Second part of a triple update. I know triple! I only mention this stuff at the beginning of chapters since often all the updates come in at once and sometimes things glitch and only the last one shows up or only one of them shows up no matter the order. Taking no chances. I've had it happen to me with stories I follow where I haven't read them in a while and I start reading a chapter then I'm like "Wait, did I know this information before?" and I end up spoiling myself as I read out of order.
Long story short, enjoy (in order)!
:P
First Person: Kaze
The wait for the Argo II's arrival would have been boring if I had any perception of time. Leo was lost in thought the entire time, so he barely noticed the wait at all. I stared down at the raft, making sure that any wandering mortals didn't disturb it. Tsuchi had told me to seek out Leo Valdez and rescue him, which I had done. Now, I didn't have orders from her or Gaea alike. Now, I was just confused as to what I was supposed to do. I wasn't upset about it, per say, but I did want to know what to do.
When the Argo II finally arrived, I began to wonder if I should rejoin the crew. It would draw attention if I was caught opposing Gaea's forces, but until then, I could simply say I was infiltrating the enemy. Then again, I couldn't very well do it while I looked exactly like a reanimation that Tsuchi and Kandai were. Where were they, anyway? I wondered. I sped through a souvenir shop and easily stole a white fedora to match my new outfit without even kicking up a breeze. I was almost amazed at how easy it was to move now - like air resistance itself couldn't affect me and my acceleration was almost instant. If I could be amazed, that is. I had a moment of pause, wondering if I should change my trench coat to be my red jacket. Tsuchi had told me that my red jacket had been utilized to make the new white trench coat, since the properties of its infinite pockets were useful, but it needed to be changed - made less human. Well, I had already chosen a white fedora. No use going looking for something else to hide my inhumanness.
The crew of the Argo II met us at the top of the city fortifications, sitting at an open-air café, overlooking the sea, Leo drinking a cup of coffee. Piper nearly knocked him out of his chair with a hug.
"Leo! Gods, where have you been?!"
"Valdez!" Coach Hedge grinned. Then he seemed to remember he had a reputation to protect and he forced a scowl. "You ever disappear like that again, you little punk, I'll knock you into next month!"
Frank patted Leo on the back so hard it made him wince. Even Nico shook his hand.
Hazel kissed Leo on the cheek. "We thought you were dead!"
"We were so worried!" Emily exclaimed.
"You got freaking shot into the sky," Audrey recounted. "I can't even imagine how that works, but at least you're back either way."
Leo mustered a faint smile. "Hey, guys. Nah, nah, I'm good."
"Welcome back," Rei said flatly.
She was so silent and she hadn't come up to Leo that I almost mistook her for someone else. The aura I was sensing off of her nearly wasn't there. Usually, she had been so full of Primordial power that I could've sensed her from a mile away even before I'd gone through my transformation. It wasn't like I had grown a sixth sense from returning from the dead or anything (Hazel had returned from the dead and she seemed as normal as a daughter of Pluto could be). It was more like Rei's presence made the pressure in the room drop just enough that you knew something had changed though you couldn't say what. To those who were too ADHD, a change like that could either pass by you completely or it could be so prominent that it takes your entire attention trying to figure out what the change was and where it was coming from.
It was clear that she noticed something was off about Leo with a single glance. He wouldn't meet any of their eyes, his hands were perfectly still - and his hands were never still. All the nervous energy had drained right out of him, replaced by a kind of wistful sadness. He looked the same way Nico di Angelo did after facing Cupid in the ruins of Salona. He was heartsick. The café had a perfect view of the harbor. Leo must have seen the Argo II sail in from a long way off, and yet he sat here drinking coffee - which he didn't even like - waiting for them to find him. That wasn't like Leo at all. The ship was the most important thing in his life, and when he saw it coming to rescue him, Leo should have run down to the docks, whooping at the top of his lungs. To his close friends, that was a big warning sign.
The others grabbed chairs from the nearby tables, Rei coming over in my direction. I couldn't decide if I wanted to keep my identity hidden or not - it kinda became harder to make decisions when you had little to no emotions, and you didn't care either way. By the time she made it over there, I still hadn't made the decision.
"Kaze?"
It wasn't Rei's voice that had pointed me out first. Instead, I felt a tug on my sleeve and turned to see that Azrael was standing beside me. How had he gotten there? My senses were hyper-aware right now. He shouldn't have been able to get under my radar.
"Azrael, there you are!" Emily exclaimed. "You went into the Veil again, didn't you?"
He nodded to her. "My mother said to look for a darkness she could not see. I found it."
"You're speaking English," I realized.
"There is no language in the Veil," He explained simply. "I have had a week to learn the Veil. Only a day, perhaps, from my own perspective."
"The Veil allows him to pass time a lot slower than in the real world," Emily informed me. "Basically, the rest of the world speeds by around him if he isn't focusing on what he's doing."
"ADHD to the max, like you, Kaze," Rei said. I hadn't noticed that she'd seen me and had joined the conversation. Maybe it wasn't Azrael using the Veil to sneak up on me but just me and my senses dulling. "Speaking of you, where have you been? You make this big deal about me leaving you and then you have me all worried about where you are instead."
