Epilogue

On June eleventh the following year, Camp Half-Blood was abuzz with excitement. The first Greek legacy to be born in a decade was on his way into the world. Will had sworn off delivering babies when Chuck Hedge was born during the war against Gaea, but he decided that he could make one exception. He was the best healer at camp, and no one wanted to take any chances that something could go wrong with the birth of Percy and Annabeth's baby.

Annabeth had Sally and Hazel with her in her private room. Piper had, surprisingly, found the whole labor process more than she could stomach and decided it would be best if she were just the official runner for the whole thing, which meant that she went back and forth from the delivery room to the group waiting to hear when the baby was born. She kept busy in the meantime, grabbing drinks and small snacks for the group in the delivery room and helping Will prepare supplies for the birth. She never stayed long in Annabeth's room, however.

Annabeth had been shocked to discover four weeks to the day after she and Percy had gotten married that she was expecting a baby. Her monthly cycle normally ran like clockwork, so they hadn't used any protection. They were just going by her calculations. Well, apparently Hera decided to shake things up and give them a surprise wedding present, and now he was due to arrive at any minute.

The pregnancy had been hard physically and emotionally. She was sick for weeks, so much so that Will had finally given her anti-nausea medication and ordered her to take it easy until she got past the worst of it. She had lost far more weight than he was happy with during those weeks, but once the morning sickness was over, she found herself eating like a horse. The kid had Percy's appetite that was for sure.

Morning sickness wasn't the end of her trouble, though. The stretching of her ligaments and the pressure on her pelvic bone were so severe that she could barely walk at times. She literally began to sit on ice packs to help alleviate some of the problem. Then the Braxton-Hicks contractions began. She had been sure she was actually in labor three times before she ever truly was in labor.

And, as if all of that wasn't enough, baby Jackson was as ADHD as his father, apparently. He kicked, squirmed, stretched, flipped, tossed, and turned constantly. Annabeth's small frame took a real beating from her son. Many times she had been sitting quietly working on homework or plans for New Greece and would suddenly shoot to her feet when the baby in her womb would jam a foot into her ribcage looking for space. She had decided to stay in New York after Percy's death and was living with Paul, Sally, and Hope, and Paul got a lot of laughs out of her discomfort and late-night cravings for bacon cheeseburgers. Sally was much more sympathetic and would comfort Annabeth with similar stories from when she was pregnant with Percy. Hope just thought Annabeth's growing belly was a wonder and was constantly trying to touch and pat it while jabbering happily in her baby-speak.

The hardest thing, though, was not having Percy there for both their sakes. Annabeth knew that he would have relished in every moment of her pregnancy. Sure, he may have laughed right along with Paul when she suddenly jumped up to give the baby stretching room while watching Doctor Who. He may have teased her relentlessly like Leo when she ate three meals and four snacks in a day. And he may have driven her crazy with his worry when she was hurting and so sick that even the mention of food sent her rushing to the nearest toilet to puke. But he would also have loved to feel his baby moving through her belly. He would have had the time of his life helping her pick a name. He would have gone out and immediately bought the perfect fishy stuffed animal for his baby to cuddle before Annabeth even needed to unbutton her pants for baby room. And the ultrasound would have been the highlight of the whole thing for him.

And at the birth, Percy would have been her rock during the long twenty hour labor and delivery. She knew he would have done whatever she needed or wanted with one word. He would have held her hand, whispered encouragement, pulled her hair back from her sweaty forehead, and would have been the source of her strength when it finally came time to push the baby into the world. And gods, how proud he would have been when the baby was finally there! She could see his face in her mind's eye, and oh how she missed him – how she needed him.

"Alright, Annabeth. One more big push, and I think he'll be here. And PUSH!" Will ordered.

