JASON
This was it. The final fight. While standing here, he realized that 'trying to stay alive and thinking of reaching in time' is all they had thought about. All along, he had never even thought about fighting Gaia if she ever woke up. According to him if she wakes game over. Now as he stood there, sword ready, to fight her, he realized how impossible this is gonna be.
But they all had done the impossible. Percy and Annabeth had gone to and fro Tartarus. Now they stood beside him on the left. Percy with Riptide, now glowing with the energy of gods and Annabeth with a dagger blazing with an owl symbol. Poseidon had added the power of oceans to riptide and Athena had given a new dagger to Annabeth. On the other side stood Piper, Hazel, Frank and Leo. Piper holding katoptris, Hazel with her spatha, Frank with new bow and arrows given him by Apollo himself. Leo had his jack hammer which he had put on fire just to look intimidating.
"Gaia, we can talk. Maybe you need sleep after all the efforts. You deserve a good night sleep to last for centuries." Said Piper. Her charmspeak was so good that even though it was not aimed at him and he had added wool in his ears which have a specialty of stopping charmspeak, he felt like he can talk to her for hours and then sleep with his arms around her.
Aphrodite had increased her charm and gave all of us wool. "You troublesome girl. You think you can charm me? You can do nothing but DIE!" just as she said it, a 10 meter wave of earth came hurtling towards them.
If not for Percy, Jason would have died then and there. Percy summoned a wave of water and deflected the earth. Unfortunately he was not able to summon a wave big enough to deflect the whole wave of earth. Jason, Percy, and Annabeth were saved but the other four…
There were no sign of them. "PIPER! NOOOOO!" He watched horror struck at the place where she had stood. When he looked back at Gaia, his rage exploded.
Annabeth
She couldn't believe how fast Percy had reacted. If not, they would be dead by now but she couldn't imagine what would happen to Hazel, Frank, Leo and Piper. What happened was too much even for her to comprehend.
Now all she could do was watch, as Jason ran towards Gaia who was on a floating land connected to the earth by roots. But when she saw a glint of smile on the face of Gaia, she snapped out of it. She saw what Gaia had planned. A bridge had formed between Gaia's land and the cliff but if you concentrated, it was just an image. Jason would die by falling off the cliff. "Jason, NOOOO!" Jason still ran forward as Annabeth watched in horror.
When the cliff came, what happened, no one would have expected. Jason jumped up, but was immediately surrounded by unnaturally thick clouds. Then it struck her, the clouds were solidifying into a chariot.
PIPER
She climbed out of the ground when Jason jumped from the cliff. When the wave had come, Hazel had created a dome covering with the help of mist and then opened a tunnel to get out.
Now she saw how Jason had transformed. The clouds solidified into a chariot. With horses which seemed to be made out of the sky itself. He even wore an armor which seemed to shine from many small dots. It was like the jacket with thousands of mini LEDs which her father had wore once, for a dance performance. Jason raced forward on his chariot, his sword now sparking with electricity.
He slashed at her, the electricity surging through her made her glow for a second. Jason summoned two venti which started biting her in the ankle and her head but one swing of her hand and both disappeared. The damage done by the shock was healing fast. If she heals so fast, Jason couldn't win.
Annabeth
When the shock had surged through Gaia, she thought they could win. But now as she healed so fast, Annabeth started to think that there was no hope… until she glanced at the roots that connected Gaia's island with land. It was constantly increasing and decreasing its width.
Realization struck her. Gaia healed when she was connected to the earth. These roots were providing the earth to heal her. They could win only if these are broken. "Percy! Attack the roots"
"Hmmmmm?"
"Jason can't win until the roots are broken." She held his sword hand towards the roots to break his wonder trance. Suddenly she felt the power of ocean. Riptide now had the power of ocean; Percy had the power of ocean. Now touching both, she felt like she is truly experiencing ocean for the first time. He can understand every fish, control every wave, shake the earth, and create cyclones…..
