Disclaimer: I don't own Percy Jackson
A/N: I know it's been forever, but I kind of lost my muse... also I had three AP classes and needed to focus on those more than my fanfiction. But I'm back because the AP tests were last week.
Hope you enjoy!
το τέλος είναι εδώ
—
The End is Near
We were situated at the United Nations building now. Kronos's army had advanced so much farther, considering where we were before: the backwoods of New Jersey. Not exactly close to Manhattan or the Empire State Building. Now, though, now we'd advanced to about a mile away from the Empire State Building. Even so, I think Kronos had planned on taking Mount Olympus today and he was peeved because he hadn't… that or the fact that he was so close, but the centaurs had come in at the last minute and totally pushed his forces back.
He was swinging his scythe angrily; the horrible blade cutting through the air sharply and so fast it was a blur. I stood next to Ethan and Prometheus. Ethan wouldn't stop fidgeting with his armor, while Prometheus stood as still as a statue holding his hands behind his back. I was just standing, shifting from foot to foot with my arms crossed.
We all stood out of the way of Kronos's scythe.
"I hate this place," Kronos snarled. "United Nations." he spat. "As if mankind could ever unite. Remind me to tear this building down after we destroy Olympus."
"Yes, lord." Prometheus said an edge to his voice. I looked over at him to see him smiling. One of my eyebrows rose and I turned to look back at Kronos just as Prometheus continued, "Shall we tear down the stables in Central Park too? I know how much horses can annoy you." He was so enjoying seeing Kronos act like this.
"Don't mock me, Prometheus!" Kronos turned to glare at the other Titan with those penetrating golden eyes, but his scythe didn't stop swinging. "Those cursed centaurs will be sorry they interfered. I will feed them to the hellhounds, starting with that son of mine—that weakling Chiron."
Prometheus seemed undisturbed by Kronos's anger. He shrugged and said, "That weakling destroyed an entire legion of telkhines with his arrows." he helpfully pointed out.
Kronos's scythe lashed out, slicing a flagpole clean in half, the flag of Brazil collapsing in the army and squashing one of the dracaena. Beside me Ethan jumped, slightly stumbling into me. I shoved him away in annoyance, and he hit Prometheus who glared down at Ethan. He hastily pulled away and glowered at me with his one eye, which was surprisingly powerful. I glowered back with narrowed eyes.
"We will destroy them!" Kronos growled bringing our attention back to him. "It is time to unleash the drakon. Nakamura, you will do this." His gold eyes zeroed in on him.
"Y-yes, lord. At sunset?" he stuttered.
"No," Kronos's scythe stopped abruptly. "Immediately. The defenders of Olympus are badly wounded. They will not expect a quick attack. Besides, we know this drakon they cannot beat." No doubt, thanks to the spy.
Ethan's dark eyebrows furrowed slightly as he looked at Kronos. "My lord?" he asked, puzzled.
"Never you mind, Nakamura. Just do my bidding. I want Olympus in ruins by the time Typhon reaches New York. We will break the gods utterly!"
I heard Ethan swallow next to me. "But, my lord," he said. "Your regeneration."
Kronos pointed his scythe at the demigod next to me. "Does it seem," Kronos hissed his eyes glowing, "that I need to regenerate?" I looked over at Ethan and realized he was totally frozen, Kronos had just frozen him in time… which kind of made the question seem a little unnecessary.
Kronos slowly lowered his scythe and snapped his fingers. Beside me Ethan collapsed, an automatic response to reach for something. Unfortunately that something had to be me. Not ready for this, he almost pulled me down with him. Almost. I quickly jerked my arm out of his grasp, letting him the hit the ground hard, and straightening up, readjusting the sword at my side, glaring coldly down at him.
"Soon," Kronos growled, "this form will be unnecessary. I will not rest with victory so close. Now, go!"
Ethan scrambled away, barely able to get to his feet for a few moments.
"This is dangerous, my lord," Prometheus spoke, sounding more grim than he had a second ago. "Do not be hasty."
"Hasty? After festering for three thousand years in the depths of Tartarus, you call me hasty? I will slice Percy Jackson into a thousand pieces."
"Thrice you've fought him," Prometheus stated using a word I'd never heard many people use before. "And yet you've always said it is beneath the dignity of a Titan to fight a mere mortal. I wonder if your mortal host is influencing you, weakening your judgment."
