an interesting aspect of the rachel/annabeth rivalry is that it was pretty one-sided in some respects. rachel didn’t have no reaction to annabeth’s overt jabs, but she also didn’t respond in kind. she calmly absorbed them but showed that she understood them. (“are you sure you don’t know? boys. totally blind.”)
the fandom has sometimes, usually to put down annabeth, spun this phase of their lives as catty, mean girl drama. but that’s not what it is. it’s one girl lashing out because she has consistently lost everyone she cares about in her short life, and she’s scared it’s about to happen again. and it’s one girl who happens to be in the way and understands, as much as she can without knowing annabeth’s history, that by no fault of her own she is an upsetting presence, and doesn’t let herself be cowed. neither of these things are “likable,” especially for female characters, but they’re essential to both of their characters
sometimes people criticize percy here, too, but i think blaming any corner of this triangle kind of diminishes the heartache and tragedy and inevitability of the situation. of course a mortal friendship is appealing to percy when his demigod life is so difficult and painful. of course that triggers annabeth’s abandonment issues. of course percy is slow to recognize that rachel likes him. of course he is then confused and anxious that annabeth is upset. of course rachel feels drawn to percy as an escape hatch from her own neglectful parents. of course it hurts annabeth that percy might be falling for someone else. of course rachel recognizes that. of course she isn’t obligated to blow percy off because of it. of course annabeth doesn’t know how to communicate why she’s upset that percy might date rachel when she doesn’t even have a real claim on him. of course she feels helpless and panicked and defensive. of course that makes percy feel like he’s being pushed away. of course he then gets closer to rachel.
it really misses the point to reduce their actions or feelings as being in the right or wronging each other. they’re just three kids staggering under the weight of enormous, difficult emotions and circumstances
Annabeth is the strategic leader of Camp Half Blood, and Percy is the emotional one
If you have time to prepare for a battle or a quest, days, weeks or even months, the Athena cabin, and Annabeth in particular, are the obvious bet.
Camp Half-Blood has known Annabeth since she was seven years old and experienced her getting better and better at strategizing with each passing year and win victory after victory at capture the flag.
They know that she is the demigod who managed to stay alive while living on the streets with Thalia and Luke, who held the sky and accompanied Percy on most of his quests, who has been part of the prophecy of the seven, survived Tartarus and managed to follow the Mark of Athena as the only Athena kid in over 3000 years.
They know that she is going to come up with a plan that is going to give them with close to no doubts the upper hand. She has their absolute trust in that regard.
But when you’re feeling hopeless in the middle of a battlefield? When your entire body is aching, and you’re so close to desperation you just want to lay down your weapons or run away? Or when something somehow goes wrong, and you need to immediately improvise?
Then you look to Perseus Jackson.
The guy who has been standing on the front lines for so long, it is more familiar to him than the schoolyard, who has been fighting toe to toe with gods and titans since he was twelve years old. The guy who has successfully been part of more quests than any other demigod alive. The guy, who you know would give his own life for you without a second thought. The guy who jumped into Tartarus just so his girlfriend wouldn’t have to face it alone.
The guy who is defined by his selflessness, genuine kindness, humbleness and bravery.
Mars told Frank in Son of Neptune that Percy is the glue that will hold the seven together, but it goes much deeper than that. He is the glue that holds all demigods together, be it at the Battle of Camp Half Blood, the Battle of Manhattan, or the Battle in front of New Rome, because more than any other character we have met in any of Rick’s books, Percy Jackson inspires loyalty and trust.
I’m not saying that those roles are not interchangeable.
