We Return to Camp Half-Blood

**We Return to Camp Half-Blood** is the seventieth chapter of The Gift of a Best Friend. It was first published on August 18th, 2018.

## Chapter

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**Annabeth's POV**
According to L.A. news, the explosion at the Santa Monica beach had been caused when a crazy kidnapper fired a shotgun at a police car. He accidentally hit a gas main that had ruptured during the earthquake.
This crazy kidnapper (a.k.a. Ares) was the same man who had abducted Percy and three other adolescents in New York and brought us across country on a ten-day odyssey of terror.
Poor little Percy Jackson wasn’t an international criminal after all. He’d caused a commotion on that Greyhound bus in New Jersey trying to get away from his captor (and afterward, witnesses would even swear they had seen the leather-clad man on the bus—“Why didn’t I remember him before?”). The crazy man had caused the explosion in the St. Louis Arch. After all, no kid could’ve done that. A concerned waitress in Denver had seen the man threatening his abductees outside her diner, gotten a friend to take a photo, and notified the police. Finally, brave Percy Jackson had stolen a gun from his captor in Los Angeles and battled him shotgun-to-rifle on the beach. Police and Protector of America had arrived just in time. But in the spectacular explosion, five police cars had been destroyed and the captor had fled. No fatalities had occurred. Percy Jackson and his three friends were safely in police custody.
The reporters fed us this whole story. We just nodded and acted tearful and exhausted (which wasn’t hard), and played victimized kids for the cameras.
“All I want,” Percy said, choking back his tears, “is to see my loving stepfather again. Every time I saw him on TV, calling me a delinquent punk, I knew . . . somehow . . . we would be okay. And I know he’ll want to reward each and every person in this beautiful city of Los Angeles with a free major appliance from his store. Here’s the phone number.”
Jasmine laughed about the whole thing later. Raylee got us plane tickets on the next plane to New York while she and her team worked on fixing everything that was destroyed.
We said goodbye to her and went off.
We knew there was no choice but to fly. It took some effort to get Percy on board the flight.
Takeoff was a nightmare for him. He didn’t unclench his hands from the armrests until we touched down safely at La Guardia. Jasmine laughed at him for the first hour, then finally got all laughed out and relaxed in her chair with Toothless lying on her lap.
The local press was waiting for us outside security, but we managed to evade them thanks to me, luring them away with my invisible Yankees cap, shouting, “They’re over by the frozen yogurt! Come on!,” then rejoined them at baggage claim.
Jasmine could’ve just turned us all invisible, but she loved watching me do my thing.
We split up from Percy at the taxi stand. He told us to get back to Half-Blood Hill and let Chiron know what had happened. We protested, considering all the five of us had been through together, but Percy convinced us to let him go to Olympus alone.
We said goodbye to him. Jasmine gave him a hug and wished him luck. Then he hopped in a taxi and headed into Manhattan.

After we got back to Half-Blood Hill, everyone we passed as we were heading to the Big House cheered, but looked concerned when they didn’t see Percy with us.
We assured them that he was fine and is currently taking the master bolt back to Zeus.
We looked for Chiron. When we found him, we called a senior counselor meeting at the Big House and told them all what happened during our quest.
Actually, Jasmine decided to show them like a movie. She even provided popcorn for everyone, but she left out the personal moments.
After that, we talked a little bit about it, then waited until Percy came back.
I went to my cabin, put on a fresh pair of clothes, grabbed a pen and a pad of paper, and sat at a desk.
I thought about the advice Percy gave me when we were in that disgusting truck on our way to Las Vegas, that I shouldn’t give up on my dad and that I should write him a letter or something.
I figured that I at least owe it to Percy to at least write my dad a letter and give him another chance at having a father-daughter relationship. So I am.
I grabbed the pen and started writing.
After I was done, I put the letter in an envelope, sealed it, addressed it, and sent it out in the mail.

