Percy POV

As I fell through the air into the pit of Tartarus with my ex-girlfriend clinging to me like a shy toddler to their mom, I wondered how I had managed to get myself into this position.

I vaguely remember telling Rachel of how I'm finally out of danger, but if this situation wasn't a dangerous one, I was a kid of Demeter.

Next thing I knew I was collapsed at the top of the chasm with Annabeth in a heap beside me. Nyx stood looking unimpressed as I resisted the urge to throw up, although the disappointed look was not directed at me but at Annabeth.

"You do realise that I can just bring you back here as many times as I like." Nyx sighed.

Annabeth huffed as she stood, "Well I can jump off as many times as I want."

Nyx rolled her eyes, "You really are an irritating demigod, aren't you."

"Generally people say that about Percy, not me," Annabeth said sounding slightly miffed.

"Hey!" I grumbled as I also got up.

It was true though.

"Last time I checked though, it was a big deal to go to Tartarus. So Annabeth why are you treating it like it's going bungee jumping." I asked my ex-girlfriend.

Annabeth scowled, "Because if you're going I'm going!"

"Well Nyx won't take you so I won't go then," I said not really meaning it, I couldn't let Clarisse go into Tartarus with just Nyx.

"Percy your coming," Nyx demanded.

"Why do you want him to go with you so bad?!" Annabeth yelled.

"Why do you want to stay with him so bad?!" Nyx yelled louder.

"Because!"

"Because why?!"

"You didn't answer my question so I won't say why!"

"I will smite you demigod!"

I felt like I was at an Olympic ping-pong match.

"What's going on?" I whispered to Clarisse.

"You really are oblivious," she whispered back.

I frowned, "I get told that too much."

She smirked, "Rightly so prissy."

I didn't get an answer though. I understood that Annabeth still liked me so that could be why she's so insisting on coming along, but I didn't understand why Nyx hated her or why Annabeth hated Nyx.

Eventually, the argument died down with surprisingly the help of Clarisse, who considering her dad, loved a good catfight.

We decided that we would all go, because Annabeth wasn't taking no for an answer.

I had assumed that the rivalry on this trip would be between me and Annabeth but while I still disliked her, Nyx seemed to start far more arguments with her than I did.

Only once Nyx flashed us into Tartarus, did I remember just how bad it was. I was always slightly traumatised by mine and Annabeth's previous visit, so I guess my brain decided it was better if I didn't remember it too well.

But once I was back the memories came flooding in, almost enough to make me want to fall down to my knees and give up, to force Nyx to take us back, to leave Aphrodite. But I knew I couldn't do that.

I looked over to Annabeth and she seemed to have similar feelings and was shaking slightly.

I took deep breaths to calm myself, but considering the toxic air and pungent smell of sulphur, it didn't go too well.

I managed to suppress my coughs but Clarisse and Annabeth weren't doing as well. They coughed and spluttered to the point where I was afraid they might cough up an organ.

Since I was a god now, the air didn't have as much effect on me, but the two demigods would need to drink from the Phlegethon if they wanted to stop the blisters forming on their skin and in their lungs and if they didn't want to die eventually.

Nyx seemed to think this too, "So first stop Phlegethon, then we can save Aphrodite." She said sounding bored.

Once we arrived there, Annabeth and Clarisse were on the brink of collapsing and if they didn't have their arms slung over each of my shoulders, I doubted that they would be able to walk.

We stumbled down the bank slowly as to not fall while Nyx appeared at the bottom.

"You could of taken us too, " I said with a grimace, referring to Nyx shadow travelling because she couldn't be bothered to climb.

She shrugged and nodded towards the fiery river, "Go on then." She said to the demigods.

"It's fire!" Clarisse hissed, "It'll kill us! Can we not just take some ambrosia?"

Nyx rolled her eyes, "Ambrosia might help a little if your injured, but this place is out of the reach of the gods so their food won't do you much good down here, especially for the damage caused by the air."

I nodded in agreement, "Think of the Phlegethon as a hellish version of ambrosia and nectar, it might hurt a bit but it won't do you any real harm and it'll help you a lot."

Clarisse didn't look happy but she copied Annabeth and knelt down, scooping the fiery water up in her hands and brought it to her lips.

I saw the two wince as the water monetarily burned their throats.

Clarisse after getting over the pain spoke, "It actually worked." She said sounding surprised that she didn't feel like she was dying quite as much anymore.

"Should I drink it?" I asked Nyx.

"I think you'll be okay." She told me, "but I mean if you really want to drink it, we can wait." She said smirking.

I shook my head hurriedly, "I'll pass."

"Well let's get going then!"

I blinked for a millisecond and when I opened my eyes we were standing outside a massive home.

It was gigantic and surprisingly modern for being in Tartarus. There were huge windows and sliding doors and it would have been fitting for a movie stars home if not for the colour theme, which was black. The walls were black, the doors were black, the furniture was black. It did look quite nice though admittedly even though the whole dark vibe wasn't for me.

"So this is Erebos' place?" Annabeth asked.

"What did you guys expect? A dark stormy castle or maybe a creaky log cabin in the woods?" Nyx said with a laugh.