Demigods obviously also rely emotionally on Annabeth, especially the Athena cabin, and Percy does often also come up with brilliant strategies (mind you, he was the leader, both emotional and strategic during the battle of Manhattan), but in the grand scheme of things, those are the roles the two of them have, and one of the main reasons why they are such a dangerous duo.
not going to lie i am kind of obsessed with annabeth at 12 years old watching one of those “is megalodon still out there?” bullshit ass documentaries and she wholeheartedly buys into it because she’s 12 and still thinks that if it airs on animal planet or the history channel it must be accurate, so she tells percy all about the totally real facts and figures and percy’s like “that’s bullshit. if we had giant sharks we’d know. that’s such bullshit” and there’s like….. you know how they canonically email each other when they’re not at camp? there’s like half the email dedicated to “here’s what i did this week” and then 15 paragraphs about their megalodon argument. neither of them do any research about it because annabeth thinks she’s done the research by watching the documentary, and percy is a) dyslexic, and as much as he wants to stick it to annabeth he will not be reading anything he does not have to, and b) why would he READ he can just ASK THE FUCKING SHARKS. but he’s stuck in NYC so he can’t ask any sharks until the summer, and the fact that percy is disagreeing with her means that annabeth is digging her heels into this argument and refusing to budge, so it’s a completely inane back and forth argument because both these 12 year olds are just making up their own arguments to try and own the other, and eventually percy defaults to going i am a SON of POSEIDON i think i KNOW A THING OR TWO ABOUT SHARKS i am BASICALLY KIND OF RELATED TO ALL SHARKS EVERYWHERE BECAUSE MY DAD MADE ALL OF THEM TOO SO SUCK IT. and then he hits send on that particular email and has an existential crisis because, if his dad is the ocean, and made all the things in the ocean, and also horses, are they all his siblings? or were the first ones of each species his siblings, and now it’s kind of questionable? how many genetic steps away is he from a fucking manta ray? he can’t ponder for long because sally reads his email to annabeth over his shoulder and grounds him for telling annabeth to suck it, and makes him write an apology email.
and then they get to camp and naturally the megalodon argument falls to the wayside because of the fact that percy and annabeth’s lives are a mcdonald’s playplace for gods and titans to do what they want. but i’d like to think during the downtime in sea of monsters, annabeth resurrects the argument and percy’s like I’M ASKING THE FUCKING SHARKS and marches to the bay and patiently waits for a shark to answer his I’m The Son Of Poseidon And I Have A Question call, and it does happen to be a traveling great white that answers. percy’s like “i’ve gotta win this argument please tell me megalodon is extinct” and after crossing the language barrier, the shark explains that yes, megalodon is extinct. they don’t call their ancestor sharks megalodon, sharks have their own words for their ancestor sharks, and because percy as tiny lord of the ocean is technically partially their god he gets to understand special shark language. but nobody else does, so when percy is explaining this interaction to annabeth and tries to repeat the shark-word for megalodon, he opens his mouth and makes a rumbling-clicking-bad-ear sound, and annabeth calls him a liar and swears he’s making up this entire shark interaction and he can’t prove anything. percy is so mad. he goes back to the ocean and talks to another shark because he’s like I’M RIGHT AND SHE WON’T LISTEN and this shark, a bull shark, helpfully suggests that cannibalism might be the answer, because he’s a shark. the conversation kind of devolved into percy nervously asking if all ocean life everywhere is technically related to him, and the bull shark is like no, no, no, that’s not how it works, son of poseidon. you’re not related to US. you’re related to the WATER. and the bull shark sounds so happy that he could help that percy just beams at him and goes “thanks!” even though internally he’s more confused than ever, and he has to sit at the bottom of the ocean having an existential crisis
cut to many years and near-death situations later, after percy’s gap….. years, in which he just did not care for the prospect of college, and annabeth kicking her own ass during undergrad and now moving on to graduate school (shhh the chases can afford it), percy’s wandered into a marine biology track. the megalodon argument has been buried by less fun arguments, like percy arguing that annabeth should help do his laundry because she pretty much only wears his clothes anyway. percy has made College Friends, and he’s really excited to introduce his beautiful, wonderful, best friend-girlfriend to his College Friends. annabeth starts the conversation by going “i think megalodon is still out there” and percy’s Marine Biology College Friends all turn to stare at percy while percy chokes on his own spit and tries (read: fails) to breathe
You ever think about how Grover and Percy have an empathy link and Annabeth is Percy’s mortality point and Annabeth wasn’t the kid Grover was meant to save but he chose to and something something divine connections cause I do
