A/N: Man, I do not even know anymore, I was terribly uninspired but wanted to try this out anyway because I saw some pretty good prompts online.

I do not own PJO or HoO, Riordan does.

Here's the smell of the blood still; all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand.

-William Shakespeare, The Tragedy of McBeth

There was blood everywhere.

There was blood everywhere, aggressively red, demanding her attention, claiming its own importance because don't you know I am vital?

"Percy!" Her throat was burned from the inside out from screaming his name out so many times. She veered left to avoid being sizzled by fire that danced atop dry grass. "Percy!"

A tired thud and a change of perspective and she found herself on the ground accompanied by a dull ache. Numb and confused, she looked back, as if she could even see through all the smoke.

Her knees were scraped and bleeding; that explained the small throbs of pain. But then an exhausted grunt reached her ears and could it be that-

"Percy?"

Movement from a nearby pile of ashes.

She sprung to her feet only to fall again, but then she got up and fell and got up again and dare she even hope? He was alive and she was happy and her legs couldn't carry her fast enough and and and-

And whatever hope she had entertained vanished.

His body lay limp and bloody under crumbling pillars that used to belong to his father's temple. He was covered in soot and ash and would have blended perfectly into the desolated frame if not for the green of his eyes, which threatened to flutter closed.

She dropped to her knees next to him and cradled his head in her arms, unable to say or do anything but hold on to him.

He coughed. "Annabeth."

Her mind reeled back to the last time he had said her name- when Gaea had almost cut him open on her bloodstone circle, just before Leo's explosion.

"Hush, I'll get you out of here." She began tugging at his hands (like she did when she dragged him along to the library, like he did when they both jumped into the lake on summer). He would not budge.

Instead, he looked up at her and then at the ground and with morbid amusement said, "Is that my blood?"

But all the response he got was her looking away as tears and smoke blurred her vision.

"Am..." his voice quivered. And, childlike, "Am I going to die?"

Desperate anger rushed through her. "No!" she screeched. "No, you're not, you Seaweed Brain, you're going to live, so help me get you out!"

But even as they spoke his breathing turned shallower and his eyelids heavier, the parade of red continuing its march from his chest and into the ground.

He shook his head stubbornly and pushed her away. "Go. Run. Get away... from..." a deep breath, "the fire."

And then he stopped struggling altogether, and once again she dropped to her knees.

"Annabeth?"

"Percy."

"I love you."

She felt what little energy she had left abandon her completely. "I know. I do, too."

With his eyes already closed and using the last bit of his strength, he kissed her.

And so the fire loomed over her and the smoke covered everything like darkness as she clung on to the last bit of hope left in her. Her heart beat furiously.

"Mom? I know you're listening. Hades, Thanatos, whoever is there- take me instead. I... I can't go on without him," she declared, looking into their clasped hands. "Please?"

Tears and smoke brimmed her vision, but she didn't care anymore. What was there worth seeing?

Pain shot through her and she doubled over, coughing. Her lungs hurt and they almost felt as if they were being crashed by-

Was that blood?

She raised her gaze and was surprised to see that, slowly but surely, Percy's wounds were closing up and he was starting to breathe again.

Happiness overwhelmed her, momentarily clearing the fog of pain that clouded her thoughts, but then her head spun and her lungs couldn't keep up with her, as neither could her heart.

But it still beat, still fought valiantly as if knowing it had its thump, thump, thumps numbered.

Percy shifted from under the pile of debris.

Her heart thumped on, but slower now. Quieter. Resignedly.

He gasped and his eyes shot open.

Thumpthumpthump.

He screamed and cried when he saw her.

Thumpthump.

He swore loudly and cursed whilst kissing her lips, her nose, her forehead, her hair. He told her she couldn't go, not yet, and don't you know I love you? I do.

Silence. She couldn't do anything but stare into his eyes and mouth the word sorry.

Thump.

There was nothing but the feel of him against her, desperate, warm.

Alive.

Annabeth's last breath was a sigh of relief.