Chapter 21: The Malice Within
"I must say I'm impressed." Minos admitted, "I never expected the two of you to defeat Tantalus. But here you are."
"And like the other two, we'll kill you as well." Percy replied.
"Granted, that's a possibility. You may defeat me. You may be able to defeat the other two. You may be able to find the key. You may be able to unlock the Doors. But at the end of the day, your efforts are fruitless. You cannot stop the Earth Mother. To her, you are another gnat for her to crush. Tell me, Perseus Jackson, how would you defeat the very thing you stand upon?"
"The same way we defeated the two spirits empowered by Tartarus. And the same way we'll defeat you." He shot back.
Minos threw back his head and roared with laughter. "Admirable courage, demigod. But no, you will not defeat me. You will defeat my creation."
"The Labyrinth?" Nico snorted. "Been there, done that."
"You confuse my creation with the cursed work of the wretched inventor, Daedalus." Minos spat.
"Don't you dare call Daedalus wretched!" Percy gripped his sword tightly. Minos smiled at Percy's anger.
"No, my Labyrinth is far more dangerous."
"It's not your Labyrinth. Daedalus made it. You forced him to." Percy shouted indignantly.
Minos ignored the accusation. "My spirit is tied to this. Try as you might, but you will not be able to kill me with physical contact. To defeat me, you must defeat the Labyrinth."
"So what, we tear it down brick by brick? I'd love that." Nico said.
"You can try, but your real objective lies in trickery and deception. You must fool the Labyrinth. It will guess and assume your decisions. Your job is to be as unpredictable as possible, but fail, and the Labyrinth will kill you."
"How do we know you're telling the truth?"
"I swear on the River Styx, my instructions and words are true."
Percy couldn't tell whether thunder rumbled. The shifting stone of the Labyrinth's walls might have drowned it out, or Minos' oath was false. Could a spirit blessed by Tartarus still hold to an oath on the Styx?
He looked at Minos cautiously, but was unable to look past his amiable expression.
"Well, demigods?" Minos prompted. "Do we have a deal?"
Percy was silent. Nico took a step forward. "Fine, we'll play."
The king smiled broadly and extended his arms as though he were addressing his subjects. "Excellent! Let the games begin!"
At those words, the ghost of Minos faded, the walls of the Labyrinth groaned and rose, and the lava hardened into rock.
"Well, here goes nothing." Percy looked at Nico, who shrugged, and the two plunged into the darkness that lay ahead.
"Hestia?" Annabeth shook the sleeping form of the goddess.
She shook slightly, and stirred. "Annabeth?" She said drowsily. "Where are we?"
"Prison, sort of. I dropped from above into here, where you already were."
"How long was I out?"
"I don't know. My watch is broken. Must be some iron around. Messes the magnets up."
She sighed. "Gods, I'm sorry. This is all my fault."
"It's fine. We couldn't have known they had set up a trap."
"No, it's not that."
Annabeth raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean?"
"Aphrodite tricked me. Again."
She drew a breath. "When I was first captured and released by Clytius, after Percy...died, I thought I felt Aphrodite leave me, and I was in control."
"Let me guess, she didn't."
Hestia shook her head sadly. "She heard everything. She's been spying through me all this while."
"Oh."
Annabeth was silent for a while. She wasn't sure whether to fume at herself or Hestia.
"How much could she have eavesdropped?"
Hestia threw her arms in the air. "I don't know. She knew about our plan, about me recovering my powers..."
"Everything I've done or seen, she's seen it. I don't know how much damage I've done, Annabeth. If more people die because of my mistake...I wouldn't be able to bear it."
"Is she still listening now?"
"It wouldn't matter. We're near Gaia's heart, right? She can probably hear us. But if it helps, I don't think she's here."
Hopefully, the two thought.
"Maybe she will if we leave, but for now..."
"Don't think about it." Annabeth said half-heartedly.
An awkward silence passed between the two.
"So...what do we do now?" Annabeth asked.
"Doesn't seem like we can escape. Guess all we can do is wait for our impending doom." Hestia said dryly.
Annabeth looked at Hestia. Her eyes were empty with resignation to their fate. She wanted to say something along the lines, like "there's always a way out" or something heroic and inspiring, but she remained quiet. Maybe they really had no hope.
Hestia had heard stories, about people bathing in the Styx, or touching lava. They said it wasn't instantly agonising. When they first touch the superheated liquid, it's so hot that the nerves register it as coldness. It's ice cold at first contact, but the next instant it's causing the skin to beg for mercy.
This was a pretty accurate analogy to her current feelings. When she'd found out that Aphrodite never really left, there was an initial shock, the first startle at the burning cold, but the more she thought about it, the burn pained more and more.
How would it feel like, to have an outside entity, listen in and feel everything you've done for the past weeks? To put it into technogical terms for mortals, it was as though a wireless earpiece had been installed in her ears and brain, and cameras in her eyes. Her entire body hacked by a goddess, how was she supposed to function? Every thought and thing she'd done, heard, saw, smelled, someone else knew about it.
Goosebumps appeared on her skin. She shivered. She crossed her legs and hugged them tightly, not daring to make eye contact with the demigod beside her. She knew it was ridiculous to think that Annabeth would mean any harm, but she couldn't help it. She just wanted to be alone and feel secure, but even that was impossible.
Percy.
