Chapter 6
Dec 20, 2019
Thalia and Reyna were on a date in New Rome in the middle of dinner, when a red Iris Message appeared in front of them. They had never seen a message like this before, so it concerned them a bit
"Thalia and Reyna, we asked Iris to make this message materialize in case the worst should ever come," Annabeth's voice came out from the image of the two holding their daughter. Reyna recognized the picture, she had taken it a few months ago but was still confused as to why they weren't speaking live.
"What Annabeth means is that this message will only appear if we are both killed, and we need you to retrieve Andromeda immediately," Percy spoke with utter seriousness and the two young women looked at each other in a stupor.
"One last thing, know that we love you and hope this message never appears to you..." Annabeth said a bit choked up.
Percy cut in "Also it will let you summon Mrs. O'leary once, to get to our house. We made a bargain with Iris that as soon as our souls entered Hades realm she would send this to you, so in case you were wondering there is no chance of saving us. You can still save Andromeda so thank you for taking care of our daughter in advance. Love you, bye I hope we don't see each other soon"
"Love you, bye" Annabeth echoed, and the message disappeared, the only trace it was ever there was a dog whistle on the ground.
Thalia was in shock, still waiting for Percy to pop up and say 'got ya.' Reyna was, as always much more efficient, but now looking back on it, the numbness was Reyna's way of grieving. Reyna immediately reached out and grabbed the whistle blew it, then pulled Thalia onto the hellhound that had appeared in front of them. She seemed to know where to go as if told by Percy himself.
The shadow traveling probably only took moments but felt like ages to both Thalia and Reyna. When they got to Percy and Annabeth's house, it looked worse than New York after the Titan War just on a smaller scale. Tables crushed, couch shredded, and walls smashed. Glass littered the floor with broken pots, windows, and pictures. Blood smeared everywhere. The Christmas tree was completely mangled. Thalia almost choked on her tears when she saw the pictures that hadn't been completely destroyed.
"Mama? Dada?" The innocent voice of the toddler rang throughout the house. Thalia and Reyna split up to be more efficient. Reyna went to search for any remnants of Percy and Annabeth's bodies, a task that the overly emotional Thalia would not be fit for.
Thalia ran towards the back of the house, where she knew the bedrooms were. When she got to Andromeda's, she saw her safely tucked away in the back of the room.
Thalia lunged out to grab the child, narrowly missing being impaled by a giant iron, bronze, and gold spike.
The second time she was more careful and examined the room, aside from the normal things there seemed to be a spattering of metallic dust around all entrances to the room. How they did it, Thalia didn't know she just knew she had to get rid of it to grab Andromeda. She wasn't as good at manipulating the wind as Jason, but it was the only thing she could think of with the mantra of "They're gone, They're gone" running through her mind.
She slowly blew the strange dust into half of a vase that was in the corner and went up to the crying toddler she lifted Andromeda into her arms and she immediately quieted
"Tally. Mama? Dada? Wanna Mama and Dada" She said with as much seriousness as a child of her age could have.
"Want to go see Rey Rey?" Thalia cooed, pulling the child closer to her chest. She knew Reyna hated it when she called her that, but it was hilarious to watch the stoic Roman praetor melt when she saw the toddler.
"Weyna!" Andromeda clapped her hands. Thalia half smiled Andromeda really was adorable. Her smile was completely Percy's, she would never have admitted it when he was alive, but that hopeful, happy and carefree smile was 100% her father's although it hadn't been as present as it was when she met him. Thalia shuffled around the room and began gathering Andromeda's things. She grabs the baby bag that lies in the corner of the room, seemingly there for this sort of occasion. Seeing as there was a slight layer of dust on top of it. Thalia rummaged through the bag, to make sure that everything that was needed was there, sure enough, it was.
She hoisted the bag onto her shoulder, then headed to leave the room. Just then Andromeda reached over her shoulder as if to grab something.
Thalia looked at her cooing "What is it, sweetie?"
Andromeda attempted to crawl over her shoulder, "Owa, owa." She grumbled.
Thalia looked behind her and saw a terribly worn stuffed owl that Luke had given a six-year-old Annabeth lying inside of Andromeda's crib. She walked to the crib, grabbed the owl, and handed it to Andromeda who promptly fell asleep.
Thalia then carried the child down the hallway, keeping Andromeda's face pushed against her shoulder. Eventually, she reached the living room, where Reyna stood pale faced.
"What did you find?" Thalia whispered, almost not wanting to hear the answer.
"They were utterly destroyed it must have been an ambush possibly..."
"Hellhounds, it was hellhounds at least 12 of them too, I'm surprised she's still alive." A male voice interrupted from behind them. Reyna turned, blindly thrusting her sword forwards.
"Hey! Look before you impale someone why don't you."
"Nico! What are you doing here? How did you know what happened?" Thalia asked, but she couldn't bring herself to say what had happened.
"Son of Hades," Nico shrugged, "I can sense when souls, especially those close to me pass. Why are you two here?" Nico wondered. Thalia thought of what a burden it must be to know exactly when your loved ones die.
"What were you doing out back in the clearing?" Thalia inquired.
"Killing the monsters so that their baby would live. What were you doing and how is she alive?" Nico
"There was a weird dust surrounding her room if you tried to cross it spikes popped up, I wanted to show you the dust, but I left it in the room. Damn it!" Thalia slid down to the ground with her back against the part of the wall that remained and let Andromeda down onto the floor. Her shoulders began to shake, Reyna noticed she was sobbing.
"Hey, shh it's okay."Reyna attempted to comfort her girlfriend and noticed Andromeda begin to stir.
"No, how can you say it's okay, they were my family, I love Jason, but I've known Percy longer. He came to me after his first date with her as happy as he could be. He asked me how he was supposed to ask her to prom. When he thought Sally was dying sure he called Annabeth, but he called me too. I held him when he couldn't even go to the hospital, I convinced him to go."
"When Annabeth got pregnant he came to me and had and I'm going to be a dad freak out for the Gods sakes. For all intents and purposes, he was my little brother. Annabeth she, she was all I had left of my years on the run, but she grew up to be an amazing young woman. I was there when she first realized she loved Percy, I was the one she complained to about when the stupid seaweed-brained moron would get the guts to ask her to prom. When Sally was sick she came and cried with me, because Percy needed her to be strong. I was the first person she told about the pregnancy, whenever she had a question since she didn't have a mom, she came to the Hunters and Artemis was happy to answer them. She showed me all her nerd papers, even though I didn't know what was going on in them I always looked at them and now she'll never get to build what she wanted."
"They wanted to change the world, even though they didn't have the time to change the world. For me, they did. Percy was the heart of our mission, Annabeth was the brains and now they're gone. Reyna, they're gone they aren't on a quest, a god didn't take them, they aren't going to show up to talk to me randomly anymore. They died and I don't know how I am going to move on without them."
"I hungy" Andromeda announced. Reyna turned her attention to the child in her care.
"Nico can you get her some food, I need to…"
"Deal with your girlfriend, yeah, yeah I got it." Nico dismissed her comment. "Come on Andromeda, let's get you fed." Nico cooed, as he left the room.