"I am not myself. I…have no idea what I am."
"You speak with no language as well," Azrael said. "We can speak freely without assistance."
Had he gotten shorter since the last time I saw him? I could've sworn he wasn't a whole head shorter than me when we'd met. Come to think of it, Rei was shorter too. Actually, I was simply taller than her. This fact was confirmed when she had to reach up to wrap me in a hug.
"What happened to you?" She asked warily. "You…"
"You smell like the two who took you," Azrael said. "You smelled wrong before, but now…"
"Smelled wrong?" Audrey asked. Wonderful. Now she had joined the conversation too. "What's that mean?"
"You all smell off," Azrael said.
"The smell of death, I assume," Rei explained. "Kaze was brought back illegally, but he was still pretty much human - like Hazel. Now…now he's a reanimation like my father and his mother."
"You smell like Zytaveon," Azrael said to Rei. He addressed Audrey next, pointing at Rei. "You now smell like her. And she smells of death as well. All different death scents."
"What about me?" Emily asked.
"You smell like…flowers."
Emily smiled. "Aw, that's so sweet."
Azrael had apparently been opening up more to the crew, willing to speak more often. Emily was the one he stayed close to and confessed the most to, as well as the one who he needed present to do much speaking at all. Perhaps her emotional aura was getting to me, but I almost thought I started feeling emotions again for a moment. It wasn't good emotion. It was some kind of sting, a sting of anger perhaps. Maybe…jealousy.
"Let us trade a recount of the events that have transpired in our parting," I said suddenly.
"Woah, look at mister fancy over here," Audrey smirked. "Right. Let's compare notes."
We were taken to join the others at Leo's table, where Jason leaned in and squeezed his friend's shoulder.
"Hey, man. What happened?"
Leo's eyes swept around the group. The message was clear: 'Not here. Not in front of everyone.' Leo had specifically requested that I don't mention Calypso to the others for some reason. I had no reason to disobey, so I just went with it.
"I got marooned," Leo said. "Long story. How about you guys? What happened with Khione?"
Coach Hedge snorted. "What happened? These ladies right here happened!" He pointed to a bashful Piper, a humble Emily, and a distracted Audrey who looked up from her thoughts and blinked in confusion. "I'm telling you, these girls got skills!"
"Coach-" Piper protested.
Hedge began retelling the story, but in his version, Piper was a kung fu assassin, Emily was a martial arts black-belt, there were a lot more Boreads, and apparently, Ariel and Audrey did a lot more stealth than they attested to. Then Azrael pops out of nowhere and destroyed Khione permanently. Hedge was just describing Piper taking Khione by surprise with a roundhouse kick as Azrael stabbed her through the chest from behind when Piper finally interrupted.
"Coach! It didn't happen like that at all! I couldn't have done much without Festus."
Leo raised his eyebrows. "But Festus was deactivated."
"Um, about that. We sorta woke him up."
Piper explained how she and Emily had rebooted the metal dragon with charmspeak by giving it the Fire of Life and enabling Festus's personality to grow out of the care that came from the people who had loved Festus around him.
"We basically gave him a soul and all he needed was a bit of juice to fully activate," Emily explained.
"Shouldn't be possible," Leo murmured. "Unless the upgrades let him respond to voice commands. But if he's permanently activated, that means the navigation systems and the crystal-"
"Crystal?" Jason asked.
Leo flinched. "Um, nothing. Anyway, what happened after the wind bomb went off?"
Hazel took up the story. A waitress came over and offered menus, and in no time the others were all chowing down on sandwiches and sodas, enjoying the sunny day almost like a group of regular teenagers.
"Why are you not eating?" Azrael asked me.
"I do not eat. My body does not need it."
He placed his hand on top of mine and suddenly a wave of cold went through me. The smell of the food now made my stomach rumble and I wanted to eat something.
"Do you like this? I do not eat much, so you can have some of mine."
He gave me half of his sandwich and I accepted it eagerly. "How'd you do that?"
"You have a soul, it is merely damaged. It is buried, it is hurt. I can fix it a little, but your body is not…right. I cannot fix it permanently."
Frank grabbed a tourist brochure stuck under the napkin dispenser and began to read it. Piper patted Leo's arm, like she couldn't believe he was really here. Nico and Rei stood at the edge of the group, eyeing the passing pedestrians as if they might be enemies. Rei tapped her foot, eager to get moving, and she kept glancing back at me as though I might disappear. I suppose that I could if I wanted to, with my speed and all. Coach Hedge munched on the salt and pepper shakers while Emily and Audrey debated whether to stop him or not. Despite the happy reunion, everybody seemed more subdued than they normally were - like they were picking up on Leo's mood. Emily noticed the subtle cues and gave a smile, and something heavy seemed to lift off the heavy atmosphere.
"So then Jason and Lu harnessed the venti and here we are," Hazel finished.
Leo whistled. "Hot-air horses? Dang. So basically, you held a bunch of gas together all the way to Malta, and then you let it loose."
"You make it sound like a fart," Audrey smirked.
