#should bring out the best in her and the worst in percy | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

happyk44 · 7 months

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I think Percy's destructive nature is somewhat of a surprise to Annabeth. Grover and Sally have long since been aware of it.

Sally because she knows Poseidon, he even warned her that his kids inherit his emotional flipflopping, she's seen the ocean at its best and its worst, she knew fully what she was getting into when she became pregnant.

Grover because even if his nature isn't oceanic, he's still a nature deity and has a general understanding of how other natures operate, and he has the empathy link, but even before the empathy link he was able to spot when Percy was resisting the urge to punch someone in the face for saying something rude.

Annabeth knows Percy can be destructive. But she's not aware of the depths to his destruction, to his anger. She's seen when he's at various positive emotional extremes - happiness, tranquility, etc - but not the extremes of his rage and all that accompanies it.

Because Sally taught him to be good, to be kind. She taught him how to relieve himself of his anger, his upset, without hurting anyone. She stressed the importance of not taking his feelings out on other people. That it's not fair to be mean to someone who didn't upset you. And Gabe's abuse made him even more reluctant to become a person who hurts other people and doesn't care.

Ironically befriending Grover made those lessons hard to follow. Grover being bullied frequently just piled on the angry feelings he had to swallow. It would bury the positive emotions, making it even harder to focus on the good things that kept him kind.

Tartarus is the first time Annabeth gets a peak at the lake, instead of the river that flows from it. She's... scared. Not of Percy, but just in general. It's okay to be scared when someone, even someone you love, tortures a goddess and only stops because you asked. She knows Percy would never hurt her.

But she also knows that Percy would hurt others for her.

She doesn't know how to bring it up, but it's clear that the mask he wore before Tartarus is broken and the methods he used to use aren't working anymore. He grits his teeth more. He clenches his fists frequently. Anger, stress, annoyance - they all flit across his face when before she had to study the tension of his shoulders to tell when he was annoyed.

His shoulders are always tense.

She doesn't know what to do. She knows she should tell Sally - Estelle is a baby, babies can be annoying, and while she doubts Percy would hurt his little sister, that doesn't mean the lake won't overflow with the emotions she could cause. She knows she should tell Grover - the two of them have more of an emotional connection, regardless of the empathy link, and he's always been more willing to hash out his emotions with Grover than with her.

She knows it's because she's solution oriented. Sometimes he just wants to say things but she struggles not to analyze the problems and figure out a worthy fix. Percy's also bad at wording his thoughts, and she lacks the patience to let him stumble back and forth and in a circle trying to find the right explanaton.

She knows she should tell them. But she doesn't. It's difficult to ask for help, even on the behalf of other people. She wants to help him herself. Prove she can fix what broke with her in Tartarus. Surely they'd already know anyway - Sally because he lives with her and Grover because of the empathy link. So she keeps her lips shut and watches him carefully. He seems to be getting better with time.

Then weeks later Grover is pulling her away as Sally calls her phone. The world goes hazy. Sounds turn vague, the only clarity being Sally's voice. Grover's eyes are full of tears. His hands shake. Annabeth reaches out and holds them.

Certain words echo in Annabeth's head and encircle everything else Sally says. Tried to kill himself, she'd said. But he's fine. Those words repeat like a broken record. Eventually they overlap until they're nothing but a garbled mess.

It hurts when Sally tells them that she can't divulge Percy's location. It hurts when she admits she's not even sure where Percy is, but that she knows who he's with, that he's safe, that's he's fine. It hurts when she reads off the short note Percy left behind. Her pained laugh at Percy's deliberate handwriting cuts through Annabeth's gut like a knife

Why didn't she do something? Percy is a good person. Kind. Loving. Unending rage towards anything and everything would drive him insane. She should've known that. She should've anticipated it. She should've helped him.

But she was scared. She wanted to pretend everything was normal. Like it had been when the mask was still in tact and his methods worked and she never became worried by the furrow of his brows or the clench of his fists. She was scared, she was a coward.

And now Percy was gone.

#happy talks pjo #suicide mention #percy jackson #annabeth chase #sally jackon #grover underwood #my writing #my fanfic

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romanitas · 16 days

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look at me go, it hasn't even been a month! we're back with (i think) the penultimate part of the spy au !! thanks to @perseannabeth who helped me figure out some plot points literally irl for the final stretch. there's always been a vague plan for the end, hopefully it lives up! also again available on ao3 if tumblr formatting screws up.

Annabeth hasn’t seen Percy for four and a half weeks. She’s been off the Jupiter Industries case for just as long, what with Luke Castellan’s involvement; they’re currently restructuring the plan forward. She’s not used to boredom, but she’s not sure she could consider it full boredom when her brain will not stop churning. She’s aware it’s usually a stomach churning, but no, in this case, her mind is on the go in a thousand different directions. She doesn’t feel nauseous or sick - just overwhelmed mentally, which as far as she’s concerned is one of the worst kinds. She’d rather be vomiting.

She’s back at her apartment - her real one. It’s nearly as empty as the fake one. She doesn’t keep a lot of things around, not wanting too many distractions on top of the fact that she feels like she spends very little time actually in it. The most personalization is an owl throw pillow with a matching blanket on the couch and a few architectural prints across her walls. It feels emptier than it ever has, and she cruelly imagines what it might be like if Percy came here. She really, really needs to stop thinking about him, but it feels impossible, because if she’s not thinking about him, she starts to think about Luke. And that’s worse.

She faceplants directly into the owl blanket with a groan and lays there, ignoring the wafting smell of her Korean BBQ takeout sitting on the countertop. This has been her life each day for the last week: different dishes but a very familiar static and face full of fluff, followed by dejectedly eating lukewarm food. And then she just gets mad at herself for being such a sad sack. She’s Annabeth fucking Chase. What the hell did Percy Jackson do to her?

Reyna checks in periodically. She sends minute updates, but not enough for Annabeth to start doing her own poking and prodding. Frank stops by a few times to make sure she’s eating, and she does welcome his company in an absent way. He brings some of the best takeout, but he knows all her favorites. He carries the conversation in directions that serve the best distractions.

“You should use this time to get out,” he says one day, dragging some naan through the rest of his curry. When Annabeth stares at him, he clarifies. “I mean, maybe think of it like a vacation? You never take a vacation. Do things you’ve always wanted to.”

She grumpily shoves her own naan into her mouth to avoid answering him. But maybe he has a point. Maybe she does need to leave the house more often, if only to refresh herself. To get back on her feet. It’s only a matter of time before they give her a new assignment, and she refuses to fall into distractions again next time.

She takes herself out. She ventures further than a ten block radius and tries a new Pho place she’s been wanting to check out. She looks up a current run of temporary exhibitions around the city, buys tickets for three of them. She makes a reservation for herself at one of the museum restaurants, uncaring that it’s definitely overpriced and she can get a burger down the block for half the cost. She is utterly determined to give herself a good, clean, solid break from her time with Percy, so she’s prepared for the next chapter. Whatever it brings.

Naturally, it’s at one of the exhibitions that she runs into Sally Jackson.

Annabeth isn’t sure she could have been caught more off guard by Luke. She turns the corner and nearly runs into the woman, but her instincts make her sidestep at the last second. She’s not fast enough to avoid eye contact, because Sally moves at the same time, an apology on her lips.

“I’m so sorry - Annabeth?”

Why is this her life? Annabeth freezes, and she can feel the guilt rain down on her like a tsunami. She’s very rarely caught off guard like this, but this warm, wonderful woman unnerves her in an unexpected way. She just assumed she would never see her again, another casualty of her break with Percy.

Despite it all, Sally offers her a small, tentative smile. “Hi,” she says, tone infused with that very same warmth Annabeth knows she doesn’t deserve.

She swallows. “Hi,” she replies, weakly.

Sally reaches out to give her arm a gentle squeeze, and Annabeth nearly combusts on the spot. But the older woman can sense her discomfort, because she pulls her hand away just as quickly and sighs. “Will you get a coffee with me?”

Every single part of her is telling her to say no; every rational, logical piece of her being knows this is a bad idea, but there’s a quiet desperation that wins out against her better judgment, and Annabeth nods mutely. Sally smiles again, then walks them both towards the museum cafe. She orders Annabeth’s coffee exactly the way she likes it and orders herself a chai latte. By the time they sit down at the table, Annabeth’s nerves are shot, so she just wraps her hands around the cup and takes a sip, burning her tongue immediately. She winces, and Sally offers her a napkin.

“Percy told me you broke up.”

Annabeth almost laughs, hollowly. There’s no way he would have told her anything - Percy might have been royally pissed at her, but he’s also not cruel, and she knows he wouldn’t jeopardize her by spilling all the beans to his mother. He also wouldn’t want to put his mom in danger. Instead, her shoulders sink, and all she can do is nod once.

“He didn’t really tell me why,” Sally continues, wringing her hands around her own cup. She gets a thoughtful wrinkle in her forehead that looks so much like her son Annabeth almost flinches. “He said it wasn’t his place to share your history, but he did tell me you lied about a lot.”

She doesn’t know if hearing that from Sally is worse than her whole exchange with Percy a month ago. She doesn’t say anything, but her lack of answer is its own confirmation.

“My son is everything to me,” she says, and Annabeth prepares to be reamed out. Why wouldn’t she be? She just broke this woman’s son’s heart, and they’re two of the kindest, best people she’s ever met. “And I have never seen him so miserable.”

It’s not yelling, but it might be worse for real this time. Which is why the next thing Sally says is the most surprising part of all.

“I think he misses you.”

Annabeth’s head whips up so fast, and she says the first thing since her awkward greeting, which isn’t much more articulate. “What?”

It’s Sally’s turn to be quiet, again looking thoughtful as she finally takes a sip of her own drink. “I’m only telling you this because I know he was happy with you. Happier than I’ve seen him in a long time. And I know what he’s like now. I’m not going to ask you what happened. I know you hurt him, deeply, and I know maybe it’s not my place to sit here with you and tell you all of this. I know maybe things have been damaged too greatly. I know it’s his life, not mine. But what I want to ask you anyway is if you want to fix it, and if you still love my son.”

Annabeth’s eyes well up. She can’t answer this one with a nod. It’s everything she’s been trying to push away, the impossibilities of Percy chasing her down more harshly than Luke in the alleyway. “I love him,” she admits, and saying it aloud to someone else nearly knocks the wind out of her. “But I don’t know if I can fix it. I really, really hurt him, and there are parts of it that feel too broken.”

She shouldn’t be sharing this with Percy Jackson’s mother, but there isn’t another person who’s spoken to her about Percy specifically like this. A person who prioritizes Percy the way he should be, no matter what her own stupid heart and head are doing. Frank worries about her, but she’s the one who needs to grovel, and Sally will always, always put her son first.

Sally takes another sip, watching her carefully over the brim. She’s never felt more scrutinized in her life, and she’s a goddamn spy. Annabeth’s been alone for a very long time, and those months with Percy and his friends and his family were the closest she felt like a real, normal person in a long time. But she isn’t normal. She can’t just slip into a real architect’s life and become a new Annabeth Chase.

“Are you willing to try?”

She’s taken aback by the question and the way it connects to her thoughts, and she’s sure the surprise is on her face. “I don’t think he wants me to. It should be his choice, not mine.”

Sally hums. “Will you give me your address?”

“He’s not going to come to my house.”

“It’s for me. Not him. I won’t give it to him.”

She hesitates. She’s unlisted for a reason, her residence deeply under wraps. She still gets mail, of course, and it’s not like she lives there most of the year. But then she stubbornly takes the receipt from the drinks, scribbles the P.O. box on the back before she can second guess herself, and slides it back over. “Can you memorize it and burn it?” she says teasingly, trying not to feel ashamed of joking about it.

