-coughs-

Okay, allow me to say this, once and for all:

You ready?

JAKOB DOESN'T HAVE ANNABETH AND PERCY AS PARENTS! NOPEEE. It's not true. Stop telling me it is. People who are suggesting other Gods and Titan's, you're wrong, but the children of Titans do make appearances in this fic, so half-marks. I plan to keep it ambiguous until the last chapter, but Jakob himself will find out.

Thanks to Reading Obsession as always for the betaing.

"Can we order room service?" asked Lily, as we all sat in the living room. It was a very nice hotel, and more than big enough, with clean glass windows and beige couch covers.

"I'm okay with that," Annabeth said, to which Nico and Giac nodded. I sighed as I felt the lipstick tube return to my pocket.

She walked to the phone, plucking the room service menu off of the end-table as she did so. The moon shone in through the windows, gathering in the pools of darkness where the light of the lamps didn't reach. Argus had installed himself at the door as guard, but it seemed peaceful here, and I felt safer than I had since camp. Like, part of the real world. Normality didn't exist when you were a demigod, and you grew to miss it.

Annabeth passed the card to Nico, who passed it to Giac who passed it to—I think you get the idea. She ordered, and we sat down, talking a little, but mostly just resting, finally.

oOoooOo

There was only one kitchen staff in the alley way which divided the buildings. He was stuffing trash into the Dumpster at the mouth of the alley.

Excellent target. Dempsey walked forwards, brushing a strand of blonde hair out of his eyes. The kitchen hand noticed him as Dempsey walked out of the shadows.

"Oh, sorry, you aren't meant to be—"

He didn't finish his sentence. Dempsey held out his hand and the man was sent flying into a brick wall.

"No, I'm good," Dempsey said, checking the man's vitals. He was still breathing, only a couple of bones broken.

The kitchen hand was dazed. "What the- How did you...?" He couldn't form a coherent sentence.

"Your persistence to live is beginning to annoy me." Dempsey clutched his fist in front of the kitchen hand's face, grinning as he looked at the hand.

The man's hands flew to his throat as all the air in his body was forcefully expelled out of his mouth and nose. He grunted, face turning white and then purple as he struggled for breath. Finally he released his clutch on the world and drifted into the afterlife.

Dempsey smiled again, releasing his fist and the slight headache he always got when he used his powers extensively. Then he crouched back down and set to work.

Five minutes later, dressed in the uniform of the hand he'd killed, Dempsey walked into the kitchen in a whirl of steam. It was busy in there, and Dempsey strolled around like he owned the place. Luckily for everyone involved, Dempsey didn't see any resistance. He walked to the loading area, and encountered a series of rolling dining carts, each with a number on them. There were only some with food on them, one of which was 299.

Dempsey already knew that this was the floor where they were. He almost subconsciously touched the side of his face with long fingers, feeling the faint bruise where that stupid hellhound had ploughed him into the dirt. He would have had them that night if it wasn't for than infuriating dog.

But no matter, he thought. They won't be escaping this time.

Dempsey chose not to manically laugh like most do after a thought like that, instead tapping a chef on the shoulder.

"Is that ready to go?" he asked the man, jerking his thumb at cart.

The chef told him very bluntly that yes it was, and Dempsey resisted the urge to see what the man would look like painted across the wall. He simply turned away, breathing heavily through his nose, and denting the bar he pushed the cart by a little.

He walked out of the kitchen, into the hall, and then into the lobby, crossing to the elevator whilst barging a fat woman and her date out of the way.

"Sorry," he said, grinning at the offended woman. "Important business."

The doors slid shut and he pressed the button for the twenty-ninth floor. Well, there were actually twenty-eight floors, but they had simply skipped the thirteen floor, the numbers flickering from eleven to twelve to fourteen to fifteen.

Dempsey hated superstition, and the hotel's quirk served to make him angrier. His mother had worried about his temper, but the stupid woman should have known better, better than whom my father was.

This calmed him down a little, and his bent his head under the small cap that the man had as a uniform. In retrospect, he should have gotten a hotel staff's uniform, but that couldn't be helped. Quickly he opened each of the dishes, sprinkling powder from a small vial over food in inconspicuous places. Nodding his assent, he replaced the vial in his pocket and put the trays back the way they were.

He walked to the door, keeping his head down.

He knocked, and making his voice slightly higher than usual, said "Room service!"

There was some mumbling over the other side of the door, followed by someone saying, "I'll get it."

