Collision (PJO/HP Crossover)

Chapter 22

Percy

I woke up in the infirmary again. My head had stopped throbbing and instead only felt a bit sore. Easy to live with. I blinked my eyes open and sat up.

"Hey. How's your head?" Annabeth said from a chair next to my bed. She rubbed her eyes and stretched.

"Fine. Were you here the whole night?" I asked. The last thing I remembered before falling asleep was lying in the bed with Annabeth.

"No," she said. "After you fell asleep, Madam Pomfrey made me go back to the Gryffindor tower. I got up early to get here before you woke."

"You should have kept sleeping," I said, yawning and stretching my arms over my head.

"I wanted to get to you before anyone else did. I think Harry and those guys are planning something today. And I felt like I was being watched on the way here." Her eyes narrowed. "I still do."

I took that as a silent command—ixnay on the Eekgray orldway—and nodded.

"The good news is, you're free to go. Madam Pomfrey said you can go back to the common room and rest," Annabeth said, tossing my shoes on the floor next to the bed. "She said you shouldn't go to class today, and I convinced Professor McGonagall to excuse me too."

"Awesome." I swung my legs out of the bed, stuck them into my shoes, and stood up. "Let's go. I need better food."

Annabeth laughed. "Breakfast is just starting."

As soon as we walked into the Great Hall, the Gryffindor table started cheering. The other houses half-heartedly clapped, mostly confused. I smiled and followed Annabeth to the Gryffindor table, sitting next to Harry and the gang. Ron pushed a plate of food in front of me and I nodded gratefully.

"Be prepared, Percy. Everyone loves you now," Harry warned. Annabeth agreed, sitting next to me. "Here, drink up." He handed me a glass of pumpkin juice which I gulped down. A strange smile came over Harry's face as I drank.

"Thanks. I don't think I've eaten since that night. I've either been sleeping or talking to you guys," I said, chowing down.

"So, Percy," Hermione said, "we were wondering, how—"

Annabeth blurted out a bunch of words in Greek, almost too fast for me to understand. Still, I got the gist of it.

They put veritaserum in your drink.

I froze. A million thoughts raced through my head. I thought that they had finally started to trust us. The attack by the Death Eaters had turned out to be to our advantage, it gave fake proof to our fake truth. We were doing everything we were supposed to, we acted as much as we could like a witch and wizard would. But they still tried to force me to tell the truth. How could they still not trust us?

All of those thoughts passed in seconds. "What was that?" Ron spluttered.

"Greek," I blurted out, unable to lie. "We learned how to speak Ancient Greek."

"We forgot to check out with Madam Pomfrey before we left, come on, Percy," Annabeth said, grabbing my arm and dragging me out of the Great Hall, but not before I shoved a sausage in my mouth and grabbed a piece of toast.

"Okay, I've done some reading on veritaserum and it takes at least an hour to wear off. So we need to keep you away from basically everyone for an hour so they can't get any information out of you," Annabeth said once there were no more wizards around.

"I took a beating to protect our secret and make them trust us, a literal beating, and they still don't? Seriously?" I said, fuming as I let Annabeth pull me along.

"That's how it's going to be for a while, Percy, they most likely won't trust us until we reveal who we really are. We just have to deal with it." We stopped in front of the wall that concealed the Room of Requirement, and Annabeth closed her eyes and paced back and forth three times before the doors formed.

With a quick glance behind us, we dashed inside and closed the doors. I slumped on a couch in the middle of the room, the Room of Requirement having given us chairs, couches, and games.

"Well, now what?" I said, not really expecting an answer.

"Now," Annabeth said, sitting at the other end of the couch, a mischievous grin on her face, "you tell me what happened between you and Rachel. And you and Calypso."

I pushed away the urge to answer, instead saying, "Hey, you're my girlfriend, you're not supposed to take advantage of me like that!"

"Please, Percy, just answer the questions. It's been killing me all these years, not knowing."

One glance at Annabeth's face was all it took for me to cave. I sighed. "Rachel kissed me. Once, before you and I started dating. I never thought more about it. That was all that happened. And Calypso . . ." I sighed again. "She was my biggest 'what-if?' I did care for her, but I had to leave her. I cared more about you."

I wasn't looking at Annabeth, so I didn't know she had moved until she was sitting next to me and interlocking her fingers with mine. "Thank you," she said softly.

"Yeah, yeah. I only told you because of the veritaserum."

"Sure you did, Percy, just keep telling yourself that."

I snorted, shaking my head. Annabeth kissed my forehead and jumped up to find something to do. I put my hands behind my head, thinking.

To be honest—which, for the next hour, I had to be—I was relieved that Annabeth knew now. I had been wanting to tell her for a while, but I didn't know how she would take it, so instead, I hoped she wouldn't ask and would forget about it.

I always had to tread carefully around girls that weren't Annabeth. First, there was Calypso, and then Rachel, and then the awkwardness business with Reyna, and I couldn't say that I hadn't seen the stares I was getting from some witches.

"How do you think they got the veritaserum anyway?" I asked, forcing myself to change the subject.

"I'm not sure," Annabeth said, folding her arms. "You're the only one who got to keep a vial, and I hid yours while you were stuck in the infirmary."

A thought struck me. "I saw Harry hiding something in his robes that day, right before Slughorn emptied all the cauldrons. He probably took a vial, that was most likely what they used."

"Of course he did," Annabeth huffed, sounding fed up.

"What?"

"It's a lot harder to fool them than I thought it would be. The stories definitely are true about them, if a bit exaggerated. They're sneaky and clever."

"And they never play by the rules . . . well, except in Quidditch."

A/N: Am I the only one who thinks Annabeth is nervous about all the girls Percy has history with? I just feel like it's ignored but that she thinks about it a lot.

Anyway, I know the chapter is short, but the last few chapters have been long and action packed, so now there has to be a cool down period (or maybe I'm just giving you a false sense of security *mischievous grin*).

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