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Annabeth settled deeper on the worn, green couch nestled in the Jackson family apartment, watching the animation as it played across the old TV.
It was early spring now, but the last dregs of winter clung to the city like an unwelcome embrace, so she tucked her feet under her legs, careful not to accidentally kick Percy in the head. He sat in front of the couch, his long legs stretched out almost all the way to the TV console.
He was laughing, the sound rarer these days than it should have been, as the blobby, little fish girl onscreen escaped her father’s home and swam for the surface world once more.
Percy stuffed more microwave popcorn in his face and then grabbed a handful of blue m&ms, and Annabeth took her eyes off of him to look at her sister.
Thalia watched Percy with a quiet fondness wrapped around guilt as she munched on her own bowl of snacks, and when her gaze met Annabeth’s, they shared a resolute grimace.
Even though she couldn’t see Percy’s face right this moment, Annabeth knew what he looked like these days, the bruises of exhaustion prominent under his sea green eyes.
Between school and skirmishes with the Titan Army, they were all exhausted. Percy, in particular had the Great Prophecy looming over his head.
In some combination of guilt and love, Annabeth and Thalia had decided to crash with the Jacksons over spring break, hoping to give Percy a few days of normal life in between the recon missions and monster slaying. Soon, Annabeth would go back to Camp and Thalia would go back to the Hunt. But for now, they were here, together, supporting Percy.
Last winter, Thalia had taken herself out of the equation. Percy, her stupid, brave, idiotic seaweed brain had taken the prophecy onto his shoulders, just like he had taken on the weight of the sky—to save someone else.
A storm raged on the screen. The sea hated to be restrained, and she knew that Percy was chafing under the weight of the future, even if he didn’t yet know the lines that would be woven into the tapestry of his fate and the world’s. A small part of Annabeth’s mind noted how this movie seemed to draw on the lore of The Little Mermaid. She hoped it would have a happy ending.
“She’s just like you,” Thalia teased, ruffling Percy’s hair as Ponyo ran across the waves, causing floods and storms. “A watery menace.”
“Oh, shut up,” Percy grumbled, slapping her hand away, but he was grinning, reaching out to steal Thalia’s last Oreo.
“Hey!”
“Mine now,” he announced, chewing obnoxiously and dodging Thalia’s kick.
“Sally! Your son is a menace!” Thalia called in the direction of the kitchen.
Sally laughed, but she chose not to intervene. Smart woman.
As her best friends squabbled, Annabeth swallowed hard, pushing down the emotions that were too big for the cramped living room and the playful punches Thalia and Percy traded.
Her larger than life hero, her elder sister, was now an immortal fifteen year old. By summer, Annabeth would be older than Thalia, and the thought was strange. They would not grow up together. If they lived past this summer, that was. She didn’t dare think about their brother.
Annabeth was selfishly glad Thalia would not be the one in the prophecy.
That didn’t make the prospect of losing Percy any easier to bear.
She had known, from the day she first saw him drooling in the Big House, that they would be comrades in arms. She had expected him to be the hero of the prophecy—she had planned to make him that hero, even if he hadn’t wanted it. But that was before their first quest. That was before she knew Percy. She had not calculated just how much she would care for this boy.
She had not known that he would become her family, too.
Knowledge was power, and Annabeth would never regret acquiring knowledge. And yet, part of her wished she didn’t know the lines of the Great Prophecy like they had been carved into her veins. A hero’s soul, cursed blade shall reap.
She would lose Percy. She didn’t see any way around it, and it made her want to scream.
They had already lost so many people in the Battle of the Labyrinth. How many more would they lose when Kronos attacked Olympus?
For months, Annabeth had been pouring herself into strategies, scouring Daedalus’s laptop for every plan and schematic and edge it could give them.
“Annabeth?”
She blinked, finding Percy looking up at her, his brows dipped in concern, the gray streak in his dark hair stark in the blue light of the screen. It matched hers, and she loved that more than she would ever say.
“I’m fine,” she rushed to assure him. “Just distracted by plans.”
He gave her a small pout. “Do you not like the movie?”
She blinked, and Thalia snorted. “It’s cute,” Annabeth allowed. “It’s clearly a retelling of The Little Mermaid, though I do wonder about the ending.”
Now it was Percy’s turn to blink. “Huh, I hadn’t thought about that. I’ve seen this one before and I totally missed that. I guess it is The Little Mermaid.”
“Seaweed brain,” Thalia teased, earning a middle finger from Percy.
Then, he tilted his head back, smiling up Annabeth, upside down, with his head on her shin. “Don’t worry; it has a happy ending.”