ONE LAST TIME . . . heroes of olympus

72

DESPITE THE GRIEF, the Earth still turned on its axis. The world still needed saving, which was what they were doing.

The first three days were spent trying to get their shit together. They flew to Epirus to shut the Doors of Death, in the hopes that maybe, just maybe, they could actually do this. That Annabeth and Percy were actually alive in Tartarus and that they were going to close the doors on that side.

The day after that, after they'd had a meeting in the mess hall at way-too-early-in-the-morning-o'clock ( it really wasn't; Kat had just woken up at her usual time, around eleven in the morning ) trying to figure their shit out, Jason and Piper cornered Kat.

"Hey," Piper said softly. "Can we talk?"

Kat looked over at her, her gaze flicking to Frank before she looked back to Piper. "Yeah," she said. "We can talk. Come on."

She walked off, letting them follow her as she went down to sickbay.

"Are you still in pain?" Jason asked, concern tingeing his voice as Kat strode into the sickbay.

"It's just my head, it doesn't hurt that bad," she said, hands busy as she filled a cup of water and grabbed ibuprofen. "It really was an accident, I swear! I was worried about you, and it slipped out. I saw blood run down your chest."

She popped the pill in her mouth and swallowed it down with water, turning around and reaching out for Jason. She lifted his shirt up with one hand and traced a finger down the shallow gash going down his chest.

He frowned. "It didn't hurt for that long, I was fine. You don't need to worry about me."

"Of course we do," Piper spoke up, leaning on the counter next to Kat. "No one else is going to worry about you otherwise."

"You don't worry about yourself enough," Kat agreed quietly, sipping at her water. She was still dealing with blood loss, too, on top of this. Ugh.

Jason raised his eyebrows at her. "Just like you."

"I have no self-preservation, that's different," she argued. "I said I'm sorry for using my powers."

"We know," Piper gently put her head on Kat's shoulder. "It's scary, knowing that you could go insane every time you use your powers."

"It's a blessing and a curse," Kat smiled ruefully, moving her hand to touch Jason's arm. "I'm sorry. I'll try and be better about it."

"I know you will, but thank you for trying." Jason leaned down to kiss her head, then Piper's. "Thank you for being here for me. Both of you."

"Always will be," promised Kat. They stayed there like that, standing there peacefully.

"We'll make it out of this," Piper vowed. "Together."

"Yeah," Kat agreed, and she actually believed it. They would get out of this together, whether dead or alive, but she could see them making it out of this quest alive and ( hopefully ) thriving. "Ride or die."

* * *

"Hey," Frank said to her that same day when dinner was basically over because Hazel and Nico had just walked out, "do you want to talk?"

Kat's lips pulled into a small smirk. "Wow, I'm popular today," she commented, standing up and stretching. "But, yeah, let's talk, Foo Foo Bear."

"Why do you call him that, anyway?" Leo asked as she ambled over to Piper to kiss her forehead ( she'd missed and kissed her nose; oh well ).

"Because I was a weird kid," she told him, ruffling his hair as she walked past him to kiss Jason on the cheek. "Says the one who calls me Kitty Kat, you fucking NASA Employee."