Annabeth steps outside. Next to her is the smoking area, where some of the restaurant workers take their break. She knows the feeling. You get a quick break, and all you want to do is get the hell out of there, even if you're being bombarded with second-hand smoke.

She feels lucky that she gets to wear shorts and a tank top to work. It's an inherently sexist uniform, but at least it's not slacks and a long-sleeved dress shirt in the middle of summer.

The temptation to lean against the dumpster is strong, but Will's likely to kill her if she ruins this dress.

Dammit.

The yellow text on the dumpster is blurring. She's feverish and she has goosebumps like she's hot and cold all at the same time. She's hyperventilating. This is bad; this is really bad. Hyperventilating outside an Olive Garden has to be a new low for Annabeth.

"Pull yourself together," she scolds herself.

One of the workers starts walking towards her. Shit. Now she's made a scene, and she's going to have to tell this guy that she's perfectly fine, she's just... waiting for a ride. Yeah, her girlfriend is coming to pick her up. Or maybe her boyfriend is. Yeah, her super straight, surfer boyfriend.

"Annabeth Chase," the worker hisses.

It's an amphisbaena wearing an Olive Garden uniform and an orange wig.

"Oh, fuck me!" Annabeth swears.

"Maybe later!" shouts Reyna. She sways like a balloon animal as she draws her spear.

Annabeth appreciates a tag team, but what the hell?

"Should you really be fighting right now?" asks Annabeth as she takes her chopsticks from her hair.

"I'm good! Seeing a two-headed snake in a wig can be very sobering! My offer still stands though!" Reyna throws her spear towards the monster's back, but it evades the attack, and the spear falls into the dumpster.

"Well, shit," Reyna curses.

Annabeth begins to expertly swipe at the monster, scales flying with each impact. She grabs one head in her fist and sticks both chopsticks in its eye.

The amphisbaena hisses in pain.

Annabeth attacks from behind, squeezing its necks in the crooks of each elbow. Eventually, she strangles it, and the body falls to the ground. Once again, there is a corpse to dispose of.

"I got my spear back!" Reyna shouts from the dumpster. "Oh, I missed the fun. Why's there a body? Are you sure it's dead?"

Annabeth explains what happened when she killed the Minotaur, and how its corpse didn't disintegrate and go straight to Tartarus as it should've.

"Hmm," Reyna wonders aloud. "Maybe we could take it back to New Rome?"

"The others will kill us if we bring this thing in the car," Annabeth says.

"Right." The girls look towards the dumpster as if simultaneously having the same idea.

Annabeth retrieves her chopsticks from the monster's eyes and wipes them on her dress as Reyna grabs one of the heads and starts to pull. It looks heavy, so Annabeth sticks her chopsticks in her mouth and starts pulling from the other head. She can fix her hair later.

"So, those were in something's eye, and now they're just in your mouth? That's... that's gross. Maybe we won't be making out tonight," Reyna says.

"That was never the plan," Annabeth says, although she's sure Reyna can't understand.
Reyna leaps into the dumpster. "Pass me a head. I can pull it up," she says.

Annabeth tosses the snakehead to Reyna, who catches it, and pulls the rest of the body into the dumpster using all of her weight.

Reyna hops out of the dumpster, landing on the pavement with a thud. "You know, I have a new appreciation for that snake tattoo now."

"Thanks," Annabeth says, now holding her weapons. "My hair is probably a mess though. Bathroom?"

Reyna smirks.

"Not like that," Annabeth says.

"Fine. I need to stop at the table and see if someone has some perfume; I smell like trash," Reyna says.

Annabeth nods in agreement. "You do."

"Wait," Reyna says before pushing the restaurant door open.

She presses her thumb to Annabeth's cheek and wipes something away.

"Just a little monster goo." She shows Annabeth the thick black substance on her thumb. It's the same stuff that came out of the Minotaur.

"Thanks," Annabeth says.

When they get back to the table, the others have some questions.

"So where were you?" asks Rachel. "Everything okay?"

They had their differences in the past, but Annabeth has grown to like Rachel. She seems to genuinely care about others.

But the messy hair? The redness in their faces and the sweat on their foreheads? There aren't many excuses for this. Either they were fighting a monster or-

"That's for us to know and for you to find out," Annabeth says suggestively. Ugh. Now the cat's out of the bag unless her friends are idiots, but when she weighs the consequences, she'll take the questions over worrying Hazel just a few days before the wedding.

"Why does Reyna smell like garbage?" Piper asks.

"Oh yeah!" Reyna shouts. "Does someone have perfume?"

Hazel pinches her nose and hands Reyna some Bath and Body Works body spray.

"Don't use it all," she says.

"No promises." Reyna starts to search for a bathroom, and Annabeth follows her aggressively.

She grabs Reyna by the forearm and drags her into a stall, locking the door.

"Oh, so now we're doing this?" Reyna asks sarcastically. "I knew you were into girls! Why did you hide it? I may have a fat crush on you, but I'm still your friend."

"Shut up!" Annabeth hisses and clamps her hand over Reyna's mouth. "First off: I'm not out to anyone here, except for Will and apparently you now. Nobody can know about this, especially not anyone that might tell Percy."

Reyna nods. "Oh my gods... is that why you broke up?"

"I'm ignoring that question. Second: I am not having sex with you! We may be the same age on a technicality, but you're in a sixteen-year-old body still, and you're a hunter."

"We swore off men, not women," Reyna says, still muffled by Annabeth's hand.

"It's weird!" Annabeth says through clenched teeth. "I'm only letting them think we might have made out because I'd rather deal with those questions than ruin Hazel's night with a monster corpse."

"So," whispers Reyna when Annabeth removes her hand. "We have a good time at the club together, and then we act like we're going back to my room, but instead, we come back here and get the body to a New Rome lab?"

"My plan exactly," confirms Annabeth. She wants nothing more than to put this monster problem in someone else's hands, preferably the hands of New Roman mythological scientists. At last, she opens the door to the stall.

Piper is washing her hands. She wiggles her eyebrows at them in the mirror. "Pull yourselves together, ladies. We're going clubbing!"

"We're only going to one club, Piper," says Reyna as she washes her hands.

"Why did nobody tell me we're going to a club?" Annabeth asks. She washes her own hands when Reyna finishes using the sink.

"Because we knew you wouldn't come if we told you," Piper says.

That's half-true. The old Annabeth would have hated clubbing. She'd be crazy agitated the whole time, just dreading having to scare off some creepy guy, and she'd complain the whole time, asking 'When are we going home? Can we go home now?'

Holy shit, what a stick in the mud she was.

Annabeth likes clubbing now. She and Will do it together, but she actually goes by herself more often than not. She gets drunk, she dances with new people, she brings people home and into her bed. The New Annabeth is known to spend some time in a club.

Annabeth coughs when Reyna begins to douse herself in Hazel's perfume. At least she hadn't gone dumpster diving.

She gives herself a quick once-over. Her spider bite studs are still intact, and nothing hit her thigh, so there's no need to worry about her tattoo getting messed up. Annabeth rinses the snake guts off her chopsticks and fixes her hair. Ready or not, she's going to the club.