Chapter 3 - Into The Pit

Fury. The Goddess was furious. How dare he just throw himself into the pit like that.

But… Dante had done the same thing, for a second time. He'd thrown himself to the wolves despite the fact that he KNEW that it was Tartarus. Why wasn't she infuriated with the son of Hades?

Because! Just because. Dante had survived the horrors of the pit twice before. It didn't make sense that he'd so quickly volunteer to go back, but that wasn't in the forefront of the furious Goddess' mind right now.

Artemis flashed herself and Percy to the same desolate place they'd been before. It was like a forest that was almost entirely devoid of life, a place that no one dared to go.

Ignoring the odd timing of the Hunter and the Guardian, Apollo sought out a private audience with Dante and Mason after the latter had ordered Clarisse to take the small Hunter unit back to Artemis' camp and stand guard. It was an unspoken command but Clarisse knew that building relations between herself and the Hunters wouldn't hurt.

Back in that isolated place where the Guardian and the Goddess of the Hunt had found themselves, an outburst had erupted from one of them.

"What the hell was that!?" Percy shouted angrily, sporting a look of anger that felt so foreign to his facial features. Artemis reeled herself in at the sudden biting attack that she'd felt. She'd never been spoken to with such disrespect in her life, let alone by a man that was still learning his place within their society.

She might have held a secret soft spot for him but that didn't excuse him for that level of disrespect.

"Do not think to address me like that, boy!" She shouted back at him, growing in stature a few feet as she erupted in a blinding light, her power being unleashed from the insult she'd felt.

Percy hadn't realized that they were standing in a small woodland with a creek that ran right next to his feet. The water was rising and swirling around them gradually with the moon forcing its way through the thinning canopy of leaves above them.

"What gives you the right to tell me that I cannot venture into Tartarus to defeat a Titan uprising!?" His voice only increased in volume. Artemis was snapping back at him now, the distance between the two of them was disappearing quickly. She hadn't meant to unleash as much power as she already had but it was clear that even to this point Percy was either completely oblivious of her outwards strength or just didn't care.

"Why are you so set on doing this, another Guardian can go in your place!" Artemis retorted quickly. Percy didn't have time to think about what she was saying, there was something on his mind that he had to get out but before he could think about the consequences of what his words might do, they were already out.

"Because I'm doing this for you!" He shouted. His eyes were glowing green with raw power now, just like Artemis' were but silver, her godly aura was illuminating the area around them. The light was playing off the swirling water that had practically engulfed them. She was stunned, she looked deep into his eyes, searching for any sign of context to what he'd said.

She closed the already minuscule distance between them and grasped him firmly by the collar of his armour, pulling him close to her, their faces only inches away as their eyes were utterly unable to look anywhere but each other.

"Explain, now!" She ordered, searching the lines of his face for any kind of tell.

Percy's confused brow quickly turned to a scowl when he saw just how much she was manhandling him. With a flick of the wrists, he pushed her away, stepping a few feet back from her overwhelming embrace.

He took a deep breath before he splayed his hand towards the swirling vortex of water that had engulfed them, causing it to fall to the ground as quickly as it had appeared. Artemis looked around in confusion, when did that water tunnel appear?

"Dante is going to Tartarus, again. He's naturally advantaged in that hellhole but it's going to take another to watch over him and make sure that he's alright. We can't have all three Guardians become entrapped in Tartarus should the worst happen, which means that Zeus would order a God to accompany us. We've already built a rapport of working together, so he'd order YOU to go to Tartarus and I just… I don't think I could deal with watching you go to Tartarus." Percy said, softening his features as he faltered on the last bit of his sentence. He couldn't look her in the eye, not after what he'd said.

There was a moment of silence where neither one of them knew what to do. "Why is it that whenever I look at you my heart races, Percy?" Artemis asked from behind a facade of calm. He could practically hear her heartbeat thudding violently against her ribcage.

She'd finally said it, she'd admitted it at its most base she was stuck waiting to hear back from Percy.

Please, say something. Say anything! Her mind raced as she stood watching him from behind folded arms, refusing to let this drop.

"I… I don't know, but I can feel whatever it is between us, you're not alone." He admitted, finally being defeated by the increasingly deafening silence that had grown in the space between them.

"That doesn't give you the right to deny me my mission. I am one of the Guardians, this is my duty!" Percy shouted. He didn't want to start the argument over again but he wasn't about to let her push him down.

"I was being level with you and you managed to throw us back into another argument. So typical." Artemis huffed, crossing her arms yet again as if to accentuate her disappointment.

"Look, we can talk about it like adults if you really want to, but I know for a fact that this is going to get awfully difficult if we put a label on anything or express it in too many words. It'll be easy if we talk about this AFTER we get out of Tartarus, don't you think?" He asked, a slight smirk breaking its way back onto his lips.

"This isn't over, Guardian." Artemis glared, slowly crossing the distance between them. It almost felt predatory, giving Percy the feeling of being prey for the first time in a long time.

"My life wouldn't be half as exciting if it was." He answered with badly hidden bated breath. Without any warning, she pulled him closer, yet again by the collar, this time her lips even closer to the point that he could feel her breath caressing his own.

Before Percy could take the leap and react in a way that could have gotten him in trouble, he felt the soft fingertip of the Goddess flick him in the nose, the next moment he was back on Olympus, standing outside the grand doors to the council's throne room, unable to fathom the fact that he'd just been teased beyond all belief by the Goddess Artemis.

There he stood, thinking about how he could appease both Artemis and the Guardians. He couldn't think of any way around the obvious, he HAD to go to Tartarus, he couldn't not. Clarisse was taking care of the Hunters while the Greater Guardians were taking care of business on Olympus, an assignment which for the most part might end up being more permanent depending on how well the Hunters took to her.

Who else would Dante take to Tartarus? The only other thing that Percy could think of was if Artemis somehow agreed to release Thalia from her eternal oath as a Huntress. Dante trusted her implicitly, just as much as Percy and Mason, she'd be perfect if they could recruit her into the Guardians.

Percy wasn't certain where Dante and Mason were but he knew that they were both still on Olympus. Somewhere.

Dante and Mason had different reasons for seeking out the God of the Sun, one of which being a rather sensitive matter, in return Apollo had asked for their views on the impending situation that was continuing to evolve between their other Guardian and his twin sister.

Dante knew little about the situation and for what it was worth he'd wished that he didn't even know THAT much. It wasn't like he'd needed to lie to Apollo, he'd just kind of skirted around what he DID know. Tensions were high, it was hard to tell what signals were coming from who.

It was clear to Apollo that his patron just wanted to stay well clear of the impending family feud, and he respected that enough not to probe further into it.

Dante left Mason to speak with Apollo about whatever it was he needed, but he didn't leave Olympus straight away, instead, he went to find Annabeth.

The two of them had been the youngest Demigods at Camp Half-Blood and they both arrived at the same time, finding each other outside the Camp along with Thalia and Luke. They'd been close friends ever since then.

They weren't as inseparable as Annabeth was with Percy though, but they were still close, and Dante hadn't spoken to her since the Guardian's disappearance well over a year. Dante found Annabeth sitting at a God-sized table overlooking the pavilion that was currently under construction.

On the table, Dante could clearly see some over-the-top blueprints that were no doubt infinitely complex. Dante jumped using all of the strength that his legs could muster and he pulled himself up onto Annabeth's table. On the side was a full glass of Nectar, he just then realized that he hadn't eaten anything in almost four days.

"May I?" He asked, getting her attention for the first time. She nodded, of course he could. He drank a decent amount. Always the fresh taste of coca-cola lapping along his lips, always refreshing. Annabeth then downsized so that Dante could hug her.

It was no secret, nor did he want it to be, he had been stunned by her beauty for years and always wanted her to know that he felt more for her than a friend, but even to Annabeth's disappointment, he never did anything about it, and nobody could figure out why. Dante was not a shy person, that just wasn't his personality, and they knew that they had the time for each other, especially now that they were both immortal, but he still didn't do anything.

Now Dante was at an incredible impasse in his life, here he was starting to feel something beyond friendship for a certain Huntress, moreover, Percy wanted to turn her into a Guardian which would make it all too easy for him to accept these new feelings.

He wasn't used to things in his life being easy, perhaps that was why he'd never pursued Annabeth because it wasn't going to be the most difficult thing in his life. She'd wanted it too, that meant that he was sceptical.

When Annabeth returned to her full height, Dante noticed a small blush that had formed across her naturally beautiful face. He was about to say something but then the Goddess that had made things difficult for him for years just had to come waltzing past.

Athena looked at Dante with surprise. She never expected anyone to recover from the trials that he'd come across with the sky prison so again… Dante.

She should have known though, he was always far too stubborn to ever give in to something like that. His pride would also then get in the way, he would never let himself be bested by a Titan.

