supreme lord of the bathroom

After a day of work Zelda would sometimes go to a tea shop close to the town square to get in her own opinion the best macaroons in town and something to drink, it was slowly becoming a habit of hers. After getting it she walked to the town square proper. She looked at her phone to make sure the mayor hadn’t asked her for something suddenly and…thankfully…he hadn’t. However when she looked up she noticed something she somehow hadn’t seen before, the guy near her was holding a very big sword and it was glowing? how could she not seen it before she looked at her phone for just one second, surely it had to be a prop of some kind “why do you have that sword?” she asked still wondering how she didn’t see it before, and surely it wasn’t like a real sword.

&

In fairness, it was a very good question. It was the logical question, for someone stumbling across a guy with a giant glowing sword in the middle of the town square. Why do you have that sword, Percy? Why did you bring it here? Who told you this was okay? Didn’t your mother raise you right? What, and I cannot emphasize this enough, the fuck?

It was a very good question. And Percy didn’t have an answer.

He looked up at the woman--blonde and pretty and well-put-together and probably undeserving of being caught in whatever the hell kind of shitstorm he’d just unleashed--and opened his mouth to answer, gaped for a moment, then closed it. Blubbering like a fish. Nice one, Jackson.

“I--” he said (or tried to say). The sword hung heavy in his hand, but it was a good weight. A familiar weight. He hefted it up and down a few times. Yeah, sure, why not? He knew it was perfectly balanced, even though he didn’t really know what perfectly balanced meant or how a sword could be it. 

He’d had the pen as long as he could remember. It was just a plastic ballpoint, the ninety-cents-at-Staples kind. He couldn’t remember when or where or why he’d picked it up--probably at some school event or a work thing or the bank. (When was the last time he’d been to the bank? Had he ever been to the bank?) Percy just knew that he always seemed to have it on him. It was in a jacket pocket, at the bottom of his bag, perched on his nightstand, half-full of its cheap ink.

He hadn’t thought much of it. It was a pen. It wrote fine. His handwriting was a nightmare no matter what pen he used; he couldn’t be picky. This one did its job.

Until Percy sat in the town square, skateboard propped against the bench, trying to remember a grocery list. (Maybe if he wrote it down, he’d finally buy a vegetable. Maybe. No promises, Mom.) He grabbed the pen from his pocket and uncapped it, but before he could pop the cap onto the back of its shitty plastic shaft, it wasn’t a pen anymore.

It was a sword.

A whole-ass full-sized glowing-bronze sword. In public. In the middle of town. In his hand. The pen cap fell to the ground with a rattle, and he nearly dropped the sword, too, but something instinctual, some weird and a little bit horrifying kind of muscle memory, kicked in and gripped it like he’d been doing this his whole life.

Danny had been surprised to make another friend - after all, it had just been the trio since elementary school; Sam, Tucker, and himself. Somehow, Danny seemed to just rub most people his age the wrong way ( on top of having the world’s most embarrassing parents ever ), no matter how hard he tried, so it was nice to connect with someone outside of his best friends. The worry that maybe Percy just put up with him out of pity seemed to persist, but the guy hadn’t told him to buzz off yet, so Danny pretty much just keep counting himself lucky.

“I don’t know, man. You’ve got that dopey look on your face - the one Tuck tells me I have when I look at Paulina.” Attempting to wiggle his eyebrows and failing miserably, Danny props himself up on the smaller counter, clearly intended to be chest height for a small child, “Are you holding out on ––”

Percy’s reiteration of his newest achievement had him stalling out, a triumphant shrug of his shoulders and a grin plastered to his face, “It was close, I’m not going to lie to you - Mr. Lancer was going to try and keep me back, but I practically begged my physics teacher to boost my grade from a D-minus to a D-plus, and eventually, after I practically laid on the ground and cried, he gave in, so my GPA was high enough!” 

With a fist pump, Danny kicked his feet, shaking his head at his own dramatics.

“The thought that I never have to step foot in that school again - there’s nothing better. My mom is going to be so cheesed that I graduated.” Resting his hand on his chin, Danny looked up at the older man with a wistful smile, “Does it feel as good as I imagine it feels? To not be a student anymore, I mean.” He doesn’t mention that his family expects him to go to college like his older sister is, or that they think that he’ll become a scientist, just like them, when all Danny really wanted to do was just survive. 