Jason frowned. "You know, it doesn't sound so heroic when you put it that way."
"Yeah, well I'm an expert on hot air," Leo said. "I'm still wondering, why Malta? I just kind of ended up here on the raft, but was that a random thing, or-"
"Maybe because of this," Frank announced. He tapped his brochure. "Says here Malta was where Calypso lived."
A pint of blood drained from Leo's face. "W-What now?"
Frank shrugged. "According to this, her original home was an island called Gozo just north of here. Calypso's a Greek myth thingy, right?"
"Ah, a Greek myth thingy!" Coach Hedge rubbed his hands together. "Maybe we get to fight her! Do we get to fight her? Cause I'm ready."
"No," Leo murmured. "No, we don't have to fight her, Coach."
Piper frowned. "Leo, what's wrong? You look-"
"Nothing's wrong!" Leo snapped, shooting to his feet. "Hey, we should get going. We've got work to do!"
"But…where did you go?" Hazel asked. "Where did you get those clothes? How-?"
"Jeez, ladies! I appreciate the concern, but I don't need two extra moms!"
Piper smiled uncertainly. "Okay, but-"
"Ships to fix! Festus to check! Earth goddess to punch in the face! What are we waiting for? Leo's back!"
He spread his arms and grinned. The tension in the air was clear despite Leo's effort to hide his feelings. Emily frowned at him, taking pity like she always did and sitting forward to draw the attention away from Leo.
"Leo's right," Emily announced. "We need to figure out our next move, and I don't think Calypso is gonna be some kind of threat."
"Calypso was a harmless woman," Audrey interjected. "She was a part of the Odyssey, right? She just had an island or something, but she wasn't some kind of fighter or witch."
"She was a sorceress of some sort, right?" Jason recalled. "Like Medea or Circe."
"She was a woman trapped on an island who was probably lonely," Emily corrected. "I doubt that categorizes her as some evil sorceress even if she can do magic. Either way, we have Leo back and we've lost an entire week thanks to him being gone. How far is Malta from Epirus?"
"We still have to go across the Ionian Sea," Audrey informed them. "Under the boot of Italy. It should be a straight shot once we go around to the north side of Malta."
"Meaning we should get going soon if we wanna save some time," Rei announced. "Everyone up, let's move it."
They started wrapping up their food and finishing their drinks. I finished my sandwich, and it was surprisingly good. As Azrael let go of me, I began to feel more and more numb like the reanimation that I was. But it was nice to be able to feel even temporarily. I would stay with them, I decided.
"Guys…"
Hazel was looking up into the air. She pointed to the northeast horizon - the direction of Epirus. A streak of darkness shot into the air like black lightning - as if pure night had torn through the daytime.
"I don't see anything," Coach Hedge grumbled.
"Me neither," Piper said.
Most of them just looked confused beyond Hazel, Nico, Azrael, Onesan, and Jason.
"That can't be…" Nico muttered. "Greece is still hundreds of miles away."
The darkness flashed again, momentarily leaching the color from the horizon.
"You think it's Epirus?" Jason asked.
It was odd that he could see the lightning when he wasn't somehow connected to the Underworld. The fact seemed to chill him to the bone as much as the rest of them.
"The House of Hades is open for business," Rei agreed.
A few seconds later, a rumbling sound washed over then like distant artillery.
"It's begun," Hazel said.
"What has?" Emily asked.
When the next flash happened, Hazel's gold eyes darkened like foil in fire. "Gaea's final push. The Doors of Death are working overtime. Her forces are entering the mortal world en masse."
"We'll never make it," Nico said. "By the time we arrive, there'll be too many monsters to fight."
Jason set his jaw. "We'll defeat them. And we'll make it there fast. We've got Leo back. He'll give us the speed we need." He turned to his friend. "Or is that just hot air?"
Leo managed a crooked grin. His eyes seemed to say, 'Thanks.' "Time to fly, boys and girls," He said. "Uncle Leo's still got a few tricks up his sleeves!"
First Person: Zytaveon
"What do you hate?"
"Huh?"
"Do you hate it when your friends are hurt? Do you hate it when things you love are taken away from you?"
"Yeah."
"Do you ever get angry? Do you ever snap?"
"Sometimes, sure. But not often."
"I get very restless. Chaos calls me emotionally unstable; I call it emotionally empowered. But you see, that means I invent and destroy and I feel too much for the human mind to comprehend on its own. You must lose yourself in order to understand me. Stop paying so much attention to everything, and therefore find out who you truly are underneath the surface when all else has been stripped away. Your darkness is impressive, but is it enough?"
I sighed. "Let's just get on with it. Chaos can't hold him back for much longer."
"Yes, yes. Let's see if we can break you, Zytaveon. The fate of our worlds depend on it."
Third Person: No. 1
Percy Jackson wasn't dead yet, but he was already tired of being a corpse. As they trudged toward the heart of Tartarus, he kept glancing down at his body, wondering how it could belong to him. His arms looked like bleached leather pulled over sticks, his skeletal legs seemed to dissolve into smoke with every step. He'd learned to move normally within the Death Mist, more or less, but the magical shroud still made him feel like he was wrapped in a coat of helium. He worried that the Death Mist might cling to him forever, even if they somehow managed to survive Tartarus. He didn't want to spend the rest of his life looking like an extra from 'The Walking Dead.'