Dante pushed himself off the table and stood in front of Athena's godly form. He kneeled in front of her feet, "My lady Athena." He said with the utmost respect.

She knew as well as everyone else that he had a special place in his heart for Annabeth, yet not even the Goddess of wisdom could figure out what had stopped him so many times from acting upon his instincts.

She wouldn't question him about it now though. Dante was a Guardian, and they were immortal warriors of skills rivalling the big three themselves. The Guardians were practically Gods but without the responsibilities.

"Hello, little one. I see you have recovered nicely from your imprisonment." She said, sparking up the conversation in a friendly tone. She would keep it civil for the sake of her daughter. Athena took a seat at the same table that Annabeth was sitting at. She clicked her fingers and once again Dante appeared on the table.

He smiled at her warmly. It was nice to see that she was willing to cooperate for the sake of her daughter. Dante felt a presence inside his mind, Athena wanted to know the questions that so many had asked him before her, but he simply couldn't bring himself to answer her.

He promised that the next time he was on Olympus he would seek out a private audience and answer her fully, but today he was simply unprepared. She smiled once again, seemingly satisfied with the non-verbal answer.

"Hello? Dante! I said what do you think of these plans?" Annabeth asked him, snapping him back into reality. He walked over to where he could see them, which was just below her chin. To Athena, it looked like a picture-perfect moment. She wondered if she'd been too hard on those three at times.

Dante frowned for a moment before he looked directly up into Annabeth's storm grey eyes from directly below. The sudden eye contact caused Annabeth to blush for a moment. "I'm not going to lie, they look way too complex for me to comprehend." He said, retaining his frown.

Athena smiled at the Guardian's lack of comprehension, "That's good Annabeth. Look into the way Dante's mind works, he can work out a lot of practical things, blueprints won't stump the likes of his mind. If he struggles, then they are clearly impressive works." Athena told her daughter, which was rewarded with a beaming smile.

She soon got back to work. Dante sighed briefly. "I should be going. I have a date with Tartarus." He smiled half-heartedly before turning towards the Goddesses before him.

"Ah, yes." Athena stated so matter of factly with a slight emphasis on the 'yes'. "I'd been meaning to ask you about that. I didn't want to say anything in the meeting and undermine you or the other Guardians, but…" Athena shuffled slightly, looking uncomfortable in his presence for the first time.

"Can you do it?" She asked at last after a long moment of tension where she refused to meet his eyes. He silently opened his arms and splayed them to the side, an open invite for Athena to be more specific.

"Tartarus. You went once before, backed by the others that followed you unknowingly into the pit, and then you jumped right into an emergence hole only days ago and somehow fought and climbed your way out." Athena explained. She's so far not reached a point that made any contextual sense to her previous question.

"Tartarus is the greatest evil that we as a pantheon have ever faced. You, being YOU of course have laughed in the face of that evil and defied it by surviving it not once like the others, but twice, and now you plan to return. I'm worried about the toll it will put on your mind and body." Athena told him truthfully. She WAS worried about his well-being, that kind of punishment wouldn't have been fit for even their greatest Heroes of the past.

"Pfft, nah, I'll be fine." Dante laughed it off, doing exactly what Athena had said he was doing. He managed to find himself squarely in the centre of the table, just above Annabeth's grand plans, being analyzed by the two most intense sets of eyes he'd ever had to face.

They watched him in silence, both seeing the obvious tells on his face. "Fine!" He exasperated, throwing his hands up in defeat. This was seemingly good enough for the two Goddesses as they both eased off, relieving the immense pressure that he'd felt.

"Tartarus the first time was… Bad." He said, looking away from both of them, crossing his arms as he did. He wasn't used to being that open to people about the hardships they'd gone through.

"I toughed it out, like everything. We all marched on, relying on each other and we fared better than anyone else would have. The three of us, we got lucky." He admitted.

"And the second time?" Athena probed, looking for signs of weakness in his almost perfect facade of stability.

"The second time was worse. I didn't really have much time to explore. In the mere minutes that I was gone from this world, I'd fought for two days, with only myself to rely on. My natural link to both Percy and Mason felt almost lifeless because of the difference in time dilation. I lost count of how many giants I killed down there, turning them into a slowly growing mountain of ash and dust." He told them, a pained look on his face.

"I'm so sorry." Was all Athena said quietly, a true genuine look of pity and sorrow crossing her features as she looked down at the Guardian.

"Don't be. I was a fairly powerful Demigod, right?" He asked, looking right at Athena, looking to her for the truth that she might not have wanted to admit.

"Yes, you and your cousins were quite possibly the strongest Demigods. Ever, to be totally honest with you." Athena shrugged, unsure of where he was coming from.

"All of that strength that we held before? Doesn't even scratch the surface of what we're now capable of. Tartarus was bad, of that there's no doubt and I'll be the last person to ever downplay the torturous hells in that place, but trust my word when I tell you that Tartarus this time around is not going to be the same as it once was." Dante reassured them both. He was sure of himself and that was something that made both of the Goddesses feel better, but there was still a natural worry. Tartarus was something that no one should have ever been subjected to, not even once.

"You'll not be alone this time." Annabeth reasoned, hoping to put a nicer light on the whole thing. She'd been in that meeting and she'd worried about the same things that her mother had, but she wasn't planning on questioning the Guardian, she just wasn't so sure that she wanted to know what the answers might have been.

"That's true. Again, Tartarus would never be a cakewalk but I think that if all of us Guardians were to go to Tartarus, armed for war, then we'd likely tip the balance of power in our world into something that would take a long time to come back from." He told them with a slight sigh. That was never their endgame though, they served a much higher purpose. They served to continue the balance. Without monsters, there would be no culture or purpose for the Demigods, and without the Demigods, there would be no worship for the Gods and their world would slowly die out, forever.

"My ladies, my time on Olympus has come to an end." He said in a suave accent as he kneeled again, looking up and giving them both a cheeky wink before falling through the table. He'd already left Olympus from the shadows underneath the table, disappearing from their collective radar in style.

Athena turned to her daughter with a wicked grin. "Quite the bundle of complexity, that one. You're very fond of him, aren't you?" She was truly evil. A godly mother, but when the need to embarrass a daughter arose; evil like no other.

Over at the campsite where thirty-four immortal Huntresses roamed, some with purpose and some without, a Guardian stood to attention. Some of the Hunters silently looked around at each other, trying to figure out what Clarisse was doing.

Sure enough, right at the place that Clarisse was standing with respect, Percy began to form himself from a swirling mass of water that was being pulled out of the moisture in the air, right in the middle of Artemis' camp.

He did it slowly as well, exaggerating the process because he wasn't sure what the nature of the conversation that he was going to be forced into having with a certain Goddess.

When he had fully formed he was met face to face with Thalia who had slowly walked past the Centurion-like stature of Clarisse. "What?" He asked, wondering what the complex mixture of emotions was on Thalia's face as she stood only a foot away from him with her arms folded.

He couldn't remember if he'd angered her recently, before departing for Olympus. Perhaps it was a fault of Dante's, or Mason's? No, that wasn't right, she'd never have taken her frustrations out on another Guardian, she wasn't like that.

"I don't know what you've done, but Artemis is in a very strange mood. I've not been given the laundry duties in six months because of my… I was gonna say good behaviour but it's more, not bad behaviour." Thalia told him. She gave him a stern glare to accompany her suspicion but that was it.

He sighed heavily before looking back at her, "You being given a shitty duty isn't my fault nor my responsibility. I will however go and see what's wrong with the Goddess." He told her before turning his attention to the lesser Guardian.

"Good work. How are you feeling? You're still going to be going through the motions of the transformation for a little while." Percy said, looking at her through an analytical eye. She seemed to be adapting incredibly well with so far no negative repercussions. That was more or less to be expected from a daughter of Ares though, and this one was impressively powerful to boot.

"I feel fine." She answered, easing her shoulder up upon hearing him address her. She got the feeling that her superior Guardians probably weren't going to be particularly harsh leaders but the whole military discipline was in her blood, she'd stand to attention because of it no matter what. "The armour feels lighter than I expected." She admitted with a slight shrug.

"The suits will always feel the same, your becoming stronger is what will make them feel lighter. Getting on well with the Hunters?" He asked, looking around to make a point of actually seeing who was present. He noticed the familiar faces of the older Hunters all in the inner circle of the campsite, which was to be expected.

"Good, sir. I've always gotten on well with the Hunters whenever they've come to camp, so I personally know most of them." Clarisse answered with a genuine smile on her face. He'd only seen that kind of smile on her face whenever she was with Mason. This line of work really did suit her then.

"Let's nip that in the bud right here." He muttered to himself very quickly and very quietly, "You are not to call me sir, under any circumstances, whatsoever. Percy is fine, we're not stuck up and we're not ever going to demand your respect like that. If we don't already have it then we will earn it the way it's meant to be earned." Percy told her sternly. He wasn't harsh or overbearing, just neutral with the way he'd told her, yet he'd managed to put a small smile over his face.