Don’t get it wrong--graduating high school was a big deal for anybody. No one was their best self at fourteen, and seventeen was barely better. Making it all the way through? You deserved a medal. For Percy, who, at one point, hadn’t even been sure he’d graduate middle school, it had been world-shaking. He couldn’t remember, exactly, but in retrospect, he had a feeling it was more than the dyslexia and the ADHD and what his geometry teacher had called a generally insufferable disdain for authority. He had the distinct feeling that everyone really, truly hadn’t expected him to live past sixteen. 

As far as he could tell, Danny was the same way. Maybe without the weird, irrational expiration date thing, but still. Plenty smart in all the ways that mattered except the ones that went on a transcript. Mostly the same.

But here he was, twenty-whatever and splattered with briny aquarium water. Saying he had his act together might have been a bit of an overstatement, but he wasn’t dead yet. (Suck it, Mrs. Dodds.)

And, apparently, he was grinning like an idiot, and fooling no one. 

“It’s,” Percy stammered. “She’s--” 

No, stop blushing, Jackson. No more blushing. You’re not fourteen. You’re at work.

“It was just one date. It’s early. I don’t wanna jinx it. Paulina, however...?”

Percy leaned against the counter, which was definitely way too short for him, and smiled teasingly at Danny. Ah, youth. He wasn’t even twenty-four, but Percy was starting to feel fucking geriatric.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: .☽ . :☆ﾟ. ───

Annabeth didn’t know why her heart was racing faster as they planned this out. She just met him, it wasn’t as if they had known each other forever and both just confessed their feelings. No. They just met and the blond didn’t understand why she was so drawn to him. There was something about the way that they just naturally flowed together that made her think that the two of them had something there. The way she wanted to hold his hand just to see how it felt.

Oh my Gods, Annabeth, you’re hopeless! This is just another brainless jock that will pretend he cares and then end up hurting you all over again.

Still, she couldn’t help but to smile when she looked at his face. His perfect smile. His dumb face, Annabeth. You don’t have a thing for him! Don’t fall for his charms, he’ll only hurt you. The voice inside of her was trying to fight the oncoming feelings she had for him, but she was torn. She wouldn’t know his true intentions if she didn’t try.

“Third date, huh? Maybe I’ll have to stick around long enough to hear the details,” she shot a playful smirk toward him.

Can you be anymore desperate sounding? What’s so special about you that other girls don’t have? He could pull any girl, better than you. Her shoulders dropped as she thought about that. She wasn’t more good looking than anybody in town. She wasn’t the perfect cheerleader type with a good body. She was just Annabeth. There was nothing special about her, at least not to herself.

Annabeth was stuck in her thoughts until he said that he’d like that. Her heart pounded in her chest and she felt as if she were at a loss for words. “You would?” she asked, hoping that she’d heard him right. “I mean– sure! Yeah, uh, I’ll text you my address and you can, uh, come by later tonight?” she suggested.

&

It was just a date. He’d just met the girl, and they were going to grab dinner, or something. That was it. Nothing more. They hadn’t confessed their undying love or proposed marriage or anything, just a date. One date. A first date.

First. 

First was the key word here--it was the first, but it didn’t feel like the first. It felt like an inevitability. It felt like a millionth. It felt like something he had done before and would do again. And, gods, he was nervous.

Why was he so nervous? 

It was just a date.

But--he wanted her to like him, so, so badly. Like, world-depended on it kinds of badly. Like, he didn’t know what he’d do if they fucked this up, and he fucked everything up, kinds of badly. Like, Percy don’t you dare light anything on fire for the next twenty-four hours kinds of badly. (He never meant to set things on fire! It just happened! But the track record was still bad! The fact that flammable and inflammable looked like opposites but meant the same thing only made things worse!)

Maybe I’ll have to stick around, Annabeth said, and his stomach did a kick flip. Percy hoped she would--he wanted her to!--but no one ever did. They spent an hour around him, and realized he had no attention span and made poorly-timed jokes and carried disaster in his wake, and they turned tail for the hills. He couldn’t blame them. He wouldn’t want to be around himself either, not if he had a choice.

(Did they have a choice, though? Whatever this thing was, it didn’t feel like it.)

