PERCY

~•♡•~

percy was literally fighting twin giants with the roman god of wine, bacchus, watching them with a bunch of ghosts in the colosseum. nico di angelo was literally trying to figure out where the hades he was, jason grace was running around like a madman, and piper mclean probably had a dislocated shoulder.

still, aruna rodrigo looked like absolute shit.

even from the ground, with water swirling all around him as he fought, and the argo II was up in the sky, he could see her. she was limping, clutching at her hip weirdly. the entire left swide of her face was swollen, and she hadn't bothered putting any sort of bandages on. dried blood stained her chin, lips, nose, cheek, and shirt. her left eye was swollen shut and her right arm grabbed her left side, so clearly, whoever had beat the hera out of her, had mainly focused on one side. her right cheek was scraped and her arm had a small cut, but otherwise, she looked fine. but one whole half of her body was turning ugly shades of blue, purple. black, green, yellow, and red.

she screamed something loudly as she peered over the edge, but over all the noise, percy couldn't decipher her. percy wondered if she was even speaking english. from what annabeth had said, the girl spoke so many languages, she got them mixed up. and with a beating like that, she must have been concussed, which only added to the fact that she was probably not speaking a lick of sense.

she yelled again, cupping her hands over her mouth.

okay, that was definitely not a language percy knew. he wasn't as good at greek as annabeth was, and he spoke some spanish (he lived in manhattan of all places. of course he knew spanish), but not a single thing that girl was saying sounded familiar. her silver eyes were wide and manic and she continued to speak before leo valdez appeared behind her, grabbing her right shoulder and turning her around.

"ENGLISH, MOTHERFUCKER! DO YOU SPEAK IT?!" he screamed at her. aruna said something to him and flicked his forehead before looking back down to percy.

"GREEK FIRE! TAKE COVER!" aruna screamed. then, she turned back to leo, and yelled at him angrily as she hobbled around the deck.

from the lake, otis yelled, trying to warn his brother, but his half-dissolved face could only manage: "uh-unmh-moooo!"

"don't worry, brother!" ephialtes said, his eyes fixed on the demigods below. "i will make them suffer!"

the argo II turned in the sky, presenting its port side, and green fire blew out of the ballista.

"actually," percy grinned. "look behind you."

he and jason rolled away as ephialtes turned and bellowed in disbelief. percy dropped into a trench right as the explosion rocked the area.

when he climbed out again, the argo II was coming in for a landing. as it got lower and lower, he could hear leo and aruna having an intense argument in spanish, but they were going so fast, percy barely understood when they said each others names. he shook his head and refocused on the arena.

jason poked his head out from a makeshift bomb shelter of a plastic horse. ephialtes lay charred and groaning on the arena floor, the sand around him seared in a halo of glass made from the heat of the greek fire. otis was floundering in the lake, trying to re-form, but from the arms down he looked like a puddle of burnt oatmeal.

percy staggered over to jason and clapped him on the shoulder. the ghostly crowd gave them a standing ovation as the argo II extended its landing gear and settled on the arena floor. hazel and frank stood close to the side, grinning down at their friends. coach hedge danced around the firing platform, pumping his fist in the air and yelling, "that's what i'm talking about!"

at the helm, leo stood cranking levers and pressing all sorts of buttons, while simultaneously yelling at aruna. they both talked over each other, though leo seemed a little disinterested. nonetheless, he fought back.

percy squinted his eyes at them. annabeth claimed they were in love and didn't know it yet, but percy didn't understand how. leo and aruna seemed to differentiate and argue about pretty much anything- she was cold, he was hot. she was pessimistic, leo always stayed positive. she was confrontational, leo seemed to stick to the sidelines (except when he blew up new rome).

he tried to ignore their yelling as he turned to the emperor's box, where bacchus sat. "well?" he yelled, throwing his hands out. "was that entertaining enough for you, you wine-breathed little sh-"

"no need for that." suddenly the god was standing right next to him in the arena. he brushed dorito dust off his purple robes. "i have decided you are worthy partners for this combat."

"partners?" jason growled. "you did nothing!"

"HIJO DE PUTO!"

"¡NO LLAMES PUTA A MI MADRE!"

"¡YO NO ESTABA HABLANDO DE ELLA!"

bacchus looked towards the ship angirly. "excuse me!" he called out. "shut up!"

leo and aruna froze before whipping their heads to bacchus, their face full of anger.

