It's less a waking up than a slow clearing of her head. There's a gauze over everything she can't think clearly enough to analyze, but the words bob up from somewhere: drugs, hospital, hurt. And then, because she's a born fighter and even drugs can't dull her sensesthat much, alone.
Percie turns her head, pretending the blur of her vision is from movement and fatigue, not the pain that pushes through her. It's not a sharp, aggressive attack she could fight, but rather slow and heavy and passive, inexorable. She's hurt badly and she knows it, but there's no one in the chair beside her to tell her how or if it's permanent or even who she is this time. Just a single demigod after a failed quest, and how pathetic is that?
Her heart knows whom it longs for, even before her mind can summon images or names: Steve, sitting bowed but fierce, eyes pained but reassuring, presence solid. No harm can come to her when Steve is there. But he isn't, and percie feels more than vulnerable. She feels frightened, even though she knows steve isn't with her because he's out fighting whatever it is that put percie here. Even though she knows steve would die before he'd let it get percie again. But that's part of the reason she's afraid.
And then there's the one percie expects to find beside het. A flop of blond, sleep-tousled hair, legs too long for hospital chairs, and eyes that can cut with their wisdom and softness. Her best freind learned defiance of fighing at percie's bedside, refusing to leave when percie was hurt, to leave her alone. She would stay to defend while Steve went on offense, and the first step in healing has always been the sight of her best friend waiting for, with her. Percie's strong when Steve is there because she borrows strength, and she's strong for annabeth because she lends it. Alone, there's not much to her, and no one to pretend otherwise for.
This time, she is alone.
She doesn't even try to remember why she's there, what combination of teeth and claws and horns and bulk and powers put her in the hospital. Percie concentrates instead on why her family isn't there, straining to remember if Steve had gotten hurt too, or, oh, God, annabeth.
But no, because memory returns unkindly. Steve yelling her name before percie passed out, rushing too late to the rescue. And annabeth…annabeth safe and on her own, across the country in school. She wouldn't be sitting in hospital chairs anymore. She'd left percie with tyson, not knowing or caring that, practically, that meant she'd left percie alone.
Percie curls clumsily, painfully on her side. There's nothing to stay awake for, nobody to be strong for, and her heart is as drained as her body. Crushing her eyes shut, she wills herself to go to sleep and escape this suffocating solitude.
It takes her a week before she's well enough to leave, even though her moms best friend she's known since she was seven ,bruce, shows up after two days and percie tries harder for him. Two weeks, and she's recovered enough that they're back on the road, or at least bruce has no qualms about giving her an assignment and taking off on a job of his own. Percie's left with a car and an address on a piece of paper and a weary, bruised body. She stares at the piece of paper until it blurs, then gets in the car and drives to Stanford.
She finds annabeth like a needle seeking out true north, shadowing her friend through a day of normalcy: classes, lunch, library time, dinner at home with her new boy toy, dancing. Annabeth looks up a few times, like she feels percie's eyes on her, but then lets it go. After annabeth and the guy go to bed, percie finds a bar and gets drunk, sleeping it off in the car's backseat a block down from her freinds home.
The confrontation was, questionable, percie broke in, got stuck in a head lock by a half asleep demigodess, and then they had a beer while annabeths new boy toy cooked waffles, blue ones that were demanded,and after begging, pleading and a few tears, annabeth finally agreed to get an oracle to find steve,but that involved finding Rachel and ella, and possibly, hopefully, Steve.
She only finds out two months later, accidentally, that annabeth had come to see her twice at the hospital and stayed in town until percie was out of danger. It eases the buried hurt but doesn't fix it completely. There's only so much you can do for old scars.
And nothing quite erases the memory of being left alone like that.
00000
She wakes suddenly, like a demigod, only groaning after, when the pain hits. Okay, not a good idea, and percie sags back, not quite into sleep but not awake, either. Searching.
It's sad when you can tell the difference instantly between a motel and the hospital by the feel of the bed and the smell in the air. And know without looking just from the sinking of your heart that you're alone.
Percie's eyes snap open. Alone?
A quick glance around shows a standard ER cubicle, including the ubiquitous family member/concerned friend chair that sits uninhabited by concerned family members. If she were on a heart monitor, it would be beeping an alarm by now, but there's nothing, which means not badly hurt, right? A quick check reveals only an IV in the crook of his elbow, and fresh bandages around her chest and one upper arm. Judging from the coldness and nausea, she's in there for blood loss and shock. Judging by the shakiness and rising panic in her throat, she should still be worried. Percie casts around for the button, and not finding one—duh, ER, not a normal room—she starts yelling, fumbling with the IV drip.
A nurse comes to calm her down, but it doesn't work. She takes out the IV before she does, glaring at her as if she'd like to reinsert it somewhere else, and she can't find the words to tell her just how much she doesn't care. Steve would have, but he's not there, and that's the point. Percie is alone, and she hadn't been. Not for months now, and that's something even a little blood loss can't make her forget.
The doctor arrives, his explanation a lot of noise in percie's ear until she gets to the important part: found on the side of the road, alone, apparent animal attack, car towed by police. And then no power on Earth could keep percie in that cubicle anymore because she remembers, and is already running. Well, limping quickly, anyway.
She finds her belongings ,or steals them, and finds the book of monsters annabeth had given her long ago, And remembers
Wendigo. This one is in Minnesota where they belonged, but no less expected when they'd gone in looking for a a sign of Rachel or possibly ella. It attacked, clawing percie before she could even raise her sword, annabeth's yell disappearing into the darkness by the time she unsteadily regained her feet. There was already no trail to follow, and she wasn't armed for wendigos, so percie had staggered out of the woods to change weapons and go in again. Apparently, she'd succumbed to blood loss first, and been picked up a good Samaritan. Terrific.
It doesn't take long to locate the impound or retrieve her car, even less to go out to where her patchy memory seems to remember they went in. The blood on the road is a promising sign. Grimly armed with flare guns, a Molotov cocktail, and a flamethrower, percie stomps back into the trees after her freind.
wendigos hunt close to home and the best candidate for residence is a cave looming up out of the ground. Percie doesn't hesitate to go in, flashlight guiding the way. Its beam almost passes over the dark heap that is annabeth, dirt- and blood-smeared face blending into the blond hair and walls.
"Anni," she breathes, and percie's frantically cutting her free when she hears the shuffle and breathing that announces the wendigo's return. She shifts annabeth behind her, annabeth's dead but warm weight against her calves, and stands ready, tight with fury. The flamethrower doesn't reach far enough as the wendigo backpedals with blurring speed, but the flare gun's faster. The creature burns to death as nicely as the one in Brooklyn, and percie doesn't even wait to see it collapse into ash, already turning back to annabeth.
Who's started shifting with moaning lurches, hand curling into percie's when she untangles the long limbs. Eyes and teeth white in her filthy face, and her murmur is like coming home. Like waking up in a strange place and finding you're not alone.
"I'm here, Anni," percie says, drawing her close, and no longer feels her own injuries, strong again. Ready to be there for annabeth, because percie's not alone anymore, either
And gods be damned if she let Steve stay alone too.
(Holy Hades Jackie! She's did so good, Jackie is a good friend of mine that wites a lot too, she wrote this chapter for me! She did so good , leave a like and lil ol star for her , ill write up again asap, byeeee)