This was certainly news to me. Kronos just didn't seem like a guy who would yield to anyone just because it was "beneath his dignity"… then again I haven't known Kronos nearly as long as Prometheus has, so who was I to judge.
Kronos turned his eyes on his fellow Titan. "You call me weak?" His voice was low and contained making him seem all the more angry.
I looked over at Prometheus who's eyes widened, just registering what he'd just said. "No, my lord. I only meant—" he started.
"Are your loyalties divided?" Kronos asked in that scarily quiet voice. "Perhaps you miss your old friends, the gods. Would you like to join them?"
I looked back at Prometheus who looked paler. For some reason this made me want to laugh.
"I misspoke, my lord." He was practically stumbling over his words. "Your orders will be carried out." He spun around toward the armies and shouted, "Prepare for battle!"
I took a step toward Prometheus. "Nice save." I muttered under my breath. He looked down on me with a sardonic smile and an eye roll.
I stifled my snicker and ignored the pounding of my heart. I hated fighting, especially people I knew. I was always questioning what I was doing here. What I was doing, turning against the very people I'd lived with for what felt like my whole life. What was the point of all of this? Then I'd look over at Kronos, in the body of Luke and remember. I know, it was incredibly selfish of me, but for once in my life I felt like I could afford to be selfish. I mean, I was going to die anyway, why not go out with a bang?
Afterward was a blur of fighting and slashing and stabbing, you know the works…. I had to keep reminding myself to put aside all emotions, as horrible as that sounds. I remember the darkon's horrible wails, shattering the windows within a mile of where it was, at least. I remember battling forward, getting pushed back—and, I hate to admit it, but the dracaena and their wall of shields was impressive… you know, for monsters that would've loved to kill me with the more horrible way not even a week ago.
But Percy's regime wasn't holding up very well. He'd lost a lot of people, and Kronos's army was still standing strong. It amazed me at first that he had so many pawns at his disposal, then I realized that most of his army were monsters and monsters were in a surplus supply right now.
I don't quite remember what happened, but it was like a fast-forward through time and suddenly Kronos's army was advancing hard and fast; the barrier of Percy's army broken and just barely able to hold on any longer. One moment I'm struggling to push forward and the next I'm suddenly standing next to the dracaena queen, Kronos next to her and Ethan Nakamura next to him. Chiron stood a few feet in front of us—mainly Kronos—with an arrow notched in his bow, aimed right between his father's eyes.
Around us, or rather around the Empire State Building, was the army, not letting anything, or anyone in or out. There were also two Hyperboreans flanking the four of us nearest the entrance.
It was an odd feeling because I don't quite remember how we had gotten to this point at all.
I saw movement out of the corner of my eyes and noticed Percy, Annabeth, Thalia, and Grover exit one of the doors of the building. They stopped short at the scene before them. Annabeth murmured something under her breath but I was too far away to hear, however, her eyes were on Chiron, wide with concern.
I could tell when Kronos spotted Percy as well, because the air around the small group seemed to freeze, and let me tell you, it's not a very pleasant feeling at all. It felt like something was pressing down on my chest, like I could barely take a full breath in. I looked over and to see Kronos's blazing golden eyes turn back to Chiron.
"Step aside, little son." he ordered not caring to mask or contain the contempt in his voice. Even during a tense moment like this, it was weird to see a 23-year-old, especially a 23-year-old I knew and loved, call Chiron his son.
"I'm afraid not." Chiron replied his voice steely and cold, his eyes determined.
More movement out of the corner of my eyes; I looked over to see the four near the entrance of the building struggling, trying to lift their feet, but it wasn't doing them much good. Obviously it had to have Kronos affecting them.
"Chiron!" Annabeth's voice called. "Look out!"
Next to me the dracaena queen lunged forward at Chiron, apparently not patient enough to wait, but Chiron was ready for this. He let his arrow fly right between her eyes. She disintegrated as soon as the arrow pierced her head, her armor clattering to the ground at my feet. I flinched and looked up.
Bit mistake. I met Chiron's eyes, they were sad and disappointed. I tried not to let this affect me. I was going to the Fields of Punishment and I knew it, might as well do it thoroughly. This only lasted a millisecond; there much bigger matters at hand. Chiron looked back at Kronos reaching for another arrow but came up empty handed. Throwing his bow aside, he pulled out his sword.
