Chapter IX - Alex shows Us Why We Can't Have Nice Things. -
~Alex POV~
I didn't understand why in Tartarus I had to go:
Underwater
Underwater with his— never mind.
Underwater as a son of Hades.
True the Big Three feud had died down a bit, but it was still brooding under the surface. And if one of the Big Three's kids went into another's territory than the feud would blow back up in full force. Remember you're immortal, they can't hurt you. I reminded myself.
But I was still scared. I hated admitting that but I was.
"Come on!" Maraya shouted at me. She grabbed my hand and basically dragged me into the ocean. We shot forward in the water and we eventually reached Oceanus's palace.
"This is it?" I asked her. Oceanus's palace was beautiful. It had white walls and the gates were pearl-white that when closed looked like shark teeth (don't ask how I know.) At the moment the gates were open, which was weird considering it was a Titans castle. The inside was revealed to be blue.
There were sharp spikes, I counted six. Well technically four. Two huge spikes were jutting away from each other. Two smaller spikes were branching off and were in between where the two huge spikes.
I noticed that there were eight huge arched hallways. Four on either side of the palace. The first hallway on either side of the castle was behind two rooms. (I'm gonna repeat one room on either side of the palace it's symmetrical.) How did I know that? Because there was a gap between them, with windows to bridge the gap.
I didn't see the back of the palace so I had no idea what it looked like. And then I noticed something. Where the two huge spikes started were eyes.
And that's when I realized that it was a lobster.
"Is that a lobster?" I asked to no one in particular.
"Actually it's a white lobster." Maraya corrected me.
"Like I needed to know that." I muttered. I looked back at the lobster-palace and found it looking at me angrily.
"Please don't tell me Oceanus is in that."
"..."
"He is isn't he?"
"Yep."
"Crap."
The lobster clicked it's claws menacingly. And seemed to be deciding to attack or not. Suddenly someone exited the lobster. You can guess where he exited from. He was a merman, his upper body was as gray as water during a storm and a beard to rival Dumbledore. He had two lobster tails in his hair (a trend that Maraya told me went out years ago.) and he was holding a blue serpent.
He gave off the aura of the calm before the storm. He saw us and smiled. "A sacrifice from Poseidon…and Hades! This is excellent! Who wants to die first? Maybe the young lady?" Oceanus suggested, throwing his serpent at us.
Why a serpent? Did he want to have a sea serpent snack and it accidentally became his symbol of power, and Kronos wouldn't let him change it? So many questions.
I was about to ask these questions when his serpent ballooned up to the size of King Kong.
"Holy crap…" I murmured under my breath.
"Ah, Yes!" Oceanus cackled, gleefully. "Attack my pets!"
Wait...pets?
Maraya and I exchanged looks, she's handle Oceanus and I'd handle his pets. Oceanus charged at us waving yet another serpent, whilst his pets zeroed in on me.
Normally I would give you lesser details and wrap it up quickly as to not bore you but alas (Wow I'm using so many big words.) Sahara has forced me to do so.
I summoned my Stygian Iron sword and swung it at King Serpent. It cut the serpent but unfortunately, the snake didn't die. Instead it bled gold, Ichor the stuff that gods bleed, and apparently immortal snake weapons. I filed that information for later use as I shadowtraveled to avoid being crushed by a lobster claw. Oceanus's lobster had been sneaking up behind me, trying to attack me unnoticed.
But the shadows warned me. I reappeared above the lobster-palace-thing whatever it was. I wondered that if I killed the lobster than would the occupations find themselves in Tartarus? Well it looked like I was about to find out.
I fell straight at the lobster, my sword impaled itself straight through the lobster. The lobster froze and then slowly crumbled to golden dust.
The Snakes eyes widened —something I thought I would never see.— the serpent seemed to pause for a moment before striking at me. I slashed at it and the snake snapped at me.
I danced away I summoned a sharp spike of stone, intending to impale the snake, unfortunately the snake was too smart. It swam straight up, and glared at me annoyed.
It dived and I backed up; straight into the wall. The snake seemed to grin at me, knowing that I couldn't do anything. Sure I could still stab it but it was immortal, it couldn't die.
But it could be trapped.
I threw my sword like a throwing knife and the serpents eyes widened in realization; but it was too late. The snake was quite pinned to the spike that I had summoned.
The serpent shrieked unable to move. Than I heard multiple curses. I turned around to see that Oceanus was trying —and failing— to stuff Maraya in a bag. Maraya was sprouting dozens of curses and was fighting against Oceanus.
I laughed, "Don't just stand there, help!" Maraya demanded. I knocked Oceanus into unconsciousness, Maraya managed to get out of the bag after five minutes of struggling for freedom.
We stuffed Oceanus in the bag and we headed to Pontus's Peak, an underwater national monument and the best place to summon Pontus.
A/N: Another short, yet happy ending for a chapter!