"Sounds good to me," Clarisse told him with a smile sent in return.

"Good. We'll likely have quite a lot of training to put you through but after that, we'll no doubt be wanting to keep someone close to the Hunters in these increasingly dangerous times, so for the time being where we're all away or otherwise occupied, you'll likely be assigned to guarding the Hunt, is that ok with you?" He asked.

The thing that struck Clarisse as odd was that he was actually asking her. It wasn't an order or a forced suggestion, he was genuinely asking her if this was something that she was willing to do.

She was going to enjoy serving the Guardians in their mission, she could already tell. A lot had changed about the man standing in front of her. From the time she'd first met him and started to mercilessly school him to now, where he was the one directing her actions, he'd become one hell of a leader.

"No problems whatsoever boss, I'll be glad to watch over these girls. I'm sure that if I ask nicely then Lady Artemis will let me join in on a few hunts." Clarisse was almost beaming with her assignment. Percy expected that the only way he could sweeten the deal for her would be if he ordered her to go into a fresh war.

"Good work Clarisse. You can relax now that I'm here. If you need me, I'll probably be getting my ass kicked by Lady Artemis." He said, propping his hand towards her tent and walking on, facing the oncoming conversation that he wasn't sure that he wanted to have right now. Artemis had blitzed him back to Olympus after leaving him mind and heart racing a million miles an hour, was she going to be in that same flirty mood or was she going to be full of wrath?

He sighed heavily before hanging his head and walking into Artemis' tent. She had captured his attention since the first time they'd properly met all those years ago when they had their encounter with Atlas, but what exactly could a teenage Demigod do to stand up to the likely countless people that Artemis might have had fall for her in her infinitely longer lifetime?

He walked into her tent, gently letting the front of the tent flap fall down so that their conversation wouldn't be overheard. How would the Hunters react if they knew that there was something bordering on happening between them? They'd probably try to skewer him then and there, filling him with arrows.

"I'm sorry that I raise my voice at you, I apologize that my temperament got out of hand, it was unprofessional of me, I just ask that you see my point of view on the matter," Percy told her, casting his glance at the entirely uninteresting floor but when he looked up at the Goddess he found that he couldn't read her expression at all.

What had he done to make her do this to him? He was immortal and yet he felt like dying from guilt. Artemis felt like apologizing, she wanted to tell him that she didn't know what had gotten into her, especially her act of teasing him and leaving him high and dry right at the end, but the simple fact was that Percy had gotten into her, he had invaded her mind and just refused to leave no matter how hard she tried, she couldn't shake him off.

Beneath his ever-changing exterior, was a man that she was falling for, no matter how much she simply wanted to deny it, she had to face the facts. She was falling for the Guardian standing half a dozen feet away.

You can't stop falling mid-air, you can't stop falling for someone once you started.

She found a lump form in her throat where her words refused to come out. She wanted to tell him that it was fine, that they shouldn't speak of it ever again, but then another part of her wanted to pull a knife out and cut his throat for being so perfect.

She wanted to kill him just so that she could have a couple of decades away from him to hopefully get him out of her mind, but she got the feeling that her yearning for him would only intensify until he'd been reformed.

In the end, she knew that there was only one way to answer him properly. She grabbed both sides of the armour that folded around his chest and quickly pulled his face into hers. She gave him a deep and passionate kiss that told him that they were about to go on an emotional rollercoaster and that there was no going back now that they'd started.

He stared into her eyes, all of his suspicions being confirmed in one fell swoop of the kiss from the silver Goddess. There was no turning back now, this was it, they had to see this journey through.

"Ok then." Was all Percy managed to vocalize as he looked at her through wide eyes of surprise.

Outside Artemis' tent, in the centre of the Hunter's camp, Clarisse waited patiently, sitting at a table with a few of the Hunters, talking idly and enjoying the time not actually having to do anything due to Percy's arrival.

In that time she'd been slowly discovering some of the new powers that she was slowly building. She knew that the other Guardians were going to be coming back to regroup before they saw off their mission to Tartarus.

With that being the case, she decided to patiently wait for Mason and Dante to appear. She knew what the Guardian's plan was beyond the core mission of going into Tartarus, and she knew was the most imminent snags in their plan were, but it wasn't really her place to say or do anything, so when she found herself being questioned on what the Guardians next move was, she had to miss out a few details.

Artemis was obviously unhappy about the idea of Percy going into Tartarus with Dante, despite the fact that those two Guardians would probably fare better in Tartarus than the Goddess herself would. If Percy absolutely had to stay away from the pit then he'd had the idea to recruit Thalia into the Guardians so that she could go with Dante.

It was a dirty move but it was Percy's plan to corner Artemis' morality and put it down to either himself or Thalia to go into the pit, something that he felt confident would get her to back off of his case and let him carry on with his plan.

Clarisse would have gone if they'd asked her, but she decided that such decisions were better left to those above her. Just as Clarisse had been about to turn back to a conversation with a young Hunter that had been asking about her armour, there was a gentle rumble in the ground that could be felt all around the camp.

"Turn down for what!?" Dante shouted out as he appeared out of the ground, his body flipping around at odd angles before his body righted its course and he somehow managed to land on his feet.

It seemed that he was already in his super hyperactive state. Clarisse had luckily learned to deal with it over the years as his personality had never once changed in all of the things he'd been through. He really was the most spontaneous man she knew.

Mason, on the other hand, was a rational man, looking at life through more reserved eyes, cautious about things that most others would dismiss or disregard.

It felt like a bonus to Clarisse that now more than ever Mason had a body that looked like it was carved from marble. It had occurred to her that actually, all of the Guardians were ridiculously well maintained. She'd noticed that, aside from the greater sense of strength she had, her body itself was starting to feel slightly lighter, as if her muscles were getting leaner whilst she gained strength.

Clarisse could hear the music playing from Dante's headphones. It was extremely loud and something that you would hear in the mortal nightclubs. He noticed the Hunters looking at him strangely, he quickly decided to change it to something more his speed.

Mississippi Queen started playing even louder than the previous song that had been playing. He started the air guitar before putting the music player away, noticing that nobody was amused by his antics.

That or they simply didn't care.

"I thought you hated everything to do with the mortal world?" Clarisse asked him when her comrade walked over. He stayed standing because while he was welcome in the Hunter's camp, he didn't want to push things too much and sit at their table with them. He knew where to draw the line.

Dante considered this for a moment, "Well, most things yeah, but the music? There's a good chunk of music that is just… GODLIKE!" He exclaimed. Exaggerating the point immensely. She looked at him funny, much like she did when she was about to attack him during a game of capture the flag, just to be beaten back by his infuriatingly incredible speed.

"You are an incredibly random man." She stated. She didn't expect a response, nor did she particularly get one, but what Dante said made her grab for her spear.

"And yet I will always be the most alluring man here." He told her without a trace of sarcasm.

"You're the only man here, you win by default, dumbass." Clarisse shot back with a playful look. She could take the liberty of mocking the Greater Guardians considering that he'd contextually asked for it.

"Be that as it may, I still have a point. Power is attractive, and what's more attractive than a badass that always pulls through? In all fairness, I am easily the weakest of my cousins. Probably still standing after a Titan fist fight though." He chuckled to himself, imagining all of the fights that he was going to get in over the next few years.

"You openly admit that both Mason and Percy are stronger than you?" Clarisse looked at, confused by the honesty in his statement. For all of his jokes and personality gripes, he was still fairly humble..

She ignored the part about his self-proclaimed attractiveness. Dante tilted his head ever so slightly before smiling again. "Of course. Each of us has a particular attribute that we excel at above all others. Mason is potentially the physically strongest thing not tied by ancient laws, maybe even the ones that are." Dante reasoned, looking around the camp, noticing a few things here and there as he found a way for his mind to multitask.

"Percy is wicked fast. It's hard to really put in words just how quick he can be. Strong, fast, then me. I am really stubborn, right down to the atomic level. I don't take damage the same way all of the rest of you people do." Dante laughed. He didn't even wait for a response from Clarisse, he seemingly had better things to do, which, he didn't.

Clarisse wanted to chase after him and give him a thorough beating just because she felt strong enough that she could and really put his theory to the test.

She knew better, but she didn't have to as soon enough she'd found something else to occupy her attention. Mason's lightning bolt hit the ground and after the flash of light disappeared, there he was, his shoulder-length wavy blond hair and piercing electric blue eyes found her immediately.

He smiled as soon as his eyes set sights on her. "Hey, beautiful." He said. He was a little tired from the strenuous work of having to deal with hearing his father groan about all of their current problems. She walked over and embraced him, her hands soon started to glide along the tops of his wings which responded at their own will.