Sally slides it into her pocket. “I’m giving you a chance now, because I love my son and I want his happiness more than anything else, but I can see you're in just as terrible a state as he is. I wanted to see for myself, after I realized it was you.” She lifts her drink again, and Annabeth’s not sure if the pause for dramatic effect is intentional or not. “This is not forgiveness. It’s not my place to give it. This is me having a conversation with you, because you’re a very smart, put together woman who has spent a significant amount of time with Percy.”

Annabeth doesn’t feel very put together at the moment, but she’s hardly going to interject.

“And above everything, Percy is my son.”

It’s not a threat, but it almost feels like one. In lieu of another response, Annabeth takes a cowardly sip of her coffee.

“Thank you, for having coffee with me,” Sally says, and it sounds like a goodbye. Like this might be the last thing they ever say to each other. They sit in silence for a few more minutes, finishing their drinks, and it’s Sally who leaves first. She climbs to her feet in a cool movement and adjusts her bag before giving Annabeth a nod, then walks away from the table.

Annabeth sits there for another thirty minutes, though what she spends it thinking about, she doesn’t really remember.

Three days later Annabeth receives a package in the mail, with Sally’s return address. She holds the box in her hands and doesn’t really know how to process it. She sets it on the kitchen island and stares at it, afraid of opening it for stupid reasons. Watching it out of the corner of her eye, she heats up a box of frozen mac and cheese, then reaches for a steak knife to slice open the packing tape as the microwave beeps.

Inside she finds a dozen chocolate chip cookies, wrapped up neatly in a transparent blue bag. Underneath them is an envelope, which she nervously lifts and carefully opens. There’s a note inside, and what looks like two tickets to - to an aquarium. Not just any aquarium, the one where she met Percy - or rather, where she orchestrated her meeting of Percy. Puzzled and sad all at once, she reads the note in Sally’s loopy writing.

Annabeth,

I bought these for you both a month ago. I’m giving them to you alone now as a final gift from me to you, and I hope you use them. Use the time to think about everything. Don’t try to return them.

Perhaps one day we’ll see each other again. Take care.

Sally

#percabeth #annabeth chase #percy jackson #heroes of olympus #i still don't know what the kids are using for tags anymore #it used to be just the first five would show up??? but i don't think it's like that anymore?????#tomato writes #spy auing

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barbarianprncess · 2 years

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bad dreams & bedsheets

read on ao3

There aren’t any bedsheets in the Big House

Fresh ones that is. There aren’t any fresh smelling or soft feeling bed sheets in the Big House. Annabeth knows this because she tore apart every storage closet and supply room in said Big House. And she’s found exactly two sets of sheets. One of which with a mystery stain she wouldn’t touch with a ten foot pole—let alone sleep on—the other with so many holes she’s convinced an Apollo kid was using it for target practice.

“Damn, Chase.” She’d been so preoccupied with Mission Find Fresh Sheets that she hadn’t noticed Clarisse wander past the disaster zone that Annabeth was sitting in the middle of. “What’d the closet do to you?”

“It doesn’t have any new sheets. There are no new sheets in this goddamn camp.”

Clarisse nods thoughtfully, as if the mess at her feet and the tears in her eyes are a rational response to not finding new sheets. “Have you checked—,”

“I promise you, wherever you’re about to say, I have in fact, checked.”

“Mm.” One of the best things about Clarisse is the fact that she never questions her. She takes whatever Annabeth says and works from there. “Why do you need new sheets in the first place?”

And therein lies the problem.

Why does Annabeth need new sheets? Because she does. She really needs new bedsheets. She really, desperately needs new bedsheets. Depending on the target, she can honestly say she’d kill a man for new bedsheets.

“Is this a Percy thing?” Annabeth shakes out of her train of thought to scowl.

“What, now that we’re dating, anything I do must have something to do with Percy?”

“Okay, so it’s a Percy thing.” One of the worst things about Clarisse is her uncanny ability to see right through Annabeth's bullshit.

“Okay, yes, fine, it’s a Percy thing.” Clarisse raises a single eyebrow. “Oh my gods, no, it’s not that. Jesus, we’ve been dating for nine days, we’re not animals.” Clarisse shrugs then smirks in a way that Annabeth is definitely going to have to ask her about later.

“Okay, then what is it? Like you said—it’s been nine days, you can’t be having problems already.” Annabeth picks at her nail beds. She feels a wave of grief as she’s reminded that the person she would go to—for nail beds and the Thing—isn’t here anymore. Clarisse misinterprets her silence. “Shit, are you having problems already? Is he being an asshole? Because I can—,”

“No, no, we’re actually great. He’s great. I don’t think anyone’s the asshole which should make me feel a lot better than I do. It’s just…complicated.”

“Percy’s a complicated person.” Clarisse says, almost unthinking. “You are too.”

Like Annabeth doesn’t know that. Like their joint complicatedness isn’t one of the main reasons she spent the entirety of last year with a knot in her stomach.

“I’m guessing the reason you’re not telling me what the thing is, is because it’s all personal and you wanna respect the privacy of your shiny new relationship.” Annabeth smiles a little subconsciously, the way she has been the past nine days when someone teased her about her and Percy's couple status. Clarisse notices—the observant little shit—and mimes gagging before she continues. “Well, whatever it is, I can tell you right now the answer isn’t bedsheets. It’s to talk to your stupid boyfriend about whatever stupid thing is bothering you.”

Annabeth looks down at her fingers and thinks that if she phrased it a bit differently, Clarisse would sound an awful lot like Silena right now. She wants to tell her that, but it might just make her sad, so she holds back and instead says what she’s been pretending wasn’t the case since she set off on her warpath to find sheets. “I’m scared of what’ll happen if I bring it up.”

“Why?”

Annabeth shrugs.

“You know he fucking loves you, right?” Another lumps pushes at her throat as she attempts to shrug.

“He hasn’t said it.”

Clarisse rolls her eyes. “Just because he’s afraid of the word doesn’t mean he feels it any less.” The statement of fact shouldn’t scare her as much as it does. Because yeah, objectively, she knows. She knows it the same way she knows that the war is really over or that Luke is dead or that she loves him back. Of course she knows Percy loves her. She’s aware it’s a fact, but it's gonna take her a while to get used to. It’ll take her a while to really believe it, at least on his part.

But she does. The more she thinks about it he’s told her a thousand different times in a thousand different ways. It caused him to forget consequences if it meant making sure she was safe, whether he realized it or not. It made him a special kind of pissed at her when she did something dangerous, and it made him kiss her like it was the first time every time. Or like it would be the last time every time. She isn’t sure. She hopes it's the first option.

(It’s probably the second.)

But she doesn’t say any of that. Clarisse might actually throw up if she did. Instead she says, “Wow. I never thought I’d see the day Clarisse LaRue would give me love advice.”

Just as she predicted, Clarisse narrows her eyes and turns to walk down the hall to wherever she was going before. “Yeah, well, this will be the first and last time.” For some reason it sounded like even Clarisse knew it was a lie, but Annabeth didn’t call her out on it. She sighs and goes to pick up the mess at her feet.

She hears the squeak of Clarisse’s sneakers and squints down at where Clarisse had come to a stop and half turned back to Annabeth. “Seriously, you’re good? You know what to do?”

Annabeth nods at her sullenly because yeah, she knows what she has to do.

She just really wishes she had found the bedsheets.

The night Percy and Annabeth got together was perfect.

From the way he tasted like her birthday cake, to the way he touched her ankle to dry her socks off in her shoes, to the way he whispered in her ear to use her hat to meet him back in his cabin after her siblings fell asleep. And how, when she climbed invisibly through his open window, he was bouncing on his heels at the other end of the room, like he was too excited to sit down. Or how they had to keep shushing each other’s giggles as they lie face to face in his too small bunk bed. Or how he kissed her through delirious smiles because he couldn’t seem to help either the smile or the urge to kiss her every thirty seconds. Or the fact that they never actually got around to sleeping.

They never got around to sleeping, but she couldn’t seem to mind the swollen lips or the bags under her eyes when Percy spent the whole morning looking at her like he’d never seen anything so wonderful in his entire life.

She’s snuck into his room every night since—partly because they’re sixteen and stupid and sneaking around is fun and partly because she spent five years thinking he was going to die and then he didn’t and she can’t quite believe that either—and it’s always the same. He’ll light up when he sees her like they hadn’t seen each other an hour ago, and they’ll make out on his tiny bunk bed, and laugh into each other’s necks until Annabeth falls asleep on his chest.

And then she’ll wake up alone. In sea salt smelling sheets with no sea salt smelling boy.

The first night she heard a strange noise at four-thirty in the morning, and blinked awake to the sight of Percy’s back. He was sitting up at the other end of the bed, telling her that she had to go back to her cabin. He’d kissed her quickly and then locked himself in the bathroom and she was too disoriented to realize at the time, but looking back he hadn’t looked her in the eye once. He was tense at breakfast, she could see from her table, but she didn’t think much of it because he relaxed when he saw her again after the fact.

The next day, and every day after that, she woken to him crouched next to her head, to tell her he’s going to the beach, and not to let the harpies find her in his room. It was on the third morning that she noticed his side wasn’t nearly as rumpled as her side. It was on the fifth that she noticed the empty bunk across the room was significantly more rumpled than hers. On the eighth she noticed how tired he seemed when he thought she wasn’t looking.

(On the ninth morning, she decided he needed new bedsheets.)

After her conversation with Clarisse, she spent the rest of the day agonizing about the conversation she had with Clarisse and using her work to distract herself from the fact that she was agonizing about her conversation with Clarisse. In fact she brought her laptop with her to Percy’s room when she knew he’d be showering, just so she had something to do with her hands.

Percy waltzes out of his bathroom with basketball shorts hanging low on his hips and wet hair dripping onto a remarkably bare chest and Annabeth hates him a little. Hates the way he’s a bit too beautiful , and it distracts her from important things like the fact that she has to have an important conversation with him. Hates the way he looks at her like he’s never seen anything like her, like he can't believe he gets to continue to look at her, like he’d be perfectly content to do nothing but look at her for the rest of his life.

“Hey.” His voice still takes her by surprise. The deepness of it. The sureness of it. She loved him when his voice cracked and wobbled—but she doesn’t hate this. “How’s Olympus?”

“Beating my ass. Mercilessly. With a stick.” His laugh is muffled by the tank top he’s pulling over his head—which doesn’t do much for her concentration because really all it does is define his arms more—and he crosses the room to stand beside her. He squirts at the program she has running to structure columns and says, “Okay, I would love to help you but everything on that screen means nothing to me.”

She tries to laugh but she’s so anxious it comes out more as a puff of air. He seems to notice, because he furrows his brow, removes one of the pillows behind her and slides in its place, and before she knows it, she’s being pulled back flush against his chest, and he’s drawing nonsensical patterns on her arms and he’s asking if her work is the only thing bothering her.

‘Okay Annabeth,’ she thinks, ‘this is the part where you tell him you know something’s wrong, that it’s alright if he doesn’t want to sleep in the same bed as you, that you can stay in your cabin and you aren’t mad, you just want to know he’s sleeping because it seems like he hasn’t slept in nine days and all signs point to her as the reason that he isn’t sleeping and—,’

“You need new bedsheets,” is all that comes out.

“That’s what's bothering you? My bedsheets?”

“Yes. You need new ones and I looked for some all morning and I couldn’t find any, so you have to ask Chiron for new bedsheets.”

She feels more than hears his shudder of laughter and he burrows his face in her neck. “Okay… what's wrong with my bedsheets?”

And now she’s angry that he seems to think her ridiculous request is funny but she’s only making this ridiculous request because he’s not talking to her and he’s not sleeping. “I don’t know Percy, you tell me what's wrong with the bedsheets.”

“I wasn’t aware there was anything wrong with my bedsheets.”

“You weren’t aware?”

“No.” He says the word slowly, seemingly detecting the lack of humor in her voice.

