The first thing that Percy Jackson learned about Y/N was that she was weird.

Firstly, he had known her since the beginning of the year at Yancy Academy, and he didn't think he had ever heard her last name. In fact, he realized he didn't know anything about her past. It wasn't super strange. He wasn't the type to go prying into people's business, but there was definitely something offbeat about her.

Secondly, she claimed she had lived in New York all her life, but still seemed to be startled at the sudden honking and loud noises. A native would have those sounds blocked out by then. If anything, silence would seem even more disconcerting.

Lastly, her eyes looked old, which didn't quite make sense. But they looked like she knew something he didn't. She also looked much too pretty to be his friend. He could've sworn if he squinted hard enough, he could actually see a glowing outline around her.

However, his other friend Grover was just as weird, so it didn't really matter. The boy looked much too old for sixth grade, and he was scrawny and jumpy. He also walked funny, like every step hurt him, but god did that boy run when it was enchilada day in the cafeteria.

Percy was used to moving schools often and hardly making any friends, so he liked his mismatched group of companions.

"I'm going to kill her," Percy mumbled as Nancy Bobofit launched another wad of her sandwich at Grover's curly brown hair.

"It's okay. I like peanut butter," Grover shrugged weakly.

He slumped down in the bus seat to dodge another piece of flying food while Y/N peered over the seat to glare at her. Percy thought Y/N could look pretty scary when she tried, like she could stab you if she really wanted to.

"That's it." Percy started to get up when Y/N grabbed his arm.

"Percy, you can't," she said.

That was another thing he noticed about his friend from the beginning of meeting her. She was a rule follower. It wasn't like she was one of those uptight, goody two shoes sort of people. It was more like she tried extra hard to be unseen. Starting fights was definitely not an unseen sort of thing.

Grover nodded, "You're already on probation. You know who'll get blamed if anything happens."

Percy grumbled as another sandwich piece was hurled their way, but he stayed put, thinking about his mom's sad reaction if she heard he'd gotten himself suspended from yet another school.

___

Mr. Brunner led the museum tour.

He was one of the only teachers Percy actually liked. He had this sword and suit of ancient armor that looked pretty genuine. The only thing was that he pushed Percy to be as good as— if not better than— everyone else, despite the fact he had dyslexia and attention deficit disorder.

The teacher gathered everyone around a thirteen-foot-tall stone column with a big sphinx on the top, and started telling them how it was a grave marker, a stele, for a girl about their age.

Percy was trying to listen, but everyone besides Grover and Y/N was talking around him. Y/N was busy looking at her cuff bracelet. It was gold with little details on it, but Percy had never gotten close enough to it to see what they were. She always got defensive and hid it under her sleeve. He got the signal that it was an off limits section about her, so he assumed it was a family heirloom because it looked as ancient as the rest of the museum.

The last straw of Percy's patience was when Nancy snickered something about the naked guy on the stele. Mrs. Dodds, their algebra teacher, of course didn't hear. She loved Nancy and let her get away with anything, while on the other hand, she hated Percy with every molecule in her little, old, shriveled body.

Y/N sensed what was coming. She nudged his arm, whispering, "Percy... don't—"

Percy whirled around and said— louder than he meant to, "Will you shut up?"

That drew everyone's attention as they laughed under their breath. Mr. Brunner stopped his story.

"Mr. Jackson," he said. "Did you have a comment?"

The blood rushed to Percy's face in embarrassment. "No, sir."

The teacher pointed to one of the pictures on the stele. "Perhaps you'll tell us what this picture represents?"

Y/N prepared herself to step in to save him from further embarrassment just in case he didn't know, but he took one look at it and recognition flashed across his face.

"That's Kronos eating his kids right?"

The girl winced at his bluntness.

"Yes," Mr. Brunner said, before continuing. "And he did this because..."

"Well... Kronos was the king god, and—"

"God?"

Y/N couldn't help herself. "Titan," she corrected. "Kronos is a titan."

