Chapter 21: Potentia

Disclaimer – I do not own any of the characters but hostage negotiations have begun and I may get what I want soon enough.

Author's Note – Welp, I'm back! And I have another chapter! Crazy right? Ahhh I'm stressed about my tests but oh well, that's just how the cookie crumbles. ALSO HOLY HECKING HECK WE CROSSED 200 REVIEWS AND 10K VIEWS YAYAYAYAYAYAY! YOU ALL ARE THE BEST :)

The Dark Fallen Fairy – Yes more puns. But I'll stop for now I suppose. I'll tell you about Annabeth soon enough mwahahaha. I am a daring person I suppose.

1234 Booklover – Yes, it was rather melancholic I suppose. We will have to see about this one, won't we?

Merendinoemiliano – Well, I did not want to describe what was essentially torture in graphic depth. So yeah, I'm planning a separate torture fic for that. Also, thanks.

Captain McShizzl – Nope, it wasn't real, I'm not as sadistic as that….or am I? Mwahahahaha. You'll find out about Annabeth soon enough.

CalRedEss – ahahahahahaha sorry bro, your reaction was honestly hilarious. It was a vision. Don't worry :D

SingularSpeck77 – Well you must really hate me now huh. Deal, I'm always up for more Percabeth. As for how far…well, I don't quite know yet but I will think about it :/

Callum Runchman – Yeah don't worry, I will.

RosesForRoyals - *Sniffs* Coz I'm horrible. :)

Olympus Angel – I'm sorry! This is actually necessary for future chapters :(

FemaleDemon – Your reviews are so good and awesome to read that I literally do not have words. This is me being clueless about what to say. *is clueless*

"I survived because the fire inside me burnt brighter than the fire around me."

Percy's POV:

Darkness isn't absolute. It has shades and tones and variants that one can only really appreciate after spending time with it. There is the dark that is cold and suffocating – it inspires fear. Then there is the dark that brings with it anticipation – the feeling of jumpiness, of barely restrained adrenaline, of demigod senses that screamed what next? Those were not the worst however, no, that honor went to the pitch black dark. A dark so black that it could not be characterized as anything other than a complete absence of light and color. I had long since resigned myself to the endless differentiation of exactly which shade and taste of dark was currently around me. Any thought of escape and rescue was long gone. Most days, or hours, or weeks, time was different here after all, Gaea left me alone, content on letting me stumble about in the dark.

Today was not that day. She appeared as she always did, slowly forming from the ground up. I thought about how fitting it was that someone as old as the Earth itself – Gaea appeared not like the gods, with flashes and bright lights and unnecessary theatrics, but with an almost whisper-like quality. Everything she did seemed slow, patient, deliberate, as if she had spent eons planning it out, which she probably had.

I had been in the presence of gods before. And while the Big Three had definitely given off an aura of undeniable power – like the wrath of nature bound to flesh, Gaea's power was so vast and terrible that comprehending it all would probably have turned my mind to mush. Everything seemed to gravitate towards her, as if her mere presence was sucking up her surroundings.

"So boy, have you finally had enough? I told you you would beg me for death, and I would deny it didn't I?"

Terrified though I may be, I had a reputation.

"Huh, did you say something?"

Her eyebrow twitched, which seemed a gesture entirely too human for a protogenos to make.

"It seems you have forgotten exactly who you are talking back to demigod."

I paled. For all my bravado, watching exactly how all of my friends could die while I was trapped here was like an endless nightmare.

"No!" I shouted, just as she snapped her hands.

Annabeth's POV:

Everyone was arguing. That wasn't something noteworthy in and of itself, it was what they were arguing about that was important.

"He is not dead." I heard Piper say, her voice hoarse.

"He will be if we don't get to him soon enough." Jason mused.

It may have seemed callous, but I knew what he meant. He was a leader, just like me and just like Percy. When someone was in danger, falling apart would do no good. He was doing what I should be doing. Pointing out the problem and trying to come up with a solution.

Problem was, I was just numb at this point.

Leo and Hazel blamed themselves, thinking that if he hadn't been busy saving them, he would've saved himself.

Frank was mechanically doing small stuff – wiping the deck, tightening the knots, keeping watch. I knew he and Percy had become friends and had grown closer, specially when Frank had told him about his ancestry.

