Guess who wrote a Percabeth death oneshot!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

TW: death, blood, wounds, grief, fire/smoke

Percy was well accustomed to loss.

He was used to the numbness that accompanied death, the frozen world around him, the blisters on his hands that bloomed from digging the endless graves.

He was versed in the tears that would slip down his face as the burial shroud burned, in the thick smoke and flames that rose to the sky. Sometimes, there was a rumbling in the skies, and rain. Perhaps a random animal watched from the shadows or wove around a demigod's body one last time.

Yes, Percy knew exactly what would happen when someone he knew drew their last breath, when those he loved, those he couldn't shield collapsed in a heap.

He comforted others. He cried his tears. He went on with his life, because what else was there to do? He thought he was prepared for death, resigned to it, for the last whispering breath exiting a friend's lungs and the screams and sobs, the rising flames.

Turned out he wasn't completely ready for death. Not hers. Never hers.

And yet it seemed he didn't have a choice in the matter. He never had a choice in anything.

And no matter how much he screamed to the gods to save her, he still had to be satisfied with the owl that swooped from the sky to land on his arm and allowed him to stroke its head.

It wasn't enough. It could never be enough. He could never be enough.

...

Annabeth could hardly walk, but she gritted her teeth as she forced her legs to keep moving. Her arm wrapped around her stomach, putting pressure on her wound, and the other one held her knife in a weakening grip.

Her ankle collapsed under her as she tried to take another step, and she fell to one knee. Her knee hardly burned with the bruise that would be forming if she survived, as if her nerves were already overworked.

An arm wrapped around her waist, hoisting her up, and Annabeth's breath escaped her in a gasp as she managed to stay upright. A tear leaked out of her eye, but she couldn't wipe it away.

"Come on," his voice urged desperately, and she swallowed hard as a sob escaped her throat. "Come on, Wise Girl, don't give up on me now."

His voice cracked on the last word.

She was going to tease him mercilessly for that when she was healed. If she was healed.

By the way her legs were collapsing under her with each step, that possibility was growing slimmer with each moment.

"Just a little longer," Percy pleaded, but she knew he wasn't talking to her anymore. This was for the gods.

But they wouldn't intervene. They never did. 

Not for Thalia, not for Silena, not for Luke, not for Jason or Michael or the countless others she'd lost. The best they would ever do was sending a sign down to the funeral pyre.

Perhaps Athena would send an owl for her.

"Stop it," Percy ordered, as if he could sense her giving up. "Please."

His words dissolved into the blood puddling beneath their shuffling steps. She took a deep breath to tell him what she needed to, but a cough racked her instead.

Blood flecked her lips, and she tightened the arm around her waist to hold in the blood spilling out of her.

"Hey," she whispered, and Percy sagged against her as he recognized her tone.

He'd heard it many times before. They both had. The exhaustion. The resignation. The fear.

Percy gently set her down, and she didn't bother hiding her flinch as her body connected with the ground, sending a shockwave through her wound.

"Sorry, Seaweed Brain," she whispered, and he closed his eyes as if he was the one in pain.

"Please don't go," he begged, opening his eyes as he laid her head on his lap. "Don't leave me."

He traced the back of his hand down her cheek, and she blinked slowly. He cupped her face in his palm, and a smile traced her lips. It almost hid the terror in her eyes.

"Stay with me," he tried hopelessly, his voice breaking. A tear splashed from his eye as he blinked, trickling down Annabeth's forehead. "Annabeth..."

"I want to tell you it'll be okay, that it's my time, and I'm not scared," Annabeth rasped slowly, and a sob shook Percy's shoulders. "But that would be a lie."

She was fearless. She was brave. She was invincible.

She was dying in his arms.

"I know," Percy murmured, leaning down to press a kiss to her hair. He gently rested their foreheads together. "I know. I'm sorry."

He didn't tell her she would be going to Elysium, because she already knew that.

He didn't tell her that he would get through this. He didn't tell her it would be over soon.

She didn't need any lies right now.

"I'll see you again," Annabeth breathed, and Percy blinked hard as he nodded. "I will find you. Whatever happens."

They'd talked about this, come to a conclusion.

"I'll wait for you," she promised. "We'll go together."

They would go to the Lethe together.

Become new people together.

And maybe, just maybe... they could find each other again. In another life.

Percy kissed her one last time, and her eyes dulled, stormy gray losing their spark.

"Together," he said softly. "We'll be together again. I swear it on the River Styx."

There was no one to hear his oath but the gods, and thunder rumbles above them.

...

Sometimes when the pressure became too much, he swam down into the ocean to scream.

To scream, and scream, until his throat was ravaged and raw and broken.

To cry and cry and cry where no one could hear him besides his father. But Poseidon knew better than to bother him. He, too, was well experienced with grief.

"Your fatal flaw is loyalty. You will sacrifice the world for your friends," Percy remembered Athena saying.

But what happened when he couldn't save those he loved?

Percy thought he might just let the world burn.

There would be others left to extinguish the flames.

...

"Hey," the blonde girl said distractedly, sparing him a single glance with her stormy gray eyes. They sparked in the light, and he found himself studying them curiously. "Can I help you with something, or are you just gonna stand there?"

He grinned, brushing dark hair out of his eyes as he leaned against the girl's desk. "Would you want to get some coffee sometime? Or lunch?"

She glanced up at that, and he swallowed hard at the steely look in her eyes, as if she were preparing for a battle as she scanned his features. She looked like she was struggling to put something together in her mind, to order what she didn't know into a neat equation. But something in her face relaxed, and she nodded. "Sure."

And something in her voice was strangely familiar as she added, "Maybe we can check out a museum or something."

He wasn't usually particularly interested in checking out a museum, but something in him made him say, "Sounds good."

And when she shot him a surprised and satisfied smile, he knew he made the right choice.

I was actually going to make this a "Annabeth slips out of Percy's grip and falls into Tartarus alone and dies oopsie and then he blames himself" but then I remembered actually I do have a functional heart and that would be too much for even me.

So instead, you got this.

You are so welcome!!!!