Song: Victorious by Panic! At the Disco

26 January 2024
Camp Half Blood
1100

I've been at camp for six days now.

Annabeth is going to arrive from her job at some architecture firm in Dubai in an hour, and I feel like I'm supposed to actually feel something about that. It used to be when I thought of her I would get all giddy or nervous, now I feel nothing.

Could be from the years of hiding every emotion I have, or also the fact that I don't give a shit about her anymore. I've gotten admitidly colder emotionally over the years.

My phone rings, breaking me out of my thoughts.

LET THE SKY FALL, WE WILL STAND TALL, AT SKYFAAALLL

What can I say? I appreciate irony.

"Jackson." I answer.

"007, nice to finally hear from you. You've been off the grid for almost a week now. You always let me know where you're going. We had a deal Bondo." I chuckle at my best friend's antics.

"Sherlock, it's been years. Can't I get a break for once?"

"Not without telling me first, you ass."

"Language, Sarina."

"Fuck off Sharktopus. I should tell you the same."

I chuckle at that. Yes, she knows I'm a demigod. I've known the woman for eight years, jeez. It also helps that she's a daughter of Hecate. More on how we figured each other out later.

"Oh shove it Sarina the Teenaged Witch. Where are you anyway? Aren't you attracting monsters?"

"If course I am doofus. Nothing I can't handle though. Besides I'm like, 20 minutes away from camp if I need help. Which is unlikely."

"You little bitch. That's where I am now! If you aren't on a mission come see me, it's been ages since we've had fun together while off duty."

"Roger that, but when I get there I am expecting my definition of fun." Her voice implies a smirk.

"Whatever you say hotshot."

The call ends at that.

Our relationship is complicated, okay?

Camp is calm for once, so I just go sit at the beach and ignore my activities until she gets here.

She knows where to find me.

About 30 minutes later I hear my one and only super spy best friend attempting to sneak up behind me.

Right as she gets to me I turn, disarm her and jump on her so that we land in the sand with me hovering over her.

"Rude. You never let anyone sneak up on you." She says.

I laugh, looking into her sapphire blue eyes. "So what is your definition of fun today?"

She leans in to kiss me and I pull her into the water, in an air bubble of course.

What? I said it was complicated.
She pops the bubble and swims up, and we splash around for a bit.
She's taken off her shirt since she didn't want her suit jacket thing soaked, which reveals her multiple tattoos. Her curly black hair cascades over her back and shoulders, weighed down by the water.

"Is that a new one?" I ask as I move closer to her to examine her left shoulder.

She smiles. "Yeah, I got it for you. Cuz our friendship and shit. Ya like?"

"Yeah, I like." I gently kiss the trident on her shoulder.

I take off my shirt, basically because why not, and she marvels at me for a bit. It's not like I wasn't doing the same thing. We're looking at each other's tattoos and scars. The fact that we both have abs helps too, I suppose.

We have a lot of both.

Her hand trails over the S and P over my heart, for Sally and Paul. Although sometimes it means Sarina and Percy too. Her hand moves to the barbed wire tattoo on my collarbones, and then to the word Magic on my right arm. She smirks at my left arm half sleeve, which is a blue dragon.

She has a lot more tattoos than I do, although I have a lot more scars. I've been shot four more times that she has. I took one of those bullets for her, actually.

Long story.

I give her a quick peck on the lips, which distracts her enough to send a wave crashing down on her.

"RUDE!" She says when she resurfaces, the water droplets on her multicolored skin glinting in the sunlight.

I crack up laughing, but it's short lived when she puts a spell on me to make me sound like a dolphin.

Then we both crack up, and are falling over laughing with her in my arms when I hear a voice behind us awkwardly clearing their throat.

I turn around and see none other than Piper McLean and my ex girlfriend.

"Hey guys," I say. I try anyway. It comes out more like "owejajaha."

I glare pointedly at the witch who groans and snaps her fingers, fixing my voice.

"Hey peeps. I assume you're Percy's friends?"

"I suppose you could say that." Annabeth replies stiffly.

"Hey Wise Girl. Beauty Queen. This is Teen Witch, who you may or may not have met yet. My best friend." I use nicknames to confuse as many people as possible.

"Oh. You're Annabeth and Piper, then. Sharktopus has told me about you two. I'm Sarina by the way. Hecate." She diffuses the situation and gets out of the water, soaking wet and in only a sports bra and spandex shorts- which were under her business attire- to shake both of their hands.

They shook hands with her without so much as batting an eye. Thank the gods.