Annabeth took a quick, deep breath, sat up with the help of Sally and Hazel, and bore down hard. A guttural yell escaped her mouth with the sheer effort of birthing her son. And by all that is holy in Olympus, that hurt! And then suddenly a baby's cry filled the air and all thoughts of pain slipped from Annabeth's mind. She fell back against the pillows exhausted, smiling, and crying, and Will passed her the tiniest human she had ever laid eyes on. She snuggled him to her chest and kissed the swath of dark hair on his goopy head. The baby's shrill cries quieted when he was chest to chest with his mother, and he was already nudging around in search of food. Sally draped a receiving blanket on them, and Hazel cooed.

After the few minutes it took to get Annabeth and the afterbirth cleaned up, Will covered her bottom half with a sheet. "Well, let me see the little guy. I need to get him cleaned, weighed, measured, and diapered. Then, you can feed him and hold him all you want. Besides, I'm sure you'd like some fresh clothes and a clean bed."

Annabeth reluctantly handed her son over, but she caught Will's arm before he walked away. He looked back at her. "Thank you, Will, for everything."

He smiled at her. "Of course, Annabeth. Now, let Piper and Hazel get you cleaned up. Sally, would you like to help me with the baby?"

Sally's eyes lit up. "Will you be alright, Annabeth?"

Annabeth nodded. "Yes. Just make sure he's good to my son."

Sally laughed. Will just leaned over the baby and said, "Your mother is showing her true colors, buddy."

If Annabeth had had the energy, she might have marched right over there and slugged the guy in the arm – in as friendly of a way as possible, of course. As it was, however, she was too tired to really care what he was telling her baby. She trusted Will. She trusted Sally. That's all she needed to know. Hazel and Piper helped her out of bed. Thank the gods of Olympus for great friends when you have jelly legs and absolutely no shame left. Somehow, they managed to get her cleaned up and dressed and back in a freshly cleaned bed by the time Will and Sally reappeared with a clean, swaddled, and hungry baby boy.

He was a perfect seven pounds and two ounces and was twenty-one and half inches long. He had ten fingers, ten toes, two eyes, and a nose. Annabeth could tell he had gotten her mouth and Percy's ears. He was beautiful – absolutely perfect.

Within minutes, everyone had left Annabeth and the baby alone for some privacy to nurse and get to know one another. In the calm and quiet, Annabeth looked at the baby suckling her breast and cried without meaning to. "Welcome to the world, Aaron Chase Jackson. Aaron was your daddy's middle name, you know. He would have loved you so much. He would have been the best father. He never would have left either of us if he'd had a choice, but you can't stop the Fates. Nico will make sure he knows about you, though, and he will think about you every day."

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The years passed. Aaron grew. Annabeth finished her schooling, became a licensed architect, worked her way up the ladder at the firm she had been hired at until she was named head architect for some of the most important projects the firm took on, and all the while, she also designed and planned the new city for Greek demigods: New Greece. She and Aaron were among the first to move into the city. She had designed a little cottage for them on the shore of Long Island Sound, and Aaron spent his childhood chasing seagulls and searching for seashells on the beach at their back door.

Everyone said that Aaron looked like a good mix of his parents. He had a head full of thick wild curly black hair. He had sea green eyes like Percy, but they were shaped like Annabeth's. He was slender, like both his parents, and though he eventually passed his mother in height, he never got as tall as his dad had been. Annabeth's mouth. Percy's smile. Annabeth's jawline. Percy's chin. Annabeth's fingers. Percy's hands. He was a perfect mix. Even his personality was split between Percy's carefree, humorous personality and Annabeth's intelligent, strategizing mind. He even drooled in his sleep and was afraid of spiders. Annabeth liked to say that he got all the best parts of them both.

Annabeth never married again. She dated a few times, but soon realized that Percy had been "the one" for her. She would always love him, and she was content in her singleness. That's not to say she never recovered from his death because she did keep her promise to him. She lived, and she was genuinely happy. Her life was full and rich and wonderful. Yes, there were days where she would miss Percy, especially those days in September marking their wedding anniversary and the anniversary of his death and, of course, August eighteenth, Percy's birthday and their dating anniversary. On those days, she would shed a few tears and gaze quietly at the ocean. But then Aaron would come and sit softly beside her and lean his head on her shoulder, and she would wrap her arm around her son and be reminded of all that she had left – and of how much of Percy she had left in their boy.