"DON'T TELL HER TO SHUT UP!"

"DON'T TALK TO HIM LIKE THAT!"

bacchus looked taken back until aruna and leo went back to yelling at each other. bacchus just rolled his eyes and brushed it off.

"i thought about making those two crazy, but someone beat me to it." he grunted. bacchus then walked to the edge of the lake. the water instantly drained, leaving an otis-headed pile of mush. bacchus picked his way to the bottom and looked up at the crowd. he raised his thyrsus (a pinecone stick).

the crowd jeered and hollowed and pointed their thumbs down. percy had never been sure if it mean live or die. he'd heard it both ways.

bacchus chose the more entertaining option. he smacked otis's head with his pinecone staff, and he giant pile of otismeal disintegrated completely.

the crowd went wild. bacchus climbed out of the lake and strutted over to ephialtes, who was still lying eagle-spread, overcooked, and smoking.

again, bacchus raised his stick.

"DO IT!" the crowd roared.

"YOU'RE JUST A LITTLE BITCH!"

"FUCK YOU!"

evidently, they'd switched over to english. percy thought that meant they ran out of spanish curses.

"DON'T DO IT!" ephialtes wailed.

bacchus did it. he tapped the giant on the nose, and ephialtes disintegrated.

the crowd cheered and threw spectral confetti as bacchus strode around the stadium with his arms raised triumphantly, exulting in the worship. percy rolled his eyes and looked towards leo and aruna. leo now had his full attention on the arguement.

bacchus grinned at the demigods and percy refocused. "that, my friends, is a show! and of course i did something. i killed two giants!"

percy's friends disembarked on the ship, with leo and aruna trailing slightly behind, still yelling. hazel and frank looked annoyed, but otherwise, they seemed alright. piper and nico struggled down from the emperor's box as the colosseum's magical renovations began to turn to mist. the arena floor remained solid, but otherwise the stadium looked as if it hadn't hosted a good giant killing for eons.

"well," bacchus said. "that was fun. you have my permission to continue your voyage."

"you permission?" percy snarled, his lip curled as he lowered his head.

"yes." bacchus raised an eyebrow at percy before looking beyond hazel and frank to aruna and leo. they had stopped midway on the gangplank, still yelling at each other in english. "could they not? what's happening anyway?"

"he's a controlling... b-word." hazel frowned. "and she's... a ridiculous c-word. and then a whole bunch of other things."

"no- i don't care what insults they use." bacchus clarified. "why did... this start?"

"yeah, i'm curious too." jason frowned.

"something..." hazel faltered and looked to frank, who just shrugged helplessly.

"she didn't... he was..." hazel stomped her foot and shook her head. "i don't even know!"

"whatever." bacchus brushed off. he waved his hand and suddenly, a grape vine lashed out at the two. aruna and leo screamed as the vine pressed them together and dragged them to bacchus, holding them upside down in the air.

"dude!" aruna choked. "i got broken ribs!"

"man, go easy on her! she just got the shit beaten out of her!"

"uh-huh." another vine wrapped around their mouths, muffling them. bacchus turned back to percy and sighed.

"as i said, i give you permission to continue." bacchus said. "although, your voyage might be harder than you expect, son of neptune."

"poseidon." percy corrected immediately. "what do you mean about my voyage?"

"you might try the parking lot behind the emmanuel building." bacchus said instead. "best place to break through. now, good-bye, my friends. and, ah, good luck with that other little matter." he frowned and then glanced at leo and aruna, who were staring at each other angrily. "and... whatever these two have... invest in muzzles, for sure."

the god disappeared in a cloud of mist that smelled of grape juice. with that, so did the vines that held leo and aruna, and they dropped to the ground like stones.

"ah! son of a bitch!"

"oh, you are still on that?!"

"i wasn't talking to you!"

coach hedge trotted up to everyone as percy and jason pulled aruna and leo to their feet. aruna cried out in pain and winced as percy set her on her feet. up close, she looked even worse. her cheeks and eyes were sunken in, her eyes bloodshot and... yellow? somehow? and her skin was sickly sweaty.

"good gods, what happened?" percy gaped.

"was that dionysus?" hedge asked. "i love that guy!"

"you're alive!" percy said to the others. "the giants said you were captured. what happened?"

leo shrugged. "oh, just another brilliant plan by leo valdez. you'd be amazed what you can do with an archimedes sphere, a girl who can sense stuff underground, a weasel, and an overall useless girl with very unhelpful words."