(Don’t be a dick, Percy. Of course she has a choice. You’re not that special.)

“Oh yeah,” he said. “It’s a whole lot. Hopefully it’s worth it.”

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Annabeth hadn’t been the superficial type that cared about looks, but she did have to admit that Percy was definitely attractive. Even if sometimes she had her own doubts on if she was attractive or not, she tried to seem as if she didn’t care because brains were more important than beauty.  Still, she found herself hoping that he found her attractive at least a little.

“Worse than seaweed brain?” she asked and found herself biting her lip. Yikes. She felt bad calling him that and knowing he’d dealt with worse made her feel sorry for him. Poor guy. Truth be told, Annabeth had her fair share of bullying, but she was kind of a tough girl. She didn’t let it get to her, or at least she never showed that it got to her. She couldn’t give anybody that satisfaction.

“I wouldn’t want to interrupt that, but if you’d like, I’d be down to go to dinner or something, or if you’d like to just like come over and hang out. I don’t know.” she was usually so confident, but found herself stumbling over her words, not able to find out what to even say. “Or we don’t have to, that’s fine. I can, like, watch something on Netflix in my apartment like usual.” 

Why the fuck did you say that? God, Annabeth, you’re smart, but you have no people skills.

He’s gonna think you’re stupid! Maybe you’re the seaweed brain.

&

She’d been pretty from the side. Staring her face-on like this, she was beautiful. Stunning and smart and a little scary and clearly way, way out of his league, but there was still that weird unshakeable joint deja vu, and the way he felt so comfortable with her already. And she wanted to go out with him? (Maybe he did need to question her judgement. Maybe she wasn’t so smart after all.)

“Oh yeah,” he said, plucking an onion ring off his plate and biting into it. Shit, hot. Good, but hot. Okay, Percy, keep your cool. He swallowed, then shrugged. “But unpacking my childhood trauma is at least a third date kind of thing.” 

There was Gabe and Nancy Bobofit, and-- and. Percy had an objective record of his life. He knew he’d gotten from point a to point b, he knew every school he’d attended, he knew they’d all sucked, he knew he’d gone mostly friendless, but he couldn’t fill in the gaps. There was color shading missing from everything between the ages of twelve and twenty-two, before it all petered out to a dull gray. He wondered if Annabeth felt the same way. He wondered if she knew what he was missing. He wondered if their lost parts had something to do with each other. He wondered how much of them they shared. He wondered if his food had cooled down enough to take another bite.

He picked up another onion ring and ate it in one, chewing, thinking. At least a third date implied a first and a second. Was that something they were going to do? Was that what this was? Had he come out and said it? Had he been too forward? Had he ruined it all before it had even started? Maybe he did have seaweed for a brain.

He just wanted to get this right so badly. He didn’t know why, but he felt like there was something enormous riding on it. He thought of the sky, slowly falling down against on an aching man’s back. He thought of Annabeth by his side as they held it together. Maybe that magic string had led the boy back to his princess, and maybe it had wound Percy and Annabeth back together from wherever they had been, but it had only gotten them this far. This was where the string ran out, where fate took down its guard rails. Where they started bowling without the bumpers, if you will. This was on them now. 

They had a chance at something, if they could take it. If Percy could make it a full five minutes without ruining everything, which would be some kind of world record.

 He smiled.

𝙎𝙏𝘼𝙍𝙏𝙀𝙍 // @rippedtide​

It had finally happened for him –– Danny was graduating high school. It was crazy, that it had taken so long (He’d been held back for a year, sometime in Junior High, but for the life of him, no matter how many times he’d asked his parents why, he could never seem to remember it just a few short hours later), but it felt like a weight was finally going to be off of his chest.

The door to the aquarium chimed with his entrance, a familiar calling since he’d done the same routine nearly every day for the last year, and Danny through his bag to the floor, more than happy to rid himself of it. “You’re never going to believe it - they tried to tell me I had to stay for some rehearsal thing after school today! The calendar says ‘seniors’ last day’ and they want to milk that time for all that it’s worth. Nutcases, right ––”

Danny stopped in his tracks, seeing Percy somewhat distracted, smiling at his phone, not a care in the world. It was rare, when the guy took a moment to himself and actually like, smiled. A symmetrical grin slowly rose to the teen’s face too. “I’m totally not taking this to heart, but – this is slightly underwhelming.” The youngest Fenton peered over his friend’s shoulder, “Who’s got you so distracted?”

