Shoot.

It missed.

Alana huffed and looked at her bow sadly. She heard something behind her and they slowly wrapped an arm around her. "Lana," she said softly. The archer glanced over to Clarisse and leaned against her. "What's up with you?"

"What do you mean? I'm fine," Alana lied.

The daughter of Ares shot her a look. "Starshine you just missed. An arrow you shot just missed. Think about that."

"I-" the huntress stopped to think of a response. "I don't know... I'm tired. I feel like-" she coughed, cutting herself off.

Clarisse's eyebrows furrowed and she brought her hand to the other girl's forehead. "I think you have a fever."

"Oh! That would make sense," Alana muttered.

The curly haired girl softly laughed and nudged her best friend. "Come on, let's go to your cabin."

"Will you stay with me, Risse?"

"Of course, Starshine."

Annabeth and Grover jolted back as Alana suddenly shot straight up. She hadn't been out long, maybe a minute, but it was enough to scare her sister.

"Alana! Never do that again!" Annabeth jumped onto her best friend to give her a hug.

Alana laughed and held her close. "I didn't know I could do that." She also felt a lot better now. Power naps do the trick, man. Or, maybe it was the shadow thing... she didn't know.

Grover smiled at her. "We're glad you're up now. Wait, where's Percy?"

The archer inhaled sharply and looked up. "Um, he fell."

"What?!"

"But like there was this water! I don't know where it came from but I saw it! It was probably his dad," Alana tried to explain.

Annabeth pulled back as her and Grover looked at the daughter of Artemis like she was insane. Annabeth just blinked at her. Grover said, "Alana, are you sure you're not delusional? I mean you were just passed out and..."

"No I swear! He's down there! He's gotta be ok!" The huntress insisted.

Annabeth got up and offered a hand to her best friend. "Well no matter what we have to get out of here. And I agree, Percy's gotta be ok."

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They stood with all of the other people that evacuated along with police officers and first responders. Some of the officers were staring at them weirdly, making Alana uncomfortable.

"They're looking at us," Grover muttered.

"We should get out of here," Alana suggested, stepping backwards.

Annabeth finally seemed to pay attention. "Come on, we should go find Percy."

"Annabeth," the satyr sighed.

Alana turned and motioned for the other two to follow. "Come on. He's alive."

"I know it." Annabeth whispered.

They were now wandering St. Louis, yelling for Percy. Alana was looking over every railing that was next to water, she knew she saw that right. Eventually Annabeth stopped walking, making the other two stop. They looked ahead to see Percy climbing over a railing and onto the walkway. They stared at him in slight disbelief. The blonde awkwardly waved to them. "Hi," he grinned. The three quickly walked towards him as he started talking. "Look, I'm sorry about shoving you in the stairwell. Even hearing myself say that sounds really bad, but I just... I knew you'd never agree, and there wasn't enough time..."

He stopped talking when Annabeth hugged him. Alana smiled as they hugged for about 20 seconds. That's a long hug. Annabeth pulled apart in realization of what she just did.

"So... you're not as dead as we thought you'd be," Grover joked.

The daughter of Artemis pulled Percy into a hug and squeezed him tightly. "Who's we?" She asked Grover. Alana pulled back and looked at the young demigod again. "You are in so much trouble."

"Uh yeah, how do you know my full name?" Percy asked. Alana waved him off.

"So what happened?" The satyr questioned.

"Short version, we need to go to Santa Monica." The blonde answered.

"What, like now?"

"My father's gonna meet me there. He's gonna help us," Percy answered simply.

"Okay. Uh, just one problem with this plan," Grover explained. "The police think that we crashed an Amtrak train and then did that."

The son of Poseidon looked at him dumbfounded. "Th... The cops are after us?" The others just nodded. "Isn't that gonna make it hard for us to get on a train? Or a bus? Or really anything you need tickets for?"

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They were walking. Oh yippee. "Hey, guys," Percy started. "I think this quest might be harder than we thought. I've been thinking. I didn't steal the master bolt. You guys didn't steal the master bolt. We're pretty sure Hades has the master bolt, but he couldn't have stolen it himself. I mean, we don't even know who actually stole the thing, or why, or how deep this goes." They all just stared at him. "I'm the last person to realize this, aren't I?"

"Yeah."

Percy sighed. "Okay, so... maybe when we started, my head wasn't fully in this, but since the river... it all feels different somehow. He saved me. My dad. I guess I just really never thought that's something he'd do for me. So maybe I gotta take things more seriously now."