One of the wings wrapped around Mason and slowly stroked down Clarisse's face while the other just fluttered back into a furled-up state. Mason tilted his head and a mere second later both of his wings went back to sleep.

"So what's happening next?" She asked him. She knew what was happening next. All four Guardians would go to Artemis' tent where they would discuss the exact details of Dante's descent into Tartarus, then Thalia would be called and offered a place in the Guardians.

If Percy's explanation to the Goddess had gone to plan.

Clarisse expected an argument between Dante and everyone else when they proposed that Thalia goes with him. It was obvious to everyone that he'd become somewhat partial to her, although that might have just been because she was so easy for him to get along with.

"Hopefully, a plan that we can all agree on." He muttered before letting go of Clarisse and walking towards Artemis' tent.

Dante was standing at the main table along with Percy. Artemis and Thalia were already both there, on the other side of the table. The four seemed deep in discussion about Olympus. Mason and Clarisse walked in and took a side of the squared-off table so that they could clearly see what was going on. Whatever had been going on, there was a lot of built-up tension in this tent, it was almost palpable.

"Now that we're all here, how about we get on with this?" Mason spoke up, getting everyone's attention. He looked around at them before nodding to Percy to propose his plan. He had a feeling that Percy hadn't actually told Artemis what he wanted to do yet.

"If any of this doesn't make sense we'll get you up to speed as we go," Percy told Clarisse, moving on once she'd nodded to confirm. "As we all know, the intel is that there's a Titan Warband amassing in Tartarus, so we have to go there ourselves and either disrupt this uprising or check that all of the Titans are still secured," Percy announced. He flicked his wrist to the table and Artemis snapped her fingers. On the table, a long piece of parchment appeared. The word 'Tartarus' appeared at the bottom.

She was drawing them a very visible battle plan as they figured it all out. "While this is happening, the others are going to have to intercept any potential threats of those dragons. The only problem we might have is potential strength." Percy said, never taking his eyes away from the plan as he watched a figure of Olympus burn itself into the map on the table, with a rather impressive rendition of the dragons placing themselves in the skies of the plan.

"What do you mean by that?" Artemis asked, folding her arms and eyeing the Guardian that had spoken his plan.

"Well." He said with a sigh, "Myself and Dante will be in Tartarus, Clarisse is being placed with the Hunt because we believe that you will be targeted in an attempt to keep you away from bringing reinforcements to Olympus. That leaves ONLY Mason to deal with the security of Olympus. Plainly put... " Percy had explained the problem, the same train of thought running through all of the Guardians at once.

"I want you to release Thalia so that we can turn her into a Guardian." He said, locking his eyes with Artemis, unwavering in his confidence to tell her what he wanted.

There was a moment of electricity in the air that hadn't come from either of Zeus' once Demigod children. "You wish me to forfeit my lieutenant? Must she be released from me to become a Guardian?" Artemis asked, feeling backed into a corner. She knew exactly what Percy's underlying plan was.

Himself or Thalia, this was the deciding factor over who went to Tartarus.

"You must release her, her affiliation would be with the Guardians, not the Hunt. Our blessings cannot coincide." Percy told her sternly, feeling more confident with this 'negotiation' than he thought he would.

"Thalia." Artemis announced, her eyes still momentarily on Percy's, "Is this something you would want?" She asked, finally looking at her lieutenant.

Thalia stood in awe, unsure of how she hadn't quite seen this conversation going. Dante hadn't said anything in protest, but he had folded his arms grumpily, clearly against the idea.

"What?" Thalia asked, looking at the son of Hades, oblivious to everyone else in the room. "If you have something to say, Guardian, then say it." She challenged him. His lips twitched slightly. He hadn't needed to exercise such restraint in a long time, so this was a challenge but he nonetheless managed to keep his silence.

"So how will this work? Because I'm already immortal." Thalia asked them with a serious look on her face.

Percy analysed the situation for a moment. "You'll basically be stripped of anything that Artemis bestowed upon you. You'll continue ageing until you reach your physical prime, it's different for everyone but it'll be somewhere between twenty and twenty-five then you'll stop ageing. The choice is yours, take it or leave it." Percy eased off of the table, letting his shoulders fall and release the tension he didn't realize he'd built up.

Thalia cast her glance back at Dante who had forced himself away from the conversation, instead playing with one of his daggers, twirling it around each of his fingers, hilt to the blade before flipping it and catching it just to roll it around his fingers again.

"Lady Artemis?" She looked towards her. Artemis smiled warmly, "If this is what you want then I have no right to refuse." She gave her sister a warm smile and raised her hand. The faint silver glow that was always around her glowed much brighter before fading completely.

They all walked out into the open area of the encampment where everyone had their attention. They'd noticed that Thalia no longer bore the blessing of Artemis which raised a lot of questions but no one interrupted as they were clearly in the middle of something.

The three Guardians excluding Clarisse who did not have the power to create a Guardian stood in a triangle around Thalia, they all raised their hands, which at first intimidated her a little bit. Mason tensed up, he got the feeling that he was being watched up above by Zeus himself.

He muttered a quick reassurance to their father before he continued. After a minute or two of extreme amounts of raw energy being passed from person to person, it all locked together in one bright flash of light.

They didn't need to check if Thalia was a Guardian or not, it was a guaranteed process when all three of them were involved. Dante waved his hand and slowly a suit of the very same white armour started forming over her body.

The armour itself was white like everyone else's but with a lightning yellow trim adorning it, and out from her back a set of feathery wings had protruded with elegance. Dante sighed, it must have been a child of Zeus thing. The transformation was complete. Now there were five Guardians.

After a moment of silence, it was broken apart by Mason mentioning their next move, "Now we must decide what is to be happening in Tartarus." He sighed at the end of this though because it would be no easy feat to convince Dante of taking anyone else.

"Percy and I will either imprison or destroy any threats to Olympus-" All three of the Greater Guardians looked towards the sky sharply. They had felt something that Clarisse and Thalia hadn't.

A sense that only they had. "The giants are resurfacing and marching back to Greece. It may actually take all of you." Dante noted. Mason and Percy contemplated this for a moment.

"Change of plans. You and Thalia go to the Underworld and find any support you can before venturing into Tartarus, just as we'd planned. We will go and deal with these giants and meet up halfway." Percy told him. Dante was about to argue, so Mason got involved.

"Dante, it's solid logic, now please do it." His voice was stern yet he wasn't commanding him to do it. Dante grunted slightly. He prodded Thalia in the forehead carelessly and teleported them from their own shadows. The Underworld it was. They couldn't go directly into Tartarus, it was a place that dampened powers of teleportation and was almost totally detached from the rest of the world.

"We must go to Greece anyway. The Doors of Death will have to be opened from either side if they wish to come out there. I know that Dante will have a few tricks up his sleeve." Percy announced, staring at the shadows where Dante and Thalia had been standing previously.

"He will. I know what you plan to do but it leaves us seriously short of stopping power if things go wrong." Mason whispered back. It was more of a warning than anything else but deep down they both knew that it was the right thing to do.

"Yeah, I know. We've just got to hope that we get in and out real quick, remember that time works differently down there. We could only be gone a short time." Percy reassured the son of Zeus.

"I need to meditate and gather what strength I currently have before coming to Greece with you. Head out and I'll join you as soon as I can." Percy whispered, patting Mason on the shoulder. He looked weary, a tiredness that Mason had only just seen. There must have been something bothering him, eating away at him from the inside for him to have gotten this tired without him noticing.

With nothing more than a grave nod, Mason and Clarisse left for Greece immediately but Percy yet again found himself staring into the eyes of a certain silver Goddess. Percy walked over to a shaded corner of the camp where he was out of the Hunter's way and closed his eyes, focusing his energy inwards as if meditating so that it didn't look suspicious to anyone that might get too close.

He used his power to sense the others that were around, creating an empathic link with the strongest being he could find knowing that it would be Artemis.

'You do not want us to go to Greece?' He asked her through projecting his thoughts right into her head. She thought up her answers. Of course, she didn't want him to go to Greece. She knew that he was capable of keeping himself safe but what they were verging on was yet another war between Olympus and some Titan-aided army.

If this potential war broke out then she had no doubt that it would be the worst they'd ever faced. Dragons were always fiercely intelligent creatures and thus, only the weak-minded ones had sided with Kronos in his attempt to seize Olympus. Now that the dragons were being led by Aranost, the oldest and strongest of them all, they had finally a reason to take down the Gods of Olympus.

It would be a bloody war than would resonate throughout the rest of time if they didn't handle it correctly. If they survived it at all.

'It's my duty, my Lady, this is what we do. I promise that I'll keep everyone safe and that we'll all return unharmed.' His words were soft inside her mind, but they turned her crazy with every syllable.

She couldn't even think about her response, she just said it. "Please." She turned to him. She heard him muffle a laugh as he stood up and walked over to her. He started his sentence in a hushed voice.

