AN:

It took a minute, but I have another chapter here for you all. Things are really spicing up. There's a lot of action in this chapter, which is good to balance out all the mystery of the previous one. Don't worry though, there's still plenty of extra information you can glean from this if you look hard enough. With each passing chapter, more of the end of this is becoming clear, so keep an eye out for the little details, and more importantly, enjoy. Here's chapter 5 of "All That's Left"

XxXxX

Soft moonlight trickled down from above, casting a dim glow across the concrete jungle around them as they waited in bated silence. For multiple nights now, the pair had watched fruitlessly over the building, waiting for something to happen. As of yet, they'd spent more time staring painfully at the building's front door than they'd spent doing anything else the past few days. The waiting was agonizingly slow.

Luke had yet to make his move, and things around the base were starting to get tense. Everyone was frustrated. Although no one would ever say it to the two of them, many believed Percy and Jason's preemptive capture and Percy's subsequent killing of Ethan Nakamura had sent Luke into hiding. Hazel held some of those same doubts, but Percy had assured her that wasn't the case. According to him, anyone willing to go to the lengths Luke appeared to be wasn't going to give up when he found out someone was after him. If anything, he was going to fight back.

And so they had waited. And waited. And when the waiting was done, they waited some more. Now, it was almost like they were playing a game with Luke. She wondered if he knew they were watching over this house, waiting for him to send someone after one of the boys inside. She wondered if he was waiting for them to make a move first. She wondered if he was watching them this entire time. It was a scary thought.

A nudge at her side drew her attention. Percy met her eyes, a dangerous visage marring his features. He nodded across the street, drawing her attention to something. Pressed against the cement wall, lurking in the shadows, a silhouette was ghosting towards the building's door. Even being told where to look, her eyes could barely make out the figure. How Percy spotted him in the first place, she wasn't sure.

The shadow inched closer, finally stopping in its tracks just outside the door. Hand hovering over the handle, the outline of the man paused. He turned outward, eyes scanning his surroundings suspiciously, as if some sixth sense told him Percy and Hazel were there. Their breaths caught, their posture going rigid as they hoped to avoid detection. As his gaze passed over their hiding spot in the alleyway, Hazel could've sworn she saw his motion hitch just for a second. Luckily, before they were discovered, his eyes continued tracing his surroundings, seemingly not noticing the danger that was concealed so close.

The man turned back to the door, satisfied that he wasn't being watched. Her and Percy let out a collective breath as his fingers once again gripped the doorknob. The door slowly swung open, the presumed kidnapper moving at a snail's pace in order to avoid making any noise. Just as he was about to slip in, everything went to shit.

Behind them, the sound of a falling trash can exploded into the night. The harsh metallic clanking reverberated off the concrete, sending a cacophony of jarring noises to their ears. Hazel's blood ran cold. A quick glance behind her showed the culprit. A rather fat raccoon with an apparent penchant for eating garbage had spoiled their whole operation in his pursuit of dinner. If their mission wasn't so vital, she might have even laughed at the unlucky occurrence.

Across the street, the man had obviously heard the noise. The falling trash can was soon followed by a slamming door as the man whirled on their position. In the corner of her vision, she could see Percy's hand slowly creeping towards his gun, ready for a fight. It was a brief stare down between the two through the shadows, but it felt like an eternity. Apparently, a fight wasn't in the cards, as the man was the first to break their locked gazes. The silhouette turned away from them, taking off at a sprint down the street, his legs eating up distance faster than she expected.

"Shit." Percy cursed, taking off after him. There was nothing else to do but run after him, for the first time thankful for all the conditioning Percy had made her do since she'd met him.

The man cut into the first alley he could find, trying to escape into the darkness. They ducked in after him, hot on his trail as he sprinted through the narrow path. As he fled, he grabbed a trash can, tossing it in their path to hinder their chase. They slowed for moment to jump it, giving the man enough time to climb the fence blocking off the end of the alley.

Percy, who was running in front of her, didn't even waste time climbing it. He ran at an angle, leaping into the side of one of the buildings and kicking against it, propelling himself to the top of the fence. He landed with his hands griping the top of the fence, hoisting himself up with one smooth motion. Pausing at the top, he leaned back over, dropping a hand for her to grab onto.

Jumping to reach his grip, she felt herself being swung over the fence, landing in a heap on the other side. By the time she started to lift herself from the cement, Percy's booted feet had already hit the ground next to her. He was off at a sprint before she was even standing, leaving her to trail behind.

Up ahead, she could see the figure still running, headed for the ground entrance of some nondescript skyscraper. Percy was hot on his trail, gaining ground quickly. The man turned around as he ran, reaching into his coat pocket with lightning speed. Before she even processed what was going on, the man had completely whirled on Percy and let off three shots. The first two were wildly off target, but the third hit its mark. She saw Percy clutch his shoulder, no doubt thanks to the bullet buried there.

