**As of 5/13/13. I don't know about you, but there's a glitch in FanFiction for me, so I just decided to repost this just in case!** Enjoy this new chapter!
Annabeth POV:
Only the Gods know how long it took before the Gates of Elysium were in front of me, and Percy still hadn't shown up.
Even as a ghost, my feet were sore and covered in blisters, and I was sweating through my long cloak. The gray had thick stains everywhere, on the front and back of me. The logical side of my mind said that it was utterly impossible that ghosts could sweat, because we were dead and our sweat glands shouldn't work anymore, but the other side didn't care. The long walk was at an end.
Soon I'd be able to shed the dreary robe and be at peace, like every person dreamed. No longer would I be in wars with other demigods and monsters. I had enemies, but they were being tortured after death, and I would never, ever have to see them again.
Paradise was coming and it was coming and it was here.
But Percy still wasn't. As I turned around to try and find him, he was absent. Dread washed through my bones and made that bubbly feeling disappear. He should've been here by now, so where...?
The few people that were near me sounded anxious and excited. Through the dark shadows I could just make out the wide smiles. There was a woman a few feet away from me, and she was crying so loudly that some of the guards were yelling at her to shut up, which only made her cry even harder.
After a few minutes of the continuous wailing, I couldn't help but go over to her because no one else was. She was shaking her head and her arms were wrapped around her waist. When I saw her more closely, I realized that she was probably around my age, only a teenager. Her brownish hair fell around her head in thick, curly knots, completely out of her hood. Her eyes were a startling green color, but not as beautiful as Percy's. She was short, too, and very petite. The sobs seemed to great for her to be to handle.
I set my hands on her shoulders and forced her to look me in the eye. "Are you okay?" I asked softly and nicely, trying to make sure that I didn't scare her. She seemed ready to fall apart. She shook her head viciously and her chest heaved. She started choking, and everything that I had ever learned from Camp was completely gone. I didn't know what to do.
"Oh gods…" I whispered, shaking her. She only seemed to start choking more. Her eyes bulged out of her head like a fish. If the situation had been different, it would've been comical, but it terrified me. She wasn't going to die from the choking, but that raised a whole line of new questions.
Did you just end up choking forever because death was no longer an option? I gulped, and looked at the guards, who were staring intently at us. The ghouls were intimidating, sure, but we were going to Elysium. We were the best of the best, the top of the top. They couldn't hurt us if they wanted to.
"Please help," I said, still trying to get the girl to stop. The tears streamed down her face still. The guards did nothing but watch. I understood that it was their job, but this girl was in so much pain. "Please," I begged, but they still didn't do anything. They were watching us like we were part of a show.
All at once the girl fell on the dirt path like she couldn't go any farther. And Elysium was so close to us. I could literally smell the barbecue and feel the hot waves of heat the warmed me to the bone. I knelt down next to the girl. "Come on," I whispered to her. "You can't give up now, not when we're so close."
She stopped choking, but when she spoke, her voice was thick with emotion and scratchy from the pain. "I've given up already. I gave up a long, long time ago."
The warmth was gone and replaced by icy fingertips that crept up my spine. Her words scared me. How could she have given up and still made it to Elysium? "But why? You are almost there. Elysium is paradise and heaven."
"That's only what they want you to think."
What?
"What do you mean by that?" I asked, my voice small.
"They only sent me to Elysium because they believed that my life had been bad enough and took pity upon me. I was bullied throughout my school years for getting good grades and never wearing the latest clothes and for not even having a cell phone. Some people teased me about where I lived. My apartment only had two bedrooms, and I had three other siblings. I grew up in a tough neighborhood."
I wasn't sure why she was telling me her whole life story, but by the way she gripped my arm, I could tell it was important. Yet I didn't see what this had to do with being judged for Elysium.
The guards had already walked off, obviously bored with what we were doing. Those few who came near us stared but passed by without another word. They were all too eager to reach their final destination.
"It never stopped. They were relentless. I hate bullies. I hate them because they never know what is going on in your personal life. The words they say can kill people." She let out a small cry, and her fingers dug into my skin. It hurt, but the look in her eyes was mad enough to kill. It was just rage, not at me, but at someone.
"My mom's boyfriend got drunk one night while she was at work. My sisters were home with me, and he just grabbed me. I wasn't sure what to do, and neither were they. He pushed me against the wall, and overpowered me. I screamed and screamed. I can't blame my sisters for not trying to save me, but they were just as terrified as I was. And when he was done, he just left me there on the ground, shaking and convulsing. And my mother never found out, but that's my fault."