“But there has to be something wrong with your bedsheets,” she insists.

“Why?” It’s the hint of mirth still in his tone that sets her off.

“Because you aren’t fucking sleeping in them!”

His hands go completely still. He goes completely still, and stays that way even as she takes a deep breath and turns to face him.

“I know you’ve been sleeping in the other bunk.” Percy is looking at her like a deer caught in headlights. “Your side is way too neat next to me and that bunk is always all messed up. Like you were moving around a lot. And every morning you wake me up, and you can’t look me in the eye. I’m not upset if you need space—that's fine, I get it. I just don’t understand why you didn’t say so.”

Percy doesn’t say anything, he just puts his head in his hands. She scoots over and reaches out to touch him, but he flinches away, stands up and begins to pace. He’s shaking his head violently, and he’s fighting back tears; she can tell.

“You can’t—” he starts, and then shakes his head again.

“What can I do? How can I help?” She’s trying not to cry but the look of anguish on his face is making it really heard.

“It’s not—,” He cuts himself off. “It’s just—

“What? What is it?” she pleads, “Tell me what’s happening, Percy, it’s all gonna be okay, just talk to me—,”

“I can’t!” he bursts, his breathing heavy and erratic. “ I can’t talk to you and I can’t look at you and I can’t sleep because it’s all my fault! Every time I close my eyes I see it over and over again and I can’t—,”

He’s having a panic attack. It registers in Annabeth's head a little too late, but once it does she goes into autopilot. She’s telling him to breathe, and helping him feel his heartbeat, and maneuvering them into sitting on the bed as she lets him sob into her collarbone. She’s running a hand up and down his back and he’s still shaking but his breathing is a lot more steady when he says, “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be, I’m right here and—,”

“No,” He shakes his head as best he can, while staying curled up into her. “I’m sorry I stressed you out. That was the opposite of what I was trying to do.”

“What were you trying to do?” She cups his cheeks and lifts his head to wipe his tears. He looks exhausted and sad and wearier than what should be possible for a sixteen year old. “I know you feel like you can’t, but please. Tell me what’s going on.”

He sniffs. Untangles his arms from her waist. Closes his eyes.

“When you took that knife I thought you were going to die.”

Oh.

“The sound you made, you’ve never screamed like that before—not ever. The way you fell, you just crumpled to the ground. And the blood…gods there was so much blood, too much blood. Will’s face, it was like he was looking at a ghost, like you were already—,” He takes another tremulous breath. “You took that knife for me and I thought you were going to die because of it. When I sleep, I watch you die over and over again. I banged into the wall thrashing around in my sleep that first night and woke you up. I didn’t want to worry you or keep waking you up in the middle of the night. That’s why I started switching bunks when you fall asleep. It’s not that I needed space…I actually needed the opposite. I can't go to sleep unless I can see that you're alive and breathing and in one piece with my own eyes.”

Annabeth is in shock. Even if she knew what to say, she couldn’t speak; her voice simply doesn’t work anymore. It doesn’t seem to matter though, because words keep spilling out of Percy.

“It’s not always the same. Sometimes me and Will are too late and it happens at the hotel. Sometimes Ethan hits you in the chest and you die in my arms on the bridge. Sometimes you’re in so much pain you ask me to do it. I can never bring myself to, and I just have to listen to you beg me to kill you. Sometimes…” He trails off and shakes his head like what he’s imagining is too horrible to be put to words. “It doesn’t matter how, all that matters is that it happens and I can’t look you in the eye when I wake up because it’s my fault. It was my knife and you took it and I feel so guilty I can barely breathe, and I’m sorry, I’m so, so fucking sorry Annabeth—,”

Annabeth finds her voice. “Percy.” He freezes again. She wishes he would stop doing that. “Look at me.”

He doesn’t move.

“Percy, I need you to look at me.” He heaves a breath, and finally turns his head. The look in his eyes is similar to the one he had on Olympus. Like he was drinking in the fact that she was alive. Like her being alive was the only thing that mattered to him. “It was my choice to take that hit.”

“But—,”

“No. I chose to take that knife. I don’t know how, but I knew it was going to save you. And I was willing to take that knife if it meant you would survive. Even if it meant—,”

“Don’t.” He warns, something primal in his voice she doesn’t recognize. She changes tactics.

“I didn’t die on the bridge, Percy. I survived because you got me out. You called Blackjack and brought Will and you did everything right and I survived. I can’t stop the nightmares. But I can tell you I don’t mind if they wake me up because I want to be there for you. I can tell you that you shouldn’t look at me and feel guilty, you should look at me and feel proud. Look at me and know that I’m still here because of you. Know that you saved me. In every way possible.”

He’s looking at her in awe and disbelief, like he can’t believe someone would do for him all the things he’s willing to do for others. And then he kisses her. He kisses her and she can feel the I love you on his lips. She wraps arms around his neck and kisses him til she’s sure he knows she loves him back.

Somehow they fall asleep wrapped up in each other, and Percy still has a nightmare, but this time he lets Annabeth card her fingers in his hair and touch her lips to his forehead and this time when she tells him that she’s here and everything is going to be alright, he believes her.

This time, Percy falls back asleep in her arms, tangled in his old bedsheets.

#percabeth #percy jackson #annabeth chase #percabeth fic #my writing

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posallys · 2 years

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happy birthday to my best boy percy 💙 i love you and here's an unfinished posally fic in honor of this special day <3

---

They’re on a hospital bed, one of Poseidon’s arms wrapped around her shoulders, pulling her into him, and his other carefully cradling a blue bundle.

He brings the bundle closer and presses his lips to their baby’s head, muttering a few words in a language she doesn’t understand.

But she doesn’t need to understand his words to know what to look in his eyes means, to know what the soft smile on his face means, to know what the way he held Percy protectively means.

He wants to stay. He wants to be here, in a hospital room beside her, holding their child—that much is clear enough. He would not be here if he didn't want to be.

But she doesn't know why he's here. He should be long gone by now, tucked away beneath the surf. He should not be here, in this room, an arm around her while he holds their child with his other. He should be doing a million other things right now, and yet he's choosing them.

She can't think of a reason for him to stay—she'd known from the beginning he was never supossed to— but for now, knowing that he wants to be here is enough. This is supposed to be a happy day; she wants it to stay that way in her memories.

Poseidon readjusts Percy in his arms, smiling down at his son.

;

The golden sunlight that flooded through the hospital windows fades into the tumbling leaves of autumn, and she still doesn’t know why.

There’s snow falling outside, blanketing the sand in a layer of white, and she still doesn’t know why.

The snow melts, leaving flowers to grow in its absence, and she still doesn’t know why.

And then he’s handing Percy a present, a box with a little blue bow. The small cake she made is sitting on the coffee table, a candle number one on top of it.

A year. It’s been a year, and yet she hasn’t been able to figure out why he’s still here. The words spill from her lips before she bites them back.

“Why are you still here?”

Poseidon’s eyes stay on Percy for a moment longer before he looks over at her, but when he does his eyes are clouded with confusion.

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

Sally leans back into the couch bringing a hand to rub her temples. “Because you shouldn’t be.”

He’s still on the floor looking up at her, but he purses his lips and grabs her hand.

“I’ve done a lot of things I shouldn’t have.”

Despite herself, the corners of her lips pull up. “Oh, I know.”

He offers her a small smile in return. “What I mean is that just because I shouldn’t doesn’t mean I can’t.”

And there’s an implication laced through his words. I’m staying, he says.

But Poseidon is not meant to be bottled in being or nature. He does not belong here, in this house, in this room. He does not belong here, with her, with their son.

The sea does not like to be restrained and neither does its ruler, but what happens if it confines itself willingly?

It can’t, she thinks. He cannot stay here, in a body that could pass for a mortal. He is too big, and it’s only a matter of time before he outgrows it. Not yet, perhaps, but he will.

And she hates him. She hates him for pretending that he can stay, for pretending that he’s supposed to be here, a mortal man, small and insignificant.

“We both know you can’t stay.”

She does not say it for herself; it is a truth she has acknowledged from the moment his name tumbled from his lips and she knew, this—this is going to burn.

And it does. It burns in the best and worst kind of way. It burns like the sun, trails of fire blazing across her skin, and it burns like smoke, the realization that you won’t be able to breathe until you’re away from the flames.

Poseidon does not shy away from her words. He leans forward. “I can.”

His eyes are sure, steady, challenging, and it’s her confirmation. It is the look of the god of the sea, the look of a god that does not like being told what he can and cannot do. He is no more a mortal than she is a god.

He can’t stay, but she knows he’ll try.

She knows what she’ll have to do—eventually, but not right now. Not when he pulls Percy onto his lap and lights the birthday candle, and smiles at her while he starts singing to their son.

Someday soon, though, she’ll have to do it. She’ll have to say the words and she knows that he’ll listen, because he’s never been good at telling her no.

The sea does not like to be restrained, she knows, and it is only fair that she lets him go.

#happy birthday to my best boy <3 #this isn't edited and i might eventually go back and finish this fic #but for now i think that this is all that's going to happen #taylor tries to write #posally #fic: eventually #pjo fic #percy jackson #sally jackson #poseidon #pjo poseidon

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stillcarmine · 1 year

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AU where Thalia and Luke find Leo as well as Annabeth.

Annabeth and Leo, traumatized besties. They get to be Annoying Children together.

Hephaestus is still a dead beat, and doesn't claim Leo.

He ends up in the Hermes cabin, even though he's pretty sure where he's meant to go.

But this makes it easier to hide his fire.

He still sneaks into the forge to tinker and Beckendorf takes him under his wing.

It's not unheard of for the children of other gods to be interested and good with machines, but Charles is pretty sure Leo is his brother.

But the kid isn't saying saying anything for a reason, is staying in a crowded cabin for a reason, and Beckendorf has a guess.

He leaves it alone and just looks out for the kid.

Luke and Annabeth don't know about his fire. At least, he didn't tell them.

The closest he came to was when the cyclops was after them and he asked if fire could hurt them and Grover told him that they were immune.

Leo slumped, because that was his only way to help his friends.

He either never visits Thalia's tree or is there all the time, but only when no one else is around.

He like. Doesn’t get Annabeth’s longing for a quest. He doesn’t want anything to do with the dangers of demigod life.

They’re best friends but this causes the worst arguments between them and after one, Leo runs from camp.

Annabeth thinks that she’ll have to be allowed a quest to look for Leo, but that doesn’t happen.

They originally aren’t going to look for him, figure a satyr will likely find him, but Beckendorf pushes for one.

He eventually finds Leo and Leo doesn’t want to come back. He tries to give the older demigod the slip but Beckendorf just keeps finding him and it stirs up a lot of Emotions(tm) for Leo.

Eventually Leo snaps and breaks down for the first time in years and his brother holds him asks him to come home. Leo relents.

Annabeth doesn’t know how to apologize when Leo comes home, and Leo doesn’t know how to ask for one or give his own. But from what he’s seen of actual siblings around camp, siblings usually don’t make big productions out of saying sorry, and he guesses that can work for him and Annabeth too.

He manages to keep his fire powers a secret for years and then Percy Jackson shows up with his water powers and Leo scratches the back of his neck and thinks “Damn, I can’t afford a narrative foil.”

Leo was never as close to Luke as he was with Thalia so his betrayal doesn’t hit him quite as hard, and he’s better able to see him for who he is.

Cue years of Annabeth and Leo growing apart as she gets wrapped up in all of the quests.

Things between them are tense when Thalia comes back to life. None of their relationships are what they used to be, but Leo is so happy his friend is back, and feels such a pang of grief for his mom that he can’t breathe.

He bites his tongue but wishes he could bring the Fleece to the ashes of her shop and revive her too. When Annabeth goes missing, and the Hunters of Artemis go on a quest to find her, Leo is ready to sneak after them, but runs into Percy, who says he’s planning on doing the same thing.