It was like she had completely understood Percy in that single millisecond. Percy snapped out of the trance and understood what she wanted to tell him. He said, "You cut these ones near you and I will cut the ones on the other side." And he jumped in water.
She ran towards the roots. They were completely made up of soil. She slashed with all her might, alert if some magical trap appears if anyone touches it. But when she hit it, it sent a shock through her body, it was that hard. She slashed again and again but the roots were really hard to break. When she finally was able to break one, two new shot out of the ground and tied her. They were dragging her to the ground and would have drowned her but suddenly flames erupted on her. She screamed but then realized that the flames were not harming her. They just dried the mud roots into plain soil. Leo came running towards her, his hand ablaze. "How….?" She asked. "How did you do it?" "Dad taught me some new tricks." Together they cut all four roots.
PERCY
The roots were no big deal. Like he says, "Noting is impossible if you have a hippocampus and a handy shark" just some slicing and then using water to dissolve the ones that attack him. He went back to Annabeth.
Suddenly Jason let out a war cry and blasted a lightning towards Gaia. It was so powerful that half of her island was blown to bits. She was smoking but still smiled.
That evil grin was the one that differentiated good guys and bad guys to him whenever he watched a film. "Jason Grace," she said. "Do you think these attacks do anything to me? You are just a demigod and I am the primordial goddess of earth. The most ancient goddess. Fight as much as you want, but I will heal. I AM IMMORTAL!"
Then she noticed that she was no more healing. She looked down to see all the roots broken. "No! This cannot be. I can't be beaten. I am the greatest…"
That was it Jason raced his chariot towards her. Jumped from his chariot and yelled "die Gaia" in a voice that was so full of anger that it almost seemed to belong to someone else. There was a flash of light and an ear popping boom.
PIPER
In the haze she saw something falling down. No wait, it wasn't something, it was Jason. "Everybody see. Jason is falling. Help him."
Only afterwards she realized that she was charmspeaking which is what made the others act so fast and in such a harmony. Frank turned to a hawk and caught Jason but since Jason was at such a high speed, it only made the fall slower. Then let him go once the speed lowered a bit. He was falling when suddenly a wave of water, hit Jason and sent him flying upwards. Then a large pit was made by Hazel and a net was made by Annabeth and Leo which held Jason above the pit.
He was lying there, bleeding from many cuts but none of them looked deep. He was unconscious. Piper was heartbroken. She couldn't think of what to do. All she did was screaming his name and hugging him. He still smelled the same like when they had a date on top of Cabin 1. He couldn't be gone. The fates can't be cruel enough to separate them. This is all she thought. She only let go Jason when Will said that he could be alive and may get cured.
JASON
Jason didn't know that it has been 2 weeks since the fight with Gaia. He lay there, unconscious but alive. He woke up sometimes but was not even able to open his eyes. All he could do was listen to the voices around him, smell the sickbed and taste whatever medicine had been rubbed in his mouth. Usually no voices were around him, the bed smelled like stale bread and his mouth usually tasted like he has eaten a mix of saw dust, sand and chili sauce.
Once he was happy when he heard his friends. It was Annabeth speaking, "…so that is how all the realization about Percy and ocean struck me and all in a millisecond. And Percy, how were you able to react so quick, to the sand wave."
"Oh, you mean the sand tsunami thingy? Well you see since we fell into Tartarus, my senses around liquids have increased. Now it's not just the oceans, where I feel the thermal currents and all but if I concentrate, I can easily feel them around me." Percy spoke.
"Well tartarus had its own rules like drinkable fire, so you could also control liquids other than water. I guess you have retained this ability even when back to earth."
"Yeah. So what happened is that before the wave the ground moved slightly backward just like water does before a big wave. So I felt it and got to know what will happen. It also happened in Tartarus when Arachne came back to attack. She had stepped on a vein thus disturbing the flow. That is how I was able to react and kill it."
And then Jason drifted off to sleep again.