"Promises have been made, I won't go back on my word. I told you I'll keep everyone safe and return. I also promise that next time I won't give your Hunters a reason to question you." He smirked. She hated that smirk, it set her emotions on fire.

Wait, what did he say? A reason to question her? "Why would they question me?" She asked him wearily.

"Oh, no reason." He said, kissing her on the cheek in full view of everyone. He'd turned into water just as a spear and several dozen arrows impaled the spot he'd been standing on, but just as quick as he'd turned to water, the water was gone.

"That. Bastard." Artemis huffed under her breath, furrowing her brow. She didn't need to look up to know that there were a lot of her Hunters all looking on, awaiting the order to hunt down the boy that dared to touch their Goddess.

Not today. She almost growled at the actions of the man that had infiltrated her emotions so quickly.

A faint sea breeze crept past everyone. She cursed him silently using every word she knew. English, Latin and Greek included. Her Hunters all looked at her, shocked that she'd let a man live after kissing her on the cheek. She had no choice but to tell them that she didn't have the power to kill him, he was immortal. She only just managed to get away with not having to tell them why he did it.

Of course, it was Phoebe that tried to murder Percy, she'd never gotten over Zoe's death and always blamed him for it. Sighing after her explanation, she retired to her tent, she had to get a new lieutenant, and soon. The Hunt had to continue, and she couldn't manage this many women all by herself, a second in command was necessary for the Hunters of Artemis.

Over with the ex-lieutenant to the Hunters of Artemis was a man that was charged with guiding the latest Guardian to join the small unit.

Thalia was looking around at every little detail as Dante led her down a labyrinth of corridors that all looked the same, then all looked vastly different, and then once again all looked the same.

The underworld looked the same as it always had. Thalia felt uneasy at first, what with being so far away from the sky and even the ground, but it soon passed.

She was a Guardian now, not a Hunter of Artemis, and Guardians had jurisdiction in every realm across Earth and Olympus. Dante had led her down a fancy corridor that was lined up by skeletal guards.

They were all military from different time eras. Standing in the way of a set of double doors there was a guard like the others, except Thalia hadn't seen anything like it.

Dante noticed her troubled look. "My father managed to sneak one from a future time era. Keep that quiet though, he was only allowed to take one of them. I think he called it a Sentinel?" Dante waved at it and the big guard moved to one side without question. He must have recognized not only the authority that the Guardians held but the son of Hades himself.

Inside the throne room, the Lord of the Underworld sat in a huge leather chair with a set of headphones on. He was listening to a vinyl of some kind before expressing his disgust at it and throwing it halfway across the room before he sent it into oblivion via a fireball.

"Hey! What's wrong with you, that was a good album?" Dante spoke up. Hades looked around before smiling at his son. It quickly turned back into a scowl as he addressed the problem at hand.

"It was a tribute album. They just can't replicate the quintessential rock and roll years, believe me, I was there for all of them!" Hades groaned in contempt.

Dante tilted his head and frowned for a moment. "Fair play." He nodded. Hades went on to curse about the album he'd spent a couple of drachma to obtain.

"You spent drachma to obtain a mortal album? You could have just sent Mrs Doody over there to go and get it." Dante pointed to a Fury that looked comfortably perched above his father's throne.

"DODDS!" The Fury screeched at him. She'd always hated Dante, with a fiery burning passion.

"Whatever. And would you pick a position and stick with it. You're annoying me." He retorted. Hades nodded and flicked his wrist. The Fury dissipated into the light and teleported somewhere.

Dante decided to get down to business. "You already know why we're here, just tell me where you've hidden the-" Dante began to explain before Hades bolted upright.

"I wondered how you were in the Underworld without setting off any neural alarms. I see now that you're one of them." Hades motioned to Thalia before pointing at his own son.

"Ah, yes Lord Hades, I apologize for the intrusion into your domain," Thalia said as she kneeled to show her respectful apology.

"You're a Guardian now Thalia, which means that you have free reign to go into any realm you want. You also needn't call me by honorifics, Hades is fine." He told her with a genuinely warm smile.

"Oh yeah, forgot to mention, we've expanded," Dante told him, waving lazily at Thalia.

"I can clearly see that for myself, you were a minute too late on that one." Hades snapped back at his son, knowing full well that they were both just playing through banterous jest.

"Let's cut to it, neither of us are particularly sentimental people. Tell me where the hole to Tartarus is old man." Dante threw the words around like they meant nothing to the Lord of the Underworld. Thalia was beginning to see that they had a pretty good relationship when it came down to it.

The determination in the Guardian's face was one of absolute certainty. Hades hesitated but decided that his eldest would find it eventually, so he gave in and told him the direction of where Tartarus was now located. The two Guardians left the palace of Hades without any further delays.

As if to add insult to injury, the way to Tartarus from Hades' palace was straight through the fields of Asphodel and beyond Elysium. More and more sights for Thalia to take in.

"You've never been to the Underworld, have you?" Dante sought to break the ice. As it were, they were about to reach the borders around the fields of Asphodel.

He didn't want things to be awkward between them, this situation didn't exactly help as all he felt was tension. He was certainly going to have a bone to pick with Percy and Mason when he was on the other side of this ordeal.

"No, funnily enough, I didn't have much chance when I was stuck being a tree and I didn't take any otherworldly adventures in the time between that and becoming a Huntress." Thalia's voice was saddened by the fact that she was no longer directly tied to her sister through service, but there was something else in her voice that Dante picked up.

"Well, you're still immortal, and no longer tied to your oath, there's nothing in your duties as a Guardian that says you can't go and shack up with a God. It'd give you someone to return to." He smirked, knowing that this was his own brand of breaking the ice. Whether or not she felt more tension from it was neither here nor there, he found himself hilarious and that was enough for him to lighten up.

She hit him hard for his comment but didn't say anything which sparked more curiosity in him, he'd been expecting something. He wasn't sure what, but just anything in response would have been better than silence.

"What? It's what I'm planning on doing. Once this potential war is over I'm going to see where my life is at." He told her, in explanation for his jokes.

Thalia nearly faltered from the way that he'd said it, did he really already have his sights set? She, like so many others, had suspected that he and Annabeth would have been a thing, but… Maybe that was who he'd been talking about?

Oh well, she wasn't going to beat herself up about it. They reached the meadows of Asphodel where they could see a slowly ever-expanding area as new souls appeared. They pushed past people, constantly looking at flickering faces around them, catching a glimpse of people that they thought they knew.

"My advice is not to look twice, trust me, you don't want to know if it really is that person," Dante whispered to Thalia, pulling her closer to him as they managed to break free of a stream of aimless bodies that were all moving in steady motion towards that slowly expanding border.

It didn't take long before they'd broken free of the fields, the only ones able to do so because they weren't bodiless souls bound to the Underworld. They marched on, leaving the fields of Asphodel in their wake.

"How many of our friends are in those fields?" Thalia asked quietly. This WAS her first time in the Underworld, there were bound to be questions that were hard to answer.

"Probably very few. I've never cared for finding them, it wouldn't bring them any closure, nor myself. Most of us would go for rebirth. Might be different people in origin and life but we're the same souls at our very core, the chance of rebirth into Elysium is at the top of the list for most." Dante explained. Thalia had almost missed it but when he'd told her about the people in the fields of Asphodel, he'd closed his eyes, his way of dealing with the pain of loss.

They bordered the edge of Elysium before Dante had stopped, looking down at the borders that only he as a son of Hades could visibly see. "We should take the long way around." He told her softly, taking a deep breath before letting it all out as a sigh.

"Why?" She asked inquisitively, trying to see what he so clearly could.

"Because Elysium is the purest place that we could ever go. Passing through Elysium will be one of the greatest feelings in your life, except, now you're a Guardian, you have TRUE immortality. Even if you die, it would take something incredibly powerful to condemn your soul to the Underworld. What I'm trying to say is that you will probably never see this place, going through it now would give you an itch that you could never scratch." He explained sadly before setting off to take her the long way around Elysium.

It was horrible morbid, but she trusted Dante. A lot more than she realized. Silently they made their war around Elysium before finding themselves standing outside a single solitary hallway, carved from dark blood-red rock with just two sconces on either side of the crude stone entrance.

When they got through the darkness onto the other side they were standing at the edge of a massive hole. It had to be a couple of miles wide at the very least. This was it. The Hell of Hells.

"Well. This is it I guess. Make sure to slow your descent with your wings, you'll know when we're getting close at it won't be a tunnel of darkness, it'll open up into a massive surprisingly well-lit cavern. " Dante told her as he checked his gear and his helmet appeared out of nowhere and covered his face completely.

Thalia nodded and did the same. "What about you?" She asked, fully prepared to carry him down with her strong wings. He chuckled a little bit which surprised her slightly. They were about to jump into Tartarus together, this wasn't exactly a laughing matter.