&

As a rule, student groups sucked. They were loud and messy and smelled like gym socks and roller rink pizza (so, also gym socks), and liked to heckle the guides and the animals and make everyone’s day a little bit worse. This morning’s group had been some thirty eight year olds, at least two of whom had been caught trying to throw pennies and erasers into the touch tank. One particularly vicious little girl had called Percy an old fishy loser, which felt really great. He’d wanted to smile and say, Actually, Kaelynn, I’m a young fishy loser, but then she’d cry and he’d get in trouble with The Moms, who he feared even more than the kids.

So, yeah, student groups sucked.

Students themselves, though? Not all bad. Danny, for one, was pretty much nearly Percy’s age, and reminded him an awful lot of himself. It wasn’t just the trouble with school, though, been there, done that, too (hello, kicked out of military school twice). It was the energy, the humor, the knee-deep sarcasm hiding something very, very tired and a little bit sad. Danny was always a welcome sight, especially at work, and would usually warrant as much of Percy’s undivided attention as he could muster.

But, just as Danny entered, Percy’s phone lit up.

There she was again. 

wise girl. 

Probably another insult. He smiled at the name. Annabeth, her blonde hair and violent grey eyes, and-- and. They barely knew each other, but she felt like the first puzzle piece falling into place. Maybe the only one he needed.

Everything in Kaz’s body shook, rage and grief and disgust roiling through him in equal measures. You may be able to swear vengeance against Rollins, but you can’t fight an entire ocean. 

He clenched his fists, feeling damp leather on his skin. It made him even more sick, even more disgusted. Leather was supposed to be a comfort, but wet like this, it was like flesh all over his hands. Like he’d stuck his hand into a cadaver and pulled out the muck that remained inside. He was covered in rot and it was like his chest was stuck in a vice. Every breath took effort to take in, and he was sure if he were to look at himself in a mirror, his skin would be even paler than normal, sickly pale and white with terror. 

There was little Kaz could do for comfort. He ignored his issues so deeply that he rarely needed to find a comfort past the gloves and he would not take them off. Not in the company of a stranger. Not like this. Not out in the world where he could touch and be touched. 

His cane.

Kaz reached for the slender piece of wood, and he felt the tension in himself ease just a fraction as he held it. A weapon. A tool. A safeguard. He felt marginally better with it in his hand, with the knowledge that if the young man came any closer, if he took notice of how much fear shot along Kaz’s spine, he could take him down with ease. “I’m fine.” He said gruffly, shucking off his jacket - refusing to let go of the cane with each jerky movement - as he dropped it sopping wet to the ground. His shirt beneath stuck uncomfortably to his skin, and he wished he could simply step into a fire - if he were to burn to a crisp, it would be better because at least then he could be dry. 

He breathed in shallowly through his nose and shut his eyes, trying to master the shaking - or at least bring it closer to shivering, to convince himself he wasn’t simply going to retch onto the docks and show this man how far Dirtyhands had to fall. “I didn’t ask you to save me. I could have managed it.” No, you couldn’t.

Pushing his damp hair out of his face, he finally began to study the man who had saved him, moving to stand and leaning more heavily on the cane. “If you wanted thank yous, maybe save a little old lady next time, hmm?”

I didn’t ask you to save me.

It hadn’t been a decision. It never was a decision. If someone was in trouble and you could do something about it, you did it. A guy was drowning, and you could swim? You jumped in, dammit. It was, what, a few minutes of discomfort and a change of clothes in exchange for a human life? That wasn’t even a trade-off. 

Selfishly, Percy didn’t want the survivor’s guilt of knowing he could have done something and didn’t if it all went sideways--and he could brag about being a little bit of a hero to his mom on their next call. Maybe he could have thought it through a little better. Maybe he could have weighed out the odds. Maybe the guy would have been fine. Maybe not everything needed his intervention. Maybe he did throw himself headfirst into this kind of stuff too often. Maybe he did have a little bit of a hero complex. 