It was a completely random thought. Why she suddenly thought of him, she wasn't sure. Then she realised why.
She was cold. She was scared. There was no campfire next to her, there was no light, there was no Percy. And without him, she didn't know what to do. Did she really want to submit entirely to Gaia and her Giants? Percy wouldn't do that. He'd keep trying over and over again.
But she wasn't sure. She couldn't conceive a single plan that would work. She could feel eyes watching her. Gaia, Aphrodite, she was being monitored. Escape was practically impossible. The air around her was heavy, not just physically, but magically. Teleportation was out because of this.
The only question she had was: If they were not taking any chances, using any advantage they had to its fullest potential, why was Annabeth and her still alive?
Percy always enjoyed playing games. He was a teenager. He appreciated the occasional shooter on his mom's old computer. He really looked forward to family game nights with Monopoly and Scrabble.
But this was a entirely different type of game. Instead of being the millionaire controlling properties, he was the poor top hat being moved by unseen forces with distance determined by rolling die. He was the minion.
Throughout his adventures, he'd been played for. He endured the embarrassment of that water ride back when he was fourteen and helping out Ares. He'd battled an arena for Luke's pleasure.
But this Labyrinth was beyond evil. The walls stretched on endlessly and seemed to go thirty feet into the air. The path in front of him was obscure due to the dark mist limiting his vision to roughly five feet. He was essentially blind.
Not to mention the chilly feeling of being watched. He knew Minos was watching him and Nico, somehow. Anytime Minos could simply strike the two and they'd be dead, yet he didn't.
Percy found that disturbing. He was unsure of why he wasn't dead within the first minute of scouring the maze. The Giants and their armies were different from the Titans. The Titans were cocky and always assumed they had the upper hand, which led to their downfall. The Giants did not. They grasped at any opportunity they had, and never took chances. If they could kill a potential enemy, they would.
So what made this situation unique? Was it the Styx oath? Was Minos' attitude towards this war unlike his allies?
Those questions were left unanswered. Not that he could answer them anyways, because it was in that moment that he realised that he was alone.
"Nico?" His voice reverberated down the empty corridor. The echoes and the silence rushed back to meet him.
He froze as panic spread like frost. Drawing Riptide instinctively, he took a step forward.
And another.
And another. He, without thinking about it, counted each of his steps, as though the next one could open the ground into an abyss, or trigger a tripwire leading to an explosion.
It will guess and assume your decisions. Your job is to be as unpredictable as possible.
Minos' words echoed in his head.
How was he supposed to do that? He had already lost Nico - whether it was to death or isolation was yet to be discovered, and fear was pounding in his heart. And the Labyrinth knew that.
He took another step and found his leg plunging down...but found it only to be a step.
He exhaled, his heartbeats gradually decreasing from its sudden rapid thuds against his chest.
But that fearful reaction was enough to confirm the Labyrinth's assumptions.
The next step, Percy found himself falling through the non-existent floor.
Nico wasn't sure what happened. One moment he was walking in front of Percy, with his Stygian iron blade illuminating the darkness, though not by that much, the next moment he was in a completely different area, at least that was what he felt. Even though nothing in his surroundings had changed. Darkness still reigned, and he was still stumbling blindly in what was supposed to be his domain.
There was a lurching in his stomach as he was teleported, the feeling that one got when taking a dive on a rollercoaster. The next thing he knew, the feeling had settled and Percy was gone when he looked back.
Uneasiness set in, but Nico forced it back. He knew the Labyrinth would manipulate any sense of fear he possessed. He only hoped Percy, wherever he was, dead or alive, knew the same.
"You can come out now," he spoke to the Labyrinth, his voice unwavering.
He sensed it. Like a hidden viper uncoiling to spring onto its prey, it emerged from the darkness.
"Nico de Angelo." The Labyrinth enunciated each syllable clearly. It's voice had a smooth baritone to it. It reminded Nico of the term "silky black". Was there an undertone of admiration? Nico couldn't tell.
"So I've separated you from Perseus, yet I do not sense any fear, to your credit, I suppose." It sounded casual, as if this were a friendly conversation.
"I do not fear the shadows. I control them. You will bow to me." The ruthless tone was met with a minuscule moment of silence.
"Courageous, courageous." It responded amiably, apparently not at all affected by Nico's command. "But you'll have to do better than that, I'm afraid."
"You will lead me to Minos' heart, so we can end this."
"As much as you'd want me to, you can't. You haven't gained full control of me, nowhere near twisting and turning my tunnels to your comfort." Nico could sense its grim smile. "We're going to have some fun instead."
It pressed on before Nico could speak. "Let me show you something...shocking. Or perhaps not. You choose which emotion best describes what I'm about to show."
The darkness in front of him rippled. Colours brightened into existence, forming a shape of a human being. It was stumbling in the darkness, crying out random names. He thought he heard his among others. Behind him, on the walls, above and below - it didn't matter, everything was pitch black - faces appeared out of nothing, unable to be distinguished. They were laughing, maliciously. At this human daring to step into their domain.
Nico couldn't help it. His heart skipped a beat.
"Percy?" His voice quavered.
That was it.
The Labyrinth showed its face. Two triangular eyes of sanguine red, void of irises, and a mouth resembling that of a jack o lantern. Blood tipped the bone white teeth, spilling into the oblivion below.
It flashed a wicked grin.
And Nico lost consciousness.