He tried to focus on something else, but there was no safe direction to look. Under his feet, the ground glistened a nauseating purple, pulsing with webs of veins. In the dim red light of the blood clouds, Death Mist Annabeth looked like a freshly risen zombie. Ahead was the most depressing view of all. Spread to the horizon was an army of monsters - flocks of winged arai, tribes of lumbering Cyclopes, clusters of floating evil spirits. Thousands of baddies, maybe tens of thousands, all milling restlessly, pressing against one another, growling and fighting for space - like the locker area of an overcrowded school between classes, if all the students were 'roid-raging mutants who smelled really bad.
No. 1 sat on Bob's shoulder as he led the two demigods behind him towards the edge of the army. He made no effort to hide, not that it would have done any good. Being ten feet tall and glowing silver, Bob didn't do stealth very well.
About thirty yards from the nearest monsters, Bob turned to face Percy. "Stay quiet and stay behind me," He advised. "They will not notice you."
"We hope," Percy muttered.
"Now, now, remain positive," No. 1 said. "The more natural you appear, the safer you shall be."
On the Titan's other shoulder, Small Bob woke up from a nap. He purred seismically and arched his back, turning skeletal then back to calico. At least he didn't seem nervous.
Annabeth examined her own zombie hands. "Bob, if we're invisible…how can you see us? I mean, you're technically, you know…"
"Yes," Bob said. "But we are friends."
"Nyx and her children could see us."
Bob shrugged. "That was in Nyx's realm. That is different."
"Uh…right."
Annabeth didn't sound reassured, but they were here now. They didn't have any choice but to try. No. 1 knew that sharing the information would likely make the two demigods even more worried, but it was suggested that the moment that they were seen by someone, they could never be unseen - once they were found out by one hostile, the illusion would wear off.
Percy stared at the swarm of vicious monsters. "Well, at least we won't have to worry about bumping into any other 'friends' in this crowd."
Bob grinned. "Yes, that is good news! Now, let's go. Death is close."
"The Doors of Death are close," Annabeth corrected. "Let's watch the phrasing."
They plunged into the crowd. Percy trembled so badly, he was afraid the Death Mist would shake right off him. He'd seen large groups of monsters before. He'd fought off an army of them during the Battle of Manhattan. But this was different. Whenever he'd fought monsters in the mortal world, Percy at least knew he was defending his home. That gave him courage, no matter how bad the odds were. Here, Percy was the invader. He didn't belong in this multitude of monsters any more than the Minotaur belonged in Penn Station at rush hour. A few feet away, a group of empousai tore into the carcass of a gryphon while other gryphons flew around them, squawking in outrage. A six-armed Earthborn and a Laistrygonian giant pummeled each other with rocks, though it was hard to tell if they were fighting or just messing around. A dark wisp of smoke - probably an eidolon - seeped into a Cyclops, made the monster hit himself in the face, then drifted off to possess another victim. One of them came near No. 1, but she waved them away and made it feel the pain of possessing a person who'd drowned to get it to back off.
"Percy, look," Annabeth whispered.
A stone's throw away, a guy in a cowboy outfit was cracking a whip at some fire-breathing horses. The wrangler wore a Stetson hat on his greasy hair, an extra-large set of jeans, and a pair of black leather boots. From the side, he might have passed for human - until he turned, and it could be seen that his upper body was split into three different chests, each one dressed in a different color Western shirt. It was Geryon, who had tried to kill Percy two years ago in Texas. Apparently, the evil rancher was anxious to break in a new herd. The idea of that guy riding out of the Doors of Death made Percy's sides hurt all over again. His ribs throbbed where the arai had unleashed Geryon's dying curse back in the forest. He wanted to march up to the three-bodied rancher, smack him in the face, and yell, 'Thanks a lot, Tex!' Sadly, he couldn't, though the image made No. 1 smile.
In this crowd, No. 1 was easily mistaken for a disguised and unique arai with the power of the Curse as Remnants of so many deaths. No. 1 was still part human, no matter how powerful she was, but she was also part monster. As such, most creatures in Tartarus didn't know what to make of her. Some tried to challenge her, others kept their distance. She drew eyes, but Bob took most of the attention and she looked like nothing more than a creature that had simply hitched a ride just like Small Bob. Either way, No. 1 wasn't in danger of being singled out even should Bob not be there. Because of the human in her, Nyx had prevented her from reaching the Doors of Death the monster way, but considering she was born in Tartarus, she was considered a monster all the same.
How many other old enemies were in this crowd? Percy began to realize that every battle he'd ever won had only been a temporary victory. No matter how strong or lucky he was, no matter how many monsters he destroyed, Percy would eventually fail. He was only one mortal. He would get too old, too weak, or too slow. He would die. And these monsters…they lasted forever. They just kept coming back. Maybe it would take them months or years to reform, maybe even centuries. But they would be reborn. Seeing them assembled in Tartarus, Percy felt as hopeless as the spirits in the River Cocytus. So what if he was a hero? So what if he did something brave? Evil was always here, regenerating, bubbling under the surface. Percy was no more than a minor annoyance to these immortal beings. They just had to outwait him. Someday, Percy's sons or daughters might have to face them all over again.
