AN: I haven't written a PJO fic before. And where's a better place to stab someone?:D

This is after Percy went to Camp Jupiter, therefore sans Curse of the River Styx. I hope you have your angst shoes on!

"Get out of here!" Percy is screaming.

Annabeth stumbles backwards. Right over her own two feet. She grips her dagger tight in her hand as she fights for her balance, waving her arms haphazardly this way and that. Jason catches her. He's retreating, too.

They're in the Labyrinth. It only makes since that this pivotal battle takes place here, seeing as how it is, loosely speaking, where everything became serious—real. Where Annabeth lost Percy the first time. Where she'd sworn she'd never lose him again.

The tunnel is essentially a sewer. Rusted metal walls, rancid water sitting stagnantly underfoot. Her boots stick in it, only slightly, but enough to slow her. And it's dark. So dark. Ironically—or not, depending on your definition—there is a light at the end of the tunnel. And they are running away from it.

That's where the monsters are coming from.

They aren't monsters, so to speak. They are, to her dismay, campers, from Camp Half Blood and Camp Jupiter. Under some kind of spell. They come in waves, brandishing swords of Celestial bronze with expertise. They've swiped her across her forehead and her thigh, but otherwise, she is free of injury.

Mainly because Jason and Percy are taking the brunt of the attack. Or, were. Now Jason is leading the way back to Camp Half Blood and Percy is picking up the rear, fending off foe/ally with his injured arm. A deep cut runs through the meat of his shoulder, but he is determined to not let it affect him. He swings with accuracy, aiming to disable, not kill.

Annabeth stands to the side of the tunnel and lets Jason, Frank, Hazel, Leo, and Piper pass so she can help Percy hold off the campers. She can tell he's tiring, and he's losing a lot of blood from his arm.

Another swarm of campers attacks and it's all Percy can do to keep them from passing. The tunnel is narrow, so it's relatively easy, but since he's trying to retreat, too, he continues to have to split his attention between fighting and running. He spots Annabeth, a streak of blonde in the dark, and yells at her, something she can't make out through the echoing clangs of metal on metal in the tunnel. She jogs to his side, regardless of what he said.

"We have to go!" she hollers, blocking blows with her knife. He succeeds to disarm most of the campers, and they take off after Jason and the rest, desperate to make it as far as possible while the flow of opponents is staunched. They get fifteen paces away from the exit when the monsters catch up to them. They manage to fight most of them off when a blade skims past Annabeth's side, sending a shrill pain up her side.

She puts her hand on the wound. A tiny, meaningless wound. Equivalent to a paper cut in the real world. But she lets her guard down.

A sword is stabbed her way.

Percy screams.

Annabeth closes her eyes, waiting for the pain;

Wait

Here it comes

Here it—

She hears a heavy sigh, then a shriek, a human, shrill, girl shriek.

She opens her eyes and sees Katie Gardner of Demeter cabin holding a sword.

A sword that goes through Percy's body.

Percy—blood—sword—"NO!" she cries, a terrible, desperate scream that reverberates through the tunnel like a horrible movie being played over and over again.

Percy lists forwards and Annabeth is there to catch him, pushing Katie out of the way. Percy is making some kind of gasping sound, his emerald eyes wide and terrified. She guides him to the ground, gently leaning him against the curved wall of the channel. The sword protrudes from his abdomen like some grotesque prop in a horror movie. The tip emerges from his back. His face is white, sweat shining on his forehead.

"Percy, stay with me," she pleads in a whisper. His eyes are trained straight ahead. She can't tell if he's heard her. She turns her attention to Katie, who apparently is in control of herself again. "We have to get him out of here. Now. You need to help me."

Katie nods. They each take one arm and pull it over their shoulders, dragging him out of the tunnel, through Zeus's Fist, and into the forest at Camp Half Blood. The moment they get Percy out Jason is heaving a boulder over the entrance, and Hazel is adding to the barricade with assorted gems that sprout from the ground like spring flowers.

Piper is first to notice Percy's condition—or at least react to it. "Oh my gods—! I'm going to get Chiron," she turns and darts out of the forest.

Jason hurries to Annabeth's aid, and together they carefully situate Percy against a tree. "We need to remove the blade," he decides.

Percy shakes his head, his eyes squeezed shut in pain. His breath is coming in short wheezes, like the air is snatching in his throat. "Too much—b-blood…"

The blade is moving with Percy's every gasp though; Jason is right. It will only make the wound worse to leave it in. Annabeth tells this to Percy, who nods reluctantly.

Jason proficiently straddles Percy's outstretched legs and takes hold of the hilt. He gives a swift tug and the blade comes cleanly out, but the momentum sends Percy forward, and he is too weak to catch himself. Jason stops him before he falls too far, letting Percy's jaw rest on his shoulder. Percy makes a heaving noise and then blood is spilling over his chin, staining his pale face a terrible crimson.

Jason leans Percy back up against the oak, and Percy moans. It's low and quiet, and Annabeth knows he regrets it. If Percy was showing signs of injury, they were in trouble.

She wipes the blood of his chin with her thumb and he smiles weakly at her, like she was just wiping at food he'd managed to get on him. His green eyes are rapidly fading.