Percy noticed she said is. "Yeah, and... he didn't trust his kids, who were the gods. So, um, Kronos are them, right? But his wife hid baby Zeus, and gave Kronos a rock to eat instead. And later, when Zeus grew up, he tricked his dad, Kronos, into barfing up his brothers and sisters—"

"Ew!" One of the girls squeaked.

He noticed even Y/N looked a little grey, but he didn't think she'd be grossed out by this sort of stuff.

"—and so there was this big fight between the gods and the titans... and the gods won."

Nancy mumbled mockingly to her friend, who was equally as irritating, "Like we're going to use this in real life. Like it's going to say on our job applications, 'Please explain why Kronos are his kids.'"

"And why, Mr. Jackson," Brunner asked. "To paraphrase Miss Bobofit's excellent question, does this matter in real life?"

"Busted," Grover muttered under is breath.

Nancy's face exceeded shade of red of her hair. "Shut up."

Percy looked over at Y/N, who was giving him a strange look, like she was especially interested to hear his answer, but he shrugged sheepishly. "I don't know, sir."

"I see," Mr. Brunner looked genuinely disappointed. "Well, half credit, Mr. Jackson. Zeus did indeed feed Kronos a mixture of mustard and wine, which made him disgorge his other five children, who, of course, being immortal gods, had been living and growing up completely undigested in the titan's stomach. The gods defeated their father, sliced him to pieces with his own scythe, and scattered his remains in Tartarus, the darkest part of the Underworld. On that happy note, it's time for lunch. Mrs. Dodds, would you lead us back outside?"

They all turned to follow the rest of the group back to the front of the museum.

"She's so irritating," Y/N muttered.

Immediately, Percy agreed, "Exactly."

Y/N closed her fist, glancing at her bracelet for a brief second. "If only I could just—"

"Mr. Jackson," Mr. Brunner called.

All three of them stopped.

"Go on. I'll find you guys outside," Percy said.

Reluctantly, Y/N and Grover continued following the group. She looked over her shoulder at them. Mr. Brunner was talking, and Percy looked a bit annoyed at whatever he was telling him.

Sighing, she turned back around, looking up at the statues of the gods— the gods she was so used to seeing in person. A cold weight settled over her chest.

___

The sky was an angry shade of grey. A storm was brewing overhead. Storms and freak weather incidents had been happening since Y/N had left Mount Olympus, which was a little over five months ago.

Athena had promised this situation would be temporary, but the storms overhead only got worse, and now the ocean had begun to retaliate with matched anger. The goddess never told her what was happening other than something was going on between the Three, but something told her it was much worse than that.

She also wondered why Athena had her come to Yancy Academy. Y/N couldn't oversee mortal affairs or just know things like the gods, but there had to be a bigger reason than it just being a coincidence.

"Detention?" Grover asked, when Percy sat down on the edge of the fountain with them.

"Nah," He said. "Not from Brunner. I just wish he'd lay off me sometimes. I mean— I'm not a genius."

There was a pause of silence. Then Grover said, "Can I have your apple?"

Percy handed over his apple without a word, then looked out on Fifth Avenue, deep in thought. Y/N watched as Grover ate the apple, stem and all. She hadn't had many satyr friends on Olympus, but she rather liked this one.

Mortal food was alright— she thought one of their best creations was pasta—  but she missed ambrosia and nectar. This food in particular was especially horrifying. The cold sandwich didn't seem very appetizing to her, so she pushed it aside and munched on the bag of potato chips.

Y/N was lost in thought when Nancy appeared in front of them, giggling as she dumped her lunch into Grover's lap.

"Oops," she smiled with an innocent look on her face.

Y/N didn't consider herself a violent person. She had hung out with Ares plenty of times, and she often thought his presence and aggressive attitude was too much. But there was something about Nancy Bobofit that made her wish she had power like the gods so she could turn the redhead into a mouse.

Percy's face blanked with for a moment. Y/N could tell he was trying to refrain from blowing up at her— rightfully so, Y/N thought— when the fountain suddenly exploded around them.

Y/N stood up in shock, her clothes soaked as Nancy flailed wildly in the fountain.

"Percy pushed me!" She screamed.

All eyes were on at them, whispering to their friends and the other people standing around them.