Sons and daughters…
The thought jarred him. As quickly as hopelessness had overtaken him, it disappeared. He glanced at Annabeth. She still looked like a misty corpse, but he imagined her true appearance - her gray eyes full of determination, her blond hair pulled back in a bandana, her face weary and streaked with grime, but as beautiful as ever. Okay, maybe monsters kept coming back forever, but so did demigods. Generation after generation, Camp Half-Blood had endured, and Camp Jupiter. Even separately, the two camps had survived. Now, if the Greeks and Romans could come together, they would be even stronger. There was still hope. He and Annabeth had come this far. The Doors of Death were almost within reach. Sons and daughters. A ridiculous thought. As awesome thought. Right there in the middle of Tartarus, surrounded by countless monsters and certain doom, Percy grinned.
"What's wrong?" Annabeth whispered.
With his zombie Death Mist disguise, Percy looked like he was grimacing in pain rather than smiling.
"Nothing," He said. "I was just-"
Somewhere in front of them, a deep voice bellowed: "IAPETUS!"
A Titan strode toward them, casually kicking lesser monsters out of the way. He was roughly the same height as Bob, with elaborate Stygian iron armor, a single diamond blazing in the center of his breastplate. His eyes were blue-white, like core samples from a glacier, and just as cold. His hair was the same color, cut military style. A battle helmet shaped like a bear's head was tucked under his arm and from his belt hung a sword the size of a surfboard. Despite his battle scars, the Titan's face was handsome and strangely familiar. No. 1 had seen many different monsters throughout her time, so it was unsurprising if she couldn't keep track of them all. Still…the name was on the tip of her tongue. Kiros?
The Titan stopped in front of Bob and clapped him on the shoulder, nearly knocking No. 1 off from the force that shook her ride. "Iapetus! Don't tell me you don't recognize your own brother!"
"No!" Bob agreed nervously. "I won't tell you that."
The other Titan threw back his head and laughed. "I heard you were thrown into the Lethe. Must've been terrible! We all knew you would heal eventually. It's Koios! Koios!"
"Of course. Koios, Titan of…"
"The North," No. 1 remembered.
"I know!" Bob shouted.
They laughed together and took turns hitting each other in the arm. Apparently miffed by all the jostling, Small Bob crawled into Bob's head and began making a nest in the Titan's silver hair. No. 1 was currently having to grip said hair to hang on, though it didn't bother her that much.
"Poor old Iapetus," Koios said. "They must have laid you low indeed. Look at you! A broom? A servant's uniform? A cat in your hair, babysitting a little girl?"
No. 1 kicked Koios, releasing a small amount of power as to not kill the Titan but just to make a point. Her kick was enough to dislocate the Titan's jaw, but with his hyper-healing from both being a Titan and being in Tartarus, it wasn't some kind of fatal wound. The entire area seemed to shake from the force, and it sent Koios staggering back as No. 1 cursed at him in Japanese.
"I am no baby to be sat upon!" No. 1 finished.
Koios simply chuckled and repositioned his jaw from the blow. "Well, at least she's not a completely useless choice of companion. Just don't tell me that she's been having to look after you all this time."
"No. She does not fight my battles."
"Truly, though. Hades must pay for these insults. Who was that demigod who took your memory? Bah! We must rip him to pieces, you and I, eh?"
"Ha-ha," Bob swallowed. "Yes, indeed. Rip him to pieces."
Percy's fingers closed around his pen. He didn't think much of Bobs brother, even without the 'rip him to pieces' threat. Compared to Bob's simple way of speaking, Koios sounded like he was reciting Shakespeare. That alone was enough to make Percy irritated. He was ready to uncap Riptide if he had to, but so far, Koios didn't seem to notice him or Annabeth. And Bob hadn't betrayed them yet, though he'd had plenty of opportunities.
"Ah, it's good to see you…" Koios drummed his fingers on his bear's-head helmet. "You remember what fun we had in the old days?"
"Of course!" Bob chirped. "When we, uh…"
"Holding down our father, Ouranos."
"Yes! We loved wrestling with Dad…"
"We restrained him."
"That's what I meant!"
"While Kronos cut him to pieces with his scythe."
"Yes, ha-ha." Bob looked mildly ill. "What fun."
"You grabbed Father's right foot, as I recall," Koios continued. "And Ouranos kicked you in the face as he struggled. How we used to tease you about that!"
"Silly me," Bob agreed.
"Sadly, our brother Kronos was dissolved by those impudent demigods." Koios heaved a sigh. "Bits and pieces of his essence remain, but nothing you could put together again. I suppose some injuries even Tartarus cannot heal."
"Alas!"
"Everything can be mended," No. 1 said. "But it will take a great deal of time and power. Either way, it seems Kronos cannot participate in this grand occasion."
