GUYS I'M NOT DEAD don't worry. Here's the new chapter (:
Annabeth whirled around as soon as the creatures swooped down on her, clawing at her hair with their scaly talons. Her first impression: psycho demon harpies (yeah, she sounded like Percy, didn't she?). Then she realized that harpies usually had six talons instead of eight. One harpy tried to snap at her ear and she noticed weirder details.
Normal harpies usually had normal bird bodies, but these ones had the bodies of steroid hawks. They had a sharp face with protruding, pointed upper lips, similar to that of birds of prey, and their hair was slicked back like the facial feathers of eagles.
Percy slashed at one and asked, "Do harpies wear make-up?"
"What?" Annabeth screamed at him in disbelief. Really, you're fighting for your life and you wonder if the harpies used make-up to look like crazy hawks? New record for Seaweed Brain.
"Check out their eyes," Percy replied. Annabeth followed. Thick black mascara outlined the harpies' eyes, curving up at the far corners to make their eyes look sharper and their stares more intense. They also had dark eye shadow all over, reminding Annabeth of eye bags, lack of sleep, and –
"Gothic pandas," Percy muttered. "With hawk eyes and eagle heads. On a harpy. Interesting package, I must say." He slammed the flat of his sword into one harpy, sending it crashing into another. The two demon women screeched at each other and started fighting amongst themselves.
Annabeth impaled another against the wall with her dagger. The harpy dissolved into a blackish substance that reminded Annabeth magnesium strips fizzing in acid – one of her favourite old school science projects. The blackish substance twisted and floated off, but didn't scatter like ashes in the wind, as monsters usually do when their essence was sent to Tartarus. Then Annabeth remembered – they already were in Tartarus. So technically, she couldn't permanently destroy any monster here.
Percy seemed to have noticed this too and it appeared to get on his nerves. One harpy reformed behind him and clawed at his back. He swung Riptide around in agitation, almost ripping his arm off, but beheading the harpy cleanly.
"Just get rid of them as fast as possible and let's get out of here!" Annabeth yelled over the mad screeching. She didn't sound like herself at all. Usually she said things confidently, with conviction (whether she was that way inside or not), but now it was desperation.
Apparently the harpies sensed it too, because the largest one with the thickest make-up threw her head back and cawed maliciously. If she did not know better, Annabeth might have thought the harpy was actually laughing.
The harpy let out another high pitch cackle, which suited a broken microphone better. The others screeched in agreement, as if mocking Annabeth's statement
"Excuse me?" Annabeth's eyes flashed. No creature questioned her plans.
The largest harpy flapped and continued making broken, high-pitched sounds like it was high, keeping out of reach of Annabeth's knife. Percy must have been irritated by her too, because he suddenly appeared behind Annabeth, taking the harpy by surprise with the length of his sword.
Silence. For a moment all the mascara-ed eyes were turned on Percy, who looked around and figured he must have taken down the leader. Then all the harpies swooped down on him at lightning speed.
Annabeth screamed and launched herself at the harpies, trying to get them off Percy in vain. The harpies had latched themselves to him by all means possible and refused to let go, clawing at him and flapping their wings, stuffing Annabeth's face with feathers.
The walls of Tartarus resonated around them, sending the harpies into a frenzy. Wind blew through and Gaea's cold voice whispered in Annabeth's mind.
No one leaves Tartarus except by my command…
The walls around them shifted and started to close in above them.
And even if you reach the doors you can only shut yourself in…
The ground trembled, threatening to throw Annabeth off balance.
And your friends will see to that too, if they want to succeed…
The earth crumbled beneath her feet, sending her and Percy (still fighting off the harpies) tumbling once again into the void.
Fortunately, the falling rocks knocked out all the harpies along the way, which left Percy covered in cuts, scratches and some smears of mascara, which Coach Hedge would demand a long explanation about once they got out of Tartarus.
If they got out.
What Gaea had just said had fuelled Annabeth's fears more than she'd like to admit. The Doors of Death had been bothering her a lot. Being two-way, someone would have to close it from inside in order to shut it completely. In other words, there was a problem of having to leave someone behind. Annabeth wondered if the other demigods aboard the Argo II had figured this out. She hoped Leo had, so they could find a way around. She did not want anyone to get left behind.
But what she was most afraid of was that when the time came, Percy – of all people – would insist on staying behind. Athena herself had said it. To save a friend you would sacrifice the world.
And Annabeth couldn't afford to let him go again.
"Hey, it's leaking here." Percy's voice broke her chain of thoughts. From the glow of his sword, she could see him standing a few feet away from her, running his hand over the surface of a wall. He looked up. "It's dripping…" He held out his hand as Annabeth approached and she took it.
She almost drew back when her hand came into contact with his because it was cold – and wet. Water. She had not realized how dry her throat was. If Tartarus had been a desert she'd have died from heat stroke long ago. Percy pulled her closer, and she felt the steady drip coming from somewhere above.
"There's a series of pipes somewhere above us. Really high up. Too high for me to determine," Percy explained. Or maybe we're too far down, Annabeth thought darkly. "Is it clean?" She asked.
"Fresh," Percy answered. "It's almost like spring water. Do you think we're under a volcano? There are quite a few in the Underworld."
Annabeth did not want to know how Percy knew that much about the Underworld, but his idea made sense. Clean water, volcanoes, springs – it all made sense. But the pipes…
Annabeth remembered their visit to Hades' place when they were twelve. She thought about how it was modeled after Olympus, and she remembered the fountain in the atrium – one of the first structures that survived the Titan War.
"We're under Hades' palace," she told Percy. "The atrium, to be exact. He should have a fountain there, like Olympus does. I'm guessing the pipes direst water from one of the springs near those volcanoes you mentioned."
Annabeth's head was whirring, calculating their position under the palace and in Tartarus. If only she had a clue or a hint in the direction to the Doors of Death, she would be certain of how to navigate from where they were.
Note: the appearance of the harpies here are purely based on my imagination and i have no say as to whether harpies are really like that.