The Doors of Death
There they were. The Doors of Death. They had made it. There it was, standing in all its might and doom. It was oozing of death. The five of the seven and Nico all felt chills going down their spines. Nothing could have prepared them for this sight. No monsters, Gods or even titans were as scary as this.
It wasn't the doors themselves that scared them. They looked pretty normal, really. They were double doors and about 9 feet tall. They had faced enemies larger than this. After all, it was just a door-opening, right?
Wrong. The doors weren't scary in themselves. They were simply made of wood. It was the sounds, the smell and the bad feeling they all got in their guts when standing in front of it. They all had some kind of idea of what was hiding inside those doors.
The sounds were coming from the dead. After listening for a while they realized they were screams. Cries for help. And the smell... it was the smell of death. Something Nico was familiar with.
"So far, so good, right?" Leo finally said. He was trying to lighten up the mood, as always, to make the others feel better. It usually worked. But not this time. Nothing could make them feel better, while standing in front of the Doors of Death. It felt like it was draining them, sucking all the happiness and hope out of them, leaving them with nothing but the despair, guilt and the feeling of hopelessness, that they had tried oh-so hard to bury . Making them want to give up. But they couldn't. They could not give up now. No way.
"So what do we do now?" Piper finally managed to ask.
Jason was about to answer, when suddenly they noticed two silhouettes coming from the door. As they got closer, they were finally able to recognize them.
"Oh my god. It's Percy and Annabeth!" Hazel cried out in joy. They all ran to meet them in front of the doors. When Percy and Annabeth finally got through the doors, they collapsed on the floor.
Piper quickly got some nectar out of her backpack, and started feeding it in small bites to them. Meanwhile the others helped and examined their wounds. They didn't find anything fatal. Nevertheless, they looked battered and wrecked, as if they hadn't slept properly for months – which, in hindsight, they probably hadn't.
Finally, when the color started to return to their faces, Frank and Jason lifted them up and moved them further away from the doors. No one wanted to go near them.
"The doors…" Percy finally managed to stammer out.
"What about them?" Frank asked with a frown. Annabeth and Percy had finally managed to escape, why did they want to go back?
"They aren't closed yet," Annabeth joined in. She had clearly regained her breath faster than Percy, "someone needs to close them."
The hall turned silent. Piper's hand, filled with nectar, halted midair. "What?" she finally managed to ask, after opening and closing her mouth repeatedly.
"They have to be closed from the inside," Percy explained, now rejoining the conversation.
"But how?" Piper asked, sounding frustrated. They all were. They had finally gotten Percy and Annabeth back, how could they possibly send one of their teammates in to close it?
"Isn't it obvious?" Leo suddenly asked. "One of us has to enter."
Suddenly an argument broke out in the group. Everyone was angry. Jason and Nico were arguing with Piper and Frank about what they should do, whilst Hazel tried to get more information out of a clearly tired Percy and Annabeth. Leo simply stood there. No one seemed to notice that he hadn't joined the conversation. Everyone was too caught up in arguing.
Leo shrugged and left the group. He went up to the doors to examine them. It wasn't by choice, but he was a mechanic after all. There must be some way to close the door… some kind of machine, he thought to himself. But this wasn't just a simple machine to fix. This was magic. It had existed in thousands, if not millions, of year. There was no machine that could fix this. There was only one thing to be done, Leo realized.
"I'll do it," Leo said. When no one heard, he repeated it louder. Suddenly the arguing stopped and everyone turned their heads and looked at Leo.
"What? No way!" Jason sounded furious.
"It only makes sense," Leo explained, "you have Piper. There's no way in Zeus' name that Percy and Annabeth are going back in. Hazel and Frank have each other. And Nico is the son of Hades, there's no way he'll survive it. But me? What am I? I'm just the mechanic," Piper gasped when she realized he was quoting her, "I'm not important. You'll be fine without me. I'm Leo Valdez, right? I'm basically invincible. "
"Even if you were, you wouldn't know what to expect, Leo. It's hell," Percy said.
"What can I say? I'm a risk-taker. Besides, someone has to do it."
Piper, Hazel and Frank started crying. Leo was touched. Especially regarding Frank, he knew that he hadn't been the nicest to him. Jason looked moved as well. Even Nico showed a hint of emotion.
"We can't let you do this," Nico finally argued. Everyone else was yelling as well. Jason moved closer to Leo to talk to him.
"Too late, " Leo said and opened the doors. "See you!" He grinned and waved. He then closed the doors behind him before anyone could react.
Finally, he had time to think about what he had done. His teasing grin was long gone. There was nothing to see, since it was all black. He sunk to the floor with his back against the door. There was so much, he had wanted to say to his friends. He wanted to tell them that it wasn't their fault, but in this case, actions had to speak louder than words. He hoped they would understand. He could make his way out of this, he then thought, and stood up.