It hadn't really sunk in for me. We couldn't be that unlucky, could we?

"…Beth, Annabeth. ANNABETH!" I heard someone shout and snapped out of my thoughts.

"What, Jason?"

"Do you have any idea about what we can do?"

I frowned. Truth be told, there wasn't much we could do right now.

"Focus on repairing the ship first and then we'll go after Percy. He's in his element here, and if anyone can win against a giant monster in the water, it's him." I said at last.

Leo nodded and ran off to make a list of all the stuff they would need for repairs.

I got up, walked to Percy's room, shut the door, and flopped onto his bed.

"Maybe if I go to sleep then when I wake up from this nightmare he'll be here, smiling and laughing." I thought idly.

Percy's POV:

It was the same, and yet the sameness made it hurt more. Had I been shown different versions of my friend's deaths, I would not have been so affected. After all, had I seen Piper die by any other method apart from being beheaded, I would have drawn comfort in the fact that this was undeniably an illusion. Watching the same thing happen again, and again, and again made it seem like a nightmare, PTSD from something that had already happened. It was as if my friends had already died and I was reliving it all over again. Every iteration of the loop seemed to solidify that position in my mind. It was like a knife cut. It hurt more when you targeted the same location repeatedly. And I, I was already worn down to the bone.

Gaea was many things, but a sweet, merciful goddess she was not. She seemed to delight in my fear and my revulsion.

"Oh I do so love when you scream like that Jackson." She remarked flippantly.

"You're a monster."

"Oh? How many have you treated badly demigod? You have slaughtered hundreds – including so many of my children. Is what I am doing to you any worse than what you have done? You threw Iapetus into the Lethe and wiped his memory, reducing him to a simpleton, a cleaner rather than the Titan of the East. You killed an entire group of Telkhines and caused an earthquake that obliterated everything in it's path and managed to loosen Typhon's prison. You killed my son Antaeus. You tricked Polyphemus and killed him in cold blood. You are a monster, forged and tested in blood, ichor and fire. Do not forget that."

Bile flooded my mouth at her words. I suddenly launched forward and retched, my stomach emptying itself of its contents.

"Let me show you, Jackson, a fraction of the pain you have caused." Gaea said.

Suddenly, I was in looking at the Dining Pavilion at Camp Half Blood. Except instead of campers, monsters of every kind were seated at the tables. There were dracaenae, laistrygonians, cyclopes, telkhines and even a few hellhounds sitting on the floor.

I turned my head and stopped cold. I'd recognize those grey eyes and blonde hair anywhere.

"No," I thought to myself, "No."

I can't watch her die too. Then I saw that she wasn't actually dead or dying.

Annabeth was…..standing near a group of Cyclopes. And she had an amphora in her hand. She was refilling their cups, but it was the way she was doing it that was all wrong. Those were not the movements of someone who was being forced to something against their will – no, she moved with determination and….excitement. As if she was trying to prove herself. Her eyes were no longer like the sharp edge of a sword – always calculating and observing and planning. They were glazed, almost unresponsive. They looked more like an old and abandoned blade that had long since lost its edge.

And she was smiling. She was serving wine to Cyclopes who were mocking and ridiculing her, and she was smiling. She hated cyclopes because they had taken Thalia from her and she was still smiling.

I was frozen in shock. A sense of utter wrongness pervaded me. This was not Annabeth. This wasn't even the skeleton of a shadow of a spectre of Annabeth. And just like that, something inside me snapped. Because This. Was. Not. Annabeth.

I could feel the ocean again, I realized. It was as if storms themselves were crackling inside my body, as if lightning had been infused into my blood.

Poseidon was the Stormbringer, but he was also the Earthshaker.

With his grace flowing through my veins, I stomped my foot on the ground with a roar, and the ground was torn asunder.

"And all those things I didn't say
Wrecking balls inside my brain
I will scream them loud tonight
Can you hear my voice this time?"

Author's Note - *sigh* I know I have dragged this on long enough, but next chapter is gonna see to it that I finally merge with canon, and then I'll be able to explore more about exactly how Percy's mind was affected in captivity. If you have suggestions, questions, stuff you wanna talk about, just shoot me a PM or a review.

Also, seriously guys thank you for your support :)

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