The darkness stretched on endlessly. Like the soot of a fire slowly coating a glass window, the darkness eclipsed any chance of sun. Apollo had been killed, like many other gods, and the Earth was the one who paid for their disappearance. Tides disappeared leaving stagnant oceans, like a puddle on a sidewalk, completely undisturbed. Nothing grew. But if that was because Demeter was dead or just a result of the perpetual darkness nobody could be sure. Nobody was sure of anything anymore.
Percy rose first as always. Leaving his solo cabin, he circled the camp. He looked for changes, breaches in the security wall. Everything was fine. Honestly, Percy wasn't even sure if anyone else was alive outside of their border.
"I guess we will find out later today," he thought to himself.
Other campers were waking up now. They murmured as they packed their rucksacks. Annabeth help the younger ones. She folded their crushed velvet clothes and stacked them among their things like a game of Tetris. The fire casted frightening shadows over the frightened faces of the campers. Fire was the only thing left that brought comfort. Light and warmth were the only things people cared about anymore, they were more valuable than anything.
"Are we ready to go campers?" Percy called. He stood in the center of the cabins and surveyed the group of campers. He counted each one in his head.
"Grover's missing," he sighed, looking towards Annabeth. They both knew where he was. Still sobbing next to the stump of Juniper. There were only so many trees within the border and fire ranked even above life now. It was a necessary sacrifice, but one that was made unwillingly.
"We should move on without him," Annabeth said calculatedly, "I can only care for so many, and if he won't help he's of no use to us."
Percy nodded. It stung his heart like a Tarantula Hawk but he knew he had no choice. So they moved onwards.
They followed the edge of the lake. Percy longed to hear the waves kissing the shore but all was still. It was deathly silent as the group of ten journeyed away from Camp Half Blood.
It was a canoe that first notified them that they had found some sort of civilization. A beat-up red canoe, white lettering along the bow read Camp Crystal Lake.
"Welcome to your new home guys," whispered Percy. He lowered his torch to the bonfire pit and set it ablaze. The huge flames warmed everyone instantly. After conserving wood for so long the two-yard-high flames seemed to wrap around each and every person like a motherly hug after a hard day. Percy looked towards Annabeth and saw the tears in her beautiful blue eyes. She looked back towards him, but it wasn't a look of love. Hey eyebrows knit together and the warmth of her face faded to a dull grey. Her pale lips moved quickly, as if he was trying to say something but was frozen.
Percy looked around and noticed the rest of the campers looking towards him with that same look. A look of horror. And that's when Percy felt it.
He didn't know what it was a first. A giant slug? A mermaid? Some other kind of terrible mythological creature. But as he whipped around, pulling Riptide out of his back pocket what he came face to face with halted him in his tracks.
It was a young boy, the age of many of the other campers. His black hair was plastered to his face. Water dripped off of him onto the hard dirt ground. A consistent pat, pat, pat as the soil beneath him turned to mud.
"You need to get out of here!" the boy whispered loudly. His fear made him trip and stumble over his words. Percy noticed the boy was carrying a machete. The dark coppery stains near the handle warned Percy it was well used, and not for collecting firewood.
"Do you need help?" asked Percy. He could hear the shuffles and Annabeth's whispers as she moved their campers back into the darkness.
"No. My mom is coming. You need to be gone before she gets back," they boy cried, tears now freely falling. Just like the lake water, his tears patted the ground and darkened the soil. Percy could see the reeds wrapped around his ankles, they dug in so deep the skin was beginning to grow around them.
"Jason!" came a voice trull-ull-ull-ing from the deep darkness of the forest. Although it sounded much like his own mother, a shiver ran down Percy's back. Percy looked in the direction of the voice and made eye contact with Annabeth. Her hands were limp at her sides, but Percy could see them counting down. 7-6-5. He glanced up at her face again and she tilted her head to the right. 3-2-1. They took off like a racehorse at the gate. Their running shoes beating the ground as they ran. Percy looked over but couldn't see anyone. So far away from the bonfire everything was dark. He couldn't remember ever being trapped in such darkness before. It was consuming. He didn't know which way he was running but his legs never stopped moving. He tripped over branches and twisted his ankles on rocks but his pace refused to slow until he reached water.
His sneakers splashed into the lake fully saturating him in the ice-cold liquid. The light of the bonfire reflected off of the ripples he had created. In the water stood the rest of his campers and Annabeth. Their hand and feet had been tied and an elderly woman pushed them deeper into the water. The apron she wore was probably white once but was now stained with dirt and blood leaving it a sickly brown.
Percy lunged forward calling out for her to stop, but "Jason" stepped in front of him.
"I'm sorry but you're too late," the young boy said. He raised the dirty machete to Percy's throat.
In the background Annabeth screamed as the water went over the first campers head. Still they continued walking deeper and deeper. Percy tuned out her pleading and chose instead to focus on the waterlogged boy ahead of him.
"Jason, tell your mom to stop. I don't understand why you're doing this," Percy said. He slowly felt for Riptide in his back pocket only to find nothing.
"I can't. They let me drown and I was the one who was supposed to save us all. This is the only way to make things right," Jason pulled on a hockey mask to hide his face.
Behind him there was nothing left but bubbles and the tips of Annabeth's hair still floating on the surface. As if her body were clinging to any possibility of life.
Percy froze in terror. The bubbles stopped rising. The water went stagnant again before giving way to the rise of bodies. The small ones at first, closer to the shore. As if leading up to the grand reveal of Annabeth. Face down, her orange Camp Half Blood shirt clinging to her body.
A sob broke through Percy's chest. He fell to his knees as the wails overtook him. But a faint white light glowed. It was Jason. He was rising out of the water as if a giant magnet hovered above him and he were wearing a full suit of armour.
"It worked mom! I can't believe it worked," the dark-haired boy cried from behind his goalie mask.
"I know Jason," his mother replied.
Percy watched Jason ascend. He was kneeling in the water, rocks dug sharply into his shins but he didn't care. Above him was the new order. An order with one ruler, one decider, one God.