"i was the weasel." frank said glumly.

"leo, you just never know when to shut up, do you?"

"oh, well, excuse me for actually telling the truth!" leo shot back. he turned to percy and his face went back to normal. "basically, i activated a hydraulic screw with the archimedes device- which is going to be awesome once i install it onto the ship, by the way. hazel sensed the easiest path to drill to the surface. we made a tunnel big enough for a weasel-"

"using my weapons." aruna gritted.

"and your lack of know-how." leo hissed. "anyways, frank turned into a weasel and climbed up with a simple transmitter i had slapped together. after that, it was just a matter of hacking into coach hedge's favorite satellite channels and telling him to bring the ship around to rescue us. aruna was very helpful in holding onto a little sword and telling me, 'nO yOu'Re DoInG iT WrOnG pEnDeJo!' like i don't know my way around a machine-"

"unnecessary." percy interjected. he understood about ten percent of leo's story and about no percent why he and aruna were so mad at each other, but he decided it was enough to move on. "where's annabeth?"

aruna's looked down to her feet and leo winced. "yeah, about that... she's still in trouble, we think. hurt, broken leg, maybe- at least according to this vision gaea showed us. rescuing her is our next stop."

two seconds before, percy had been ready to collapse. now, adrenaline surged through his body, reinvigorating everything that had been worn down before. he wanted to strangle leo and ask why the ship hadn't sailed off to rescue annabeth first, but he thought that might be a little ungrateful.

and besides, aruna seemed to pick up on his desires. she death glared him like she would go toe-to-toe with him in combat if he bothered touching leo, which, again, was excruciatingly ironic.

"tell me about the vision." percy said to aruna. "tell me everything."

the floor shook. for the first time percy had ever seen, aruna's balance gave out, and she nearly toppled over. leo caught her and helped her stand up before letting her go immediately. the wooden planks began to disappear, spilling sand into the pits of the hypogeum below.

"let's talk on board." hazel said. "while we still can."

~•♡•~

they sailed out of the colosseum and veered south over the rooftops of rome.

all around the piazza del colosseo, traffic had come to a standstill. a crowd of mortals had gathered, probably wondering about the strange lights and sounds that had come form the ancient ruins. as far as percy could see, none of the giants' spectacular plans for destruction had come off successfully. rome looked the same as before. no one seemed to notice the huge greek trireme in the sky.

the demigods gathered at the helm. jason bandaged piper's sprained shoulder while hazel sat at the stern, feeding nico ambrosia. the son of hades could barely life his head. he spoke so quietly, hazel had to lean in whenever he did.

aruna sat a few feet off from them. so far, percy hadn't seen her intake a single ounce of nectar or ambrosia. he had seen her take three ibuprofen, and claim she'd be fine. percy stood next to her, and he could hear how shallow her breaths were. sight alone proved how much blood she'd lost.

he didn't bother telling her to take something. if she refused, percy wasn't going to bother. he doubted anyone could actually make her do something.

annabeth could.

he brushed it away.

frank and leo recounted what had happened in the room with the archimedes spheres, and the visions gaea had showed them in the bronze mirror. when frank explained why aruna looked so terrible, everyone except leo stared at her with sympathy. instead, leo kept his sad gaze on his control panel.

"guys, i'm fine." aruna assured. "i drank some water. i'll be fine."

"that may work for percy, but not you." piper said sadly.

"gimme a tic-tac and i'll be okay." aruna said. percy took note of how she moved so slightly, clearly displaying how hurt she was.

"if you would just listen to me every once in a while..." leo mumbled.

"shut up."

"uh-huh."

"where did this come from?" percy finally asked. "you have been fighting nonstop for like, forever now-"

"it's been like, ten minutes." leo snorted.

"-which is funny, because before we all left, you were clinging to each other!"

"that was different." aruna pointed out. "that was when leo wasn't being a controlling fuck-"

"oh, well, i'm sorry if trying to keep you alive is a crime!"

"if i say i'm fine, I'M FINE!"

frank cleared his throat. "i am like, 87% certain your liver got nuked."

"but there's still 13%." aruna pointed out. "trust me, i am fine. i will live, i'll be okay, we'll save annabeth, and then leo and i will yell in private to spare you guys."

