Aroma ~ A Percabeth Story (ongoing): Book 3 - Percy Jackson Fanfiction

Prologue

Prologue

"What... what do you mean?' Annabeth buried her head in her hands. Percy gently lowered his arm around her shoulders. "How could our children be... be gone?"

"I know it's hard, my dear," Chiron said. He seemed to have aged a hundred years. "We've got satyrs and tree spirits and demigods looking out everywhere. But it's been almost a year now, Annabeth. I'm afraid... well, you might need to prepare for the worst. Nobody's seen them."

"Don't forget the human police are all over this too, Chiron," Thalia put in.

"We needn't rely on them," Chiron said softly. "They're going to close the case. The twins are fifteen now. Whilst still children, they're not high priority."

Annabeth stood up, shaking with fury, tears pouring down her cheeks. "How could anyone say that?" she screamed. Percy grabbed her arm but she pushed him away, her voice shrill and trembling. "How could you sit there so bloody calmly and tell me that my children probably won't come back? Do you have any idea how that feels? DO YOU?"

"Annabeth!" Thalia slammed her fist on the table. "You have got to be quiet and listen. Everybody is searching. The gods are keeping an eye out. Things will work out for the best."

"No." Annabeth collapsed to the floor, sobbing her heart out. Percy knelt beside her and pulled her to his chest. "No. I can't live a world without them, not my babies, not them."

Percy kissed the top of her head. "I'll be back in a minute, sweetheart." He turned to Chiron. "Can I have a word outside, please?"

Chiron nodded. Thalia rushed forwards and hugged Annabeth, who was wailing hysterically. Percy quickly left the Big House and then fell on the steps, breathing hard. Chiron - in wheelchair form - stopped shortly behind him.

"Is there nothing you can do?" Percy asked desperately.

"If there was, I'd have done it by now," Chiron muttered.

"How can there be twelve Olympians, a bunch of minor gods, millions of demigods, a national appeal throughout all of USA and now into the UK, and the two camps searching for two children, and not find them?" Percy's throat was hoarse from all the crying he'd done. "Camp Jupiter have a few hundred kids. We have nearly a thousand. We've got every country in the world pretty much covered. There's satyrs, nymphs, tree spirits looking... surely they'd pop up on the radar in monster areas, too, right? Bornes attract huge attention!"

"We'll keep looking, Percy," Chiron said. "Listen, I promise we won't give up. You have my word. A year is a long time, and things could have happened then... but they're smart kids. They'll come home."

Percy nodded. "Yeah. Yeah, thanks, Chiron. I best get back to Annabeth." He stood up, then stopped. "She's not right, you know. This... this is destroying her. And that's destroying me. I can handle this whole nightmare, because I know my two children, and I know they're not stupid, and I have every faith that they're alive - sure, I miss them with everything I have and I wish they were here, but I have every faith. But seeing Annabeth, the strong one out of us, so broken and downhearted... it kills me, Chiron, every single time. And it kills me that there is nothing I can say or do that will stop it."

He sighed, the tears breaking forwards again. "I can't lose her too, Chiron. I just can't."

Defeated, he walked back into the Big House, where Annabeth's howls of a mother's agony could still be heard.

Chiron sighed and transformed so that his glorious lower half broke out - a horse, that is, for Chiron was a centaur. He left behind the Big House, away from the room of the ping-pong table at which Annabeth was propped against, Thalia and Percy comforting her the best they could. He galloped up the path to where the Oracle resided.