Then Nico di Angelo finds them both and this just isn’t going to work.

He asks them both to stay, because they don’t have any experience with quests. Percy was just trying to be logical but he accidentally hits on Leo’s feelings of inferiority, because it’s true, there’s nothing Leo can do out there to help Annabeth, except his fire, which only ever hurts people.

Suddenly Percy’s got two people he doesn’t know well asking him to bring back their loved ones.

He pulls Leo aside and asks him to keep an eye on Nico. Leo is not in favor of this idea because 1) should a twelve year old be watching a ten year old (irony oh irony), 2) Nico is annoying and reminds Leo too much of himself, though he doesn’t yet recognize that’s what’s bothering him about the other boy and 3) Leo is. Bad with people. He is bad with emotions. He should not be left with a kid he doesn’t know who is feeling Big Emotions while Leo is also feeling Big Emotions.

But he eventually agrees.

It’s bad for a while. Leo doesn’t know what he’s doing. The older campers are helpful but Leo doesn’t let them do everything because he gave his word and he’s going to keep it. Leo and Percy made a deal, and he isn’t going back on it.

It’s not fun though because Nico is chafing at being given a babysitter. He eventually blows up because he’s been under so much stress and Leo remembers how he did the same thing once and how Beckendorf stayed with him through it.

So that’s what he does.

When Nico’s calmer, they talk about how they’re both worried and tell each other about their sisters, though Nico seems a bit sour about hearing about Annabeth’s adventures with Percy.

And it’s better from there.

Until Percy and Annabeth come back to camp.

Leo isn’t there for what ever happens, knows that Nico’s run off and… Chiron seems fine with that?

Leo isn’t though, and taking another page from his older brother’s book, he goes to find Nico.

Leo’s no good at goodbyes, and after just getting Annabeth back, and learning that Thalia is taking a different path that means they’ll only see her a few times before they die and she goes on living-

Well, he can’t bring himself to say anything in person. He leaves a note for Beckendorf, knowing he’ll understand and tell the others.

Kronos forces somehow learns about his fire and use that to try to convince him to join their side. How the gods cursed him with this awful power and then just left him without any acknowledgment. That they must have something terrible planned for him, that’s the only reason they want heroes in the first place.

How his father, god of fire, stood by while his mother died in a fire and did nothing.

That one gets to Leo.

But he’s got a mission, and doesn’t have time for the problems the titans have with the gods or the gods with the titans or whatever. He can’t change big, lofty stuff like that, is no child of prophecy but he can pay forward the kindness shown to him in the past.

That's what he can do.

#leo valdez #annabeth chase #thalia grace #percy jackson #nico di angelo #charles beckendorf #i love the idea of Leo siding with Kronos but idk how to write it and having a real family has a major impact on his life #damn if only Leo and Beckendorf got to be brothers #pjo #percy jackson and the olympians #the lightning thief #the titans curse #tbh I have like 0 memory of the og series so there’s prob plot mistakes here #that’s also why I cut it off there lol #I’ve been meaning to do a reread so if I ever get around to that maybe…#look leo cares deeply about people and if he had a loving influence earlier in his life like dang just imagine

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watanabes-cum-dump · 7 months

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thoughts abt darkstalker now that i am no longer ten years old

everyday i sit and think "oh yeah darkstalker went off the deep end it's his fault he's kinda racist" and then i remember that his father never seemed to love him despite being able to love his mother and sister and like did that not get to him???? no it doesn't justify shit but given that he knows abt how rigid the icewings are and his dad apparently doesn't have the capacity to love his own son (and i guess his daughter properly bc he did make the analogy that arctic sees whiteout as a necklace, you know an object) for no reason he probably thinks they're all heartless.

oh also did arctic reallllllly love foeslayer or was he just longing for an excuse to get out of his royal duties or whatever? because he's absolutely miserable in the night kingdom and makes no move to try and adjust and be happy. like i thought this is what you wanted buddy i thought you didn't want ur life being controlled. because suddenly he's soooo miserable he tries to bring whiteout back there. like god damn you are such an asshole idc if you loved your wife you sure as hell never acted like it.

oh and ALSO darkstalker wanting a redo of his family with clearsight so he can be happy? he views her as his only option to be happy and have a family with. on the one hand it's really cute how he's only willing to have her and that he literally could not cope with her death in like book ten??? (gimme a break I dropped wings of fire after they introduced the lost continent or whatever) he's literally sort of a yandere with the earrings and stuff, and listen i love my yandere men but i digress, he would have never hurt her. even in the cave he probably could have seen it coming but no he trusts her more than anything like god damn when is it my turn??? these two were so loving and healthy while it lasted, the fact that there were some futures where clearsight is his queen makes me believe that she would also do unspeakable things for him and that's what makes her decision so much more heartbreaking :( in the same way the fact that there were futures where they had their little teehee domestic life with their kids suggests darkstalker could let go of his racist ass conquest for her??? I KNOW DARKSTALKER DID WRONG BUT BY GOD HE LOVED HER. I want a love like theirs (the cute soulmate high school sweethearts part obvs)

can we also talk about how much he loved his sister and mother? like seriously i cannot believe this shit darkstalker LOVED AND RESPECTED the women in his life and i am here for it. ik wof universe is like a matriarchy but still i am so tired of dudes having these warped perceptions of their mother and sisters i just like that he actually loved them.

i will always say that darkstalker's story was not only a villain origin story but a tragedy because darkstalker really only wanted the best in the beginning and in later books he turned out like... that. initially i didn't think much about how he manipulated moon but uhhhhhh... now i do be thinking twice. seriously out of all the futures clearsight and darkstalker managed to get the worst one.

idk what prompted this i was just thinking about how much darkstalker and clearsight were tragic (yes darkstalker's choices were bad, i meant tragic in the "a thousand different futures, a thousand different ways we can be happy together but this one still happened" sense. damn clearsight had it rough) and then i just... thought. which is a dangerous think i should not be allowed to ponder under any circumstances.

anyways about my past with wings of fire, i think the series has kind of fallen off but this shit was my childhood like this was everything to me. i read book nine in ONE DAY and i made a fanfic with OCs with my friend i was dedicated. next to percy jackson, wof was my top dog until i got into anime and video games

#it's amazing how almost every single person who liked wof as a kid turned out gay #no listen it should be studied or smth #kouryuu's shit #wings of fire #darkstalker #wings of fire darkstalker #wof legends #darkstalker is my favourite book btw if you can't already tell

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shes-a-badkid · 1 year

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Thoughts while reading “The Blood of Olympus” with my nephew-

1. Jason sending out a message to his dad asking him to look out for Nico- I just want them to be besties

2. Oh shit- Jason got stabbed and with imperial gold! (Although I love that Annabeth is the one to panic a little and Piper is being the clearheaded one- because Piper has to be clearheaded and Annabeth can afford not to be)

3. Seriously- I am obsessed with how much Jason is worried about Nico

4. I don’t like Juno/Hera, because she’s caused a LOT of issues, but also, I love the drama. Plus, Jupiter/Zeus is the worst and if he’s mad at her, then I know who I stand with

5. My poor sweet Nico just working his poor butt off with this shadow travelling

6. Do I ever find out what happened in Albania? Because I need to know

7. I’ve said it several times and I’ll probably say it several times more- Octavian is the WORST

8. Seriously, I love Leo and Calypso and I want him to find a way back to her so bad. I just want my boy happy

9. I love that Percy physically can’t not be sarcastic to just every god/goddess he comes across. No restraint, only sass

10. “Change the plans and then stick to it.”

11. Clarisse still manages to be angry and caring all at once and I adore her, also I’m obsessed with Hedge leaving his pregnant wife in her care

12. Hades, my love 🖤 (I may or may not be influenced by my love of the Disney-Hercules version of Hades… 🤷🏻‍♀️)

13. Nico’s concern goes from Hazel then to Jason then Percy and the rest! My Nico/Jason best friendship is thriving

14. Hades wants his boy to be happy! This chapter is killing me

15. Piper and Frank are kind of sweet together as friends- just chill vibes until they need to fight

16. Buford the wonder table- an icon, a legend

17. “Piper McClane, that was without a doubt the dumbest risk I’ve ever seen anyone take and I date a dumb risk taker.” Annabeth- you think Piper taking a literal leap of faith into that pit was dumber than any risk Percy ever took? Girl, you must be blinded by love because I’m pretty sure dumb risk taker is one of his defining traits

18. I really like Piper and Annabeth as a combo- Annabeth is all plans and logic, while Piper is all about her emotions. Plus this whole chapter with them fighting with Mimas and Piper having BIG Percy energy- love it

19. Reyna is a badass. That’s it, end of thought.

20. Orion is an incel- makes sense

21. Hylla is also a badass- gotta love the Ramirez-Arellano girls

22. “I’m breathing Dylan!?”

23. Nico may say that Hades isn’t the best dad or whatever, but of the gods/goddesses- he seems alright. Like most of the others are indifferent at best, but Hades actively has tried to help his kids. Poseidon only seems to care about Percy and maybe a smidge about Tyson, but then we learn about Kymopoleia. Ares is… Ares, and only seems to care if his kids win/fight. Aphrodite seems like she’s just there for the drama. Of the godly parents we have seen more of he’s doing okay. (My love of Hades popped out full force here)

24. My son, Nico, is the best and I adore him and Bryce got what was coming to him, the little psycho

25. Hedge may always be ready to throw down and be just over the top all the time, but he is a real one- he cares so much for his charges 🖤

26. As much as I am team Nico/Jason besties, Reyna/Nico friendship is dear to my heart. Plus team Parthenos (as I’ve dubbed them in my head) is wonderful

27. Apollo is ridiculous and emotional and I love it

28. I don’t know why, but Asclepius prescribing Jason glasses amuses me more than is should

29. Rick… what the fuck?! Why my sweet son, Leo?? And he’s just so accepting? Fuck you!!

30. Tyson, my love 🖤🖤

31. Reyna continuing to be a badass and I love that she gets to kill this absolute incel of a giant

32. YES! Bringing in Pipers indigenous heritage! The song of the snakes! I love it 🥰

33. I may have complained previous about Piper in “House of Hades” but I see she was saving all her badassery for this book, because she has just been killing it the entire time- being the most emotionally intelligent, being an incredible team with Annabeth. This is the Piper I missed in “House of Hades.”

34. YAYAYAYAYYAY HEDGE MADE IT FOR HIS BABIES BIRTH!!!

35. Will just stepping up and telling Nico no to his shadow travel so he doesn’t do himself more damage- okay, get it [yes I have been spoiled about the future of Will and Nico, but I love that the first scene of them together is Will being all medic guy and stubborn about Nico not doing himself more damage with his shadow travels, telling Nico that his feeling about the campers thoughts about him are in his head, and just in general being a little shit]

36. I’ve said it so many times and here is one more- Octavian is the WORST!

37. Hell yeah- God fight!

38. God fight seems done, giants are all destroyed and Leo is still okay, but Gaea is awake and I still have like 8 chapters…

39. And we are talking vaguely about Leo’s death again and I DON’T LIKE IT

40. RIP Argo II and questioning what happened to my boy 🥺

41. I love the insane differences between the Romans and the Greeks fighting- Romans are so organized and just proper. Greeks is just chaos and enthusiasm.