"aruna, just-"

"private!"

leo whispered under his breath, "fucking son of a bitch, so fucking annoying all the fucking time." as he went back to the control panel.

after that, the demigods were able to quickly decide that their best lead for finding annabeth was the cryptic advice bacchus had given them; the emmanuel building, whatever that was. frank started typing at the helm's computer while leo furiously tapped at his controls, mutters, "emmanuel building, emmanuel building..." coach hedge tried to help by wrestling with an upside-down street map of rome.

percy knelt next to piper and jason. "how's the shoulder?"

piper smiled. percy harbored no attraction to her- his type was more murderous blondes- but piper's smile made just about everyone's heart stop. "it'll heal. both of you did great."

jason elbowed percy. "not a bad team, you and me."

"better than jousting in a kansas cornfield." percy agreed.

"there it is!" leo cried, pointing at his monitor. "frank, you're amazing! i'm setting course!"

frank hunched his shoulders. "i just read the name off the screen. some chinese tourist marked it on google maps."

aruna grinned. "he reads chinese!"

frank blushed. "just a tiny bit."

"how cool is that?!" leo gushed.

"guys." hazel broke in. "i hate to interrupt your admiration session, but you should hear this."

she helped nico to his feet. he'd always been pale, but now his skin looked like powdered milk. his dark, sunken eyes reminded percy of photos he'd seen of liberated prisoners-of-war, which percy supposed nico basically was.

"thank you." nico rasped. his dark eyed darted nervously around the group. "i'd... given up hope."

aruna limped forward, holding out a fresh water bottle. nico stared at it for a minute before his weak hand reached out, gratefully taking it.

the past week or so, percy had imagined a lot of things he might say to nico when they met again, but the guy looked so frail and sad, percy couldn't muster much anger.

he looked at aruna. her eyes were downcast and sad as she limped back to where she had previously been standing. nico drank a few sips of the water before removing it from his lips, almost like his organs had shrunk so much, he couldn't possibly intake any more.

as percy studied aruna, he wondered why she'd seemed so drawn to nico, so attached. it didn't seem to be an attraction thing, but he did notice the way she stood up for him so strongly, the way she was being more gentle to him now than percy had really ever seen her be to anyone else. from what he had gathered, aruna wasn't really friends with him.

percy turned back to nico. "you knew about the two camps all along. you could have told me who i was the first day i arrived at camp jupiter, but you didn't."

nico slumped against the helm. "percy, i'm sorry. i discovered camp jupiter last year. my dad led me there, though i wasn't sure why. he told me the gods had kept the camps separate for centuries and that i couldn't tell anyone. the time wasn't right. but he said it would be important for me to know..." he doubled over in a fit of coughing.

hazel held his shoulders until he could stand again.

"i-i thought dad meant because of hazel." nico continued. "that i'd need a safe place to take her. but now... i think he wanted me to know about both camps so i'd understand how important your quest was, and so i'd search for the doors of death."

the air turned electric- literally, as jason started throwing off sparks. aruna yelped as one stung her hand and jason looked at her apologetically.

"dude, chill." leo grunted.

percy looked to nico. "did you find the doors?"

nico nodded. "i was a fool. i thought i could go anywhere in the underworld, but i walked right into gaea's trap. i might as well have tried running from a black hole."

"um..." frank chewed his lip. "what... what kind of black hole are we talking about?"

nico started to speak, but whatever he needed to say must have been too terrifying. he turned to hazel.

she put her hand on her brother's arm. "nico told me that the doors of death have two sides- one in the mortal world, one in the underworld. the mortal side of the portal is in greece. it's heavily guarded by gaea's forces. that's where they brought nico back into the upper world. then they transported him to rome."

piper must have been nervous, because her cornucopia spit out a cheeseburger. aruna began to reach for it, but shook her head.

at that, leo looked immensely worried. he turned to percy with wide eyes, who could only put a finger to his lips.

"where exactly in greece is this doorway?" piper asked.

nico took a rattling breath. "the houses of hades. it's an underground temple in epirus. i can mark it on a map, but- but the mortal side of the portal isn't the problem. in the underworld, the doors of death are in... in..."

a cold pair of hands did the itsy-bitsy spider up percy's back.

a black hole. an inescapable part of the underworld where even nico di angelo couldn't go. why hadn't percy thought of it before? he'd been to the very edge of that place. he still had nightmares about it.

