TERRIFIED . . . annabeth chase

thirty two.

SHE DID NOT, in fact, hit the ground. Or get sent to Whosville or whatever.

At least according to Annabeth, who was patching her up.

"You took awhile to wake up," Annabeth commented, putting nectar on a spot on Val's chest, and she nearly flinched, and instead kicked Annabeth's arm. Flexiblity. "Tina, I know it hurts, but could you try to not give me any more bruises?"

"I thought you liked it when I gave you bruises," the words came out of Val's mouth before she could stop them.

Annabeth laughed, but her face was turning red. "Gods, V. You're going to pull those jokes on me when you're seriously burned?"

Val frowned. "It doesn't hurt that bad."

It did, in fact, hurt that bad.

"I concur," she mumbled, settling against the headboard behind her.

Annabeth sent her a smile. "I'm always right. Now, can you let me give you painkillers and help your burns disappear? We need to help look for Leo, Hazel, and Frank."

Val frowned. "What happened to them — wait. Oh."

Right. She hadn't thrown the Greek Fire in time and they'd sank into the ocean. To be fair, she was still trying to get a grip on her vial of fire after Leo just threw it in the air and hoped she'd catch it.

"Yeah, oh." Annabeth tried putting some kind of ointment on Val's arm and she immediately flinched. Annabeth sighed. "If you're good, I'll give you a piggyback up so you don't have to walk. Deal?"

"Yes, ma'am," Val pointed her toes, which were basically the only part of her that didn't hurt.

Annabeth murmured, "hey," and Val looked up, and suddenly her lips slid with Annabeth's, and she sighed into the kiss and lazily brushed her tongue along her lips. At least, until her chin started hurting. Then she pulled away, and watched as Annabeth pouted.

"My chin hurts." Val complained, flexing her toes.

"Painkillers?" Annabeth pushed herself off of the bed, raising an eyebrow as she turned to grab some. Val just nodded and settled back.

It took at least a half hour to put ointment on every single burn ( seriously, screw Greek Fire ) and then Annabeth had to put a shirt on Val, because apparently she couldn't just go outside in just a bra, which was pointless. But it didn't matter because she got a piggyback ride, and life was content.

At least, until she heard someone splash in the water below, and Annabeth ran over the edge to see what was going on and nearly fell in the water with Val on her back.

"Annabeth!" Val squealed, hopping off of her back and getting the heck away from the water. "You almost just dumped us into the water!"

"Tina, I wasn't going to throw us into the water."

"You nearly fell off!" Val pouted, staying far from the edge and looking away from the girl she loved, but then seeing Leo get up on the ship and grinned before hugging him anyway. Despite the fact that he was wet. And her body hurt. But that didn't matter.

Once they got on board and changed into dry clothes ( poor Frank had to borrow a pair of too-small pants from Jason ) the crew all gathered on the quarterdeck for a celebratory breakfast — except for Coach Hedge, who grumbled that the atmosphere was getting too cuddly for his tastes and went below to hammer out some dents in the hull. While Leo fussed over his helm controls, Hazel and Frank related the story of the fish-centaurs and their training camp.

"Incredible," Jason said. "These are really good brownies."

"That's your only comment?" Piper demanded.