Clarisse smiled, the first time she had since entering the literal 'pit of evil'

"I don't know?" She said, "Something that screamed 'guy who wants to overthrow the gods' and not 'Hollywood'."

Nyx shook her head, "Anyways you guys sneak in without me and then if you accidentally bump into Erebos I'll help you out I guess."

"You're all very calm for sneaking into a literal primordial's house, " Annabeth said nervously as we went around the back of the house.

I guess we were, I didn't know if it was the fact that we were breaking into a pretty ordinary rich person home, (even though it didn't belong to a very ordinary person at all) that calmed me, or because we had Nyx as backup.

"So do we just go in the back door or something?" I asked Clarisse.

"Have you ever even broken into a house prissy?"

"Uh no? Have you??"

"Duh, " she said. I expected an explanation but it was clear I wasn't getting one.

The daughter of Ares clambered up onto the window ledge then turned to Annabeth, "You got a bobby pin?"

Annabeth reached to her hair and pulled out a little brown pin and the bits of her hair that were previously pulled back out of her eyes fell back into place. She handed the pin to Clarisse.

Clarisse carefully bent and fiddled with the pin before pushing it into the lock on the window handle, she twisted and pushed and twisted and pushed. I thought she wasn't going to be able to open it but after about two minutes I heard a little click.

She grinned in triumph and pushed the window open. The window itself was huge, but the part that opened was very small, maybe the size of an A4 page.

Annabeth looked unimpressed, "That's great and all, Clarisse, maybe I might be able to fit in there but..." She walked over to me and put her hands on each of my shoulders pretending to measure the broadness of them that came with me being a god, "I don't think, he's gonna fit."

Clarisse scowled, "If you would wait a minute you would see I wasn't done yet."

She reached into the hole of the window so she had a hand on each side of the glass. She pushed and prodded along the edges of the window making little snapping and cracking noises that reminded me of rice crispies.

I wasn't sure what she was doing but when she pushed and the entire window's glass panel was popped out of place I realised she had been breaking and removing what kept the glass and window frame together.

It was a great method because it made little sound compared to breaking the glass and it could probably be put back in place after if you wanted to remain undetected.

It likely would have been less effort to just pick the lock on the door but I didn't want to tell Clarisse that and besides the doors potentially had much higher security than the windows.

"Where the Hades did you learn that?" Annabeth asked.

Clarisse just shrugged and climbed inside.

I'm sure that would be an interesting story, I would have to ask her when we got out of this hell hole.

Wow it really was very literally a hell hole, wasn't it?

One by one we quietly climbed into the house. Something told me that Nyx was already inside, hiding somewhere in the shadows.

Once again, if she was really in here, she could have taken us with her and saved us a lot of bother but I don't think she likes helping Annabeth very much.

"Alright, if you kidnapped someone where would you keep them?" I whispered.

We all looked at each other and at the exact same time shared our identical thoughts, "The basement."

We looked around for a while before we found a dark staircase going below ground level.

"This is definitely it." Annabeth murmured.

I had to agree, it was quite creepy.

We carefully slipped down the stairs with soft steps.

The basement was bigger than I could have imagined, it stretched out further than the house above and was a maze of corridors with tons of doors.

"I'd say split up because this place is so big, but we really don't want to get caught by anyone by ourselves so we'll stick together but move quick okay?" I said in a hushed tone.

The girls nodded agreeing with what I had said and we started our search for the goddess of love and beauty.

After what felt like forever, we had searched every single room, which we had found out were cells, except for one and naturally, that was the one she was in.

When we found her, she was still beautiful for normal people's standards, but for her standards, she was looking a little worse for wear.

He hair looked limp and for the first time, she had bags under her eyes. I noticed that some of her clothes were ripped or missing and that made me wonder just what Erebos had been doing with her.

However, I had to brush that thought out of my head because if I didn't I would get angry, and being angry in delicate and time-sensitive situations tended to screw up most plans because you acted more rashly without thinking things through.

Aphrodite looked even more delighted to see me than normal which was very. For a second she tried to stand to hug me before remembering she had chains keeping her tight to the wall. That must have been why the cell door wasn't locked.

"Percy!" She squealed, which made me cringe considering we were trying to be quiet.

"I didn't think you would come because it was down here! I thought I would be Erebos' toy forever. Thank you so much!" She said nearly in tears, although I wasn't sure whether it was of joy or remembering of her time with Erebos.

"What do you mean toy?" Clarisse asked.

Aphrodite didn't answer instead she said, "Oh and thank you two as well, I know you, Annabeth but what's your name."

Clarisse looked slightly annoyed that she didn't answer her question but she decided not to push and told her that her name was Clarisse.

"Uh let's get going then, " I said, anxious to leave before Erebos realised he had intruders.

I pulled out Riptide and slashed through Aphrodite's chains with ease.

She shakily stood up and kissed my cheek before hurrying out the door with the rest of us.

Now if I said we got out easily with no compromises in the plan, I would be lying.

We were almost there, but unfortunately, almost is never enough.

Erebos had caught us.