Chapter Text
Annabeth Chase was quite ready to go to the Hero Centre. She adorned her school uniform, a dark blue blazer with the symbol of her mother with a crisp white dress shirt underneath. Her skirt was primp and right on her knees, exactly how the school manual described.
Since she’s been claimed, Annabeth has practically been the model child of Athena. Being borne to the Chase Family, she was an heiress to one of the biggest dynasties of the entirety of Greece. She’s spent most of her childhood holed up in one of the royal castle’s library, and her move to the centre every summer didn’t change that habit to any extent. She’s been known to be a bit of a know-it-all, but she takes it all in strides. Being called smart is, after all a compliment.
She’s sixteen now, and headed off towards another summer with Chiron, and her only real friends. Being an heiress to such a large fortune made her father incredibly protective of her, opting to homeschool her. She’s never had many mortal acquaintances, and she doesn’t mind that either. They won’t understand her like her demigod friends. They can’t hope to realise her thirst for knowing, just how she relinquishes the hunt more than the catch, how she’s proud, but not arrogant and definitely not how she practically leads an entire camp of a few hundred demigods
It’s not that her half-blood friends are regular people either. The gods don’t just take an interest in peasants. They only deal with the richest of the rich, and that’s why basically everyone at camp belongs to some kind of royalty, or an incredibly powerful lineage. Just take her best friend, Piper McLean. She’s the daughter of the owner of the ‘Herculean’ drama, the biggest theatre business in the entirety of the country. Heck, even the son of the Grace family is on good terms with her, and they practically own Greece as a whole.
Her father decides to take an interest in her godly life for the first time in a while. She can practically count on one hand the number of times he’s even talked to her about camp. He spends a whopping two hours of his valuable time to lose his daughter for four whole months, even though he doesn’t even mind her when she’s home.
He tries to talk to her, but she’s just not interested. He doesn’t know the slightest thing about her real life, and she wants it to stay that way. This part of her, her divine connection is the only thing that she feels is truly hers.
They make it to the tip of Long Island in record time, their chauffeur having expertly sped through New York traffic. She straightens her skirt once more as they park. She looks at herself in her phone camera, and fixes her princess curls for the last time.
She gets out, and is bombarded by the biggest hug she’s ever had in the form of her brown haired, gorgeous best friend Piper McLean.
“Piper!” She squeals. “How’ve you been?”
“Me? I’ve been m’eh,” she says rather monotone and Annabeth understands why. Her relationship with her father is probably more distant than her own. “What about you? You have such an incredible tan now!” She grabs her forearm as they pull away.
“Oh,” she says. “California was a good break.”
The cherokee girl hums in response, as the both of them link hands and walk towards the Big House, barely turning around to wave goodbye to her father. They stride across the winding gardens surrounding the humungous area that they call camp. Lush strawberry shrubs line up around the big house in long, straight rows. Across the crest of the hill, Annabeth can see the barest rises of the roofs of the cabins. Gods, how much she misses Cabin 6. Her room at home might be like double its size, but nothing’s ever felt so homey to her. She still has a bunch of blueprints on her desk there waiting for her, as well as probably Malcolm, her godly younger brother.
“So, have you heard?” Piper grins maniacally as she says. “There’s only one new recruit this year, and he’s apparently-“ she leans in closer and whispers close to her ears, “a commoner.”
“Is that so?” She tries to hide her surprise, but her face betrays her. Everyone at camp is rich out of comprehension. It’s practically a spoiled child daycare at this point, with a high chance of death, with torture as dessert. It’s no home to a peasant. How he even got in, Annabeth has no idea.
“Looks like someone hates them already,” says Piper, and Annabeth realizes that she hasnt’t been very successful at hiding her scandalized face. Piper’s fighting a grin, as the end of her lips twitch upwards.
“Ugh, stop,” she groans as she blushes hard.
“Buuut, I hear he’s friends with Jason,” she says unexpectedly, and Annabeth blanks out again. How in Tartarus was a commoner friends with Jason Grace? The prince of all of basically everything. The son of the literal King of the Gods.
“I think you’ve been listening to Drew a bit too much,” grins Annabeth, and Piper smacks her upside her head.
“I guess we’ll see, won’t we?”
“We will.”
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