42. FESTUS! And my boy right there with him! 🖤

43. Oh no….. Jason and Leo are fighting Gaea… I don’t like it

44. And I’m crying and plotting my revenge on Rick

45. Bye bitch! (Me to Octavian)

46. And I’m crying over Leo again (still- my nephew is only slightly concerned)

47. Awwwww! Hedge is so proud of his baby! And Clarisse is the godmother 😊

48. Okay, seriously- Renya/Nico friendship reigns supreme (sorry Jason/Nico besties- I still love you)

49. Nico teasing his sisters boyfriend should happen always

50. And once more crying about Leo- fuck you, Rick

51. Ooohhhh Nico trying to suppress his crush on Will- I see you

52. Just when I say Reyna/Nico friendship reigns supreme, Jason comes along and talks with his bestie and even gets a hug and is so excited that Nico is staying at Camp Half Blood! (And they are besties and NO ONE can change my mind on this)

53. Will scolding Nico for not stopping by to say hi while he was busy in the infirmary and then telling him he is getting at least three days of rest in the infirmary 🙌🏻

54. Percy’s brain processing in the slowest possible manner over Nico telling him he used to have a crush on him, but that he’s not really his type is kind of precious

55.. Piper once again with the emotional intelligence!

56. Leo 😭

57. HELL YES FESTUS! My wonderful, beautiful dragon!

58. And he gets to find Calypso! (Okay, Rick, you are forgiven- a little)

#heroes of olympus #blood of Olympus #jason grace #annabeth chase #percy jackson #piper mclean #leo valdez #hazel lavesque #frank zhang #nico di angelo #coach hedge #reyna ramirez arellano

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jasontoddssuper · 2 years

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Percy and Annabeth really bring out the worst in eachother.Percy goes from standing up to bullies since he was a little kid to Annabeth's doormat of a boyfriend who just lets her call him stupid all the time and never calls her out for being an asshole because 'he loves her :((((' and Annabeth goes from a cool 'mean but still goodhearted tomboy' type of character to a pick me who gets praised for letting her anger get the best of her.Piper brings out the best in Annabeth(her soft side and bravery)and they should have ended up together because that's what your s/o is SUPPOSED to do and Percy should've waited to figure himself out more before getting shoved into a romantic relathionship because everyone keeps insisting he needs one

Noah's fence but if you ship Annabeth with Thalia or Percy with Luke or the gods,i hope you get hit by a truck

#rr crit #lesbiannabeth #pipabeth #percy jackson defense squad #letters from summer

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banannabethchase · 2 years

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Baldabeth is the best AU ever! If you ever want to write more, I would read that shit so fast.

idfhgjdfghjknfdb thank you I'm so glad you enjoy it <3

Annabeth chokes on her complimentary Styrofoam cup of water. "Excuse me?"

"Your wife," the teacher, well meaning and smiling, says. "I would love to meet her." She adjusts in her seat, and Annabeth watches her smile wobble a little bit, lose some of its surety. "I mean, I like to make as much of the connection with all of the parents as possible."

Annabeth considers this for a moment. She brings up Piper a lot, sure. But she's brought up Percy too, right? He's on the emergency contact list. He's the one home with Ali most of the time, after all, with his weird evening schedule at the fire station. "Husband," she says carefully. "My husband, Percy."

She watches as the teacher goes from a bemused contentment to a horrified shock. "I - I am so sorry to presume. I just -" She sputters. She begins to look from Ali to Annabeth, then her gaze flickers up to Annabeth's hair. And, suddenly, Annabeth gets it.

"Oh!" she says. "Oh, no, you're good. I just - yeah, I hate taking care of mine, it's less manageable than hers, and it tangles so bad." She finds herself running her fingers through Ali's meticulously cared for curls, the ones she's moisturized and gently carded through, the locks she's found joy and solace in managing, unlike her own. Dark and coiled, smooth and perfect. Ali bumps her head up into Annabeth's hand like a cat.

The teacher relaxes. Annabeth knows that expression. It's one she wears often when interacting with people she doesn't understand all that well, when they wait for her to explain what she means instead of assuming the worst. "I should have asked," the teacher says with a laugh, and it's only then that Annabeth realizes she's got no idea what Ali's teacher's name is. "My wife and I do that a lot."

Annabeth relaxes even more. She feels safe with vulnerable people. Maybe because her experiences with gods and their assuredness have failed her every time. "Don't worry. It's really hard to offend me."

Ali distracts them both by getting up and walking over to a space in the room, grabbing a white file and, staggering under the weight of it, drops it in front of Annabeth.

"Mama," she says, pushing it toward Annabeth, "this is my bucket. I got all my journal stuff in here."

The teacher nods, pulling out a green notebook. "Thank you for reminding us of our plan, Ali," she says, "let's talk about how hard you work in reading and how quickly you pick things up in math!"

Ali beams. "Okay, Ms. Bryan!"

Ah, Annabeth thinks, watching in amiable silence as Ms. Bryant and Ali share Ali's math and language arts successes, her ability to finally blend and decode CVC words despite years of dyslexia getting in her way showcased by her teacher, and settles, finally, as Ali is praised for the progress instead of disparaged for it, Ms. Bryan is her name.

#Baldabeth #Yes some of this is based on my teaching experience #No I will not tell you which parts #Annabeth Chase #percabeth #otp: i fight the world for your heart #PJO #HoO #in which Sara writes

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staliaqueen · 3 years

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Just curious, what is it about Percy/Annabeth that you don’t like (other than the stans)?

I'll happily explain! Just a quick disclaimer that it was a while ago I last read the books.

The entire thing was kinda surprising, cause on paper, percabeth should've been the perfect ship for me. They've got this enemies/rivals to lovers, bickering married couple vibes, unique nicknames etc. I love these tropes, hell, I’ve written them myself, but in percabeth's case I just don't think they're done very well.

To fully explain, I first wanna bring up an example of these things being done right, and why. The first one that comes to mind is Dan and Blair from Gossip Girl. They are also an enemies to friends to lovers ship, with this bickering married couple energy, and they're one of my favourite ships of all time. Their bickering is pretty similar to percabeth's (in the sense that it's mostly Blair saying mean things to Dan), but the key difference is that her insults (at least during their friends and lovers stages) are never coming from a malicious place and Dan's feelings are never hurt by her comments. He recognizes that this is just how Blair expresses her affection for him, and it's even something he enjoys about her. Every time she cleverly insults him he laughs/smiles and looks at her like she's the best thing in the world.

[Id: Two gifs of Dan and Blair. First gif has Blair saying, “There is no up-and-comers section. And even if there were, I mean, let’s face it Humphrey – you still wouldn’t make the cut.” And Dan smiling/laughing like she’s the best thing since sliced bread. Second gif has Blair saying “I care about you too, even if I have odd ways of showing it. Like bossing you around or making fun of your hair. Seriously, you should cut it.” And Dan, once again, smiling/laughing with the most lovey-dovey look on his face. / end id]

(x)

But in Annabeth’s case, insulting Percy isn’t how she shows her affection. She lashes out at him due to her repressed trauma, and Percy does not like that she does this. Annabeth resents people assuming that she’s dumb because she’s blonde, but she continually calls Percy stupid. She’s generally terrible at communicating how she feels and what she needs and then gets mad at him when he doesn’t respond exactly how she wants. I think the worst example of this is in the beginning of The Titan’s Curse when she punches him in the stomach for not asking her to dance with him.

[Id: Excerpt from The Titan’s Curse: “Dance, you guys!” Thalia ordered. “You look stupid just standing there.” I looked nervously at Annabeth, then at the groups of girls who were roaming the gym. “Well?” Annabeth said. “Um, who should I ask?” She punched me in the gut. “Me, Seaweed Brain.” “Oh. Oh, right.” / end id]

Unlike the judo-flip, I’ve never even seen this moment discussed before, and it’s so annoying, cause I just know that if the genders were switched people would be horrified by it.

The same issue comes up with the nicknames. Wise Girl is clearly complimentary while Seaweed Brain is derogatory. Now, what I expected when I read PJO was that Seaweed Brain would eventually turn affectionate, sort of like an inside joke, which again, is a trope I LOVE. And that kinda happens, but only after they start dating. I initially thought it had done so at the end of Lightning Thief when they became real friends, but then this happened in TTC:

[Id: Excerpt from The Titan’s Curse: But Thalia held out her spear. “You want some, Seaweed Brain?” Somehow, it was okay when Annabeth called me that—at least, I’d gotten used to it—but hearing it from Thalia was not cool. / end id]

This really shocked me when I read it. Cause this clearly shows that Percy still doesn’t like when Annabeth calls him that, he just doesn’t respond with anger anymore because he’s “gotten used to it”, which is... not good.

Annabeth also never steps in with reassurance that she actually knows that Percy is smart. For all we know she actually believes that he's an idiot (which he definitely isn't!). That's definitely how she makes Percy feel.

There’s also the case of Annabeth’s extreme jealousy. Like, the way she treats Rachel... I’m pretty sure most percabeth shippers even agree that she’s being completely unfair. (Edit: No, they don't, it seems. God I hate this fandom). @fake-plastic-trees made a meme that explains how hypocritical her behaviour concerning Rachel is way better than I ever could, so here’s that:

[Id: Picture of a meme. First a picture of an anthropomorphic flower screaming in anger, paired with the caption, “How Annabeth reacts when Percy is with Rachel”. Second picture is of the same flower with a sweet/happy look on it’s face, paired with the caption “How Annabeth expects Percy to react when she simps over Luke”. / end id]

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This is the situation where I have the most sympathy with Annabeth, though. At least in the Calypso situation. Like having your best friend that you have feelings for go missing for so long that there’s pretty much no way he’s not dead, only for him to show up on his funeral and you find out that he was sent to an island where another girl took care of and fell in love with him and he most likely had feelings for her too, yeah that must suck. Especially with her abandonment issues. Still, doesn’t make her actions okay.

And the way I see some percabeth stans talking about this is honestly disgusting. Slut shaming Percy like crazy, calling him a hoe (he was literally 14 while this happened) and being mad at him for "stepping out of line". Annabeth clearly believes she has some sort of claim on Percy and her stans have been convinced of that, too.

All of this is what, partially, makes perachel so appealing. They’re a breath of fresh air, because Rachel is the exact opposite. She’s straight forward with Percy. When he doesn’t make a move on her, instead of punching him or calling him a coward, she just makes a move. Which is, you know, the reasonable and healthy thing to do. Percy himself even expresses that he appreciates this about her.

[Id: Excerpt from The Last Olympian: She nodded. “And so ... hypothetically, if these two people liked each other, what would it take to get the stupid guy to kiss the girl, huh?” “Oh ...” I felt like one of Apollo’s sacred cows—slow, dumb, and bright red. “Um ...” I can’t pretend I hadn’t thought about Rachel. She was so much easier to be around than ... well, than some other girls I knew. I didn’t have to work hard, or watch what I said, or rack my brain trying to figure out what she was thinking. Rachel didn’t hide much. She let you know how she felt. / end id]

It's pretty clear that "some other girls I knew" is just Annabeth.

Finally, I just wanna say that I would be fine with all of this if Annabeth actually had a character arc where she realizes how she was acting was not okay, apologizes, and makes an effort to change and work through her trauma so she wouldn’t lash out on people anymore. Characters are allowed to have flaws, it’s encouraged actually! But those flaws, at least the ones that have a large negative affect on others, need to actually be acknowledged. And if you want the character to be framed like a hero, they need to take steps to change. But that is not what happens with Annabeth, so I’m not okay with it.

really hope you had the energy to read through all of that

#yikes this is almost 1000 words #i'm actually really happy to have this all written down #cause if someone in the future asks i again i don't have to write it all down i can just link this post #emily-smx #percy jackson #meta #percy jackson meta #anti percabeth #anti annabeth chase #perachel #mal answers

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umbran6 · 3 years

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The Argument Against Caleo

Spoilers up to Blood of Olympus and beyond. Beware! (Or not, the book series has been out for a few years, get over it). I wrote this after seeing a user wondering why people didn’t like Caleo, or in some cases, hated it. Here, I want to explain the answer as much as possible while doling out my own points.