"Did you see—"

"—the water—"

"—like it grabbed her—"

Y/N wasn't sure what had happened with Percy. She'd heard the water behind them splashing, and then Nancy was in the fountain.

Mrs. Dodds materialized in front of them, cooing at Nancy as she helped her out of the fountain. Nancy had this pitiful look on her face as if she was just attacked for no reason.

The math teacher turned on Percy, "Now, honey—"

"I know," he grumbled. "A month erasing workbooks."

Mrs. Dodds look turned murderous. "Come with me."

"Wait!" Grover yelped. "It was me. I pushed her."

Percy and Y/N looked at their friend in disbelief. Grover was deathly afraid of Mrs. Dodds.

"I don't think so, Mr. Underwood," she said.

"But—"

"You—will—stay—here."

Finally, Y/N spoke up. "Mrs. Dodds, please. I think—"

"You will be dealt with later," she glared.

Y/N wasn't finished. "Wait, there's got to be some sort of mi—"

"It's okay," Percy said. "Thanks for trying."

"Honey," Mrs, Dodds barked. "Now."

Nancy smirked at Percy. He glared at her with his harshest look he could muster. Then he followed Mrs. Dodds into the museum.

Grover looked panicked as he went to run over to Mr. Brunner.

"Grover, what's going o—" she asked.

She knew Grover was a satyr, and they could smell certain things. So if he was getting Mr. Brunner, which she knew was Chiron, then something must be really wrong. She wished she could sense monsters and demigods like he could.

"Stay here," he exclaimed.

"But—" she started but he was too far.

Follow Percy or stay and let Chiron handle it. She paced at the bottom of the steps. There was definitely something going on. Athena had led her to Percy for a specific reason.

She glanced at Grover and Mr. Brunner to see if they were looking before dashing up the steps into the museum. She decided she wouldn't interfere unless completely necessary. She only wanted to know.

She followed the talking to the Greek and Roman section. Hiding behind one of the cases, she stayed right outside.

"We are not fools, Percy Jackson," she heard Mrs. Dodds say. "It was only a matter of time before we found you out. Confess, and you will suffer less pain."

There was a pause. Mrs. Dodds was waiting for an answer— one that Percy didn't have.

"Well?" She demanded.

"Ma'am, I don't..."

"Your time is up." There was a sickening sound like something was being crinkled. A loud hiss echoed off the walls.

Y/N was about to intercept or at least move to where she could see what the hissing was coming from to really assess the situation, when Mr. Brunner came wheeling around the corner. She adjusted her spot so she wouldn't be seen by him.

"What ho, Percy!" he shouted, and tossed a pen to Percy.

The pen changed midair into a sword that she recognized as a celestial bronze sword. There was a screeching noise and the sound of flapping. Y/N adjusted to where she could see.

She nearly gave away her hiding spot as she gasped. A fury. That was from the Underworld. How could she not have noticed sooner. There was definitely something off about the teacher, but she hadn't been taught to identify the difference between a mean math teacher and a monster. Sure she'd been trained to fight monsters and combat others, but she'd never actually seen a monster in person before. And a fury nonetheless. That was Hades' realm.

The Three really were angry, and it definitely had something to do with Percy.

Y/N slipped the gold cuff off, flipping it into the air. It landed in her hand as a sparkling, golden sword. She was about to run in when she heard the sound like a water balloon popping.

___

Y/N was sitting on the fountain again.

Raindrops were collecting on the ground like sprinkles. Grover was next to her, a museum map tented over his head.

She wondered when it had started to rain.

Percy approached them, a confused look on his face. "Where's Mrs. Dodds?"

"Who?" Grover asked.

Y/N drew her eyebrows together. Something was wrong. Why did that name sound familiar?

"Not funny, man. This is serious," Percy turned towards his other friend. "Y/N?"

She searched her memory, which she knew to be flawless. She could name what she had been doing on this day 258 years ago, but there was something fuzzy about just now.

"I-I don't know, Percy. I'm sorry."

___

2425 | unedited

hello! i hope you like it so far.
thank you so much for reading!
i'm actually rereading the book as i write, so it'll be as accurate as i can make it.