JASON
When he finally woke up for good, it took some time to remember how to speak, and even more time to make his body sit up. By the looks of his it seemed like he was bed ridden for a whole month. Just when he was about to try standing, an Apollo kid came in. when he saw him sitting, he ran out screaming, "JASON IS AWAKE! JASON IS AWAKE" soon the whole crowd of camp half blood had accumulated outside the Apollo cabin. But Chiron sent them away saying that Jason need to rest and he won't be able to handle such a crowd.
Jason was very happy to see his teacher back and saw that Chiron was happy too. But there was something else too. Not only happiness or relief, but there was pride. Jason stared in amazement. Chiron was proud of him. The trainer of earlier Jason, Perseus, Achilles, Hercules, Asclepius and even Dionysus was proud of him! That itself was worth more than a hundred gifts. Then came the other six Argonauts; Percy, Leo, Annabeth, Frank, Piper and Hazel. He was so happy to see all of them. Then piper kissed him and told how worried she had been all these days when he was in coma. According to them he had been out for 3 weeks. Annabeth said, "How did you do that? I mean, how were you able to kill Gaia.
"I don't know, I was just really angry when I thought that she had killed Piper." He said. "And Frank, Hazel and Leo" he added quickly. "So I just attacked her with lightning and all."
"You didn't realize that you were on a chariot made out of clouds with horses mad of sky, did you" Percy asked.
"What are you talking about?" he asked.
"He is saying the truth, Jason. We all saw that." Piper replied.
"What? I mean how can it happen. I don't know how to do it." He said. Annabeth was staring at him. She was in deep thought. He had always marveled about Annabeth's vast knowledge and how she had answer to almost any question. Annabeth asked him, "When you were fighting, was there any other voice that you heard? Anything unfamiliar?"
"Nope, just my mind yelling 'DIE'. I was really, really angry at that time.
She looked at Chiron who slightly nodded his head. There was something that they knew and were not sharing with him or others.
Piper said, "Jason, when you were in that armor, on the chariot, you looked so, so powerful. The armor was shining with many small dots."
"Twinkling." Annabeth said, "It was twinkling."
JASON
He was confused and scared like hell. He had done thing above the capability of any demigod. He needed answers. "Annabeth, please tell me what all is this." Jason pleaded.
"Jason," Annabeth said, "Not even Zeus can conjure a chariot by solidifying clouds. Only one god has the capability, or had the capability. The one who had faced the same fate as Kronos…"
"Oh my god! You don't mean Uranus?" Hazel exclaimed.
Chiron rose up from his wheel chair and said, "Ouranos, yes. The former god of the sky." He let that sink in. Jason's whole body was numb and it did not have anything to do with the fact that he was sick.
"Ouranos had given some of his powers to Jason along with his chariot and armor. It would have taken centuries for him to accumulate enough of his consciousness and power to beat Gaia."
"How? I mean why? I mean, it couldn't have been Ouranos, like, couldn't the gods have been helping?" Jason asked. For once he was completely at loss of words.
He had never thought of something so powerful to be on his side. Sometimes he thought that even some gods are not on his side. Like, the primordial god of sky, one of the oldest gods, not just noticed him but trusted Jason so much as to give him all the power Ouranos had accumulated over the millennia. He trusted that Jason would be able to avenge him. He suspected that even Zeus didn't trust him so much.
Percy said, "Man, I've had an encounter with Nyx, as well as I have seen the power of gods when I fought Ares. This was something way above gods, even more powerful than titans or giants. This can only be a Primordial."
Just then there was a rumble in the sky. It was as marvelous. The winds and the clouds seem to make sounds in harmony. The clouds were cracking to produce a long sound like 'Hhhhheeeeeeeeyyyyy' followed by a serpent like sssssss from the winds and then a sound like 'Ruuuuun'.
"The sky is saying something." Said Annabeth "It says aye-ssssssss-un. No wait, it is 'Jason'. Yep it is Jason."
The sound came again. This time it was clearer.
JA…SSSSS…SON
THE END