Kronos chuckled in amusement and took a step forward. Chiron's horse-half shifted back nervously, his tail flicking back-and-forth, but Chiron held his ground.
"You're a teacher," Kronos spat. "Not a hero."
"Luke was a hero," Chiron responded bravely. "He was a good one, until you corrupted him."
"Fool!" Kronos snapped, his voice shaking the very ground beneath my feet. "You filled his head with empty promises. You said the gods cared about me!"
I started when he said "me."
It had to be Luke. It just had to be. More hope started to form inside and my heart pounded in response to this. I shifted from foot to foot and tried to keep where I was.
Chiron didn't fail to notice this either. "Me," he said. "You said me."
Kronos was stunned into silence for a moment and Chiron capitalized on this moment by feinting quickly followed by a strike to the face. But this was Kronos, a Titan, in Luke's body who could access Luke's skill. He easily knocked Chiron's blade away and barked, "Back!"
A stunning white light exploded between Kronos and Chiron, who was thrown into the side of the building with so much force that the wall crumbled like he'd hit a rotting wall of wood and fell on top of Chiron, making a rubble tomb.
"No!" Annabeth's cry broke through the menacing laughter of the Titan's army as her, Percy, Thalia, and Grover ran forward to the pile of wall that used to be apart of the building. There was a moment as Percy and Thalia pulled at the bricks in vain, before Annabeth spun around, her gray eyes alight with the fire of fury and hatred. "You!" she shrieked looking straight at Kronos who was smiling smugly, admiring the work he'd done. "To think that I... that I thought—" Her words faltered but she pulled out her knife.
"Annabeth, don't." Percy warned grasping her arm which she quickly shook off.
When Annabeth charged Kronos's smile dropped and he stood there as she plunged her blade right between his armor straps, near his collar bone. But her blade bounced off harmlessly. Annabeth doubled over and clutched at her arm, her face a mask of pain. Percy quickly pulled her back just as Kronos's scythe sliced right where she'd been standing seconds ago.
"I hate you!" she shrieked fighting against Percy, tears streaming down her face.
"I have to fight him." Percy told her.
"It's my fight too, Percy!" she yelled back.
Kronos laughed beside me, making me jump.
"So much spirit. I can see why Luke wanted to spare you. Unfortunately, that won't be possible."
A chill went down my spine at his words. What was the reason he still kept me alive. He could've easily disposed of me when I'd first met with him and we talked about that fateful day in Colorado when I met with Apollo. I mean I realize that if I hadn't kept trying to convince Luke to stop letting Kronos control we might not be here today, but that was a big might. Besides, it was partly because of Kronos as well because he had to do more convincing to counter my arguments. So I honestly didn't see why he was still keeping me around.
I would've liked to think that it was because Luke was having some kind of influence on Kronos, like Prometheus was saying earlier, but what was much more reasonable, something that made more sense was that he had some ulterior motive that I had an unwilling part in.
The howling of what sounded like a hellhound broke me out of my thoughts and I jumped a mile, my heart pounding in my chest, the blood roaring in my ears.
"Mrs. O'Leary?" Percy called cautiously hopeful.
Around us the Titan arm shifted uncomfortably and you could just feel the change in the air. Then, just like the Red Sea, Kronos's army started to part, making a perfect path, too perfect, it had to be someone affecting where they stood.
When the dust cleared—so to speak—standing about a black away was the biggest hellhound I'd ever seen in my entire life and a small figure standing next to it sporting all black armor.
"Nico?" Percy called again.
The hellhound, Mrs. O'Leary howled again and bounded toward Percy, totally ignoring the evil glares and growls coming from the surrounding audience. Nico followed Mrs. O'Leary, but less enthusiastically. The army fell back, like he was a disease or something... but I did know that he was the son of Hades, so that probably made a difference too. I guess even monsters were afraid of death.
"Got your message. Is it too late to join the party?" Nico asked through is skull-shaped helmet.
"Son of Hades." Kronos spat distastefully. "Do you love death so much you wish to experience it?"
"Your death," Nico responded bravely, without a waver in his voice, "would be great for me."