Why did he feel like this was a habit? Why was he thinking about this as a usually and an always, like dealing with a life-or-death emergency was just another Tuesday? The last crisis he’d had to handle was a fourth grader trying to steal a penguin during a field trip that morning. He wasn’t, like, Spider-Man or anything. He worked in an aquarium. He owned two pairs of shoes and a beat-up skateboard. 

He just didn’t want to watch another person die.

(Another person? Who else -- ?) 

He was losing it. There was water in his ears, sloshing around his head. Probably some algae lodged in there, fighting his frontal lobe for real estate. (Seaweed Brain, she’d called him.) His clothes clung uncomfortably to his skin, water dripped into his eyes, and this guy and his whole bitchy Hot Topic Jack Skellington situation were on track to drive Percy straight off the dock and left towards batshit.

“Good note, thanks,” he said. “I’ll keep it in mind.”

The guy grabbed his cane, and Percy stepped closer, his foot edging against the jacket and phone he’d abandoned in his dive. He knelt down, picked them up, and folded them to his chest. His wet shirt would probably soak them through, too, but he was past caring. Hair-trigger reflexes. Poor impulse control. Jumpy, they’d called him. Fighty. A pain in the ass. Headfirst, one more time.

He stuck a hand in his pocket reflexively, feeling around for--what was he feeling for? All he had on him was a cheap ballpoint pen. Muscle memory was a bitch. 

Lara can’t help but laugh, though another part of her always despaired at the constant likening to Indiana Jones. It was no one’s fault that he was arguably the most notable archaeologist in modern media, but it meant that he therefore shaped peoples minds about who they were and what they did when it reality their jobs were a lot more mundane and considerably less dangerous. She was more at danger of getting a papercut than getting chased down by a giant boulder on the job. And don’t even get her started on the amount of men who had made lewd comments about the whip. “I only managed to stomach one of those movies” She smiles sheepishly, her nose scrunched up “I picked way too many faults and I was only seven.”

Still smiling Lara pushes herself to her feet, brushing the dirt and sand from her knees “As for my toolkit it’s considerably less exciting than anything Indiana would have used.” It wasn’t going to be the quickest of jobs since the fossil was still fairly deep into the rock, but she always had the tools in her Jeep no matter the kind of expected job run, it was just always better to be overly prepared than caught out. “Is your boss actually okay with me hacking at the rocks in your habitats?” They hadn’t been bothered by any animals since they arrived so Lara had either assumed the keepers had kept them in a separate area or this one wasn’t in use, if it was the former she may only have so long to get in and out before the animals got too antsy “I do have everything I’ll need out in my car so I can do it right now, as long as it’s not going to cause any bad blood.” 

“Wait, hold up,” he said, eyes wide, mouth open. “You mean--the Ark of the Covenant didn’t actually melt a bunch of Nazi faces off? That’s not historically accurate? Shit, dude. No wonder I did so badly in history class.”

Percy had spent most of his childhood shuffled from school to boarding school. There weren’t many family nights at home--when Gabe had been part of the picture, there wasn’t much in the way of family at all. When there were, there hadn’t been much money. A good night together, one of precious few, had been a muggy summer night, Gabe playing poker at someone else’s apartment, Percy and Sally curled on the couch with an old adventure movie and (blue) snacks. Lots of Star Wars. Lots of Indiana Jones. Some Die Hard. And, weirdly, a good amount of The Sound of Music? Sally’s choice, clearly. Definitely. Every time. Nothing to do with Percy at all.

He missed those nights.

Now, he was here, an adult, responsible for overseeing some kind of historical excavation with a cool, pretty, young, very self-serious archaeologist. He felt goofy just standing there in his uniform, glibly cracking jokes and trying to stay more or less out of her way. He didn’t have many answers about anything, just the offhand Hey, Jackson, go deal with the rocks he’d been given when he’d clocked in that morning.

Emma’s expression softened upon hearing his explanation for tapping her. “You’re fine, sorry for snapping. It’s been the literal worst day.” She said, although it wasn’t truly any of his business. The blonde was just over that day and wanted to drink enough to forget it. She was a bit pissed at the way things had gone, so she was taking it off on others and she recognized that. It wasn’t her proudest moment, but that’s what she was doing.

“I’m Emma,” she told him, introducing herself as to not be too rude. She usually kept to herself, but she did feel bad for snapping at him, so she might as well be nicer to the guy. After all, he did seem to be a bit disappointed that she wasn’t who he had thought she was. She was a bit surprised at that though, it was usually a thing of people not recognizing her even though she could have sworn they’d met before.