"But the rest of us have another chance to shine, eh?" He leaned forward conspiratorially. "These giants may think they will rule. Let them be our shock troops and destroy the Olympians - all well and good. But once the Earth Mother is awake, she will remember that we are her eldest children. Mark my words. The Titans will yet rule the cosmos."
"Hmm," Bob said. "The giants may not like that."
"Spit on what they like. They've already passed through the Doors of Death, anyway, back to the mortal world. Polybotes was the last one, not half an hour ago, still grumbling about missing his prey. Apparently some demigods he was after got swallowed by Nyx. Never see them again, I wager!"
"Quite literally, since it's Nyx and all," No. 1 smiled.
If the giants had already passed through the Doors, then at least they wouldn't be hunting through Tartarus for Percy and Annabeth. Unfortunately, that also meant their friends in the mortal world were in even greater danger. All of the earlier fights with the giants had been in vain, as their enemies would be reborn as strong as ever.
"Well!" Koios drew his massive sword. The blade radiated a cold deeper than the Hubbard Glacier. "I must be off. Leto should have regenerated by now. I will convince her to fight."
"Of course," Bob murmured. "Leto."
Koios laughed. "You've forgotten my daughter, as well? I suppose it's been too long since you've seen her. The peaceful ones like her always take the longest to reform. This time, though, I'm sure Leto will fight for vengeance. The way Zeus treated her, after she bore him those fine twins? Outrageous!"
"Zeus is the cause of 90% of this world's problems," No. 1 sighed.
Leto: the mother of Apollo and Artemis. This guy Koios looked vaguely familiar because he had Artemis's cold eyes and Apollo's smile. The Titan was their grandfather, Leto's father. The idea almost gave No. 1 a migraine.
"Well! I'll see you in the mortal world!" Koios chest-bumped Bob, almost knocking the cat off his head and No. 1 had to brace herself. "Oh, and our two other brothers are guarding this side of the Doors, so you'll see them soon enough!"
"I will?"
"Count on it!"
Koios lumbered off, almost knocking over Percy and Annabeth as they scrambled out of his way. Before the crowd of monsters could fill the empty space, Percy motioned for Bob to lean in.
"You okay, big guy?" Percy whispered.
Bob frowned. "I do not know. In all this-" He gestured around them "-what is the meaning of 'okay?'"
"Fair point," No. 1 muttered.
Annabeth peered towards the Doors of Death, though the crowd of monsters blocked them from view. "Did I hear that correctly? Two more Titans guarding our exit? That's not good."
"The south and the east," No. 1 remembered.
Percy looked at Bob, the Titan's distant expression worrying him. "Do you remember Koios?" He asked gently. "All that stuff he was talking about?"
Bob gripped his broom. "When he told it, I remembered. He handed me my past like…like a spear. But I do not know if I should take it. Is it still mine, if I do not want it?"
"No," Annabeth said firmly. "Bob, you're different now. You're better.
The kitten jumped off Bob's head. He circled the Titan's feet, bumping his head against the Titan's pants cuffs. Bob didn't seem to notice. Percy wished he could be as certain as Annabeth. He wished he could tell Bob with absolute confidence that he should forget about his past. But Percy understood Bob's confusion. He remembered the day he'd opened his eyes at the Wolf House in California, his memory wiped clean by Hera. If somebody had been waiting for Percy when he first woke up, if they'd convinced Percy that his name was Bob, and he was a friend of the Titans and the giants…would Percy have believed it? Would he have felt betrayed once he found out his true identity?
"This is different. We're the good guys."
But were they? Percy had left Bob in Hades's palace, at the mercy of a new master who hated him. Percy didn't feel like he had much right to tell Bob what to do now - even if their lives depended on it.
"I think you can choose, Bob," Percy ventured. "Take the parts of Iapetus's past that you want to keep. Leave the rest. Your future is what matters."
"Future…" Bob mused. "That is a mortal concept. I am not meant to change, Percy Friend." He gazed around him at the horde of monsters. "We are the same…forever."
"If you were the same, Annabeth and I would be dead already. Maybe we weren't meant to be friends, but we are. You've been the best friend we could ask for."
Bob's silver eyes looked darker than usual. He held out his hand, and Small Bob the kitten jumped into it. No. 1 slid off Bob's shoulder and onto the ground before the Titan rose to his full height.
"Let us go, then, friends. Not much farther."
Stomping on Tartarus's heart wasn't nearly as much fun as it sounded, No. 1 decided. She wanted to say she was amazing, being who and what she was and living to survive this experience, but it was honestly drab. The purplish ground was slippery and constantly pulsing. It looked flat from a distance, but up close it was made of folds and ridges that got harder to navigate the farther they walked. Gnarled lumps of red arteries and blue veins gave them some footholds when they needed to climb, but the going was slow with the low stamina and Death Mist caution. They didn't want anything to make the Death Mist wear off, they weren't sure if a certain thought or lack of concentration could have something disturb their concentration, etc. And, of course, the monsters were everywhere. Packs of hellhounds prowled the plains, baying and snarling and attacking any monster that dropped its guard. Arai wheeled overhead on leathery wings, making ghastly dark silhouettes in the poison clouds.