"Don't worry about me, this is where I'm the most powerful. The fall won't hurt me but it will alert pretty much the whole of Tartarus that we've arrived. I'll see you down there babe." He laughed as he jumped straight into the depths of Tartarus.

The walls became a distant grey blur that rushed past them. The wind would have obscured their vision if they had been without their helmets to keep their heads clear.

Further they'd fallen, faster and faster they'd gone until they were travelling much faster than should have been possible. "Hey, can you hear me over this wind!" Thalia shouted almost as loud as she could only to be surprised when she could hear feedback of her own voice crackle through her helmet.

"Yeah, duh, we've got built-in communication in the armour." Dante spouted back in a deadpan.

"Sorry! So what's our mission?" She asked, trying to get her mind to focus on something other than the fact that she was falling so immensely fast in such a dark tunnel that it was almost nauseating. As a Demigod, she probably would have long since lost consciousness.

"The Black Mountain. It lies at the heart of Tartarus with tailored prison cells for all of the bad boys of our world, including one for yours truly." Dante muttered, slowly pirouetting his body just because he could.

"You have a prison cell in Tartarus? Do you even hear yourself sometimes?" Thalia asked in wonderment. He really was one of a kind.

"Well, yeah. Me, Percy, and Mason all have prison cells down here. We've obviously never been in them, they were just made for us when we started to thwart the shit out of Kronos' plans, so he had them made years ago." Dante explained. "Probably wouldn't do very much against us now, that being said Tartarus is a bastard among bastards and probably adapted to the changes, either way, let's not go to my personal Hell.." Dante chuckled lightly, pretty much ending the conversation where it was.

"We're close, get ready," Dante announced, breaking the silence that had grown between them. As if on cue the darkness erupted into a dim red light with no identifiable source, it was just kind of everywhere. Their world had opened up into a massive amount of space, eventually teetering off into darkness where their eyes could no longer see.

It had only taken a few seconds before Dante had engulfed his entire body in a rippling blaze of fire that boiled the air around them. It felt like he'd sped up, shooting towards the ground like an angry comet.

Dante changed his posture and simply impacted the floor, erupting into a cloud of dust and broken rocks. The sound alone probably alerted any monsters within a hundred miles that they'd arrived. Thalia splayed her wings out and her fall changed into an easy glide to where Dante was climbing out of his massive crater.

He pulled out his daggers and shook them slightly. They morphed into sickles, a longer reach weapon for each arm. Thalia instinctively tried to take a bow from her back before thinking that she no longer had her Huntress gear. She was surprised when her hand touched a bow nonetheless and she pulled a bright white longbow off of her back.

"Are there any other weapons that come with the job?" She asked instinctively. Dante nodded and touched her hip which was a bit close to her backside for her liking but she soon realised that he was pointing towards a piece of her armour that protruded further than the rest.

She put her bow on her back and pulled the stick of armour and shook it like she'd seen the other Guardians do. It turned into a war hammer the size of her arm. She waved it around before she wobbled it once again and it turned into a full-sized two-handed maul of white destruction. She was fascinated once again by her armour.

They started walking but didn't get half a mile away from where they'd dropped before they were attacked by giants who were wandering around trying to find the hundred-handed ones to fight with. What they got instead was much worse for them than relatives of the cyclops.

"Giants are not a problem, what we are here to stop is another Titan uprising. Four Titans to be specific." Dante told Thalia as he turned a giant into a mound of sliced flesh. Thalia knew exactly what he was talking about at that point.

They were Kronos' brothers. Hyperion, Iapetus, Koios, and Krios. Thalia wasn't looking forwards to fighting Hyperion or Krios, those two were some nasty work. She wondered if they even could best them.

They were in Tartarus so surely they would reform straight away? Immortals fighting immortals in the heart of Tartarus was sure to be a never-ending battle, but Dante seemed to have thought about all of this before he came up with the idea of venturing this far into the dark. She hoped.

The giants hadn't been any challenge at all. It felt good for Thalia to get a bit of revenge on those who had almost actually killed her before. She could feel the power of the Guardians fortifying her every move though. They marched on, first stop, the Black Mountain.

Far above them, many, many miles, the other Guardians had arrived at their next destination in a staggered party.

"Where are we?" Clarisse asked at once. Percy formed out of water right next to them. He took one look around before smiling like an idiot.

"What is it?" Mason asked with irritation present in his voice, he didn't have time for Percy's games.

"This! Is! Sparta!" Percy shouted out at the top of his lungs. Not a second went past before they heard another voice.

"No shit Jackson." A gruff voice answered them. They were in a built-up city that had a decent amount of open area around it. They were clearly on the outskirts of the area, in some ruins that were more desolate than anything else, but they were grateful that they had areas that wouldn't get obliterated by a fight if the giants decided to come their way.

The man whose voice it belonged to was sitting on a motorcycle that looked like it was made entirely from chains. It had a skull where a windscreen should have rested and the wheels were emanating enough heat that a match would probably have made them explode.

Ares had decided to either spectate or make things more difficult for them. Ares was the only God that Percy wouldn't bow to outside the throne room on any given day.

He still wasn't happy with him for tricking him into delivering Zeus' lightning bolt to Hades all those years ago. Ares smirked from behind his shades. Percy had to hand it to him, after all this time, the guy definitely knew how to look like a badass.

"What is it that you want, God of War?" Mason asked, breaking up the tension that was building. Even though Mason was dating his daughter, Ares liked him more than Percy because he respected strength, and Mason was the strongest Guardian there was. He chuckled for a moment before his face turned dark.

"You face more than dragons Jackson." He said, turning back to Percy. "Down in Tartarus things are stirring. Death breath's son won't completely stop the Titans from coming back. Four Titans are on the rise. I have complete faith that the boy will succeed in slowing them, but they are greater Titans." Ares grunted mildly before stepping off of his unique cycle, standing up straight and cracking his spine with pleasurable pops.

"The Primordial lords of the stretched world so to speak. The brain behind this scheme was VERY clever, this dragon thing yeah? It has set a plan in motion that will bring titans back and it has also organised a champion for each of you Guardians. Which means that you've got its attention." Ares spoke quickly and darkly. So the dragons have got the four most powerful Titans on the rise, Kronos excluded and it had chosen a specific warrior to kill each Guardian.

"Excellent." Percy sighed, "So who has been chosen to fight me?" Percy grimaced when Ares stroked his chin. "I don't know for certain. You, however-" He pointed to Mason and grinned, "Are a very lucky boy indeed." He started to chuckle. Mason groaned and moaned because he knew for a fact that he wasn't really lucky at all.

"You have got a child of Styx after you. Does the name Kratos ring any bells?" Ares asked him with a wide grin of mischief.

Mason paled slightly. "Fuck sake." Was all he said. Kratos was the God of strength and if Aranost had convinced him to hunt Mason down, then he'd already be on his way.

"So did you just come here to warn us?" Clarisse asked her father, feeling a slight tug in her gut. She noticed that the other Guardians felt it. That meant that there was a situation arising. She also knew exactly what was about to happen. She realized that it was because of her powers as a Guardian. Giants were coming their way.

"No, I offer you something else. I have a son the same age as Clarisse. He lives in the highlands somewhere over in that other shit hole. He is aware of his heritage but wanted nothing to do with traveling overseas to get to Camp Half-Blood, he will join your Guardian unit if you offer him. I'm sure that you can see him on your way home. You'll know exactly how useful he'll be when you meet him." Ares grinned again. This was where Clarisse looked annoyed. Ares hadn't even suggested her when the Guardians were contemplating first recruits so what made this guy so special?

"What's his name, father?" She asked before Ares gunned the motorcycle and revved it loudly. He looked at them all with that same grin.

"War." He laughed before the bike took him ten yards before melting away into the ground. That raised a lot of questions to Mason but they could see a giant on the horizon.

Percy nodded and disappeared, he would handle it with each while they talked. "You know where he is?" He asked Clarisse who just nodded glumly.

"Yes. He lives in the mountains of Scotland. He lives by old means and he stays away from people. If you can convince him of joining the Guardians then we will truly have a decent fighting force." She told him.

He guessed why his namesake was War, he must have had the strongest potential for Ares to have given that privilege. Percy reappeared holding a giant's head with a seriously worried look on his face.

"I've just figured out who's hunting us. Aranost has given each Guardian a God whose attributes are far greater than our own. Kratos, the God of strength is hunting you. That must mean that-" Percy never got a finish, he was hit in the face by what looked like a winged angelic statue. When he straightened up with an annoyed look on his face he just sighed.

"What I was going to say before you so rudely interrupted me! Is that my rival is going to no doubt be the lovely lady flying above us." He said, looking up with disgust. Above them, a winged angel of beauty stood with a spear in hand.