As the bartender handed her the drink she’d asked for, she took a gulp and sighed, setting the glass down. Nothing like a good old rum and coke to make her worries go away. The woman had recently found herself missing something in her life, but she couldn’t quite place it. She didn’t know her family and she’d never had a significant other– at least in current memory she didn’t think she did. Still, something was missing and she didn’t know what.

&

And just like that, the moment faded. The strange clarity he’d felt in the haze, the confidence in his hope, the beer-addled idea that maybe he’d found a missing piece, faded. (Annabeth, he thought again. The girl from the diner and from his dreams, who he’d been looking for but hadn’t known long enough to lose. Or maybe the girl he’d known forever and hadn’t realized she’d gone until she’d come back. This whole thing was a head trip.)

From the sound of it, he wasn’t the only one who was kind of a little bit sort of losing it. The not-Annabeth woman--Emma--didn’t look too thrilled to be here tonight, either. Percy knew literal worst day. Most of his life had been literal worst day. He was very good at accumulating drama and collecting bad days. It was one of his best talents, probably.

He nodded and watched as the bartender handed her her drink. Something dark and unfussy, which she was drinking with a practiced hand. Yeah, they were both literal worst day vets, weren’t they? 

Inej wasn’t sure what it was about the aquarium that had drawn her in. The place was full of kids pulling on their parents hands. Their eyes alight with wonder at the various spectacles around them. It partially reminded her of the times that she performed. When she saw that look in others eyes because they were watching her. Sometimes she missed it. Inej put it off to a place in Echo Springs that she hadn’t yet explored. One that she hadn’t mastered. It could be a weakness. So, she wandered the various displays and the shows that were offered. 

It had only managed to make her feel homesick and conflicted. She missed performing sometimes more than anything. Walking on the high-wire. Not the performing that she’d done at the Menagerie, if that was what it was called. 

The animals were trapped at the aquarium. Forced to put on a show whether they wanted to or not. She knew a little something about that. More than she’d ever wish upon anyone. 

“Thelma and Louise?” Inej questioned, not getting the reference. What odd names for seals. Brow furrowing slightly, she watched the man wipe his fishy hands on himself and resisted the urge to wrinkle her nose. “No. I don’t want the conservation speech. I want to know that they’re well taken care of. I don’t want them to be forced into something they don’t want to do.” 

He’d worked here long enough to know the type--the animal rights activists, the protestors, the group of college kids who liked to come yell at the gift shop every few weeks. In a perfect world, they’d be right. They were right, sort of. No one and nothing deserved to be cooped up and on display, especially not in a little nowhere town like this, not when they belonged to the open ocean. But it wasn’t a perfect world; they’d ruined the wilds (just thinking about the Great Barrier Reef made Percy’s bones ache, like a part of him was dying, too). There was nowhere else to go. The best Percy could do was make sure his charges were treated well.

And wonder why he saw so much of himself in them.

This job was a best-case-scenario. Full-time work that he was good at? No unexplained explosions to date? An income, an apartment, a viable way forward to a neat, stable little life? None of it had seemed in the cards for him. Sally would say she’d always known he could do it, but Percy had seen the look on her face when he’d actually graduated college, the heard little hitch in her voice when he’d told her he’d gotten the job. It was the best he could ask for. Better than, even.

But he felt like there was something missing.

Like the woman’s sense of humor, apparently.  “Yeah, Thelma and Louise,” he said. “Like Thelma and Louise. From, you know, Thelma and Louise.” Did she--not get the reference? Really? They weren’t that far from the city out here, were they?

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Once she cleaned the mess she’d made by choking on her shake, Annabeth was thankful that her food had come out. She was hungry and needed to eat something. When she was about to dig in and start eating, she noticed that he grabbed a napkin and pen, writing something on it. She was curious as to what he was writing. That is until he handed her the napkin.

“I would love to-” she paused, feeling as if she sounded too desperate. Honestly, if the two felt this connection with one another, maybe it was fate or something. It was weird, but she wanted to get to the bottom of it. Maybe the more time she spent with him, she’d figure out why they seemed to know each other without having met prior to this interaction.