Percy stumbled. His hand touched a red artery, and a tingling sensation went up his arm. "There's water here…actual water."
Bob grunted. "One of the five rivers. His blood."
"His blood?" Annabeth stepped away from the nearest clump of veins. "I knew the Underworld rivers all emptied into Tartarus, but-"
"Yes," Bob agreed. "They all flow through his heart."
Percy traced his hand across a web of capillaries. Was the water of the Styx flowing beneath his fingers, or maybe the Lethe? If one of those veins popped when he stepped on it…Percy shuddered. He realized he was taking a stroll across the most dangerous circulatory system in the universe.
"We should hurry," Annabeth said. "If we can't…"
Her voice trailed off. Ahead of them, jagged streaks of darkness tore through the air - like lightning, except pure black. The sight made No. 1 smile. Very close now.
"The Doors," She said. "Must be a large group going through."
Percy's mouth tasted like gorgon's blood. Even if his friends from the Argo II managed to find the other side of the Doors of Death, how could they possibly fight the waves of monsters that were coming through, especially if all the giants were already waiting for them?
"Do all the monsters go through the House of Hades?" Percy asked. "How big is that place?"
Bob shrugged. "Perhaps they are sent elsewhere when they step through. The House of Hades is in the earth, yes? That is Gaea's realm. She could send her minions wherever she wishes."
Percy's spirits sank. Monsters coming through the Doors of Death to threaten his friends at Epirus - that was bad enough. Now he imagined the ground on the mortal side as one big subway system, depositing giants and other nasties anywhere Gaea wanted them to go - Camp Half-Blood, Camp Jupiter, or in the path of the Argo II before it could even reach Epirus.
"If Gaea has that much power, couldn't she control where we end up?" Annabeth asked.
Percy really hated that question. Sometimes he wished Annabeth wasn't so smart.
"You are not monsters," No. 1 reminded them. "It may yet be different for us."
Great, Percy thought. He didn't relish the idea of Gaea waiting for them on the other side, ready to teleport them into the middle of a mountain; but at least the Doors were a chance to get out of Tartarus. It wasn't like they had a better option.
Bob helped them over the top of another ridge, and then suddenly the Doors of Death were in plain view - a freestanding rectangle of darkness at the top of the next heart-muscle hill, about a quarter mile away, surrounded by a horde of monsters so think they could've walked on their heads all the way across. The Doors were still too far away to make out much detail, but the Titans flanking either side were familiar enough. The one on the left wore shining golden armor that shimmered with heat.
"Hyperion," Percy muttered. "That guy just won't stay dead."
The one on the right wore dark-blue armor, with ram's horns curling from the sides of his helmet. Now that one was Krios, the Titan that Jason had killed in the battle for Mount Tam. Koios was north, Krios was south (yeah not hard to confuse those guys at all), Hyperion was the east, Iapetus/Bob was the west.
"Bob's other brothers," Annabeth said. The Death Mist shimmered around her, temporarily turning her face into a grinning skull. "Bob, if you have to fight them, can you?"
Bob hefted his broom, like he was ready for a messy cleaning job. "We must hurry," He said, which No. 1 noticed wasn't really an answer. "Follow me."
No. 1 couldn't blame Bob for his evasiveness. It wasn't just a matter of Bob's mental willingness to fight his brothers, but it was also a matter of Bob being one of four brothers. He had been the one his brother's had made fun when he got kicked in the face by Ouranos holding down his foot; Bob was the one that they treated more as a joke of a brother rather than respecting him. Because he had lost his memories, they treated him like a lost pet to toy with. Bob was considered the weakest of his brothers - especially since he had changed from his murderous ways. Bob would not only be facing them should he choose to protect Percy and Annabeth in a worst-case scenario, but he would also be fighting all of these monsters.
So far, their Death Mist camouflage plan seemed to be working. So, naturally, Percy expected a massive last-minute fail. Fifty feet from the Doors of Death, he and Annabeth both froze.
"Oh, gods," Annabeth murmured. "They're the same."
Framed in Stygian iron, the magical portal was a set of elevator doors - two panels of silver and black etched with art deco designs. Except for the fact that the colors were inverted, they looked exactly like the elevators in the Empire State Building, the entrance to Olympus. Seeing them, Percy felt so homesick, he couldn't breathe. He didn't just miss Mount Olympus, he missed everything he'd left behind: New York City, Camp Half-Blood, his mom and stepdad. His eyes stung; he didn't trust himself to talk. The Doors of Death seemed like a personal insult, designed to remind him of everything he couldn't have.
Meanwhile, No. 1 took in the other details: the frost spreading from the base of the Doors, the purplish glow in the air around them, and the chains that held them fast. Cords of black iron ran down either side of the frame, like rigging lines on a suspension bridge. They were tethered to hooks embedded in the fleshy ground. The two Titans, Krios and Hyperion, stood guard at the anchor points.
As the small group watched, the entire frame shuddered. Black lightning flashed into the sky, the chains shook, and the Titans planted their feet on the hooks to keep them secure. The Doors slid open, revealing the gilded interior of an elevator car. Percy tensed, ready to charge forward, but No. 1 quickly grabbed his wrist tightly.