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Annabeth was headed into the city for her weekly visit with Sally. She never thought that when she started the tradition at sixteen years old during those months that Percy was missing that she would still be at it nearly thirty years later, but it was habit she could never break. And neither she nor Sally really wanted her to, anyway. They had taken comfort in one another when Percy was missing, and after he died, they again took comfort in one another. And eventually it wasn't about grieving, it was about spending an afternoon with a friend, and then it was about spending an afternoon as a mother and a daughter. Hope had spent most of those afternoons with them, too, while Paul and Aaron would have some guy time.

Annabeth was forty-six years old. Aaron was twenty-seven and had been married for two years already to his sweetheart from Camp Half-Blood. The September anniversaries had passed just the week before, and Annabeth was thinking about Percy remembering the last hours of his life. How he had bravely fought for those hours, despite enormous pain and suffering. Even all these years later she could still hear that final heartbeat: the way it echoed in his chest and the silence that followed.

She was so lost in her thoughts that she didn't even notice the cyclops follow her off of the train. Without Percy around, she usually only had one or two monster encounters a month while away from camp and New Greece. Even Aaron, a powerful legacy in his own right, didn't come close to attracting the number of monsters his father had. Annabeth still trained three times a week and even taught a class every now and then at Camps Half-Blood and Jupiter, but over the years, she had become a bit less vigilant because of fewer attacks aimed at her.

Annabeth was two blocks from Sally's apartment building when the cyclops decided to strike. No one was out on the residential street at the moment to see the monster pounce and knock her into the alley. Annabeth did a summersault, pulling her dagger from its ankle sheath as she rolled. Gymnastics were a lot harder at forty-six than they had been in her teens, and she didn't have time to catch her breath because the cyclops was nearly on her by the time she got to her feet.

The creature laughed at her when he finally got a good look at her age. "Ooh, an old one. Not as tender as the young heroes, but I'm hungry enough to make an exception. Besides, you'll be much easier to catch than someone like that little Evie Grace who killed my brother two weeks ago."

Annabeth's heart pounded extra-hard when the cyclops mentioned Jason and Piper's youngest child, a slight girl due to being born six weeks premature, but what she lacked in size, she made up for in fierceness. The girl was a force, and her small stature and control over the winds made her extra quick.

Annabeth pushed her feelings aside. She had a fight to win. "Well, you're out of luck today, lump head. I'm Annabeth Jackson, and I taught Evie all she knows about dagger fighting, so bring it on."

Recognition shone on the monster's face. "The Widow…This will be one for the minstrels. Prepare to die, demigod!" And he pounced, again. For all of Annabeth's bravado, she was slower than she once was, and she fell way behind Evie in speed. The cyclops slammed her into a brick wall. Her head hit it so hard, she was seeing double. She shook it to clear it, but that only made it worse. The cyclops lunged at her, again, and she side-stepped and took a swipe with her dagger. She connected with flesh, but it wasn't a fatal blow to the creature. She wished her vision would clear as she stumbled around to the other side of the alley.

The cyclops laughed, again, and pulled out a butcher knife of his own. "Now we're even, daughter of Athena." He twisted around faster than Annabeth had thought possible for such a lumbering creature, but he seemed to be smarter and more agile than most cyclopes. She was still reeling from her concussion and was unable to move away before his knife cut a deep gash into her torso from the bottom of her rib cage to her abdomen. In a wild frenzy, she brought her dagger down and buried it deep into his chest. His one eye widened in shock that he had been beaten by a forty-six year old, widowed daughter of Athena, and then he exploded into golden dust.