“I’ll check my schedule,” Annabeth corrected herself, trying to make it seem like she wasn’t too eager to see him again. She was though, for reasons unknown to herself. She wanted to understand why she knew him– why he was familiar. After putting his number into her phone as seaweed brain, she texted the number.

‘Hey! It’s Annabeth aka wise girl.’ the message read. It was stupid and funny, but it fit. Wise girl.

Why did that name feel so familiar? What couldn’t she remember?

Annabeth began to eat her food, a million thoughts running through her mind. “Sorry for, uh, being rude I guess.” Her words were genuine. She didn’t know why she had the strong impulse to insult him and call him names such as seaweed brain. It wasn’t even clever to her in that moment, yet nothing else seemed right. It fit better to her.

“Do you have any plans for the night?” She found herself blurting out. It had just slipped out, she wasn’t even sure when she’d be ready to see him again, but yet found herself wanting to see him. It was odd. She wanted to know everything about him, wanted to uncover why she remembered him yet didn’t know him at all. Maybe he was the missing piece in her life that she’d been feeling for a while. Or maybe she was just going mad.

&

He was making a move. He’d never been too good at making moves--it wasn’t that there hadn’t ever been interest interest (Percy wasn’t blind; he knew he’d come out the other side of puberty pretty well off, and his years on the swim team hadn’t hurt), but he’d sit there wide-eyed, blinking, unsure how to read the whole thing, afraid to screw it all up. It was easier to play oblivious. No one got hurt that way.

(Right? Right. A nagging feeling in the back of his mind told him that, no, maybe it wasn’t that easy, but he also told that nagging feeling to shut up and bother him later.)

This didn’t feel like making a move, though. This felt like retracing steps he’d already taken a million times. This felt like putting a chain of inevitable events into action. For a split second, Percy was afraid that he was wrong, but the look on her face, the curve of her lips, drowned out his nerves. What was that quote from The Office? Something about the shots you didn’t take?

Something about the shots you felt like you’d already taken?

And--she didn’t throw a burger at his head. She didn’t run screaming. She said yes. 

Holy Hades, she said yes.

(She said she’d check her schedule, Percy, you dumbass. Don’t get ahead of yourself.)

(The little victories.)

He tried not to watch her type something into her phone, tried to act surprised when his own lit up with a message from an unknown number. He hid his smile poorly, texted back a little owl and thumbs up emoji, and saved her in his phone as wise girl, as requested. If they were committing to this bit, they were committing to it.

“Don’t sweat it,” he said. “I’ve dealt with worse.” He thought of Smelly Gabe, of Nancy Bobofit and her peanut butter sandwiches, of the dorm of burly jocks who’d terrorized him in high school. Seaweed Brain was a compliment by comparison. 

​percy jackson + tv tropes

“No one’s!” she exclaimed, hurriedly, right after his last question. She then took a deep breath, and added in a softer voice: “I mean… it was an old guy, anyways. It wouldn’t be proper, you know?” Even if it would be very well deserved. But… still! No. Violence is never the answer. She feels pretty bad. And it sucks. She wouldn’t wish that upon anyone, no matter their personality. It’s nice, though. The concern. The checking up on her and meaning it. New, but… nice.

Still glued to the wall, she looked down, making a hurried attempt at wiping her face. Then, she finally looked up. She’s smiling, but it’s… sad. Weak. Looks more like a grimace, to be honest. As if she’s straining not to get right back to sobbing. “Just work, you know? I usually get through it pretty well, but-” a pause, and a deep sigh. “… it’s like I did everything wrong today. Every single thing. And I got yelled at for it. It was awful.”

“Fuck proper,” Percy said. He didn’t make a habit of starting fights (fights always seemed to be started around him, leaving him standing in the middle and taking the blame), but he couldn’t have made it as far as he had without learning to protect himself. It was easy, Percy knew, to just lay down and take it. He also knew that sometimes it wasn’t worth pushing back that much of a fuss -- but sometimes it was. “Sometimes the old guys deserve it the most. Respect your elders? Nah, dude. Not until they respect us.”