The door was opened, and a teenager stood there. That damn Jakob. Same black hair, same grey eyes. The fool still had no idea. He did have four parallel scars running across his left cheek though, and Dempsey decided he'd give a medal to the monster that did it. If it wasn't dead already.

"Thanks," he said, taking the car and pushing a fifty-dollar note into Dempsey's hand.

"You're most welcome," Dempsey said, grinning. Jakob paused.

"Do I know you?" he asked.

"Nope," Dempsey said quickly, walking down the stairs. He heard the door close behind him, and grinned, descending the stairs loudly, and then creeping quietly back up them.

oOoooOo

Snow capped trees. The scent of grapes in the air. A winding mansion built into a hilltop. A palace, blazing with light. Two figures, a guy and a girl, moving away from the building. Towards a smaller one.

One leaving, the other staying. Brief pain. Nothingness.

I gasped as I awoke, struggling against the chair to which I was bound. The room was cold, freezing the sweat that had accumulated on my brow.

I fought, fought desperately to hold onto the memory that was just at the tip of my consciousness, but it slipped away from me, like water droplets off of glass. I sighed, leaning back, before realizing that I wasn't in the hotel. In fact, I realized that I was in imminent danger.

The room was bare, except for a door and small window. The windows weren't barred, and the doors looked flimsy enough to break, but I couldn't move. Rough rope bound me, tying me to the simple wooden chair underneath me.

There was someone beside me, their warmth leaking out into the room. I could turn my head, and did, looking to my left.

There was Annabeth, head lolled forwards onto her chest, still unconsciousness.

"Annabeth," I said, trying to struggle out of my bonds, the chair banging against the floor. "Annabeth!"

This seemed to rouse her, because she sat up and looked at me blearily. "Jakob, where... where are we?" She frowned.

"I don't know," I said. "I think—"

The door banged open, and in strolled the teenager we last saw at camp. He looked even taller now, fierce and commanding.

"Oh good. You're awake. We can begin." His tone was colder than a nuclear winter. "First of all, I am Dempsey, and you're both going to die. I'm sorry to tell you this, but it's the truth."

We aren't going to die, I thought. We aren't.

He crossed to Annabeth.

"Sweet, sweet Annabeth. You will serve me well," he said. "My father is Boreas, God of North Winds. Apparently I inherit his looks and temper." He smiled briefly. "I serve one true master, one greater than Gods and Titans. He is the beginning and the end of all civilisations. He's the sky, he's everything. My master is Ouranos. "

He paused to draw breath. "Because I am only the son of a god, I need to be stronger. And I am, because the collective life force of children of the twelve Olympians runs through me." He regarded us with a calculating look. "I am four hundred years old. I can appear in any form I wish, and I can manipulate my powers for hours and not feel any strain. Do you get it? I am more powerful than any other half-human in the world!"

His chest rose and fell erratically, and I wondered if he was entirely sane. But there was nothing I could do but sit there.

"Unfortunately, I am still not as powerful as I could be. I am missing the life force from one more person, a child of Athena."

He looked at Annabeth. "Annabeth, you always claimed you were smart. Where do you think this is going?"

"Go to Hell," Annabeth said, disdain evident in her voice. "You won't touch me."

"Oh, but I will." Dempsey crossed to Annabeth, holding some weird potion. He pinched her nose as she struggled against the chair and him. I reached out, trying to reach her, but I was thrown back by an unbelievably cold wind. Annabeth finally couldn't take in anymore and breathed in through her mouth. Quick as a fox, Dempsey tipped the silver potion down her throat.

Annabeth gargled, her eyes going wide. Then she slumped in her chair.

"Annabeth!" I yelled as the wind turned into a tornado. Her body lifted from the chair, ropes twisting and fraying, crumpling into dust around her.

She disappeared in a whirl of silver stars. Dempsey threw his head back as a silver stream coiled into the air. The gleaming thread whirled down, striking Dempsey in the face.

This was all I saw, because then my vision turned red, and then black. The anger I felt, at Annabeth's death, at Dempsey, even at my parents from abandoning me, welled up inside and exploded forwards.

When I awoke, sunlight hit my face. I was first aware of an enormous pounding headache and a fatigue that ran deep in my bones. I was lying on a concrete floor, the water around me not touching my clothes. Ragged remains of the room we were in were strewn around me, and Dempsey was nowhere to be found.

She's dead, Annabeth is dead. That was my first thought. And then the second came after my first, my mind exploding with information.

I know who my parents are.