"tartarus." he guessed. "the deepest part of the underworld."

evidently, everyone was terrified. leo patted out smoke on his arm, and piper's cornucopia spat out muffin as it started to float towards aruna the way percy had seen things do on spaceships.

nico nodded. "they pulled me into the pit, percy. the things i saw down there..." his voice broke.

hazel pursed her lips. "no mortal has ever been to tartarus." she explained. "at least, no one has ever gone in and returned alive. it's the maximum security prison of hades, where the old titans and the other enemies of the gods are bound. it's where all monsters go when they die on the earth. it's... well, no one knows exactly what it's like."

her eyes drifted to her brother. the rest of her thought didn't need to be spoken: nobody except nico.

aruna held out nico's black sword, her own arm shaking. nico nodded in thanks as he took it, and leaned on it like an old man's cane. "now i understand why hades hasn't been able to close the doors." he said. "even the gods don't go into tartarus. even the god of death, thanatos himself, wouldn't go near that place."

"then, i'm confused." leo said. "if it's the home of titans... what about aruna's mom?"

"selene didn't fight with the titans." aruna explained easily. "in either titan war. in the first one, she and her siblings, helios and eos, took a step back and remained neutral because it meant they could keep their spots as the moon, sun, and dawn. it wasn't until artemis and apollo were born and became olympians that they stepped back. after that, they were worshipped less, and lost power. so, in the second titan war, even if they wanted to join a side, they were too weak to."

percy nodded. "actually, in the last war, there were several titans that just... didn't participate. at all. i don't know if they were weak or just indifferent, but annabeth mentioned titans like themis who just stepped to the side, not siding with anyone."

"themis? isn't that the mother of achilles?" piper squinted.

"no, that's thetis." aruna corrected. "themis is the titan goddess of law and justice. thetis is a sea nymph."

"i hate greek naming systems." jason groaned.

leo snorted. "because sextus and quintus and octavian are better? thosr are fucking numbers, dude."

"none of that matters right now." aruna huffed, but she looked amused. "what matters is our quest just went from a hundred percent hard to like, a thousand percent hard. i mean... i've had dreams of tartarus before and those were bad. but... in reality..."

leo glanced at her quickly before turning to the rest of the group. "so let me guess. we'll have to go down there, since even the gods don't want to."

nico shook his head. "it's impossible. i'm the son of hades, and even i barely survived. gaea's forces overwhelmed me instantly. they're so powerful down there... no demigod would stand a chance. i almost went insane."

nico's eyes looked like shattered glass. percy wondered if something inside him had broken permanently. he remembered on his first quest when grover was nearly dragged to the pit- how terrifying it was just to be near it, to feel the hot breath of evil coursing your entire body. but for nico di angelo to go entirely by himself...

"then we'll sail for epirus." percy said. "we'll just close the gates on this side."

"i wish it were that easy." nico said, his face hollow. "the doors would have to be controlled on both sides to be closed. it's like a double seal. maybe, just maybe, all eight of you working together could defeat gaea's forces on the mortal side, at the house of hades. but unless you had a team fighting simultanously on the tartarus side, a team powerful enough to defeat a legion of monsters in their home territory-"

"there has to be a way." jason said.

nobody volunteered any brilliant ideas.

percy thought his stomach was sinking. then he realized the entire ship was descending toward a big building like a palace.

annabeth. nico's news was so horrible percy had momentarily forgotten his girlfriend was still in danger, which made him feel incredibly guilty.

"we'll figure out the tartarus problem later." he said. "is that the emmanuel building?"

leo nodded. "bacchus said something about the parking lot in the back? well, there it is. what now?"

percy remembered his dream of the dark chamber, the evil buzzing voice of the monster called her ladyship. he remembered how shaken annabeth had looked when she'd come back from fort sumter after her encounter with the spiders. percy had begun to suspect what might be down in that shrine... literally, the mother of all spiders. if he was right, and annabeth had been trapped down there alone with this creature for hours, her leg broken... at this point, he didn't care if her quest was supposed to solo or not.

"we have to get her out." he said simply.

"well, duh." leo agreed. "but, uh..."

he looked like he wanted to say, what if we're too late?

"bacchus mentioned breaking through." aruna said. "and we know annabeth is underground. naturally, our only obstacle at the moment is a parking lot."

percy turned to coach hedge. "coach, you still have ammo for those ballistae?"

the satyr grinned like a wild goat.

"i thought you'd never ask."

~•♡•~