Why, hello again!

This one's rather long, especially compared to the other chapters.

I think I'm giving up on the 'exactly 100 words long' thing. Oh well.

I own nothing.


It was a sad fact of life, Leo thought, that when you're trying to save the world, playing prisoner in a dark cave is not fun, no matter how much you like your prison buddy.

Especially when said prison buddy is unconscious and you're worried sick about her.

He heard Hazel stir. "Leo? Are you there?" Phew. She was awake, thank Zeus.

"Yup. I'm here."

He heard a sigh of relief in the darkness, and then a wince. "Ouch, my head. What happened?"

"Those big, scary, snowball monsters knocked us out and dumped us in here. Man, I hate Khione." He leaned his head against the rock wall.

Rock. Hm. "Hey, do you think you can drill through this wall?"

She was silent for a minute. Leo could just picture the adorably thoughtful look on her face.

"No, I don't think so. There's some sort of enchantment on it…and anyways, I've never tried to drill through solid rock before." She paused. "I guess we're stuck."

Leo sat up straight. "Us? Stuck? You gotta be kidding me!"

"Leo."

"I mean, sure, we get into a lot of really, really bad situations, but we always…"

"Leo!"

"Okay, fine! I'll be quiet."

For a while, the only sound was a drip of some water from the ceiling. They had to be in some sort of cave.

Then Hazel broke the silence. "I just wish it wasn't so dark in here."

"Oh don't tell me you're afraid of the dark." Leo thought this would be odd in someone who was such an expert at tunneling underground.

"No! Well, maybe a little. It's just…I can't help thinking about Percy and Annabeth."

She sniffed, and Leo realized she must have been crying silently. He tentatively reached out and put his hand on her shoulder. "Hey, they'll be fine."

He could tell that Hazel didn't believe him, but she didn't say anything.

Leo got an idea. "Of course!" He raised his hand in front of him and lit it.

Light illuminated the cave, making shadows behind some of the stalactites (or maybe they were stalagmites, Leo had never figured out which was which.) It was a small cave, just large enough for Leo to stand up and stretch out his arms, which he did just now. "Whoa, where's the door?"

Hazel had stood up next to him, and looked around, her eyes wide. "It's one of those caves that are just deep in the earth and don't have any large openings." She looked at his hand in alarm. "You'd better put that out, or the smoke will make us suffocate!"

Leo immediately turned off the fire. He sat down, and could hear Hazel sitting down too. The darkness seemed more oppressive and threatening now that the light had been taken away. "You think that we'll run out of air anyways?"

She was biting her lip in confusion, he just knew it. "Maybe…if they wanted to kill us they could have done it already...but we should probably stop talking, just in case."

Leo mock-gasped, trying to hide how scared he was. "Stop talking! I, Leo Valdez, possibly going to my grave and not talking my head off and being annoying?"

"Leo."

"Okay, okay!" He was silent.

The minutes dragged on. Hazel was so quiet that at times Leo couldn't even tell she was there.

"Leo?"

"Ye-es?"

"Could you make some sort of small noise? Not talking...just something that doesn't use a lot of energy. I don't like it being so quiet in here…and I need to know that you're there."

"Okay."

He put his fingers on a rock next to him and tapped his fingernails against it. At first, there was no method to his tapping, he just drummed his fingers in no order at all.

Then, Leo got another idea; maybe the last one he would ever get. He smiled slightly to himself and changed the rhythm of his tapping.

He tapped long and short taps; in Morse code. It was the language he could best express himself to organic life forms in. Even if the organic life form in question didn't understand him (or, at least, he hoped she didn't. That would be awkward if they somehow managed to get of this mess alive.)

He tapped what he had tapped on walls to his mother, and what Sammy had tapped on the arm his chair in that flashback.

Over and over, as they waited in the darkness, Leo tapped three little words.

I love you.


For those of you who just hate open endings:

thensuddenlytherewasahugecra shwaterpouredintheroomlights hownindidyoumissmesaidpercy.

Phew. That was long

Next theme is 'Holding Hands'

I am open to suggestions :)