date!"

We walked over to the lake. Andromeda was apparently a big swimmer, so we had decided to spend the rest of the day there. We didn't even bother to change into swimming clothes, not that I had any on hand to change into. For the next couple hours, we swam around in the water, trying to dive to the bottom a couple times but never quite making it. As the day came to an end, and the sun began to set, I surfaced one last time. Treading water right in front of me was Andromeda. Now don't get me wrong, I thought she was beautiful before, but something about the way the setting sun was catching her hair, reflecting off of it and the lake, made her seem utterly flawless. Maybe her dad was giving her a bit of help, I don't know.

"Hey! Earth to (Y/N)!"

I blinked. Apparently I'd been staring. Andromeda was blushing.

"Sorry, you just look really pretty right now." I said, blushing myself.

She stayed there for a second, and then did something that I was not expecting.

She kissed me.

It didn't last that long. It was my first kiss and, as she told me later on, her first as well, so neither of us really knew what we were doing, but for the second or so our lips were connected, I tuned every other thing in the world out. She was all that mattered in that moment. The lake could have suddenly caught fire, and I wouldn't have cared.

She backed up and smiled.

"I... I had a really good time today, (Y/N)."

I smiled back. "I did too, 'Meda."

She began rubbing the back of her shoulder.

"Well..."

I interrupted her. "Look, you asked the first time, so I think I should now. You want to make this, like, a proper official thing? Us I mean."

Andromeda smiled brighter than I ever had seen her before.

"YES!" She screamed, then covered her mouth as a nearby dryad glanced over.

I laughed and pulled her into a hug. "Let's get out of the water now, my skin is going to look horrible with how long we've been in."

We got out, dried off as much as we could, which wasn't much, and walked back over to our cabins. Before we separated to go wash up and change into dry clothes, I gave her a quick peck on the cheek.

"See you at dinner, 'Meda!" I said with a smile.

She just giggled a bit and ran into the Apollo cabin.

As I walked back to the Athena cabin, I started to fully comprehend what had happened.

Oh my gods. It actually happened. We... I... me and 'Meda...

I made a silent prayer of thanks to Aphrodite. I wasn't sure if that was the right thing to do, but it felt like it was. Couldn't hurt, surely. Annabeth, who was sitting outside reading, gave me a knowing smile as I walked towards the door to the cabin. Good to know she was on board with this whole thing, I suppose.

I'm not particularly proud of it, but I squeed a bit before I walked in. The most beautiful girl I had ever met was not only interested in me, but was now my girlfriend. Maybe the quest hadn't been all bad after all.