Hades has the helm of darkness. How could anybody else sneak into the throne room and steal the master bolt? You'd have to be invisible."

Silence settled over Percy at the word "invisible," his mind going to Annabeth's invisibility cap as Aurora snorted, eyeing the boy suspiciously. "He didn't mean Annie, dipshit."

Behind them, a man screamed in terror, car doors slammed, and the Lincoln peeled out of the car wash at a speed that was much higher than the speed limit.

"You'd better go see what that was," Luke said. "Listen, Percy, are you wearing the flying shoes? I'll feel better if I know they've done you some good."

"Oh... yeah!" Percy was many things, but a liar was not one of them. "Yeah, they've come in handy."

"Really?" The older blond boy beamed. "They fit and everything?"

The water shut off. The mist started to evaporate.

"Well, take care of yourself out there in Denver," Luke called, his voice getting fainter. "And tell Grover it'll be better this time! Nobody will get turned into a pine tree—"

But the mist was gone, and Luke's image faded to nothing. 

Unknowingly to Percy, Aurora glanced at him, who stared at what was Camp Half Blood. Although it was not his true home, the warm feeling he had gotten in his stomach was gone. Aurora looked away. Little did she know, Percy's eyes had settled on her grim, disappointed face as soon as hers left his. He wanted to know what she was thinking, and was extremely tempted to ask.

Annabeth and Grover came around the corner, laughing, but stopped when they saw the two's faces. You would've thought that Annabeth would have separated the two, given how much trouble they were together. Annabeth's smile faded. "What happened? What did Luke say?"

"Nothing, he was just Luke." Aurora was a much better liar than Percy. Percy didn't know what "just Luke" meant to the two girls, who were obviously closer than Percy could've imagined, but Annabeth seemed to accept her answer. 

Percy nodded, desperate to change the subject. "Come on, let's find some dinner."

ೀ⋆｡🌷 notes ...

word count: 3719

date published: march 9, 2024

thoughts: a little change in the plot :) sorry for the long chapter. i'm trying to consolidate the amount of chapters so the book isn't 10000 parts at the end of the last olympian, so the chapters will be way longer :( 

also this has been a WILD week THANK YOU ALL SO FUCKING MUCH FOR OVER 10K READS when i first published haven about a month ago i wasn't expecting this much love i love you all so much <3

also announcement!! i just published a sirius black x female oc fanfiction called RENEGADE if you want to check it out, for all the harry potter fans out there!