I was gaping at the girl. She was so young, and to think that he mom's boyfriend had done that to her was sickening. I wanted to hug her, but I wasn't sure how she would feel about it. She seemed to sense my thoughts and shook her head.
"I got pregnant, and everyone thought that was the giant slut. My mom asked who the father was, but I never told her. She would've been ruined if she had found out that it was her boyfriend. He never touched me again after that. And eventually, I did have my baby. He was healthy and beautiful, and I love him so much. But I dropped out of school so that I could take care of him."
She rubbed her face. "I ended up killing myself and my son, John. I couldn't take it anymore. I was so selfish, but I couldn't stay with my mom anymore. Her pitiful looks became too much. Whenever I saw one of my old classmates, it was humiliating. And I couldn't bear to part with John. We died together when I crashed my car. In my suicide note, I asked my mom to play the song 'How to Save a Life' by the Fray at my funeral."
Before I could say another word, she started to sing softly. "Where did I go wrong, I lost a friend? Somewhere along in the bitterness, and I would have stayed up with you all night, had I known how to save a life." She wiped at her eyes and shook her head back and forth. "I'll never know if they played the song, but I like to hope that they did."
A single tear slid down her cheek, but she had stopped crying. "I had believed that death would be sanctuary, but it has proven to be a burden. Everything is unlike I thought it would be. Even this heaven, this Elysium that I am going to, is only a lie."
My stomach churned with a sudden fear. This cloud of feelings had stormed into my head over what she had done. I felt vulnerable and sick hearing about it. "What do you mean by that?"
"This place we're going to is no paradise. They took John away from me. They won't let me see him. He was in my arms the entire time until I was judged. Then he was ripped from my grasp. He was the one person that I still loved. I died so that I could be with him forever and so he wouldn't ever have to go through what I did. It was awful. I still am haunted by it."
She took a shaky breath… not that she needed it. "This system has been corrupted by someone. Everything is unfair. They are judging by personal opinions rather than the facts. John was everything for me, and without him I am nothing. I have no reason to live after death either. This heaven will be hell without him. This government is taking our loved one away from us. You must run away while you can, before they come after you, because they will. We are no match for them."
What was she talking about? "Why are you telling me these things?" I couldn't even believe her.
"I know the sacrifices I am making, and this time I think they are for the right cause. I thought killing myself and John would save him a terrible life like the one I had, but now he is gone from my grasp. I tell you these things so that you can carry on my legacy, because no one will remember me. But you stopped and bothered to help me. You will change all of this. You will lead us out of this lie and into the afterlife that we have dreamed about. You will judge those who've already been judged, and you will do so fairly. I can tell that you know how to love, and that matters."
Her words seemed so final and sad that my heart broke. This poor girl had given up everything, but none of this made sense. Why hadn't they let her baby John go with her?
"I don't even know your name," I said quietly, lamely.
And for some reason, that made her smile, but the smile was tight and controlled. "Names don't matter, but the actions of the people who have the names do. You, Annabeth Chase, will have your named remembered though. I am sure of it."
How did she know my name?
Out of nowhere, giant hands lifted her off the ground. She started to scream and scream and screamed. I scrambled backwards and onto my feet. "HEY!" I shouted. "Don't touch her! She did nothing wrong!"
The ghouls and skeletons were ignoring me like I wasn't even there. They started to hit her over and over again, and suddenly I felt like I was one of her sisters, watching her with her abusive father. Very human blood came from her nose. Apparently we still bled. I couldn't just stand there and watch them do that to her. I had nothing to fight with, but whatever.
There were two of them, one a skeleton and one a ghoul. I leapt on top of the skeleton, wrapping my arms and legs around it to try and bring it to the ground. I was unsuccessful, but I distracted it enough to loosen its slack on the girl. She fell on the ground, her hair clouding her face. She was breathing, "John." She yelped as the ghoul's foot came down on her. I think I heard something snapped.
The skeleton bucked me off, and I went sailing backwards. When my back hit the ground, bits o pain swept through me. When I looked back up, they were dragging the girl away, off towards Asphodel and Punishment. "We should've taken you here in the first place, you good for nothing slut," they hissed at her. "You skanky bitch." They spat in her face, and I lost it inside.
This was so wrong.
And she cried for her son, but when our eyes met again, she motioned for me to keep moving. There was something in her expression that told me she had expected all of this to happen. After all, she said she had nothing to live or die for now that her son had been taken away from her.
I got up to go after her, this girl that I didn't know at all but I felt like I had known her my entire life. She was sobbing again, and the wails were so loud and echoed around in the Underworld. I stood there and then I lurched off of the path to go after her. Somehow, a new guard pushed me back onto the path and blocked my way to her. "Keep moving, or you'll end up like her."