"Wait."
Hyperion yelled to the surrounding crowd: "Group A-22! Hurry up, you sluggards!"
A dozen Cyclopes rushed forward, waving little red tickets and shouting excitedly. They shouldn't have been able to fit inside those human-sized doors, but as the Cyclopes got close, their bodies distorted and shrank, the Doors of Death sucking them inside. The Titan Krios jabbed his thumb against the UP button on the elevator's right side and the Doors slid closed. The frame shuddered again and the dark lightning faded.
"You must understand how it works," Bob muttered. He addressed No. 1 only to make sure that he didn't appear to be talking to Annabeth and Percy. "Each time the Doors open, they try to teleport to a new location. Thanatos made them this way, so only he could find them. But now they are chained; the Doors cannot relocate."
"The biggest question is why Thanatos invented them in the first place," No. 1 muttered.
"Then we cut the chains," Annabeth whispered.
Percy looked at the blazing form of Hyperion. The last time he'd fought the Titan, it had taken every ounce of his strength. Even then Percy had almost died. Now there were two Titans, with several thousand monsters for backup.
"Our camouflage," Percy said. "Will it disappear if we do something aggressive, like cutting the chains?"
"I do not know," Bob admitted.
"Mrow," Small Bob said.
The kitten leaned out to sniff No. 1, who smiled and set her stuffed poodle beside the kitten on Bob's hand. Small Bob sniffed the poodle before lying down beside it.
"Bob, No. 1, you'll have to distract them," Annabeth said. "Percy and I will sneak around the two Titans and cut the chains from behind."
"Yes, fine," Bob said. "But that is only one problem. Once you are inside the Doors, someone must stay outside to push the button and defend it."
Percy tried to swallow. "Uh…defend the button?"
Bob nodded, scratching his kitten under the chin. "Someone must keep pressing the UP button for twelve minutes, or the journey will not finish."
Percy glanced at the Doors. Sure enough, Krios still had this thumb jammed on the UP button. Twelve minutes. Somehow, they would have to get the Titans away from those doors. Then, Bob, Percy, Annabeth, or No. 1 would have to keep that button pushed for twelve long minutes, in the middle of an army of monsters in the heart of Tartarus, while the other three rode to the mortal world.
"Why twelve minutes?" Percy asked.
"I do not know," Bob said. "Why twelve Olympians, or twelve Titans?"
"Fair enough," Percy said, though he had a bitter taste in his mouth.
"What do you mean the journey won't finish?" Annabeth asked. "What happens to the passengers?"
Bob didn't answer. Judging from his pained expression, Percy decided he didn't want to be in that elevator if the car stalled between Tartarus and the mortal world.
Percy looked to the doors. "If we do push the button for twelve minutes, and the chains are cut-"
"The Doors should reset," Bob said. "That is what they are supposed to do. They will disappear from Tartarus. They will appear somewhere else, where Gaea cannot use them."
"Thanatos can reclaim them," No. 1 continued. "Death goes back to normal, and the monsters lose their shortcut to the mortal world."
Percy exhaled. "Easy-peasy. Except for…well, everything."
Small Bob purred. No. 1 took her stuffed poodle back.
"I will push the button," Bob volunteered.
A mix of feelings churned in Percy's gut - grief, sadness, gratitude, and guilt thickening into emotional cement. "Bob, we can't ask you to do that. You want to go through the Doors too. You want to see the sky again, and the stars, and-"
"I would like that," Bob agreed. "But someone must push the button. And once the chains are cut…my brethren will fight to stop your passage. They will not want the Doors to disappear."
"My Remnants might be able to defend against this horde for the allotted time," No. 1 said. "So long as I make it to the surface, their actions will not hold weight. Our greatest concern lies with the destruction of the chains. The one who chained them in the first place is a powerful one. Chaos itself. Only one who has the blessing of Chaos might be able to sever the chains. My Original, she may yet have that power. Because I am the Remnant of Rei Chikara, I may yet utilize her power as a potential Chaos host. But to hopefully receive the blessing of Chaos, I fear I may not be able to defend against the monsters. I could be wrong - the chains could be as easy to sever as rope with your weapons. Or they could be protected by Chaos's power. In which case, I will attempt to do what I can. I can't promise I'll be of much use if I fail, and even if I succeed, it may take time."
The cement settled in Percy's stomach. He had always suspected how this would end. He would have to stay behind. While Bob and No. 1 fended off the army and broke the chains (or both), Percy would hold the elevator button and make sure Annabeth got to safety. Somehow, he had to convince her to go without him. As long as she was safe and the Doors disappeared, he could die knowing he'd done something right. Unfortunately, Annabeth would rather die with Percy than life without him. Love, survivor's guilt, Annabeth would not stand for Percy sacrificing himself.
"Percy…?" Annabeth stared at him, a suspicious edge to her voice.
She was too smart. If he met her eyes, she would see exactly what he was thinking.
"First things first," Percy said. "Let's try and cut those chains the old fashioned way. If that doesn't work, we start going with Plan B."