The Lightning Thief (Argo/hbh's Version)

Angst

A/N: Sorry in advance. This is what reading "Dear Luke, our brother." from beginning to end in one night does with me.

TRIGGER WARNING: (HINTING TOWARDS) ABUSE, SPIDERS, GORE, (HINTING TOWARDS) SELF HARM

Bea's POV 

That game of football was great. That night however, the mood was a little different than I intended it to be. If you've read the chapter before this one (🤨) I'll save you the going-to-bed moment.

And the part where I died and came back in the same hour :)

I tossed and turned in my bed for a long time. I just couldn't get sleep. My thoughts kept wandering around, fighting to get my attention like a thousand little voices in my head. Even if I tried letting one of them win the other 999 would just try even harder, push my mind over the edge even more. 

Luke, I thought. I've noticed him disappearing from camp a lot at nights. He's been so neglecting towards me the past few weeks. When that Percy kid arrived even more. Then he went on the quest, with Margo and Heja and Anathea, if I remember correctly. The last two arrived with Percy. Great, I thought. Three new campers and already in more danger than some of us who've gone to camp for a long time. 

I turned around once more, my face towards the wall. I could feel the blanket on my body. It felt weirdly heavy. I was sweating. I brushed it off as the heat and kicked the blanket away. It was colder than I thought it would. I compromised it by letting the blanket only cover half of my body. It felt good. I finally had some hope to fall asleep peacefully. Welp, no. 

Ugh, I thought. Why being able to control someone's mental state when you can't even control your sleep? I closed my eyes. Just resting would be good. I've done it before. Pulling all nighters with my brothers, just because being aware that you're breaking the rules, forcing your body to stay awake and eventually just not being tired anymore... Those moments were fun. 

My thoughts went to the quest Luke went on again. I thought about Heja and Anathea. I remember Heja was claimed close to the moment she arrived. Anathea still wasn't claimed. I opened my eyes again. Did I feel pity? I'm not sure. Unclaimed, and already thrown into life-threatening situations. I stared at the ceiling, as I turned again. Why can't I just sleep? 

I could softly hear the snoring of Castor. Not Pollux, because he's sleeping beneath me and the snoring would be louder then. I tried to focus on that, and on the soft ticking of the clock. In other words, I tried to focus on consistent and regular sounds, hoping it'd calm my mind down and finally let me sleep. Thankfully, it did.

Not so thankfully, as Anathea and Heja were the last two people on my mind as I fell asleep I subconsciously threw them into my nightmare, mixing their experiences with mine and creating one shared nightmare filled with angst and trauma. Don't we love that?

It felt like as soon as I closed my eyes they jolted open again. Thinking I just failed to fall asleep, my hand moved to somewhere left of me where my nightstand was, to grab my glasses. Too late I realized my vision was just sharp, and that I was standing. Huh? I looked around. I realized I was in a nightmare. I observed my surroundings. But I didn't recognize them. I was... in a house. A window gave me the ability to watch some fields, I was in a room with just one bed, a desk and a nightstand and in front of me was a man whom I didn't recognize. But he was looking at me with furious eyes. "WHERE WERE YOU??" The man yelled at me. Words left my mouth, but I didn't control it. That made me realize I wasn't only in a nightmare, but in a flashback. But whose... 

"I.. I was just with Heja, dad!" I said. Heja? Was this Anathea? "Just Heja?" The man sad furious. The man, whom I expected to be Anathea's dad then. "Yes. Why won't you believe me?" "Look at yourself! You're all dirty, your backpack looks like it was on some forest floor and 'just being with Heja' is not an excuse to come home FOUR HOURS AFTER SCHOOL ENDED!! DON'T LIE TO ME!" I/Anathea could feel myself taking a step backwards. "Okay I was not with Heja, I was outside." 'I swear to I don't fucking know what but I'm rather outside than here!' I/Anathea added in my head.