Hey guys!

So, this is the third (and likely last) companion I had planned for The Missed Call. If you haven't read that yet, I'd probably recommend you go read that first, but it isn't completely necessary. Chronologically, they go The Missed Call, Proof, and then Promise. The can be read on their own though if you want. :)

This story contains minor SPOILERS FOR THE HIDDEN ORACLE. No more than any of my other one-shots have (It's actually the exact same spoiler), but just putting it out there.

Thank you so much for all the support you all have given me with these fics. I never expected them to go over as well as they have with you guys, and I'm so happy you like them! I love you all. Now, enjoy!

Percy unlocked the front door and stepped into the apartment, closing it again behind him. "Mom?" he called, slipping out of his shoes, "Paul? I'm home." When he got no reply, he determined he was home alone and walked further inside, unconcerned. He was a little early and he knew that the baby had a doctor's appointment earlier, which was probably where they all were.

Since graduating high school and going back to camp for the first peaceful summer since he was twelve years old, Percy had gotten into the habit of coming home for the weekends. As a senior camper, not to mention his status as the Savior of Olympus on more than one occasion, he had this freedom to exercise as he pleased and it was nice to see his family regularly-he'd gone far too long the year before without that luxury, while still getting to spend his summer at Camp Half-Blood. Annabeth often came with him on his weekend trips back into the city, but Chiron had asked her to assist him with his Saturday mythology class this week, so she'd stayed behind this time.

Percy, after grabbing a blue cookie off the covered plate in the kitchen, which his mom always left full and waiting whenever he came home, meandered into the living room with the intention of finding something on TV to keep him entertained until his family got back. The answering machine was flashing on the table next to the couch, signaling a new voicemail, and Percy pressed the button on it as he walked by, searching for the remote, which always seemed to be missing.

The message, which had been left just a few minutes before he'd walked in the door, was from his mom, which wasn't unusual as Percy still didn't think the benefit of carrying a cell phone with him was worth the risk of monsters it brought with it, and more often then not he could use Annabeth's if he had to. "Today at four-thirty eight PM," the machine's robotic voice informed him before it relayed the message. "Hi, Perce," Sally's voice said from the small speaker, "Annabeth said you already left camp, so in case you beat us home, I just wanted to let you know that the appointment ran a little late. We should be getting out of here soon. See you in a little while. Love you."

The machine beeped to signal the end of the voicemail and when Percy, who was still busy searching the small living room for the TV remote, did nothing to turn it off, it continued, moving on to saved messages. The first, from about two months earlier, was from the publisher that his mother was working with to potentially publish her book by the end of the year and was of little interest to him.

Percy had just discovered the remote to be wedged between the couch cushions and was in the process of retrieving it when the mechanical voice piped up again for the second saved message. "June twenty-fourth, two thousand ten, at twelve twenty-nine AM." The time and date didn't immediately register with Percy, occupied as he was, but he froze and straightened quickly, the newly retrieved remote forgotten in his hand as he turned to stare at the small machine when his own voice began playing from it. "Mom. Hey, I'm alive."

Motionless, Percy listened to the message in its entirety, which wasn't very long at all, remembering back to just over a year ago when things had been so different. He hadn't known, when he left that message for his mom from Alaska, just how much still awaited him and his friends. At the time, he hadn't been thinking particularly far ahead at all. He'd just wanted to go home to his parents and Annabeth.

Until now, Percy had never really found out the fate of the voicemail he'd left from Seward. He remembered his mom mentioning it briefly the day he'd returned home after the war ended, but she hadn't gone into detail, shocked as she'd been, and he hadn't cared enough at the time to ask. He supposed Annabeth probably knew about it too, but it had never come up between them, and in the time since, he'd all but forgotten about it.

From the moment he'd come home again, Percy's mom had been nothing but overjoyed to have him back and in one piece. In fact, her biggest grievance about the whole thing was the year of service insignia Camp Jupiter had branded onto his forearm. He knew though, without a doubt, that the time he was missing had been the worst six months of her life and, though she would never admit it, she'd feared he wouldn't be coming back. She didn't have to say it for Percy to know it was true. It was why he'd felt so bad when his memories had finally been returned in Alaska and why he'd called from that payphone in the first place.

If he thought about it, he was still more than a little upset with Hera for those six months she'd stolen from him and all the grief she'd put his parents through during them. He knew the goddess had done what she thought she'd had to and there had supposedly been no other way and blah, blah, blah, but at the end of the day, he wasn't immortal and his days were numbered, probably more than most peoples', and every day was precious. What she'd done was far from okay. But getting a goddess, Hera especially, to admit such a thing was never going to happen and it just wasn't worth the time and energy expecting her to ever do so would require.

Percy couldn't believe his parents had kept the message, a twenty second long, low quality voicemail recording of him apologizing and tripping over his words, for over a year, well after he came home again. He wondered if his mom even remembered that she still had it. It wouldn't have been at all surprising to him if, with everything that happened during the past year-his sister's birth, his finishing high school-if she had forgotten about it completely. And yet, at the same time, he was not surprised at all, and, even as the thought crossed his mind, he knew that she did know it was there and had intentionally kept it.