One of the main grievances I have as a fan of Leo Valdez would be the ship Caleo, or Leo x Calypso. It’s a complicated ship, to say the least, with multiple issues that make me question why people like the ship. And I admit it, they initially had some chemistry, but there’s multiple issues that Uncle Rick produced through making such a relationship that makes it extremely open to criticism, criticism which I will explain through this post.

One of my main points against them is that the ship was created on a very limited time scale. Although we aren’t given an exact date to date of when Leo and Calypso met to when they fell in love, we can safely estimate it to be a week at best. Such a limited amount of time from going through the multiple stages of a relationship already stresses the limits of the suspension of disbelief.

A counterexample would be Percabeth, or Percy x Annabeth. Throughout the series, we aren’t introduced to them being romantically involved until the Titan’s Curse, which was two years after they met. Specifically, this is brought up by Aphrodite, the goddess of love herself. Admittedly, Percy and Annabeth were twelve years old when they first met, when romance was definitely out of the picture, especially with a quest to get the Master Bolt.

However, from there we get to see multiple examples of their character depth, ranging from their respective fatal flaws to their ambitions, hopes and dreams, and their friendship. We get to see the slow build up of their chemistry, which was a really good writing move on Uncle Rick’s part. These characters took their sweet time to get to where they wanted to go, and despite the false romantic lead of Rachel, they still got together.

On the other hand, we don’t see enough of this between Leo and Calypso — we only see one book where they interacted with each other in The House of Hades, and that was only for a handful of chapters. While they are definitely older so they can jump straight to romance (some may say too old, but I’ll get to that) its still a pretty huge gap to jump through without making it stick. This makes it hard to root for a ship when it is built on a rather faulty foundation from the ‘they just met’ to ‘they get together’, especially when they don’t have a lot of events to show their chemistry.

Which brings me to Ogygia, which has raised a few red flags for me when looking at it from a retrospective point of view. Now, we know what the main issue of the island is that the hero who landed on said island can’t leave until Calypso falls in love with them. And we’ve seen this with Percy during the Battle of the Labyrinth, where he lands in the island and Calypso falls in love with him while tending to his wounds from, you know, being erupted from freaking Mt. St. Helens. Needless to say, this falling in love with each other montage happened quickly to the point of suspicion, which sets up the complication that Calypso and Leo might have fallen in love due to magical intervention.

And hear me out, because although this might be a pretty big pill to swallow, we have evidence for this through Percy. It only takes one chapter for Calypso and Percy to meet, and the next he’s willing to consider leaving Camp Half-Blood and Annabeth behind to live on the island when Hephaestus gives him the choice to leave Ogygia or stay. We don’t even get an explanation on why Percy considered giving it all up just so he can be with her. All we know is, girl meets boy, now they want to live on an isolated island forever. It’s especially absurd considering Percy’s hamartia (fatal flaw) is freaking loyalty to those he loves. Needless to say, It’s a huge YIKES, especially when we apply it to Leo and Calypso.

It also raises the possibility that the romantic relationship between them is doomed to failure. And if you guys want to fight me on this, let’s look at Jason and Piper, a couple whose relationship started with a similar foundation. Piper had romantic memories implanted into her brain by Hera through the use of the Mist, while Jason was reduced to a Tabula Rasa (a blank slate for those who lack culture) by said goddess. They broke up before the Trials of Apollo because it was clear that when the dust settled, Piper had been aware that their romance was a lie and that their intentions to stay together was a mix of delusion and pressure from freaking Aphrodite. Leo and Calypso get together under what is arguably a very similar set of conditions if Ogygia’s magic had any influence on their relationship, and that this magic could wear off if given enough time.

Third, and here’s a pretty big one for me, would be Calypso’s character, mainly because there are a lot of unfortunate implications attached to it. In The Blood of Olympus, she was turned into the divine equivalent of Princess Peach, with Leo being her Mario (except he saves her with a badass metal dragon). Its extremely unnecessary to make a character, especially as one such as Calypso, get turned into the typical reward of a B-Class action movie. It’s insulting and puts her up as a trophy, a narrative that is definitely not ok by any means necessary.

In another direction, Calypso is also really, really worrying when things don’t go get her way. First, let’s look at The Odyssey, the first myth she pops up. Calypso had imprisoned Odysseus for ten years on her island until Hermes said to let him go, and although it gives them plenty of time to fall in love, it also raises the implications of stockholm syndrome. Then we’ve got the fact that Calypso cursed Annabeth out of spite, implicitly saying that she wished the daughter of Athena would suffer the same isolation that she did, which came to reality when Percy and Annabeth met the Arai in Tartarus. And Annabeth wasn’t even aware that she was still in Ogygia, much less intentionally intervened in the matter. When Percy left Ogygia, rather than be angry at Percy, Calypso cursed Annabeth out of all people to suffer the same loneliness and misery she went through. That’s some Hera at her worst levels of spite.

Through such evidence we can see that Calypso is extremely wrathful towards those who break her heart even though they don’t want to. It certainly implies that Calypso isn’t in a good state of mind, and could easily repeat said actions if provoked. We could almost compare it to Medea and the original Jason, but at least in that case, Medea has every right to be pissed off at Jason and take her revenge. Calypso’s curse and how she handles things certainly implies a level of immaturity that would end in disaster if they broke up.

One issue that, I’ll admit is more from my personal point of view is that the ship took a lot of Leo’s character and threw it in the garbage in Blood of Olympus. Though we see him do a lot of stuff behind the scenes, the fact that its all for the goal of reaching Calypso just reduced him to someone who is more focused on love than, you know, fighting the evil goddess that was responsible for killing his mom and getting sweet sweet revenge. While the revenge plot can be cliched sometimes, it can be played well, while romance and the typical ‘always save the girl’ trope is just overdone. If Leo had been allowed to, you know, be more focused on other things rather than Calypso, we could have seen a lot more variety in his character.

For example as one of the possible character arcs he could’ve gone through, Leo has always been alone among the couples, often being isolated. Heck, Nemesis herself stated that he would always be the seventh wheel, and that he would never find a place among his brethren. Though some fellow tumblr users have taken this in multiple ways, either saying that he should learn to be happy by himself or that he is socially isolated in the Argo II because of these romantic relationships (I prefer a mix of both). Uncle Rick just giving him a girlfriend seems like taking the easy way out of solving such an issue and abandoning what could’ve been a rather interesting character arc. The relationship isn’t a bad thing if we remove some of the unfortunate implications, but it is a bad way to end what is a complex and realistic problem for a character and in some cases maybe possible in real life.

One more minor but still yikes worthy point is that there’s a huge age gap between them. We’re not talking about the ‘Hazel is 15 and Frank is 17 and in one year that’ll be a problem because then Hazel will be jailbait’ age gap. And even then, we can argue that Hazel is older since she is chronologically ninety-one years old. No, Calypso is older by millennia in terms of mindset and body due to the perks of being a goddess, while Leo is sixteen.

God-to-Mortal relationships are already complicated, even with emotionally and socially well-functioning adults. The fact that Leo is underage, inexperienced with romance (despite his flirting, Calypso was his first kiss), and has been through a freaking ton of trauma in his youth, does not make this okay. At best, they’re both mutually interested in each other but may have different expectations when it comes to a relationship. At worst, Calypso is taking advantage of a boy just so she can get out of Ogygia and possibly dumping him later on like the wrapping of a candy bar. Even though Calypso lost her immortality during The Trials of Apollo, that doesn’t even compensate for the immense age gap alongside Leo’s guilt at the possibility that he might’ve been responsible for her losing said immortality.

Oh, and about Leo... I’m a fan of him, but I can admit that he is in a bad spot both mentally and emotionally throughout the series. He’s lost his mom due to a mix of his own powers and Gaea’s trickery, and never had the chance to fully process that event and come to terms with it. The foster home system alongside his own trauma has forced him to hide his emotions through a façade of happiness and jokes when it’s quite clear to me he needs a therapist, stat. He's also run away from several foster homes, implying this means he was and still is being affected by the event. His mask is still on during The Blood of Olympus considering he hid a lot of things from Piper and Jason.

Speaking about them, not helping this matter is the fact that he’s rather isolated in terms of friendships since Jason and Piper, his supposed best friends are more interested in locking lip rather than, you know, actually hanging out with each other. He doesn’t have good friendships with the rest of the Seven, and the closest ones he does have is with Hazel and Frank. And even then they start off in the wrong spot since Frank is very insecure about possibly losing Hazel to him during Mark of Athena while Hazel in the meantime, is also dealing with the fact that he is the descendant of her possible boyfriend Sammy Valdez.

This could indirectly have made him desperate for affection since he has nobody else to confide in during the rest of the series, which is a bad mental state to be in when one lands on Ogygia, the island that we’ve seen could possibly force two people to fall in love with each other. A romantic relationship is not something that he needs or something that will help him in the future. He needs more than that, and having him in one that could end in disaster is the last thing he needs.

And that does not make him a bad person, much less a bad character. While some who are similarly emotionally and socially isolated may turn to violence or creepy behavior on those they want affection from, Leo does not do that to the other characters. It just means that he as a character needs more time to recover and develop before we go giving him romantic relationships, much less one with Calypso.

That’s not to say that they don’t have some things in common. Both are starved for love and affection, with Calypso being constantly rejected by heroes while Leo was rejected by foster homes and his own family. It’s a trait that they have in common, but it shouldn’t be the only thing that they have in common, especially since it is laced with a trauma that is clear they haven’t had help processing. They need to develop more as characters and as friends before they should be paired together.

So… yeah. The Caleo relationship is, in my eyes, doomed to failure, or at least heavily flawed after taking the above points into account. Uncle Rick, as if seemingly aware of these criticisms, has put the relationship in a rocky place by The Tower of Nero, giving them the possibility of overcoming the above criticisms and their own flaws, or giving fanfic writers an out and pairing Leo with another character or have him single, but happy. Either way, in my opinion Caleo is a bad ship when it comes to how it was created, alongside the flaws and unfortunate implications it has.

While I can see some of the chemistry the ship has, you can’t just use a couple of moments where they get along as evidence that they belong together, especially with the above reasons. That’s like using a band-aid to cover a bullet hole without removing the bullet, stopping the bleeding, and preventing infection. If both characters and their relationship had been given more time to develop, I would understand how they would get together.