"Car," Grover notified.

"That's not a car, it's a bike," Annabeth corrected.

"Just let it pass," Alana said. "Come on." They hid behind a road barrier to let the bike pass.

Percy just kept going on about the quest, things Alana and Annabeth had known for a while. Annabeth kept dryly responding to him. "Why are you being weird with me again? I thought we weren't doing that anymore."

"I'm not being weird." Annabeth insisted.

"Yes, you are. You've been weird since we left the Arch." The blonde pointed out. Oh... I get it. It doesn't have to be a thing, you know. That you hugged me. I mean, we're like friends now. That seems like a thing friends do. At least I think they do."

Alana had to keep herself from laughing. Percy was the most awkward person ever, and Annabeth was in denial about being awkward. It resulted in some pretty funny things for the 15 year old.

The daughter of Athena cut Percy's ranting off.

She sighed and said, "I saw the fates."

"You what?!" Alana whisper-yelled.

"Back at the Arch, I saw the Three Fates, and I saw Atropos cut a piece of thread." The younger girl explained.

Percy looked confused. "And that's bad or...?"

"Yes! Yes it is!" Alana interjected.

"The Fates weave the life strand of every living thing. When you see a string cut... It means one of us is going to die."

"We're all gonna die eventually."
Alana almost facepalmed at Percy's blunt obliviousness.

"Soon. It's a warning. An omen." They all stayed silent for a moment, before Annabeth spoke again. "Also Alana hugged you too. Why aren't you nagging her about that?"

"Cause," the blonde started, "Alana seems like she'd hug anyone."

"Woah there, that's not true," the huntress disagreed. "I would NOT hug anyone." She paused trying to think of an example. She looked at Annabeth and said, "Like Xander Wright. Ugh I hated him."

"Ew!" Annabeth shrieked. "Oh my gods remember when-"

"Clarisse beat him up?" Alana finished, giggling.

The daughter of Athena nodded. "Then you punched him in the face! That was funny." The two grinned at each other while the boys looked slightly confused.

No one said anything for a moment. "Okay. Guys, we need to talk about this whole fate thing." Percy sighed. "Three old ladies with a ball of yarn can't know what's gonna happen. What I choose to do changes what's gonna happen, and I can choose to do anything I... want." He trailed off upon hearing the bike noise stop. The kids all peaked over the barrier to see what it was.

The man on the bike had stopped right in front of them and said, "Need some help?"

Alana blankly stared at him, trying to figure out why she knew him.

Clarisse turned away again before speaking. "My dad doesn't give a shit about me. He thinks I shouldn't matter because I'm a girl."

"Real. My dad doesn't even want to acknowledge my existence," the huntress rolled her eyes then looked at Clarisse. "Your dad is a bitch."

The curly haired girl turned to her with a confused face, trying not to laugh. "Did you just call the god of war a bitch?"

Alana nodded and smiled at Clarisse. "Yeah. And I'd say it to his face."

"You sure? Because you guys are so behind schedule. I mean, summer solstice is just a few days away.And as much as I'd love to see a good war pop off, as your big cousin, I feel like, maybe, I wanna give you a hand."

"Cousin?" Percy questioned.

"Ares." Annabeth said simply.

"You must be Athena's kid," the god reasoned. "Always gotta be the wisest one in the bunch."

A gasp escaped Alana's lips, causing everyone to look at her. "You're a bitch." She said suddenly, with little to no emotion at all.

Ares furrowed his eyebrows as the other kids looked at her like she was insane. "Alana Gatti. I never thought I'd see you again. You've grown up."

"Yeah, that's like, how time works." She sassed.

Ares chose to ignore her for now. Annabeth said something to distract him from the archer. "Why would you help us? How do you even know what we're doing here?"

"Because I'm doing exactly the same thing as you. Zeus sent all of his kids out looking for the master bolt, too." The god of war explained. "Listen, dummies. I'm hungry. There's a halfway decent diner up the road. If you want my help, you'll meet me there. But don't dawdle. Won't wait forever."

He left and Percy looked at all of them. "That's my cousin? What kind of family is this?"

Alana answered immediately. "A fucked up one."

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A/N: off topic but I love it when you guys use my name to yell at me for torturing you all 🤭

Edit: I was going to change the wording on this sentence but now it's funny to me. Suffer with your dirty little minds