"Whoops," he mutters.

Annabeth can't help it, she starts to cry. Tears trickle down her cheeks, but she's too proud to wipe them away.

Jason stands up and orders Piper, Hazel and Frank to go get help, now, and tells Katie to stay put. "We need to lay him down," he says to Annabeth, and, trusting his medical judgment, Annabeth helps him do so.

Jason turns to Percy. "So what happened, Perce?" he says casually as he uses Annabeth's knife to cut open Percy's shirt.

Percy shivers. His jaw is clenched so tight, Annabeth can't help but wonder what screams he's keeping back. "Annabeth—." He stops and chokes out a wet cough, like he's got pneumonia or something. Blood sprays onto his lips, and he licks them before he continues. "Annabeth was hurt a-and she was going to g-get stabbed so I took the blade for h-her." The short sentence seems to drain him.

Jason has balled up a dry portion of Percy's white shirt and is pressing it against the wound. Percy unwillingly cries out, pressing his head back into the moist grass below it. "Please stop," he whispers.

Annabeth can't imagine the agony Percy must be in to cause him—Percy Jackson, defender of Olympus, praetor of Camp Jupiter, leader of Camp Half Blood—to beg. She slides her hand into his, giving it a little squeeze. His skin is hot, clammy to the touch.

"Can't, Percy, we have to stop the bleeding," Jason says sympathetically. Annabeth is glad Jason is doing this, she would have broken down. She would have stopped.

Percy is fading, quickly. He looks at Jason, his face set the way it is when he's giving directions. "I-I need you to"—gasp—"keep an eye on the c-camps." He closes his eyes as a cough hit him, blood spurts from his lips. Annabeth's highly analytical mind is running an analysis, and it finally stops at a conclusion. Punctured lung. He is going to drown in his own blood! From the look on Jason's face, he's figured it out, too.

Jason rolls his eyes. "You're not going anywhere. Thanks for the advice, though."

Percy meets Jason's steady gaze with a wary one. "If anything happens… you know what to do."

Jason and Percy have only known each other for a few months, but the way they can communicate without talking freaks Annabeth out. They'd bonded like brothers over the past rigorous months.

Jason nods gravely. Just then, the rock concealing the entrance to the tunnels shifts, like someone is banging on it. He looks intently at Annabeth. "I need you to take over here." He hands her the bloody wad of cloth and leaps to his feet, running to secure the boulder.

Annabeth presses the cloth to Percy's stomach and, now uninhibited, he groans through his teeth. "Annabeth…"

She reflexively brushes his black bangs from where they stick on his forehead and tries to smile but it feels like a grimace. "I'm sorry, Seaweed Brain," she breathes.

He gives her a mockingly stern look. "I wouldn't ch—change it if I could, Wise Girl." He's struggling to breath, she can see it in the way his chest is rising and falling abnormally. Then his face is serious. "I love you, Annabeth."

A fresh round of tears pour from her eyes and she tosses the completely soaked cloth aside, tearing off a bit of her own shirt to replace it. "Don't say that, Perce, Chiron is on his way, everything is going to be fine." She says the last word with such vehemence that it sounds like she's praying.

Percy's eyes are closing and his breathing is growing agonizingly slow. "Stop being proud and just say it back," he whispers.

A choking sob emits from her, unprecedented, and she says through the tears and the pain, "I love you."

The words are salt in her mouth. She wants the spit the taste out, just get it out. It clashes with the bitter feeling in her stomach, the broken sound of her heart.

Percy smiles and stops breathing.

"Jason!" she cries, but he's busy keeping the boulder in place. She pumps on his chest, but all she gets is a lethargic resistance, like she's pressing on a bag of sludge. "Come on Seaweed Brain, breath!"

"Don't die, oh gods! Percy!"

"Jason!" she screams again, and he wedges a huge gold piece under the boulder. It would hold for now. Jason is at her side, executing CPR more efficiently than she could at the moment. Or maybe ever. She isn't exactly in the mood to analyze his technique.

There's the thunder of hooves on sediment and Chiron is there, Piper mounted on his back. Careful to not upset the situation, he approaches slowly, placing a gentle hand on Jason's shoulder. Jason doesn't stop, doesn't look up, doesn't acknowledge Chiron's presence. Doesn't acknowledge that it's too late.

"Son, it's time to stop," Chiron says softly. Annabeth whips around, eyes wide.

"Are you giving up?" she whispers, baffled.

Jason leaps to his feet and stumbles back suddenly, spooked. He's trips over his own two feet as he scrambles back, landing on his butt. He's shaking his head like maybe this vision in front of him will go away, that maybe his new best friend will get back up, tell him the joke's up, that he's on candid camera. Maybe he'll tell him he passed his training exercise, because that's all this was, just another dumb drill.

He doesn't.

There's a moment of realization and then Annabeth throws herself over Percy's body, wailing. Piper drops off of Chiron's back and kneels next to Annabeth, rubbing small circles on her back, not daring to make a sound.

Before dusk the news has spread through camp.

The mighty Perseus Jackson has fallen.