"I'm immortal, you fool! I have escaped Tartarus. You have no business here, and no chance to live."
Nico drew his sword, a wicked long, three foot, black thing, that looked razor sharp. "I don't agree." For such a young kid he had guts, I had to hand it to him. Just then, the ground rumbled like there was an earthquake. Cracks started appearing in the road, sidewalks, and even the sides of buildings. Out of these cracks skeletal hands grasped at the air and clawed their way up out of the ground and into the living world. I'll admit it, it scared me to no end. The dead had entered the living and there were thousands of them.
Even the monsters of Kronos's army started to fall back along with the mercenaries and turned half-bloods. But Kronos wouldn't have any of it.
"Hold your ground!" he barked. "The dead are no match for us."
The sky above turned almost pitch black and the air became deathly cold. The shadows seemed to become mass. A war horn sliced through the air—making me jump yet again—as the dead soldiers started to form up ranks with their guns and swords and spears: An army of the dead. Following the sound of the horn was an large, imposing chariot roared down Fifth Avenue and came to a stop right next to Nico. Riding behind him were Demeter and Persephone.
The horses that led the chariot couldn't even be called horses, they were just like black masses shaped like horses. The chariot was something that suited the Lord of the Dead well, inlaid with obsidian and gold, decorated with scenes of painful deaths, of course. And standing in the chariot, holding the reins was Hades himself, wearing black armor, with a cloak as red and bright as blood as it hit air. Atop his head was his helm of darkness: a crown that had an aura that made me want to run away screaming. It also changed shape, but I wasn't paying very attention to the shapes it was taking because when I looked at it all my worst nightmares seemed to come alive. I fought the urge to run the in other direction, away from all this.
Hades smiled coldly. "Hello, Father." he greeted. "You're looking... young." That was for sure.
"Hades," Kronos snarled through his teeth. "I hope you and the ladies have come to pledge your allegiance."
"I'm afraid not." Hades sighed. "My son here convinced me that perhaps I should prioritize my list of enemies." He shot a look at Percy. "As much as I dislike a certain upstart demigods, it would not do for Olympus to fall. I would miss bickering with my siblings. And if there is one thing we agree on—it is that you were a terrible father."
"True," muttered Demeter. "No appreciation of agriculture." I was surprised that she'd make a comment like that, but then again she was goddess, she couldn't technically die.
"Mother!" Persephone objected.
Hades drew his sword, a double-edged blade that was etched with silver, probably tired of all this idle banter. "Now fight me! For today the House of Hades will be called the saviors of Olympus."
"I don't have time for this," Kronos growled. Immediately after he slammed his scythe against the ground, a crack spreading in both directions, circling the Empire State Building. Along the fissure line a forcefield shimmered separating Kronos, myself, Nakamura, and Percy and his friends from practically everything else, which comprised of both of the armies currently surrounding the Empire State Building.
There was some talking coming from Percy and his friends but I wasn't paying any attention. I was looking beyond the barrier as all the the mortals started to wake up. Cars roared to life, people stirred from their sleeping positions looking, wide-eyed and dazed around at the monsters and zombies around them.
Another moment passed before Hades charged at the wall, but the forcefield was very strong. His chariot simply crashed into it, like a car would crashing into a solid concrete wall, and overturned. Cursing Hades stood up and blasted the wall with his black energy, but the barrier still held.
"Attack!" he ordered.
I watched, mouth slightly ajar as the streets exploded with war. The mortals shrieked and screamed and ran for cover while monsters, zombies, mercenaries, and demigods alike battled the enemy.
"Nakamura, Victoria," Kronos said, breaking me out of my trance and trying not to let him see my irritated look from him calling me by Victoria. "Attend me. Giants—deal with them." He pointed to Percy and his friends before entering the lobby of the Empire State Building, Ethan and myself following quickly.
Also, I got this amazing review from an anonymous reviewer named 13 Redvines, and I thank you, whoever you are, for the awesome review. I hope I haven't kept you, or any of my readers, waiting too long. You know school. Also, I apologize if my Greek is wrong, but I used Google Translate (I'm totally going to learn Greek now).
I will most definitely be posting the next—and possibly last—chapter sometime next week. All I can say is: Brace yourself.
thank-you-for-everything
~ See you at Camp Half-Blood!