Like Hell. I threw my fist up at the guard and nailed him right in the eye. He cursed and lunged for me, but I was fast enough to dodge out of the way and roll across the dirt. I jumped back up to my feet and chased after the poor, helpless girl. Another guard grabbed at my arm, but I maneuvered underneath him and kicked the back of his knees. He stumbled away, and I smiled inwardly. These guards needed training.
I sprinted forward towards the girl, calling for her. Her head popped up, and she smiled at me. Go, she mouthed quickly.
No, I mouthed back.
I heard the crack before I even felt it. Then I saw stars and my cheek burned like crazy. One of the guards had backhanded me so harder that I was seeing stars. I blinked at tried to move forward again, but the guard yanked me back by my hair. I cried out like a fool, and that seemed to encourage him. He dragged me back to the path, and out of nowhere, he drew a gun. He pointed it between my eyes. I couldn't die, but I was still scared of bullets. "I suggest you move," he chuckled, and then rammed his knee into my stomach. I almost fell down, and for some reason, it hurt so much that I could move. The guard backed up a few feet but kept the gun aimed on me. "Move."
I think there were tears in my eyes too. She was getting farther and farther away. I doubted that I would ever see her again. But I had to remember her. It was the least I could do if this was going to happen to her. And she was accepting it. She was accepting her new, horrible fate.
She could've gone to Elysium, but she didn't because of love.
Where was Percy?
I turned around to look back down the path, just for a second. But he still wasn't there. He wasn't anywhere. There was that bad feeling inside of me again. I couldn't stand it. The world, the dark underworld, started to pin around me. I was feeling lightheaded.
My eyes sought out the girl once more. Everything had gone wrong for her, but this was just terrible. Just because of what she had said she was no longer allowed to go to Elysium. Everything did seem corrupt. And the girl was gone. There was not a trace of her anywhere, not even a blood stain or tear. There was nothing.
That was too much for me. I dropped.
. . .
.
. . .
I was running for my life in a sea of death.
There were corpses all around me, like zombies, trying to come after me and wanting me to be like them. I wanted to help them; the looks on their faces were enough to bring me to my knees. But I had to push through and I wasn't sure why. There was something telling me what to do, and instinct of sorts.
It was much colder than I wanted it to be, even though there were fires everywhere. I was running around in the midst of an uprising that I had helped orchestrate. And by the gods was it ever so deadly.
These tortured souls had finally had enough. They knew they were never going to be brought back to life, but in death they wanted to be treated fairly. They were never going to be able to see their beloved ones again. Some of them didn't even have memories of life before the Underworld, and yet they were still fighting to set things right.
I wished I was that selfless that I could help them, but I had my own purposes for running through here.
The guards of the Underworld's various sectors were doing their best to keep everyone in line, but it wasn't working out all that well. The riots were getting worse. Of course, they had all been through things like this before, and they had known that this was inevitable, but they hadn't known that this would be so bad.
If everyone wasn't already dead, they'd be like that in a second. Limbs were hacked off and blood was spraying in all different directions. The weird part was that the limbs started to grow back right after they were lost, and it looked painful. I guess that was part of being dead.
And these people looked like they wanted to die all over again, and stay in Charon's lobby without a coin to pay him. They would give anything to be anywhere else.
Fear was in their eyes, but so was something else…
It looked like determination.
I wondered what my face looked like. Scary, probably. There was a cut across my cheek that was dripping with blood. Someone kicked me in the face trying to struggle to their feet, and blood pooled in my mouth. I spit it out to the side and wiped my mouth, which only made it worse.
"Please, help me," someone cried, and it sounded like a little boy, but I didn't stop to help.
What does that say about me? I'm a selfish and terrible person.
If I were a good person like Percy, I would've stopped and helped the kid. I would've made sure he was alright and get him to safety, regardless what was happening or who he was. He could've even been the enemy, and Percy would've taken pity on the kid.
Hades was missing. The Three Judges had been taken some place to be kept safe, but that wouldn't work out for long. These people wanted to kill them again, or at least hurt them so bad that they would be brought down to their level.
I was out to find someone that I hadn't seen in a very long time.
My legs pumped back and forth underneath and the wind whistled through my lanky form as I ran around. He couldn't be that far away. I had to be getting closer to wherever he was. I wasn't short of breath anymore, since I didn't need to breathe, but my muscles ached. I'd been running for hours.
I had to be getting closer.
But then I did see him, standing in front of me. There was a long cut across his broad chest and he was reaching towards me. He was so far away but he was so close at the same time. I hadn't been this close to him in so long that my body actually needed, not wanted, to be closer.
I took a step forward. So did he.