"Cool, so how do you know Percy?" Piper asked, more comfortable with the situation than Annabeth.

"We've been coworkers and best friends for eight years." She laughs.

I get up out of my position laying in the water and swing an arm around her cheerily.

The two girls unused to seeing me shirtless inhale sharply.

Annabeth's eyes go wide. "When did you get so many tattoos?" She asks, yet her eyes trail down my scars instead.

"Being besties with a walking art show tends to rub off after a while." I shrug.

"But that's not what you want to know. You wanna know how I got these scars?" I gesture, imitating my best Joker voice.

"That works too." Piper answers.

"Too bad that's classified." Sarina says for me.

I have to admit, the look on Annabeth's face when she said that made up for her leaving me all those years ago. It was hilarious.

"We should probably have you go see Chiron, how long has it been since you've been a camper?" Annabeth brushes off the classified thing.

"Sheesh, it's been like four years now I guess since I've seen him. I was in the battle of Manhatten and the war with Gaea, but I preferred to stay under the radar. I wasn't very good with my abilities yet."

"Wow, another veteran. Sweet!" Piper exclaimed excitedly, giving her a fist bump.

"I'll go meet up with him, but I am not meeting up with my old mentor dressed like this. Someone ruined my clothes when he splashed me with a huge wave! I'm not going to mention any children of Poseidon's names though."

Sarina's glare was directed at me.

"Hey, you're the one who made me sound like a dolphin."

"Fix me or your hair will be pink and green for the rest of your natural born days."

Now don't get me wrong, I like Cosmo and Wanda as much as the next guy. However; I don't think terrorists will take me very seriously with that hair, much less my fellow agents at the Bureau.

"Ugh, fine. Here, take my shirt. But if the Aphrodite cabin murders me, it's on your conscience." I say, picking my dry shirt up from the sand and handing it over. It is huge on her body, it goes to her knees.

"Jackson there are a lot of things that should be on my conscience, many of which concern you. You'll be fine." Her smoldering look made me gulp.

"Whatever you say."

"Afraid of a girl Perce? Damn, sweet dragon!" Leo, who showed up a little bit ago to the party asks.

"Considering said girl could beat everyone here to a pulp without breaking a sweat, yes. I am afraid and you should be too."

"Remembering Budapest?" She asks.

I cock an eyebrow at her, we're almost to the Big House now. "I think you and I remember Budapest very differently."

"You were drugged most of the time." She shrugs.

"That was so not my fault." I reply.

"Oh really, but who was the one who said not to go into the creepy abandoned building? Not you!"

"Hey, those bits and pieces of memory I have from that building were actually pretty great." I reply with snark.

"True. But I still beat your ass."

I roll my eyes, and at this point the entire group is just staring at us oddly. The entire group meaning Annabeth, Piper, Leo, and the extra strays we picked up. (Jason, Nico, Frank, Hazel, and Rachel.)

"Language, Miss Clarke." A voice from in front of us playfully chides.

"Chiron!" She runs up to him excitedly.

"Sarina my girl, it's been far too long." He envelopes her into a crushing horse hug.

It's hilarious seeing a seven foot (213 cm) tall centaur hug a girl who can't be any more than 5' 3". (160 cm)

"Been busy with work. I missed my favorite pony though."

They both laugh like long lost friends, which they kind of are.

While we watch them, the group decides it's time for interrogating Percy.

Good luck with that, I am still the FBI's top interrogator.

"So... New girlfriend Perce?" Leo is the first to ask.

"No, we're just best friends."

"And best friends kiss each other on the lips a lot, then?" Jason smirks.

"You don't know my life." I reply smoothly.

They seem unconvinced.

"So Annabeth, how's Dubai treating you?" I tried to subject change.

"Awesome, we'll talk about that after you give us answers." She deadpans.

I prayed to the gods for anything to take the attention from me, everyone was starting to stare at my tattoos and scars, and honestly Sarina and I have no idea what we are. When you almost die together on a daily basis, it can be hard to update your relationship status.

Be careful what you wish for, though.

I really didn't want Rachel to turn green and start spitting out a prophecy to serve as that distraction.

A/N: Yes, it's been centuries. In my defense- this is a terrible defense- I forgot this story existed. Clearly Percy's being paired with Sarina, who is a fellow badass super spy. Don't worry this isn't becoming fluff, and you'll see her badass side in the next chapter, and no she's not going to be one of those OC's who takes over the story and winds up more powerful than Percy blah blah blah. Let me know what you think of the chapter. Sorry there's no action.

Her name is SARINA. Autocorrect changed it to Sabrina almost every time. -____-