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happyk44 · 8 months

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actually annabeth joining luke's army as a double agent for chb but percy doesn't know this so he just thinks alright and grabs grover and hooks it over there bc annabeth does what she wants and he knows there's no convincing her otherwise bc she's a stubborn ass and also ares fucking sucks so as far as percy's concerned the gods can suck it based on that alone

grover is just ??? bc he does NOT want to be over here and percy's just like "look, we can't convince annabeth to not be part of monster army, so the only option is to be part of it ourselves" and annabeth walks in on them trying to join (or rather percy trying to join for both of them and grover looking on the verge of tears) and she's just ??? bc what the fuck percy why are you two here

whole time percy is going on a rant about ares and how he sucks and how he's pretty sure the god has abused clarisse ("maybe we should get clarisse to sign up with us") because no one believes that he wants to join luke's army and they just thinkk he wants to spy on them so he's trying to show that he thinks gods (well at least one god) is a total ass and can get obliterated and percy will be happy to do that bc he did it once before, he can totally do it again! and if they get clarisse she can deliver the final blow as an FU

someone asks why grover's there and percy is like "um. he's my best friend? he has to come with me? what, you think I'm gonna fucking fight my best friend? are you stupid?"

meanwhile grover is having the worst panic attack of his life. like why is this how he discovers percy has no morals. couldn't it be something smaller like putting french fries in a strawberry milkshake?

and annabeth is resisting the urge to start screaming and now she's gotta vouch for percy and her vouch for percy is basically "if it came to saving me and grover or a bus full of people about to plunge into the atlantic, percy would save us, no hesitation" and everyone's like "jesus christ, the hell is wrong with this kid" because like maybe they're on the side of a cannibalistic titan but they're not fucking evil

ofc once they're let into the group, annabeth drags them both to the side and wrings percy a new one for fucking up her double agent plans and they're both whisper-arguing bc it's not his fault he didn't know she didn't really shack up with the enemy, but like fuck off percy, you didn't have to follow me here! why the hell would you choose to come here, were you going to try and kidnap me and bring me back to camp by force??

and percy is just like "yes that is 100% what i was going to do, i was definitely not joining with the intent to be by your side and blow up olympus because i'd rather destroy the world than fight my friend" and grover turns to annabeth and is just "he's fucking lying" "yeah i know"

anyway grover is released as a double agent for the monster army (but actually for CHB) bc the idea is that he can help them get more demigods to their side as a searcher being sent out to grab kids and he's mentally banging his head bc NOW he has to figure out how to get unclaimed demigods safely to camp without making it look like he took them there on purpose and if it looks like he defected back to CHB, they'll probably kill annabeth and maim or imprison percy and good gods, percy i hate you so much rn

percy? idk. it's past summer so he just goes home and luke is like "bro you can't just fucking leave" "um no offense luke but if you try to stop me from going home to my mom who i love more than life itself i will legit eat you" and then he goes home

come december, grover is calling percy up like "hey i found these fucking powerful ass kids, plz help me get them to camp without making it look like i got them there on purpose" and so they gotta loop annabeth in who's just mentally banging her head and cursing percy out over this whole thing as she strategizes a way to get the army there but have them fuck up so badly it would look super suspicious if grover just shoved them over

so first she yells at percy then she makes grover call thalia up so she can help him and it'll be okay 'cause she's in the same area as him so it won't look suspicious, it'll just seem like camp sent her in with him, like they do sometimes when there's dangerous monsters that a satyr might not be able to handle by themselves.

and then she makes percy go with them as support for grover's "nefarious" deeds since thalia's there. and it's a whole fucking thing, and mentally she's just like "oh thank fuck" when artemis and the hunters show up.

they retreat back to wherever the monster army was at this time (not the boat, but like idk. atlas' post? were they all chilling there or was it just luke and some ppl being assholes and everyone else was still on the boat, i can't remember) and curse their loss of two powerful and clueless demigods, only for percy to call annabeth up a couple hours later like "hey, remember those kids from a couple hours ago with the manticore and the hunters and everything"

"percy it was two hours ago, ofc i remember it, my memory isn't as shit as yours" "right right, you're elephant" "oh my- why are you calling me!!" "oh yeah. uh. well. they're kinda in my house" "what??" "yeah they're sitting right across from me. my mom's giving them some hot chocolate."

"how the hell?"

"i have no clue. they also have no clue. they just, uh, didn't feel safe at camp, bc grover was being weird about trying to save them. which, um, yeah, makes sense. and they don't like thalia because her spear scares them 'cause they don't like lightning. and also the girl said the hunters keep trying to convince her to join them which is freaking her out, so they didn't want to stay at camp. and then suddenly they were in my house."

"..."

"what do i do?"

this time annabeth bangs her head physically on the closest wall. and somewhere in the fine forests of new york, grover is banging his head on the nearest tree, both of them unified in their feelings of "for fucks sake percy i hate you so much rn"

#this is just a total nonsense stream of consciousness #and no before you ask i still have not eaten #happy talks pjo #in this au bianca doesn't join the hunters because. well i don't want her to #but also bc of my artemis told the hunters to kill bianca and nico bc she knew who they were and needed them to die theory #and bianca obvi felt that energy and since annabeth didn't get captured by the monster army she's not as freaked out #and desperate to rely on the safety of the first god she meets #plus grover thinks artemis is the coolest thing ever and bianca does not trust grover rn so like she's not gonna trust the goddess either #lmao percy sitting across from his cousins and thinking why does this feel familiar and then suddenly hades appears and he's like oh right

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theweasleysredhair · 4 years

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Baby Love [F.W.]

Character: Fred Weasley

Word Count: 1693

Requested?: Yes/No

Summary: Looking after Teddy Lupin makes Fred decide he wants a baby of his own with you.

Tags: @gracemayhateyou @criminalyetminimal @firewhisky-kisses @obsessedwithrandomthings @angelinathebook @iprobablyshipit91 @potterverseimagine @slytherineheir @kpopgirlbtssvt @rexorangecouny @mytreec @hemmoporro @thisismysketchbook @acciotwinz @shadowsinger11 @aaannabbanana @lestersglitterglue @anyasthoughts @lxncelot @harrypotter289 @wand3ringr0s3 @ickle-ronniekins @sehunasbitch @cryingforcrystalpepsi @kashishwrites @girl-next-door-writes @susceptible-but-siriusexual @crissdanvers @whizbangs-78 @heart-of-tempered-steel @oh-for-merlins-sake | message or send an ask to be added/removed!

Disclaimer: Gif isn't mine, credit to whoever made it

A/n: just a reminder that this is a queued post! i’m currently taking a small break from tumblr (should be back by the end of the week though!) as i am not in a good place at the moment. feel free to continue sending in asks and messages whilst i’m away - i’ll answer as soon as i’m back online! i shall also catch up on things that i’ve been tagged in and fics i’ve missed then as well! ❤️❤️ to the requester - i hope you enjoy my love! 💕

~*~

PLEASE DO NOT REPOST MY WORK! REBLOGS ARE ABSOLUTELY FINE! <3

+ + + + +

“Never seen him so content,” you hummed to Hermione, a smile playing at your lips as you nodded over to Fred, who was sitting on a nearby couch in the living room of the Burrow, where everyone had gathered for Christmas - the second one since the Battle of Hogwarts - holding a tiny toddler, who was giggling at Fred’s attempts to make him laugh, hair turning a bright blue as he threw his arms into the air.

Hermione laughed, “He’s always loved Teddy.” “He reminds him of Lupin I reckon,” you replied, not having to mention the reason why, considering the small boy looked just like him. Fred, you knew, felt indebted to Lupin, since he was the one to bring George back to the Burrow when he lost his ear - kept him safe after the incident, travelling back quickly to save him. You knew that was one of the reasons Fred offered to look after Teddy so often - that and the fact that the baby adored him.

“Are you not thinking about children yet?” Hermione asked you, breaking you from your thoughts, “I’d have thought with the way he can never keep his hands off you that you’d be pregnant by now.”

You let out a laugh, knowing she wasn’t exactly wrong - Fred always had at least an arm around you or a hand on your waist, always pulling you into his lap and kissing you when he got the chance. And he’d only gotten worse since you were married a few months ago, thoroughly enjoying the new house you’d moved into after the wedding and all the privacy it gave you both - George had learnt to knock on the door when he arrived rather than apparating in immediately, after finding you both in a rather compromising position on the kitchen counter one time.

“Well, I mean obviously we’d love to have a baby... it’s just, well we both got hurt pretty badly in the battle and each had to deal with nearly dying,” you spoke, earning a sympathetic look as thoughts of the battle crossed both your minds.

Fred had nearly been hit by a wall falling in an explosion - he had been knocked unconscious and the moment you saw him laying on the floor of the Great Hall, you’d assumed the worst, until Molly had assured you with a watery nod that he was okay. Then when the battle recommenced, you’d had your leg crushed by falling debris, not being able to dodge spells fast enough, meaning you were nearly hit with the killing curse, had George not have pulled you out of the way in time.

The battle overall took its toll on you both, causing flashbacks and nightmares for the first year or so, only just beginning to ease when you and Fred decided to get married a couple of months back, wanting to make things official after years of dating.

“We just haven’t had the time to plan for a baby. Plus, we’re still really young,” you continued, shrugging your shoulders a little before turning your gaze to Fred, who was preoccupied by baby Teddy, pulling faces at him and playing peek-a-boo, not being able to help the smile that graced your lips, “But maybe having a baby would be a good thing.”

“He’d be a great dad,” Hermione grinned, seeing the way your eyes lit up as you watched your husband cradling the toddler in his arms, even as Teddy decided to grab a hold of Fred’s ginger locks, pulling at them happily.

“The best,” you nodded with a content smile. You excused yourself from Hermione as you saw Teddy reaching out in your direction, stuttering out what you assumed was his attempt at saying your name, clambering over Fred’s lap to get to you.

“I’m here baba, I’m right here,” you cooed, scooping the now-sandy haired toddler up into your arms and giving him a hug, his little chubby arms wrapping around you as best they could. You marvelled at how much he resembled Remus, the same tiny smile on his face.

“Be careful, he likes hair now apparently,” Fred grumbled, rubbing a patch on his head that you assumed Teddy had yanked. You laughed as you sat beside him, nudging his side a little with a wink, “I thought you liked having your hair pulled.”

“I do, but only when it’s you that does it, not when a baby does it with the intention of making me bald,” Fred replied, but despite himself he was smiling at Teddy, who had curled up in your lap and was babbling nonsense to you both.

You glanced up, noticing a presence watching you, finding Molly stood in the doorway to the kitchen, holding a spatula and practically cooing at the sight of her son and his wife looking after a baby.

“Oh you remind me of me and Arthur when we had our Bill,” she gushed, waving the spatula in your direction. You smiled at her warmly and shifted the toddler a little, Fred holding his tiny hand in his much larger one.

“I’m assuming Bill was a lot calmer than the rest of them, eh Molly,” you laughed, watching as she nodded immediately, nearly sighing as she thought back to her other children.

“Indeed. Charlie was a nightmare, always finding creatures from the garden and claiming them as his pets - once found a Doxy in his room that he’d been keeping from me, if you can believe it! An absolute pest, had to get rid of it as soon as I could. Percy was a good child, very smart. Almost as good as Bill. And then came you two,” she pointed the spatula at Fred who mocked innocence and pointed to himself in shock, “Who were nightmares. Then there was Ron and Ginny, but they were almost easy compared to the twins.”

Fred grinned smugly, “We enjoy keeping you on your toes, mother dearest, what can we say.”

Molly hummed disapprovingly at him, “I can’t wait until you both have a baby - for your sake, Y/n, dear, I hope they’re like Bill. For your sake, Fred, I hope they’re like you were, an absolute terror.”

Fred’s jaw dropped comically, absent-mindedly taking Teddy from you as he crawled on his lap, jogging him up and down on his knee, “Terror? Me? As if. I’m the light of your life. Besides, it’s awfully forward of you to think we’re having a child, Mum.”

“Oh look at you both with him,” Molly gestured pointedly at the toddler, who was happily playing with Fred’s jumper, “You’re parents already, you just need a baby of your own.”

With that, she turned to head back into the kitchen, as Fred turned to you, wiggling his eyebrows, “What d’ya reckon, eh love? Want a baby with me?”

“Already picked the names,” you joked, taking Teddy back from him and lifting him up in the air, making him squeal in delight, waving his little fists around.

Fred grinned, then found himself watching the way you were holding Teddy, the way you were cradling him so gently, making him smile and laugh. He bit his lip, imagining what it would be like with his own baby - one with his ginger hair, his nose, and your eyes and lips. One that was half him and half you.

All through the rest of the gathering, all through playing games with his family, talking about how Bill and Fleur were expecting their baby in April, and how Hermione was doing working in the Ministry, all he was thinking about was starting a family with you, watching as you cared for Teddy, to give Harry and Ginny and few hours alone before they took him back for the evening.

And as he sat, arm slung around your shoulder, Teddy now asleep across both of your laps, he decided he wanted his own baby with you.

Later that night, after you’d returned Teddy to his godfather, you and Fred retreated back to the room you were staying in in the Burrow. You lay on the bed, watching your husband move around the room, seemingly deep in his own mind as you watched him bump into the corner of the cabinet twice, and nearly trip over the rug, before you spoke, “What’s on your mind, Freddie?”