The girl looked a few steps closer to calmer, but it was a narrow ledge. A strong breeze or a loud bird might set her off again. Work troubles, Percy understood. He thought about the day a few weeks ago when Henry, a particularly excitable ray, had tried to say hi to a group of schoolchildren and left a fourth grader in tears. Percy had gotten the better part of an hour of a Karen spewing about how her daughter could have died and aren’t you ashamed of yourself and lawsuits and bad Yelp reviews. Percy had been about thirty seconds from throwing her into the tank to meet Henry herself.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Annabeth didn’t know what was wrong with her. She’d never met him before in her life, but here she was– insulting him as if they had been friends for years. Maybe she did know him, maybe the two of them had met before but didn’t quite remember. No. You don’t know him. She had to keep reminding herself that, because she didn’t know him. It was delusional to even think that. Delusional to give in to the fact that he said that she seemed familiar. She blamed him. Maybe his words were just putting thoughts in her mind that weren’t true.

Taking a moment, Annabeth took a sip of her shake. Trying to just clear her mind. That is until he called her wise girl. Such an odd thing to call somebody. Once those words left his mouth, she found herself choking on the drink. Wow, that would make a good first impression. Not that she even cared. “Can you hand me a napkin?” she asked, disregarding his question for the moment.

“I’m a journalist. I haven’t gone to the aquarium before. I keep planning to, but I just can’t bring myself to go alone,” the blond admitted before making eye contact with him.

Suddenly, she had this moment of a memory coming back. A distant memory that she didn’t know she even had. The memory had him in it, yet this was the first time they met. What the hell. She didn’t know him, yet it was so clearly him in this long forgotten memory. You drool in your sleep.

Hey weird question- do you drool when you sleep? She couldn’t possibly ask him that. It was ridiculous. He was just some stranger. These memories and familiarness weren’t real. They just couldn’t be.

A journalist, huh? Good for her. Percy pictured her with a notebook and a big camera and one of those old-timey felt hats with the paper in them, scoping out a big story. Yeah, he didn’t really know how small-town journalism worked, but he figured there was a good amount of snooping and some voice recordings involved. He didn’t really read the paper; not regularly. He’d flip through the headlines and photos and squint through the biggest stories when he had to, but he’d never been much of a reader. For the amount of time and effort it took him, he’d always found something better to do. (He was sure Sally still regretted the day they’d finally been able to afford him a skateboard. He’d immediately used to tear up the Upper East Side, much to the chagrin of the stuffy old-money neighbors and museum-going tourists swarming the neighborhood.)

No, Percy wasn’t a person who read the news, but he liked the idea of being someone who was. He knew, somehow, that Annabeth was absolutely the smartest person in the room, and that whatever she was writing was monumental, and it would be well worth his time to try to read it.

Maybe it was just that Annabeth seemed well worth his time. Even as he was making a total ass of himself, and she probably just wanted him to go away and leave her to her shake and... journalist-y... things, he had a feeling. There was something here. A past, maybe. A story, probably. A future? He didn’t know. Percy hoped she could use her journalism skills to get to the bottom of it, because he had no fucking clue what was going on. He just knew he had a track record for causing disasters everywhere he went, and he actually kind of really liked this girl, and he didn’t want to be the one responsible for stuff blowing up this time around.

Because--dammit, she was cute. Even choking on her shake, she was cute. (It also made him feel less bad about doing the same thing minutes before, but he was sure he hadn’t been nearly as cute about it. The waiter probably hated them both now.) He grabbed a napkin from the holder in front of him and passed it to her. If he blinked, he could see a much younger version of himself and a girl who could only be a young Annabeth squeezed into a booth in a diner not too unlike this one. They were starving and filthy and exhausted, like they’d been traveling without suitcases or adult supervision, and were joined by someone else--someone blurry and vague, someone with a task for them. No, a mission. No. A quest.

Then he blinked again, and it was gone. Their food was arriving, steaming and piled high on the plates. He pulled his hand away from Annabeth’s. Maybe it was the residual ache of the boy in the diner, whoever and whenever and wherever he was, but Percy’s stomach growled in response.

First, though--

First, he had an idea.

He grabbed another napkin, then reached into his pocket for the pen he couldn’t seem to shake. It wasn’t anything special, just a ninety-nine cent plastic ballpoint, and he couldn’t remember when he’d picked it up, but he hadn’t lost it yet. He twirled it around in his hand once, twice, three times, then wrote something on the napkin.