"I thought these Gods and Goddesses were aligned with Olympus, it doesn't make any sense why they would turn now," Clarisse argued. It was obvious that Aranost had power, but in such large amounts that immortals were turning against Olympus, especially after the war with Kronos.

"Nike." Percy spat out the ichor that had formed in his mouth from the kick that the Goddess of speed had issued him with. He turned to water and reformed immediately near where the giants were charging towards them, he felt like he could keep up.

"That means that deep down in Tartarus, Dante not only has to deal with four major titans but also…" Mason started, but quickly strained his brain as he tried to think of who was the ancient Greek God for Fortitude.

"Oh shit, it's got to be Heracles! He really doesn't like us, it wouldn't have been difficult to convince the guy." Mason shouted out. He grabbed Clarisse and they went straight over to Percy to join the battle.

He could only hope that Kratos didn't join the fight so soon. If he was lucky, he'd be able to take him on with everyone else there. Mason couldn't help but wonder exactly how large the forces that Aranost had managed to secure were. The battle raged on but after a few minutes, the giants were all dead. Nike was sitting on a boulder twenty yards away from everyone, yawning sarcastically.

"Well if you're done with the foreplay." She began as she rose into the sky. All three Guardians converged at the top of the hill to see a huge army of giants and dragons all waiting for them. Nike resumed her position at the top of them all. Mason unleashed a breath of relief when he couldn't see Kratos anywhere near them. "Prepare to be fucked!" Nike shouted out. When she'd finished two more giants, far larger than any of the others rose out of the ground.

"Those aren't giants. They're Gigantes." Clarisse muttered as she squinted to take a closer look. Neither Mason nor Percy could differentiate them from the other giants down there so it was lucky that they had someone with an intelligent side with them.

Clarisse's eyes widened in horror when she figured it out though. "That's Porphyrion and Polybotes! This whole battle has been thought out." She stated in shock at the organisation of their enemy.

"Let's do this." Mason's battle hardened mode had kicked in. Several blinding streaks of white lightning struck the battlefield. The wind picked up and even more dust had been scattered around. The three Guardians proceeded to do what they did best. They kicked ass.

Pretty soon the battle came between the Gigantes and the Guardians. "We need to Triam if we want to take these guys down now," Mason told them. Percy agreed and they began to power themselves up.

Deep down in Tartarus Dante stopped and crouched down, knee to the ground. "What are you doing?" Thalia asked him, wondering what had caused the funny expression.

He explained that he felt a connection between his cousins and that they were starting a Triam, their ultimate expression of power. Dante quickly explained how it was possible for him to do it. His part of the Triam would continue to travel faster and faster, through everything that came its way until it hit its target.

Thalia muttered something about being overpowered but let him be. When Dante was glowing violently red he turned on his heel and a fiery pitchfork made completely of red light formed in his hands. He continued to spin before launching it straight into the ceiling of Tartarus. The pitchfork would only become stronger as it continued to travel, but he wouldn't be able to pull that off again, not for a while. He hoped that they weren't in too much trouble if they were calling for a Triam. He could only hope.

"Do you know where we're going?" Thalia asked. She was staring at him again, he kept catching glances when she obviously didn't think he was looking.

"Of course, I knew where I'm going," Dante answered her with a strained look on his face. It took a moment before he finally faced Thalia and her unconvinced look.

"Yeah, no, I'm lost," Dante admitted at last with a slight sigh. "If you like I can stop and ask for directions?" Dante asked with a grin that made her sigh. This whole trip to Tartarus was going far differently than she'd expected.

After being ignored by the new Guardian, they'd walked onwards, coming to a clearing that a building that looked like it was constantly on fire and yet never degrading.

"Is this the prison? I thought you said we were going to the Black Mountain." Thalia spoke up, looking around at what might be coming their way.

"I think it's the entrance. Things don't work quite how you'd think they would down here. We might walk through forty miles of the hallway and only move ten feet, or it could be the other way around, we might go a short way and end up at the Black Mountain." Dante explained, enlightening the daughter of Zeus as he walked up to the actual front door of the stone building.

"What are you doing?" She asked, following him over, looking in mild wonderment.

"Oh you know, just greeting the new neighbours," Dante replied with a grin of mischief. "Honey, I'm home!" He shouted with amusement as he kicked down the door with enough force to send it flying further into the dimly lit room.

There was a crash that echoed around in the dark prison-style open room beyond the front doors. "You mean to do that?" Thalia asked, pointing towards the fact that the door was now in a thousand pieces.

"No, but the result was awesome nonetheless." Dante beamed back at her, flashing his sharp canines at her. The light coming off of the fiery walls shone on Dante's face as she looked over him. Things had really changed for them in such a short amount of time.

There was a deep grumble that brought their attention back to the prison entrance. "Ah," Dante whispered, slowly backing up. Thalia mirrored his action on instinct.

"Little son of Hades." A gruff voice echoed. Thalia couldn't see the source of the voice yet but she could tell that it was something huge.

"You're in Tartarus now boy. Oh, how I'm going to enjoy ripping your spleen from your body." The voice boomed in such a calm manner yet his tone was so threatening.

"It's Iapetus, this is one of those prison cells I told you about. It's no doubt at one of the far corners of the Black Mountain." Dante explained, continuing to back up from the entrance to the building.

He instinctively twirled his swords around in his hands, mentally getting himself ready for what was going to be a painful fight. Iapetus got out of an old chair and grunted as his muscles heaved him forwards, each footstep bellowing in the room, echoing around the massive custom prison cell.

He'd spent way too long out of the circulation of things, but even so, Dante was much faster and stronger than him. And he was sure as Hades MUCH tougher than this big bastard, but that didn't mean that Iapetus would go down easy or without a fight.

Dante was the stronger fighter, and he had another Guardian at his back, but Iapetus was full of pent-up hatred. Thalia didn't need to be told to know from Dante's body language that a fight was coming their way. She was surprised that it had taken this long before they'd come to the first big fight. She set her body into an easy evasion stance and covered herself in static that shot around her body as if chasing one another, bow in hands with an arrow drawn, ready to attack.

"Can't we talk about this?" Dante asked the growling Titan in his most genuine but obviously fake voice. Iapetus snarled his response as he smashed downwards with a big meaty fist. Dante easily pushed away from it with his hands, keeping his swords in his palms as he did so, giving himself some distance to manoeuvre.

Thalia just watched, looking bored with herself. She must have

"We have nothing to speak of, Demigod!" He screeched at Dante. He winced at the sheer volume of the Titan's shouting before taking things into his own hands and going on the offensive.

"You think I'm a Demigod? Cute." Dante laughed, turning the Titan's confusion into his best chance to attack. He jumped, pirouetting over another swipe before inversing himself and performing an upside-down axe kick that ended with a crunched heel into Iapetus' face.

"Listen big boy, if you get back in that cell and let me shut you in then we don't have to do this. We came to Tartarus to prevent your little uprising, no one's gotta know that you were afraid of little old me." Dante taunted the Titan, knowing that Iapetus would never take bait like that.

"Dante, don't make this harder than it has to be," Thalia warned him, eyes set firmly down the sights of the nocked arrow.

Dante moved fast, ducking down between the Titan's legs, swiping one of his sickles out and slicing clear through the tendons on the left knee, rendering Iapetus to the ground.

"Screw yourself, little one. You're in for a shock if you think I can be properly killed. Down here, in the pit, I am more immortal than your imagination could ever comprehend." Iapetus swiped out, pounding his fist into the ground, making the surface of Tartarus shake.

"Bad move, big guy," Dante muttered, slicing down and cutting straight through Iapetus' hand, freeing his fist from his body. Tartarus was filled with screams of pain from a Titan and a Guardian sliced away at his body before reaching the threshold and felling him with a clean cut through the neck, decapitating the Titan.

Iapetus turned to dust, but instead of gently flowing into the breeze, every part of the dust exploded outwards in a thousand directions. "Titan tinsel. Nice." Thalia commented, rescinding the tension in her bow before she put her arrow away.

Back above ground, the situation was as much of a polar opposite as a battle could be. Percy had Nike hunting him down, and in all honesty, he wasn't certain that he could best her, he could definitely keep track of her, but how he was going to bring her down was currently beyond him.

He didn't even know how that pesky dragon managed to recruit her into a titan army. Gods and Titans working together under a dragon's banner to take down Olympus?

Why did this always have to happen to him? He turned his body into a wave that just kept increasing in size and soon enough he had near enough covered the entire battlefield.

Mason got the notion of what he was doing and a moment later he sent a dozen streaks of searingly bright lightning into the body of water. The lightning networked and pulsed through every part of the water and Percy felt all of the entrapped monsters explode and turn into dust, dying away in a watery vortex of lightning-filled death.