He paused in place, having removed his trousers and instead stood in a shirt and his boxers, “Just thinking about Teddy... and you... and how good you are with him.”

“You’re pretty good with him too, you know, he loves you. Kept asking for his ‘Unca Fwed’ when I gave him back to Harry,” you laughed a little, shaking your head.

Fred grinned, “He’s pretty cute, huh? Been wondering what it’d be like to have him around all the time. Except not him, but a different baby. Our baby, to be precise.”

“You want a baby?”

Fred nodded, almost shyly as he pulled his shirt off and threw it over to you, you swapping the shirt you were wearing for his, happily breathing in the smell of him clinging to the fabric.

You smiled at him, holding your arms out to him as he crawled up the bed until his body hovered above yours, leaning on his forearms on either side of your head.

Wrapping arms around neck, you leaned up to brush your lips against his, “I’d love to have a baby with you, Freddie.”

He nudged his nose against yours, humming contently, “Yeah?” “Yeah,” you confirmed with a soft smile, kissing him gently, “Imagine, we could have one by next Christmas, or one on the way.”

“Maybe babies. Multiples run in the family, you know,” he murmured, moving to place kisses along your jawline and you felt him grin against your skin.

“I’m not having twins,” you deadpanned, shaking your head at him fondly as you scoffed out a laugh. Fred pulled back a little, still grinning back at you cheekily as he gently rocked his hips against yours, making your head fall back against the pillow,

“Oh yeah? We’ll see about that, love.”

#fred weasley #fred weasley x reader #fred weasley imagine #fred weasley imagines #hp #harry potter #all queue have to do is follow the spiders

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stanning-reyna · 3 years

Text

Pre-tlo Percabeth angst (because that’s all I write evidently)

“Just sleep with one eye open, that’s all I’m saying”

. . .

Through the sparse tree branches above her, Annabeth could make out chunks of the constellations. Underneath a tree wasn’t her ideal spot to sit on a clear night like this one, but Percy was here, and she had spent far too much time ignoring him the past few months. She was trying to make up for that with their conversation tonight.

It was going shockingly well, the small talk and jokes flowing off her tongue seamlessly. She couldn’t remember the last time it was this easy. Their conversation had became a little deeper, talking about how things were at home with Percy’s new stepdad. In the moment Annabeth felt like they were thirteen again, like nothing stood in between them. Maybe that was what gave her the courage to bring up the time Luke had asked her to run away with him.

“It sounds crazy… but some part of me thinks that maybe Luke didn’t really care about being together again. Maybe he had some other reason, and he was just… using me.”

She couldn’t believe she had just said that to Percy. She knew she sounded paranoid. Now he was going to think she was some narcissist who believed everything in the world revolved around her, and the worst part was that it was partially true- she did believe she was a valuable asset to Camp Half Blood. Whether or not Luke felt the same way, she wasn’t sure.

Percy had gone silent, though she could still sense his presence on the other side of the tree. She wished she could take what she said back. They’d been having a pleasant conversation before, the way two best friends should talk to each other. That was rare between them, even more so in the past year. And she had to ruin it by bringing up Luke. Now the night would likely end with them screaming at each other.

“Forget I said that,” she spoke quickly, hoping it would be enough to deter them from the crash course she had set just them on a moment earlier.

“Annabeth?” he asked, his voice small in the silence of the dark and vast forest surrounding them.

“Hm?” she hummed in response.

“I think you’re absolutely right.”

She was taken aback. Sure, she usually loved it when people agreed with her, but this was different. She wasn’t sure that she wanted to be right today.

“It would surprise me if his motives had been genuine when he came to see you,” Percy continued. “After everything he’s done, it wouldn’t make sense. If he wanted to run away with you, why not do it sooner? Why wait so long?”

Annabeth had no response to that. She hated when Percy made logical arguments. It meant she had to actually consider and evaluate what he said, and she didn’t want to do that right now. She had been hoping that he would dismiss her idea as some crazy theory, as something only a stressed demigod functioning on 4 hours of sleep would think up. Then Annabeth would know that she was simply paranoid and Luke was still the caring person she remembered.

Percy didn’t know that, of course. He didn’t realize that his response was pushing Annabeth farther and farther over the edge. That’s why he continued.

“I have no clue what exactly he wanted, but my guess is it wasn’t good. Sleep with one eye open, that’s all I’m saying. I don’t want to see you hurt.”

Her throat felt tight. She wasn’t sure what about his words made her feel that way- the insinuation that Luke would harm her, or the fact that Percy cared enough to warn her.

“Luke...” wouldn’t do that, she wanted to say. But she couldn’t. She’d grown up over the past year, and that meant realizing that Luke wasn’t all she hoped he was. Still, she couldn’t bring herself to admit that to Percy, to say it out load. That would make it real, and Annabeth didn’t know what she’d do with herself if that was real.

#I can't resist a good percabeth angst prompt #Percy jackson #annabeth chase #pjo #pjo fandom #pjo series #pjo fanfic #pjo fanfiction #percy jackson fanfic #percy jackson fanfiction #annabeth chase fanfic #annabeth chase fanfiction #percabeth #percabeth angst #percabeth fanfic #percabeth fanfiction #percy jackson and the olympians #Luke castellan #annabeth chase angst

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bipercabeth · 3 years

Note

28, gimmie your hand

sequel to this photographer percy au

When Percy took pictures of Annabeth before they started dating, she could never tell if he was looking at her through the lens of artist or lover. Now, she’s beginning to think it’s the same thing. There’s a delicacy to his gaze, as though his smile is meant both for Annabeth and the light shining on her. His taking a picture so often looks like gratitude, like the fear of forgetting his luck in a moment so blissful. And he immortalizes her on film, takes his care to capture and develop her image. It is no small thing, being a muse.

She envies it, sometimes. Percy gets to show Annabeth and the world exactly how he sees her, while she is left with her words, which can only ever fall short. He captures time and frames her suspended in the golden glow of sunlight, he makes her laugh moments before the flash, and he does not believe in bad photos. He photographs her bedhead, her soft stomach, her bent posture, and her chewed fingernails. He photographs her genuine laugh, her pouted lips, her pensive expression, her golden curls. Annabeth has never liked the sharp upturn of her nose, but Percy photographs her profile with such care that she can’t help but soften to it.

They’re at the beach for what feels like the last warm day of September. The Atlantic ocean is too vast to be swayed by the local weather, so they stay on the sand until they need to cool off. Percy’s camera is buried in their beach bag as they soak up the day—not every moment needs to be captured. Sometimes happiness demands to be fleeting. Nostalgia wouldn’t be as powerful if Annabeth could remember exactly how many freckles the sun kissed into Percy’s cheeks today. The longing comes from the fear of forgetting.

Sunset brings a gentle chill and sends Annabeth into Percy’s side. He pulls her bare legs into his lap and rubs his hands up and down them. It only works for a few seconds, but she’ll take any excuse to keep his hands on her. (She thinks he will too.)

One of the best parts about being in a relationship, she thinks, is not needing an excuse. There is an agreement between them that says you can touch me. I am trusting you to handle me at my best and my worst. I think that’s love. Please touch me.

Annabeth shifts her weight and straddles her boyfriend in a way that’s a bit indecent for a public beach, but the closest people are specs on the horizon and Percy is leaning back on his palms, his face to the orange sky and throat exposed. His skin looks golden, dripping in sunlight like honey, and Annabeth watches his Adam’s apple bob as she tastes. Even his smile is sweet. Annabeth is not an artist, but sometimes loving him makes her rethink that.

“Baby,” he whispers, and Annabeth opens her eyes to him chewing his lip. “You know the last thing I ever want to do is stop making out with my beautiful girlfriend on the beach, but...” He juts his chin to the sun, then to her general face. “I‘ll kick myself if I don’t get this.”

Annabeth pretends to roll her eyes as he lays back on the beach blanket with his camera in hand, but the way he looks at her is too profound for her to do much else. She’s always loved the way he looks at the world, though it wasn’t until recently that she discovered she likes the way he looks at her more. All that wonder, all that love, plus a surety that is so rare on him. There is the boyish boldness that makes her want to strangle and kiss him, plus the sly cockiness that has her leaning toward the former, but that gleam in his eyes cannot compare to this glimmer. His fingers slide along her chin, angling her kindly from the harsh angle he captures her at.

She chuckles, gestures to his hand. “We wouldn’t get anywhere without this. Piper says I can’t pose for any camera you’re not behind.”

Percy pokes her in the side quickly, snapping a photo when she laughs. “That’s because Piper is a terrible photographer.”

“I’m sure she’d love to hear that.”

“I’m just saying, it’s more than landscapes and lighting. If you’re taking pictures of people, you should try to capture something real. Something human.”

“Her Instagram feed is very focused on humanity.”

She said it to rile him up—passionate Percy is one of her favorite versions of the boy she loves. She’s snuck more than a few photos of her own during a long-winded rant about camera lenses and color editing.

But this passion is quieter than what Annabeth is used to. Honest. Soft. Percy rests the camera on his chest and trails his fingers from Annabeth’s wrist to her elbow, his eyes following the slow migration.

“I don’t always know why you’re looking at me the way you do. I think that’s why I picked up a camera in the first place—my mom looked at me like I was the best thing that ever happened to her, and I was scared that one day she’d come to her senses. I wanted to remember that face before it disappeared.” He doesn’t look at her. Can’t, maybe. “It’s been over a decade, and that look is still there. I guess now I take pictures to try and understand it. Because I don’t— I want—“

Annabeth takes hold of his wrist. It’s then that he looks at her, propped up on an elbow. He breathes.

“You look at me like I’m a good thing.” And he’s opening his mouth like there are more words he wants to say, but they won’t come.

Annabeth kisses him, sweet and soft and a bit desperate. The lens of the camera presses into her chest, and she slides it out of Percy’s grip as she presses a kiss to his nose, his forehead.

“Lay down for me,” she says. And, at his hesitation. “C’mon, Jackson. It’s hardly the first time I’ve had you on your back.”

That earns a laugh, which earns the first picture. The camera may be out of Annabeth’s league, but she’s seen Percy use this thing enough to know that the big black button is all she really needs for what she’s trying to do.

She says, “I love you,” says, “You’re everything to me,” and, “You are so beautiful,” for the sake of his smile. She says, “Gimme your hand,” and kisses his knuckles. She sits a little lower in his lap and photographs the way his eyes darken, and his hands, still itching for the camera, busy themselves with her thighs. The sun is disappearing quickly, but Percy is glowing with the last of the New York summer. His skin is still damp from the kiss of the Atlantic, and Annabeth thinks that he was born to look like this. Love and light, gentle and summer-warm by the seaside. Percy Jackson summed up in a time, a place, a feeling.

And Annabeth isn’t great with words, but he needs to hear them.

“The sun is gonna set,” she leans in, throwing her shadow over his face, and sets the camera down, “and it’s gonna rise, again and again and again, and I am never gonna stop looking at you like this. Even if you never take my picture again.” She plants her hand over his shoulder to lean down. “You’re gonna spend your entire life by my side waiting for it to go away, and one day you’re going to forget to worry. Just like you help me forget to worry.”

And then he smiles a bit sideways, a dimple pressing into his cheek. “You proposing to me, Chase?”

She rolls her eyes, but smiles back. “As if you won’t know when I propose.”

Percy’s hands skim up her back, where the last of the light stretches over the horizon of her skin. “Not if I beat you to it.”

He pulls her down for a long kiss. When Annabeth comes up, it’s nearly dark out.

“I’m pretty sure you’re not supposed to photograph your own wedding.”

“Yeah, well.” And he’s arching up for one last kiss before they have to leave, a comma on the page of this long day turned night. “We’ll cross that bridge when we get there.”

#annabethsinvibilitycap #pjo fics #my fic #my percabeth #drabbles #percabeth #pjo

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