Prologue
Sara died.
She had accepted her fate months ago, with her grad project gone wrong, and the radiation killing her cells slowly. Before losing her mobility, she had said her goodbyes, finished her projects, and seen that the unfinished ones went to capable hands. Her death was peaceful.
However, any amount of peace couldn't stop her from panicking right now because she was smelling purple, hearing fluffy, and seeing colors she didn't know existed. In between this, Sara momentarily saw images that she was sure weren't from her own memory: a washerman at a river shore in what appeared to be the ancient Han period, people teleporting in metal pods, a panther ready to pounce on her, a medieval-looking castle being burned, machines she didn't recognize, a ship being attacked by a giant octopus. She couldn't move an inch. She wasn't even sure she had the body that she was trying to move. She had expected everything to end, for her consciousness to stop existing, this was not it. She was floating, or tumbling, she wasn't sure.
Gradually, everything faded. She couldn't see or hear anything, the purple smell was gone. The state lasted for hours, or years, or a few seconds; Sara wasn't sure.
Then she was breathless, and being squished. She slid into gigantic hands, and everything was light. She sucked in the deepest breath she could fill her lungs with, and it felt like she was hit by the bus. She started crying, and it sounded like a - baby? Oh hell no, she was NOT going to be a baby. She was being wrapped tightly in some towels, and even with her blurry baby eyes, she could make out the outline of a hospital room. Yes, she was definitely a baby. She cried harder. The not-giant hands handed her to another pair of not-giant hands, and all the exhaustion kicked in.
"Oh my sweet little bunch, Mamma loves you Annabeth!"
Sara - no, Annabeth made the wise decision to go to sleep and deal with any problems later.
*****
In the last few months, Annabeth - it took some time to get used to her new name - had concluded that she was born in Britain, in the year 1979, to a family that seemed fairly rich and included her mother, her father, and an 8-year-old brother.
She was a fast-learning baby. That was what adults around her would often say. The baby in question, however, had unfair advantage that she decided must remain a secret. It was not easy to become proficient in her locomotive skills again, without her brain already hardwired to react to things instinctively, but babies had a lot of time when not trying to figure out why the floor feels cold, and Annabeth made good use of it. By the age of 7 months, she had retaught herself to move her limbs on command, to control her facial expression, and to read; the last of which she made sure didn't become obvious to people around her.
Annabeth still had nothing to do - babies did nothing - which gave her plenty of time to think about her situation. She was in the past. Could she change the timeline so that she doesn't die in her past life? Will there even be a Sara in this world? Did Annabeth exist in her previous life? What if she changes something that leads to a paradox? Was it even the same universe?
After a few weeks of fretting about the nature of space-time, (and pulling facial expressions that had her parents constantly checking her diapers - which were obviously clean because the next thing she had done after relearning to read was to make her poop-cycle regular - and led to two trips to the hospital only for Mr. and Mrs. Hitchens to conclude that they had a healthy and weird daughter), Annabeth decided that she will not worry about reality crumbling down to sand. With so many people dying and being born every day, she couldn't be the only reincarnated person. Maybe they had decided to keep quiet like her, or maybe no one had believed them, or maybe some of those children claiming to remember their past lives weren't lying. If the universe had to explode, it would have done so ages ago. She should focus on living her new life.
The UK was a fine place. The 1980s weren't exactly ideal, but she could have done worse. Her family was nice, she had even grown attached to them. Her parents seemed well-to-do enough to send both their kids to some posh British boarding school, see them through college, and still have a comfortable retirement.
Yes, Annabeth could live this new life.