Avengers and Percy

Chapter 5

---- Annabeth ----

I don't know how long it's been. Whatever the length of time - it's too long.

When I pushed Percy away from me, it was with the hope that he would move on and live his life and that eventually, we'd meet again in Elysium. I didn't consider the effect of not being with him until that time. I didn't have time to think of it then, I was about to get crushed by a giant hand, for Pete's sake! The only thing I could really keep my mind straight on was Keep Percy safe.

So I pushed him away.

"I'll see you in Elysium."

Why, oh, why did I have to push him away?

I circle my toes about in the lake again. The Elysium the rest of the Seven and I were presented with was a mix between Camp Half-Blood and Camp Jupiter. And the house I have is nearly an exact architectural match to Percy's Cabin back at Camp. I say nearly because first, there are three or four Athenian pieces built in, and second, on the inside there is a kitchen, a bathroom, a TV, a Master bedroom with a queen-sized bed, and two closets - one of which is filled with Percy's clothes.

I honestly wear those more than I wear my own. They are comfortable and they smell like him. Like sea salt and Sally's blue cookies.

My eyes fill with tears as I remember seeing her for the first time in Elysium. I thought that Percy, when he didn't have me, would at least always have his mother. Instead, he's left with no family - no Paul, no Sally...

No Baby sister.

That's the most heartbreaking part of this whole situation. When they died, Sally was pregnant. She was five months along, but since she wasn't really showing and I was so busy worrying about Percy, she never told me.

So the baby died with Sally.

However, there's another part to the story. Apparently when a baby dies - born or not (no matter the stage of pregnancy), the baby will be placed in a special part of the Underworld which lies directly between Elysium and Asphodel. A nursery of sorts. There, each soul under the age of two is basically frozen until the parent arrives. If the responsible parent(s) (or guardian(s)) is worthy of Elysium when they die, the baby appears at the home of the parent(s) and they are given the opportunity to spend time and connect with the child until they choose the child's next parents to whom he/she will be reborn.

I know. I thought this was a strangely kind and even...beautiful rule for Hades to have come up with, but then I overheard the shades outside of Elysium talking and learned that it was Queen Persephone who made this rule and forced Hades to enforce it.

So all is well with the world.

Sally and Paul have spent every waking moment with their little girl. It's clear that they love her very much. They both know that they'll eventually have to start looking for her next parents, but for now, they're happy.

And that's all I could ever ask for.

Right?

I suddenly realize that I've been sobbing. What exactly I'm crying for, I don't know. Maybe it's for Sally and Paul who won't get to see their little girl grow up. Maybe it's for little Estelle who won't even remember her first parents. Maybe it's for Leo who we can't find anywhere in Elysium. Maybe it's the knowledge that I will never know that love - the unconditional kind that a mother has for her child.

Maybe it's the stupid, selfish hope that Percy will die quickly so I can be with him again.

I push myself off the dock and into the lake. Approximately ten feet below the surface is a bubble of oxygen atop a mound of sand - much akin to the one he made around us when we were sixteen. My ears pop with the pressure of the surrounding waters, but I don't mind. It reminds me of his embrace and the way he used to make me so frustrated my ears would pop with the effort it took to not throw him right into the forge fires.

Ah, good times.

I pick up the small photo I have of the two of us. It's a stupid photo that Piper took with an old Polaroid of us arm-wrestling during dinner on the Argo II. The stakes had been high with two plates of syrup-drenched waffles on either side of our arms and a plate of blue cookies for the winner. Both of us were glaring rightfully at the other with stubborn determination. Those blue cookies were mine.

I stroke my finger across the image of his tense jaw. Oh, how I miss moments like that. The ones where we could actually be just a little bit childish. It was a rare feeling for any demigod.

A stray tear plops onto the photo and I quickly swipe it away before it can ruin the photo. I roll to my back, staring up at the light that manages to filter through the water. "I love you, Seaweed Brain. Please be happy." I take in a shuttering breath as my eyes start to shut from emotional exhaustion.

"Maybe when you finally get here, I will be, too."

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Hi Y'all! I'm just gonna be completely honest - I am terrible at updates. So here's this chapter. When I was working on it in my Docs, it said that it was only two pages long, so yeah, kind of short, but I'm trying to do the chapters by shift in perspective. So if they seem to have really staggered lengths, it's just because certain perspectives would work for different amounts of time.

Anywho, Caio!

-Violinner24