I was crying now because it had been so long since I had seen him, and he was gorgeous even though he was hurt. The wind blew his black hair all around his head and even from afar I could see the familiar twinkle in his sea green eyes. I think I smiled at him. It looked like he smiled back at me, but it was pained.
When I took another step towards him, he backed away. Something inside of me crumbled, especially when he turned his back to me.
But everything pieced together as he began to walk away. This churning feeling started in my stomach, and I stopped crying as I watched him walk away. But one by one, many people around me gathered behind him, and soon I was part of the crowd.
Percy couldn't leave with me. He was a leader, and he had to lead these people.
After all, he was one of the people who'd started the war too.
. . .
.
. . .
I woke up with a scream that felt very out of place.
Actually, I just felt very out of place in general.
I sat up in sheets made of satin, warm and comfortable and not covered in blood. My body felt incredibly clean and I was wearing a white cotton robe. The pillows underneath my body were fluffy and I felt like I was on a bed of clouds and in heaven. Last I checked, I was in a battle.
No, that had been a dream, but it had been so weird. Why had we been fighting in some crazy battle? It had definitely had a purpose in the dream, but now, I could barely remember any of what had happened to me.
And before that dream, back when I had last been awake… I had been walking. Yes, I was walking down the path to Elysium, and then that girl had told me all of those things right before the guards had beat her and taken her away. That had to be the reason why I had such a bizarre dream.
That girl… oh no! No... It wasn't possible. Had that all been a dream too? I wanted to believe so, but I knew it wasn't.
She was gone and I hadn't been able to do anything about it. She was completely gone now, off to Asphodel or Punishment for all eternity, just for speaking to me about her theories. I blinked slowly, still trying to process everything that had happened.
I hadn't known the girl at all, but I still should've done more to try and save her. If I had been Percy, I would've done more.
And Percy, he still wasn't with me. He hadn't been walking with me. Where was he? I remember what the girl had said about the corruption and unfair judgment, but that was absurd. The gods know that Percy would be the first one to Elysium. Something must've happened on the way to Elysium, but he'd be okay. We'd be together soon enough, right?
I wasn't feeling too well.
I looked around at the room I was in for the first time. Everything was white, like I was in some sort of asylum. It was a pristine white that just couldn't be dampened by anything. Good gods, it was almost blinding. There was my bed in the room. It was huge, like a California King Bed. The carpet was white too, free of any stains. This was what Elysium looked like, and I was so, so alone.
Was I being punished by being in this room?
I got to my feet all too quickly. Black spots danced before my eyes, and I fell to the ground, grabbing my head. The headache that had started just hurt a lot. It was like someone was slamming my head into the wall over and over again.
I set my hands down on the ground to steady myself, and then I noticed how perfect my skin looked. There wasn't a single flaw or mark on it. Barely even a freckle. And my fingernails were scrubbed clean, free of blood and dirt. I felt awesome, besides the nausea. I felt so clean, and like I belonged in the white room.
I was starting to lose it.
I was going to be sick.
Jumping to my feet, I raced towards the nearest door, which happened to lead into a bathroom. That was a coincidence. I didn't see why I needed a bathroom, since I was dead and would never have to eat or drink anything, but in the back of my mind, I could remember the scent of cooking food. Maybe the souls here did get to eat and drink. My stomach felt empty as it had since I had died, but I was going to throw up.
I knelt beside the toilet and began to vomit in it, repeatedly. It just seemed to go on for hours, but once I was done, I felt like I needed to fall asleep all over again.
I sat backwards and sighed deeply. Now, the entire bathroom smelled terrible, so tried not to inhale anything. I used to wall to support me as I stood to me feet. There was a small window in the bathroom, so high up that I had to stand on my tiptoes to see out of it. I wasn't feeling perfect enough to do so, but looking somewhere else, anywhere else, other than this bathroom would be great.
I glanced out of it, and I lost my breath.
The world of Elysium, or wherever I was, gleamed outside, so bright that I was forced to squint. And even after the bright flashes had dulled, I still couldn't see right. The sun shined too brightly but with the most elegant beauty, like looking at a god. I could hear faint laughter, and sounds of happiness that I didn't feel. but when I backed up a few feet, they died off.
I fell back on the ground with a thud.
My headache was only getting worse, and I was still just so confused. There was no one near me. There wasn't the hum of electricity or the comforting sound of my brothers and sisters fighting in the other room. There was only me and this blinding white, super sterile tile that I sat on.
I'd never been more alone in my entire life… or death.
So, would anyone like a chapter somewhere in this story from Nico's POV? Leave reviews telling me your thoughts and feedback.
-BBH