Percy came back to camp a couple hours later. And since we were the first heroes to return alive to Half-Blood Hill since Luke, so of course everybody treated us as if we’d won some reality-TV contest. According to camp tradition, we wore laurel wreaths to a big feast prepared in our honor, then led a procession down to the bonfire, where we got to burn the burial shrouds our cabins had made for us in our absence.
My siblings made a special shroud for Jasmine—orange with a symbol of the first letter of her last name embroidered on it. She absolutely loved it, and gave them all hugs.
“I really don’t want to burn it,” she said. But she had to.
My shroud was amazing, too—gray silk with embroidered owls—Percy told me it seemed a shame not to bury me in it.
I punched him. “Shut up.”
“Hey,” Jasmine said. “I think that was kind of nice. But also a little funny.”
I glared at her. “You shut up, too.”
She just smiled.
Percy’s shroud wasn’t pretty at all.
Him being the son of Poseidon, he didn’t have any cabin mates, so the Ares cabin had volunteered to make his shroud. They’d taken an old bedsheet and painted smiley faces with X’ed-out eyes around the border, and the word LOSER painted really big in the middle.
Percy was probably glad to burn it. I knew I would’ve been.
As Apollo’s cabin led the sing-along and passed out s’mores, Jasmine and I were with my siblings from our cabin, Percy was surrounded by his old Hermes cabinmates, and Grover’s satyr buddies, who were admiring the brand-new searcher’s license he’d received from the Council of Cloven Elders. The council had called Grover’s performance on the quest “Brave to the point of indigestion. Horns-and-whiskers above anything we have seen in the past.”
The only ones not in a party mood were Clarisse and her cabinmates, whose poisonous looks told Percy they’d never forgive him for disgracing their dad.
I don’t think Percy cared.
Even Dionysus’s welcome-home speech didn’t seem to be enough to dampen his spirits. “Yes, yes, so the little brat didn’t get himself killed and now he’ll have an even bigger head. Well, huzzah for that. In other announcements, there will be *no* canoe races this Saturday. . . .”
Camp went back to normal for a while. But I don’t think for me, exactly.
Every time I’m near Percy, or even see him from a distance now, I can feel my face get a little warm, and I think I’m blushing. Kind of like when I see Luke, but not as noticeable.
I saw that I had a letter from my dad at the Big House less than a week after I sent my letter to him. I opened it and read it all the way to my cabin.
Jasmine was lying on her bed, reading yet another new book from the library, when I came in.
“Whatcha reading?” she asked me.
“A letter from my dad,” I replied.
Her eyes widened. She closed her book and jumped out of bed. “What’s it say?”
“Well, do you remember when we were riding in that truck to Las Vegas?”
She nodded. “Yeah. Percy suggested that you should write your dad a letter. Did you?”
I nodded, then held up the letter. “And this is his response.”
“What does it say?”
I handed it to her. “Read it for yourself.”
She did.
“So are you going to give it another try?” she asked me.
I nodded. “Yeah. We are.”
Jasmine smiled and gave me a hug. “I’m so proud of you.”
I smiled and hugged her back. “Yeah. I kind of am, too.”
“And if it works out this time, you have Percy to thank.”
“Uh, yeah. About that . . .”
“What?”
I looked around the cabin. Jasmine and I were the only ones in it, and Toothless too, which I didn’t mind. I closed the door to give us more privacy and slowly sat down on my bed.
I took a deep breath. “I think I like Percy.”
“Define like, exactly,” Jasmine said.
“I think I like him like I like Luke.”
Jasmine’s eyes widened. “Really?”
I nodded. “Yeah. I doubt I like him anywhere near as much as I like Luke, but I’m sure that I feel a little bit of something toward him.”
“When did the feelings start?”
“I think when we were in that truck and talking about my family, but I didn’t realize it until now.”
“Well, you did have other things occupying your mind at the time. But, you know, I think he likes you, too.”
“You do? Why?”
“Well, he really wants to help you work things out with your dad. I mean, I hate to think that the only reason a guy is nice to a girl is because he likes her and not just because he’s doing that out of the kindness of his heart, which I actually do think Percy is. Possibly because he just met his father and can’t really have a father-son relationship himself since his dad is a god.”
“Maybe,” I said. “But I’m surprised you’re not saying anything against my new crush on him.”
“Why would I be?” Jasmine asked.
“Because you don’t like that I have a crush on Luke.”
“Well, that’s different.”
“How?”
“Uh, maybe because Luke is seven years older than you while Percy is much more age appropriate.”
“I thought you said age is just a number.”
“It is. But Luke is an adult and you’re still a kid. If you had any chance with him, you’d have to wait until you’re eighteen, and until you are, I’m going to keep being against your crush on him.”
“You don’t think he’s cute?”
“From a girl’s perspective, yes. But he’s too old for me, and I honestly don’t think of him that way. Especially when he calls me his little girl.”
“Yeah, that’s a mood killer.”
“Definitely,” Jasmine agreed. “So what are you going to do with your newfound crush on Percy?”
“Uh, nothing,” I replied.
“Why not?”
“It’s just a crush.”
“A crush that could turn into something more in the future.”
“I don’t know about that.”
“I do if you don’t try.”
“You do? Can you predict the future?”
“Well, no. But you don’t know if you don’t try.”
“I’m not going to try, Jasmine.”
“Why? I mean, there’s got to be a reason why you’ve been having all those visions about him. This has to be why.”
“Because he’s a boy and I’m a girl?”
“Yes.”
“You read too much romance.”
“Well, it’s true.”
“You mostly read fictional romance.”
“It’s still true. Love is not fiction. It’s real if it’s between two people who truly love each other.”
“And you think Percy and I do?”
“Well, not now. But in time I bet you will.”
“And I bet I won’t.”
“We’ll see about that.”
“Yes, we will.”
That was the end to that conversation. But knowing Jasmine, it won’t be for long.
“I’m going to go stroll around camp for a while,” Jasmine said. “Do you want to come?”
“No thanks,” I replied. “I’ll just stay here.”
“Ok. I kind of want to be alone anyway.”
“Why?”
“Because I want to be. I’ll see you later.”
“Ok. Bye.”
“Bye.”
She opened the door to the cabin and closed it behind her.
She wants to be alone.
That’s odd for her. I wonder why.

**Jasmine’s POV**
As soon as I closed the door behind me, I put my back against it and inhaled and exhaled unsteadily.
Annabeth has a crush on Percy.
Ok. I should’ve seen that coming, but I wasn’t sure considering that they didn’t get along at first, mostly because of Annabeth, but now they are.
I’m glad for it, but it also means that I’m in trouble.
Why?
Well . . . because I have a crush on Percy too.

**So . . . What do you guys think? I feel like I'm being Aphrodite, lol.**
**And happy birthday, Percy!**
**Please review** here**.**

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## Character Appearances

### Main Characters

* Annabeth Chase
* Jasmine Saturday
* Percy Jackson

### Minor Characters

* Grover Underwood
* Dionysus