What was more surprising, honestly, was that it had taken Percy this long to find the message himself. He had lived in this apartment regularly for almost all of the last year, and this was the first time he had actually listened to it. He hadn't even spared it a second thought since the previous summer, during the quest, when he had been falling, with Annebeth, for nine straight days into the depths of Tartarus. Those days spent falling had almost been worse than once they'd actually got there. Down there, at least, they'd been able to do something. While they were falling, there'd been nothing to do but hold each other, wait, and think, dreading the certain death that awaited them at the bottom. It was during this time of falling and thinking, that Percy had remembered the voicemail he'd left his mom and the promise he had made her in it. I'll make it home. I promise. He had never broken a promise to his mother before, and the thought that he might soon be forced to do exactly that had scared him almost as much as the thought that he and Annabeth were falling into literal hell and likely would not make it out alive again.

Now, standing in the middle of his living room, listening to that same voicemail over a year later seemed, at the very least, anticlimactic. The whole war had seemed that way at the end, really, all things considered, though he was very okay with that. He remembered back to all those days spent in fear of what was to come, not even necessarily of the fact that they would die but that they would fail, in the end, to stop the world from falling into the evil hands of Gaea and her Giants, and everything they'd all fought so long and hard for would be for nothing; that everyone they loved would die along with them, because of them; that, to storm or fire, the world would fall.

It was weird, thinking about it, that all their efforts had been for this end-all of them living in peace again. Honestly, the idea that things were peaceful at last, even after all the time that had passed, was still surreal to Percy. He'd spent nearly half his life at this point constantly fighting to protect Olympus and the world from enemies that wanted to destroy all of it, and to think, now, that he was finally, finally, reaping the benefits of all the fighting and quests, and getting to live an almost normal life seemed like a dream. A totally awesome dream, which, as a half-blood, he didn't really ever have, but still.

Almost robotically, the television all but forgotten, Percy crossed the small living room to the table beside the couch and, sitting down on the arm of it, pressed the replay button on the machine, listening to the message he'd recorded again, reliving the moment one more time and allowing himself to feel incredibly happy and grateful as he did, that he had beat the odds and made it through, that they all had.

The message was nearing the end of its replay when Sally appeared in the doorway, looking slightly puzzled. He'd been so absorbed in his discovery that he'd apparently missed the arrival of his family. The two listened together as the words; "I'll make it home. I promise. Love you…" faded into silence and the machine beeped again, signaling the end of the recording and grew silent once more.

Still reeling slightly, Percy met her eyes. "You kept this?" he asked.

"Of course I did," she replied, moving toward him, "That message was my lifeline for almost two months last summer. Did you expect me to just delete it?"

"No, I guess not," he replied.

"Are you okay?" she asked softly, sitting down beside him. From his place perched on the arm of the couch, she was quite a bit lower than he was. Normally, she would probably have reprimanded him for sitting that way, as she did quite often, but she apparently chose, for the moment, to ignore it.

Percy nodded. "Yeah, I just… wasn't expecting it. It kinda brought me back." Wordlessly, Sally placed an arm on his knee, mistaking this to be a bad thing. Shocking as it had been, Percy couldn't call it that. His face breaking into a smile, he looked at his mom again. "I can't believe you still have it."

Smirking, she answered, "I couldn't bring myself to get rid of it." She shook her head, looking thoughtful. "I heard the phone ringing that night. I ignored it because it was so late and I wasn't in the mood to talk to anyone." His heart jolted slightly at this information, but her smile only grew as she looked at him, apparently amused, though at the time, Percy knew this fact must have been beyond devastating. "I rushed out of our room and ran to get to the phone before you hung up, but I tripped in the dark and missed you by a second. I was horrified. I tried to call back, but no one answered." She blinked hard, as if fighting back approaching tears. "I listened to that message nearly every night until you came home. I showed it to Annabeth the next day. I don't think you realize just how much it helped." She lifted her hand from his knee and reached up to run a hand through his hair lovingly.

"Why didn't you ever tell me that?"

She shrugged. "I didn't think about it, honestly. I was so happy once you came home, I nearly forgot about it. I haven't really listened to it since, but I knew it was there. I found it a few times since." She shrugged again. "I like it."

He smiled a little. "I kept my promise," he informed her quietly and met her eyes again. "It took a little longer then I thought it would, but…"

He trailed off at the same moment Sally, her eyes filling again with tears, pulled him into a hug. Percy moved off the arm of the couch, squeezing onto the cushion beside her as she held him. "I know," she murmured, smiling, "Thank you." After a second, she added, "I'd be lying if I said I never doubted you would."

He smiled into her shoulder. "So would I."

"Thank you for proving me wrong," she said, finally letting him go.

Percy sat back a bit and looked at her, grinning, as she scooted over to make room for him to sit more comfortably beside her. "Anytime."

She smiled at him for another few seconds before she took a deep breath, composing herself, and said, "Anyway, I take it you got my message from before then?"

He gave a laugh. "Yeah. How'd the appointment go?"

"It was fine. No shots this time, thank gods. How's camp?"

"Good."

"And how's Annabeth?" she asked this, as she always did, with a knowing smile and Percy felt his cheeks color against his will.

"Great."

His mom smiled wider before moving to stand. "Good. I'm going to go start dinner while your sister is sleeping. You didn't fill up on cookies, did you?" She raised a suspicious eyebrow.

Grinning, Percy diligently replied, "No, I only took one."

Sally smirked. "Good." And then, without another word, she crossed the living room and disappeared into the kitchen. Percy stayed where he was for another few seconds, staring at the spot where his mom had vanished before he too stood up and, with one last glance cast toward the answering machine, moved to follow after her, intent on stealing another cookie or two before dinner and feeling his chances were pretty good.

So originally, I was going to write Percy thinking about the promise to his mom as a separate fic, but I felt like I think it's better incorporated as part of this one. Thoughts?

Thanks for reading!