Annabeth fell to her knees in the alley. It had begun to rain, and blood was pooling around her. Her vision was still blurry, but she caught sight of her purse ten feet away beside a dumpster. She had her cell phone and some ambrosia in it, if she could just get to it. Sheathing her dagger, she began to crawl to the purse. It was painful, and she felt like her insides were going to fall out onto the pavement. She made it, though, and propped herself against the wall. She dug out the bag of ambrosia and quickly ate the last piece. Her vision cleared, the pain in her head eased up some, and the shallower parts of the cut began to close, but she had already lost a lot of blood. And it was still gushing from the deepest sections of the gash. She quickly dialed Sally's phone.

On the third ring, Annabeth was greeted by Hope's voice. "Hey, Annabeth! You're -"

"Hope! I need help," Annabeth interrupted. "A cyclops caught me. I killed him, but he got me with a butcher knife first. I'm two blocks north in the alley. Come quick."

"Oh, gods! Yes! Of course. Don't move; we'll be right there." Hope hung up the phone, and Annabeth put hers back in her purse and waited. She didn't have to wait long. In no time, Sally and Hope came rushing into the alley. Annabeth was too weak to sit up. They had called 911 and were under instructions not to move her, so they sat with her and applied pressure to the wounds.

Annabeth closed her eyes as the cool rain fell onto her slightly fevered face. "The water's nice," she commented, echoing Percy's twenty-eight year old words.

Sally's hand cupped Annabeth's cheek. "Annabeth, stay with us. The paramedics are on their way now. The ambulance will be here soon."

Annabeth opened her eyes to look at the women sitting with her. "I've made him wait long enough, don't you think, Sally?"

Sally's eyes glistened with tears, but the rain masked whether she was actually crying or not. "He would be okay with waiting longer, dear."

Annabeth felt her own tears slide down her cheeks, and Hope was sniffling and wiping her face enough to tell Annabeth that her sister-in-law had already lost the battle. She hated making them hurt, but her own life was literally pouring out of her belly, and no amount of pressure was going to stop it. She could already see black encroaching on her vision, her feet were numb, her heart was beating wildly in her chest, and she couldn't take a breath deep enough to get all the oxygen she needed for her body to continue to function. She was dying; there was no two ways about it.

She gazed back at the woman who had been more of a mother to her than anyone else. "I'm not going to make it, Sally. Tell Aaron how much I love him, how proud I am of him. Tell him that his dad and I will be waiting and to make us wait a very long time. And tell everyone else that I love them, too." Sally nodded.

Annabeth swallowed hard and looked to her right. The pain in her abdomen was so great that she was trembling all over, and it was hard to think. She persevered, though. "Hope, you're the best sister I've ever had. Marry that boyfriend, okay. He's a great guy; Percy would have approved. I love you, Bitty Sis," Annabeth whispered, using the nickname that Percy had given her when she was born and that Annabeth had only used on rare occasions through the years.

Hope leaned over, hugged Annabeth, and gave her a kiss on the cheek. "I love you, too, Bethy. Give Percy a kiss for me, yeah?" No one but Hope had ever called Annabeth Bethy, and even she hadn't used the name in years. It brought back memories of sleepovers when Aaron and Hope were children, and Annabeth smiled at Hope.

Annabeth then turned to Sally. Even in her mid-sixties, she was still a beautiful, strong woman. "I'll give him a kiss from you, too. You're the best mom I ever had. I love you, Sally." Her voice was fading. She only had a couple of minutes at best.

Sally kissed her forehead. "You've been a wonderful daughter. I'll tell Aaron and the others. Go in peace, Annabeth. We love you."

Annabeth shakily reached over and squeezed Sally's hand. Then, she looked to the sky. She vaguely heard sirens in the distance, but what she saw brought fresh tears to her eyes and a wide smile to her face. She saw Percy. He was whole and healthy. He was beaming at her and holding out his hand to her. "Percy," she whispered, and she closed her eyes and took her last breath.

The End.

A/N: Well, that's it. Our story concludes. I know, I killed Annabeth, too, but I gave her a longer life, and she got to reunite with Percy, even if I didn't write that part.

Anyway, I hope you liked it. Thanks for reading!

Happy 2016!