Percy reformed and uncapped Anaklusmos. Mason was way ahead of him. His wings were flapping furiously, twisting him around in a hurricane of furious wings and lightning, his greatsword at arm's length, cutting down anything that threatened to get in his way.

Nike had been caught up in Mason's whirlwind and Percy saw his opportunity, he travelled through the water moisture in the air, shooting his way over to them instantly, latching onto the Goddess' back. He cut her throat open before she could even scream for her life.

The rest of the battle raged on for another few hours, and none of them faltered in their efforts to defend against the Titans.

Percy sat down on a rock and started cursing his bad luck, this whole battle felt like it could have been avoided. This fight still felt easier than the alternative of navigating the incredibly potent minefield that was Artemis' heart.

Trust him to be stuck in a battle match-up with a Goddess that was so fast she was a blur when she moved. "Well, that was…" Clarisse began. Percy had an excellent way to finish that sentence.

"Highly satisfying." He grinned as he nodded at the beach of gold dust that had appeared below them in the fields they had shed ichor in.

"That's one rival killed, only Kratos and Hercules left." Mason groaned as he sat down next to Percy and waved his hand. Immediately his boot had formed in his hand and he was shaking it free from the dust that the monsters had become. He quickly reformed it around his foot before laying down and muttering things Percy couldn't hear, probably gripes about the fight.

"I wonder how Dante is doing down below. We should get to the doors of death soon and be ready." Clarisse told them. She was right of course, they really needed to get a move on with things, but they hadn't been expecting an army to oppose just three of them so soon. It was tense alright, but they knew that they could do it.

"Shouldn't they already be out? Dante spent like two minutes in Tartarus, at most. That took him two days." Mason reasoned, looking grim with the implied concept.

"Yeah, if that IS the case, there might be places where time works differently. I reckon that on the other sides of the doors of death time is matched up properly. They could literally just be getting there now." Percy answered, adding some hope to them.

"I think we need to send one of us to fetch War. Either me or Clarisse." Percy added.

Clarisse nodded slightly at this. "I shall go. I'm his sister, I can relate to him the most. We need a place to keep him, but he doesn't respond well to other people, so Camp Half-Blood might not be the best place for him." Clarisse sighed. Percy nodded ever so slightly, she was the right choice for that, plus Percy and Mason were far stronger than she was right now, if they came to blows with any more armies, then he was sure that they could handle it.

Clarisse couldn't imagine Percy succeeding to get her brother to join the Guardians, no this had to be her, and it's a delicate situation, which is a strange thing to associate with children of Ares. Percy nodded, he was clearly thinking of the Hunters but there was no way in hell Clarisse could see them accepting a child of Ares named War among them.

He was supposedly the exact stereotype of a 'man' that Artemis and her Hunters hated. The last time she'd overheard Ares talking about him, it was about a 'rampage' that he'd gone on that had consisted of drinking and other activities concerning women.

The Hunters would never accept him as anything other than a Guardian. "I guess I can ask Artemis, but I seriously doubt we'll get any leeway with him." Percy bit his lip before he closed his eyes.

Artemis. Percy thought about Artemis and focused when he could feel her mind, it was a warm sensation that actually made him blush slightly. his cheeks felt hot, but he could easily blame that on being a part of the telepathy powers.

'Artemis, it's Percy.'

'Percy? Where are you?' She asked, getting used to the feeling of the mental connection between them.

'Greece, like I said I would be. Things have taken a turn for the worst and Ares has decided to point us towards a child of his that would be perfect for the Guardians. He has some serious issues with people in general so we can't take him to Camp Half-Blood.'

'I don't like where this is going, Percy. I'd do a lot for you but I can't voice for just any old man that isn't a Guardian..'

'It's nice to know that you've got a lot of stock in me.'

'I only promise to try and warn the Hunters, what is this child's name?'

'His name is War.'

'Absolutely not, I know of that child of Ares. He lives in the mountains of Scotland, secluded from humanity. He isn't welcome here as a mortal, and I'm going to pretend to be angry with you even when he's a Guardian. Goodbye Perseus.' She forced him from her mind. Well, that was certainly a new experience. Interesting.

"So yeah, there's no way that the Hunters are letting War anywhere near them. I guess, just take him to Olympus for now?" Percy told her. She nodded quickly and vanished in a flash of red light. That left just Percy and Mason to fight off endless waves of monsters, and very possibly Kratos. Excellent!

Back in Tartarus, the speed of battle was nonexistent compared to Percy and Mason's large-scale war.

"So, we've killed Iapetus, but we haven't heard from the other Titans, which means that we should assume they're free above us or in the four corners of Tartarus, either one is going to be difficult to prove. That's not good." Thalia frowned. Dante walked over to her. He looked around their surrounding areas.

"Not good at all. But at least we won't have to fight anymore Titans while we're down here. My power has been limited to twenty percent the entire time." He laughed as if that was a perfectly reasonable thing to have happened to someone.

"Twenty percent, are you kidding me?" Thalia asked him, looking at him incredulously. He looked at her strangely.

"Thalia come here." He said as he cupped her face in his hands. He pulled her face close to his and her breathing hitched immediately. He stared into her eyes for what felt like the longest time.

"Thalia you're using even less of your power than I am." He said extremely calmly before he let go and backed away. Less than twenty percent of her power? How could she be, she felt stronger than ever!

"I know what you're thinking, it'll all come to you in one quick flush when we're on the outside world. I knew the risks of coming down here but we didn't have time to explain it to anyone new to the Guardians. I'm sorry about that." Dante told her before turning around.

"I'm more annoyed that you didn't kiss me, to be honest," Thalia muttered too quietly for Dante to hear her.

"Hmm?" He prompted her to say something but he didn't turn around. She scowled silently.

"Nothing." She told him as she caught up to his strides.

How could he tease her like that? The absolute bastard! Thalia knew that he was taking as much opportunity to touch her without fear of being turned into a woodland animal by Artemis now that she was no longer a Hunter or tied to that eternal oath of maidenhood and chastity.

He'd managed to annoy her now, she knew that he saw it as a game. Fine, she'd play by his rules. "It's getting pretty hot down here." She said as she casually strolled one of her fingers down the sides of her armour. It cleaved itself into a more revealing suit from her sheer will, one that hung loosely to her body but would still protect her if she needed it.

She saw Dante's eyes widen out of the corner of her own. He was in front of her and her little show had caused him to just stop walking. He stood with his jaw wide open, probably unbeknownst to himself.

She sauntered up to him sexily and pushed his jaw back up. "Come on, we're lagging behind." She winked at him and continued to walk past him.

According to what he'd said an hour ago, they were probably now only a few miles away from the Black Mountain. The sooner they could get in and eliminate any threats, the sooner they could get to the doors of death.

They continued walking and eventually she noticed that Dante's eyes began to get brighter, almost illuminating the area with power. His aura became visible. They were getting closer to a centre of power, which had to be the prison of all the big bad things of the world. Thalia felt stronger and faster as well. She noticed that her body began to pulse with a constant crackle of electricity despite not being in her high adrenaline combat mode.

She climbed up a small tower of rocks, Dante hot on her heels. She had definitely gotten his attention. It must have been all of the teasing and looks that she'd been giving him for the past couple of miles.

She would have hated to have been him right now. Thalia overlooked a rocky plain where a set of doors that were easily fifty feet tall stood guarded by a huge army.

They seemed to have known that we were down here and didn't want them to leave. Still no sign of the other Titans. They must have left Iapetus down there to rot. She looked over at Dante, but he wasn't looking at her anymore. He was standing facing the other way with his arms crossed. It would appear that she had defeated the famously stubborn Guardian.

Thalia was loving every moment of it, but she only made things worse when she turned to him and pressed her body against the back of his, "Dante, what's wrong?" she asked, teasing him so much more than was fair.

She wasn't expecting him to turn so sharply though. He pushed her against a rocky wall and held her arms above her head. His lips were pressed firmly against her own, it was only a matter of seconds before she felt his tongue wrap around her own, the warm wetness that it brought through only made her more excited.

He eventually broke away from the kiss but it wasn't over yet, She soon felt his hot breath against her neck. "Not so fun now is it?" He asked. She managed to squirm one of her hands out of his grip but he didn't really try to stop her.

She ran a hand across his armour. It didn't budge, but when she did it the second time, a streak where her hand had run across broke away at her touch, revealing his solid muscles underneath.

"It's always fun." Thalia grinned at him before he broke away from her completely. He didn't say anything else to her; he just pulled his armour back together and jumped down into the sea of monsters eagerly awaiting them below, effectively leaving Thalia high and dry.

"For fuck sake!" She growled at him as she jumped and glided down into the battle as well. Enraged that he'd just left her there, wanting more but denied everything.

She'd just have to take out her frustrations on the massed monster army below. It was only then that she noticed that they were guarding the massive Black Mountain. How had she not seen that before?

A/N: Review?