She looked at him as he stood there in that dark cave. He looked like he had been running around a bit longer than she had been. She watched him as he watched her. She couldn't tell if he hated her or if he was grateful that she helped kick that stupid dragon's butt.

"So I'm Luke." He said as he outstretched his hand to her.

She shook his hand but her blue eyes were still uneasy, "I'm Thalia."

"Cool name." he smiled.

"Do you get many Star Wars cracks about your name?" she asked.

His smile fell, "Yeah why?"

She turned toward the exit of the cave, "Well may the force be with you young padawon."

Luke stood there dumbfounded, "Hey wait!"

He ran after her and she turned around. She looked at him, "What?"

"Hey where are you headed?" he asked her.

She looked at him, "New York why?"

"Well that's where I'm headed, do you want to come with me?" he asked.

She looked at him, "Sure."

He grinned, "Cool."

"Come on we better get going before anything else shows up." She said pushing ahead in the rain.

Luke stood there and grinned. For the first time in his life he felt like he had a friend. Someone he could count on. He grinned and ran after her. He could tell that they were going to be very good friends.

Two years later she died. She died to save him and Annabeth. Their latest traveling companion. Thalia stood her ground and died to allow him and Annabeth to get to camp safely. Where she died now stands that tree. The tree that contains her spirit stood there.

He watched it as he stood there on the hill in the rain. Annabeth calling out Thalia's name. Their satyr guide Grover stood there in shock muttering that he had failed.

Something had broken in Luke that night. Something made his insides hollower. Something in his heart died. He had really cared for Thalia. Now his best friend and possibly his first crush was gone. Imprisoned in a stupid pine tree.

Five years later he walks up the hill and sits by the base of her tree. He could just picture her there next to him. Her raven hair, adorable cinnamon freckles, her soft hand wrapped around his, her naturally red lips curling into something melodically sarcastic, her brilliant blue eyes, and of course her heavy boots or possibly her favorite pair of green high-top Chucks.

"Thalia I don't know if you can hear me but it's me again." Luke said.

The branches rustled in the wind. To him that was some form of sign so he continued to talk, "I've done something horrible. I've stolen something that belongs to your father. He told me he could bring you back. He lied but our parents will pay for letting you die and what they did to everything else."

There was dead silence Luke stood and placed his hand on the tree and rested his head on the trunk. She was in there he could feel it. He knew she was there and he had yet to find a way to bring her back. He was a monster, his nightmare had just begun.

Two years later he did something that he'll never forgive himself for. He stood there at her tree once again. It was pouring rain. There was the tree; the only thing that remained of her beside her backpack that he had kept. He held the python fang in his hand. He did want to do this he really didn't. In a way he knew that this was going to hurt her not just the tree.

He felt something roll down the left side of his face, "I'm sorry Thalia."

He stood there for a moment with his hand on the trunk of the tree. He cried for a few moments there at her tree right before he did something that he could never forgive himself for doing.

"I'm sorry Thalia." He whispered before driving the fang through the trunk of the tree. He could feel the energy seeping out of the tree with the venom that was slowly seeping into the tree. He sank to his knees after doing so. This was his best friend and now what was he doing? He was slowly killing her even more than she already has been.

"I'm so sorry Thalia." He whispered.

Then he swore to God as started to walk away he saw her standing there. Her hair still raven but longer now, her freckles still there, her blue eyes full of shattered emotion. She shook her head as if trying to figure out what had happened to her best friend. Someone she thought she had trusted. Luke knew what he was, he was a monster.

The next winter he receives word that she's alive and back in all her punk glory. She back and he was hoping that he could talk to her and get her to see things his way. If there was anyone he could get to see things his way it was her. She was bound to hear him out. She was the one he was counting on. He had tried to convince Annabeth but that didn't work; she had been too brainwashed to see thing for what they really were.

"You aren't Luke. I don't know you anymore."

Those words caused the rest of his heart to hollow out. There was now a huge black hole where his heart used to be and who had caused it? Her? Him? A mixture of both? His father? All three?

"Yes you do, Thalia," he pleaded. "Please. Don't make me…Don't make him destroy you."

In the end he had gotten himself pushed off a cliff and that allowed him to see what she meant. He didn't even know himself anymore. He was unrecognizable to even himself. He was the monster he didn't want to become.

He had turned her away from him. Now he was going to fully become that monster that he hadn't wanted to become. The nightmare wasn't even halfway through.

He stared at the stupid river. It was disgusting, things floating in it but he knew it had to be done. He looked over at Nakumaura who was watching him, waiting for him to step into the river. Before he knew it he was submerged in the black water. His body burned with the acidy water swirling around him.

Just as he felt like he was about to suffocate the face of someone appeared above him. Her blue eyes were full of humor and her freckles were scrunched on her nose, "Come on moron grab ahold."

Luke was finally out of the water and found that his Achilles heel happened to under his arm where he swore Thalia had hoisted him out of the river. There were no signs that Thalia had been there at all, nothing that led him to believe that she wasn't just there in his imagination. He felt her grab his arm and pull him out. There was no one but who had been there when he entered the river.

The night he died she was the only on that wasn't there. She, he later found out, was pinned under a statue of Hera. He never got to say what he had been dying to say. He instead said it to Annabeth. For awhile the raven haired girl was dead to him. She didn't exist; but somewhere down in the black hole he called his heart ached a spot that existed just for her. They say you never forget your first love and he tried so hard but it never worked.

She was part of the reason he did what he did. She wouldn't face it but somewhere she knew it in the back of her mind and she had that nagging feeling that she should've tried harder to reach out to him.

He died right there Annabeth sobbing, Percy watching in horror, and some little kid he didn't know dressed in black. No sight of his favorite punk girl who was now adorned in the colors of Artemis's hunt. She was still the same punk he had fallen for all those years ago just now immortal.

He let go, he was still the monster and now this was the end of his nightmare. The end of everything he had put everyone through.

She sat there looking at the moon. She was in her pajamas; tonight they happened to be matching silver and black silk top and pants, her raven hair was plaited over her shoulder. Her blue eyes looked slivery in the light. The huntresses were back at camp for awhile.

She felt a presence beside her. She looked over to find herself looking in his polar blue eyes. He smiled at her sheepishly and she just looked at him.

"Thals." He smiled.

"What the heck are you doing here, you're dead?!" she asked.

He shook his head, "Nope they gave me a second chance."

She looked at him, "What the hell did they give you a second chance for?"

"To try to fix things." He whispered.

She glared at him, "Fix things?"

He nodded, "To fix things I never got the chance to fix before I left."

"Look you're going to have a long road to fix things…Clarisse hates you because you killed Silena…well not directly…."

He cut her off with a kiss, "Not with them."

She looked at him and blinked a couple times, "With me?"

He nodded, "With you."

She sat there for a moment in silence and then out of nowhere she threw her arms around him. He hugged her back tightly, "Don't you ever do anything that stupid ever again!"

He chuckled and smiled at her, "I won't."

"Promise?" she asked him.

"Pinky swear." He nodded as he intertwined his pinky with hers.

They sat there in comfortable silence until she fell asleep wrapped in his arms under the tree that had caused so much trouble in the first place. He kissed the top of her head and decided that there was no other place he wanted to be; in her arms with her.