Percy stumbled in his tracks for just a few steps, but that was all it took. The man had bought himself too much time. He made it to the skyscraper entrance, pounding some code into the front door before either of them could get there. The door swung open, giving way to what looked to be an obnoxiously lavish interior. They were almost there, but the man was able to squeeze in just before they made it, the door slamming shut behind him.

They slowly rolled to a stop, and she dropped her hands to her knees to catch her breath. Unlike her, Percy didn't seem exhausted, only frustrated. Blood was leaking from his shoulder, but he didn't seem to mind as he slammed a fist angrily into the pass-code locked door protecting their prey from them.

"Why didn't you shoot him." She huffed out, her chest heaving.

"Because I wanted him to lead us right back to his base, which he can't do if he's dead or bleeding out…" he muttered. "Plus, I didn't know he was going to shoot me."

Her eyes instantly went to his shoulder, reminded of his injury.

"Oh my god. You're shoulder!" she breathed out, body springing into action on instinct alone.

She moved to inspect it, hands approaching the wound tenderly, but he waved her off, grumbling something about how he'd had worse. As she backed up to give him space, something caught her eye over his shoulder. For the first time ever, she found herself grateful for the needlessly arrogant displays of wealth that marred this city's finer buildings. Slowly ascending the side of the building in an elevator made of glass was the exact man they'd just been chasing after, catching his breath in much the same way as she had just been doing.

"Percy, look." She said quickly, pointing up at the escaping man.

Percy spun in an instant, quickly taking in the sight before him. Without a second's thought, he unholstered his gun, aiming up at him. He let off shot after shot, leaving expanding cracks like spider webs in the obviously bullet proof glass as the elevator pulled away.

"What happened to not shooting him?" she asked over the muffled sound of silenced gunfire.

"He shot me." Percy said simply, his finger again squeezing the trigger.

He continued his firing, bullet after bullet whirring upwards. With each shot, the cracks in the glass stretched further, almost encompassing the entire elevator now. Before he could do something he'd regret she reached out, grabbing his hand and halting his firing. He turned on her, eyebrows raised in a mixture of frustration and confusion.

"What are you doing?" he asked slowly, sounding genuinely puzzled. His hand started to rise again easily, as if the downward pressure she was applying on his arm was insignificant to him.

"You can't just kill him." She protested. "We need him to take us to wherever Luke is."

Percy's eyes flicked up to the elevator still slowly meandering up the side of the building with its no doubt now cowering passenger.

"I don't know if you noticed, but he kind of already got away."

She frowned, realizing he had a point. She wracked her brain, searching for any way they could keep up the chase. If Annabeth were here, they'd have gotten in the locked door instantly. Unfortunately, they were down one significantly skilled hacker at the moment. Suddenly, an idea, although insane and frightening, sprang to mind.

"Our moon boots." She rushed out. "Do they go both ways?"

"How do you mean?" he inquired, lost with where this was headed.

"The gravity. On our first mission together, at the warehouse, you had us test the low gravity setting for Leo. Does that mean our boots have a higher gravity setting?" she hurried, nearly stumbling over her own words.

She wasn't even sure if they worked the way she was imagining or not. For all she knew, they actually increased or decreased the pull of gravity on you, which spoiled her plan. Hopefully they weren't so straight forward and functioned more as a repellent or attractor to the surface beneath them at the user's command. If it was the latter, her crack shot idea might work. A look of understanding dawned on Percy's face as she spoke. He seemed to be following her train of thought now, and wasn't shooting her down, which meant her hunch was right. They worked as she imagined, which meant her plan could work.

"Hazel that's the most genius and batshit insane idea I've ever heard." He said excitedly, bending down to activate their boots. He stood up in a blur. "I fucking love it."

As soon as his finger hit her boot, she felt the change. It was like she was wearing cinderblocks, or she'd somehow traded her shoes with massive tree roots. Straining her muscles, she made to take her first step, fighting against the insane pull of the shoes with everything she had. She went to step onto the side of the building, but Percy halted her, digging around in one of his many pockets.

"Here," he said, handing her a pair of gloves. "You can't tell me you thought you could just walk up a building? The boots will stick, but the rest of your body will still get pulled downwards. You'll need these too so you're not just dangling."

He walked ahead of her, placing his hand against the glass. He tugged hard, and she could hear the stickiness of the gloves fighting against him. It was like the palms of each glove was covered in dried syrup. Each time he pulled with his injured shoulder, he let out a guttural groan, but he pushed on, climbing higher and faster as he worked himself into a rhythm. Tugging on her own gloves, careful to keep the sticky palms away from her, she started scaling the building behind him.

The climb was long and arduous, made difficult by the intense pull of her boots against the glass of the building and the relentless stickiness of her gloves. She wondered what Leo had initially made them for, but whatever the purpose, she was glad Percy had them on hand. Thanks to her idea, combined with the gloves, they were incrementally gaining ground on the slow-moving elevator. Luckily for them, whatever rich architect had designed the building must have thought it was important that the elevator gave the rider ample time to look down on the people below.

As the climb continued, she did her very best to ignore the crazy wind blowing around her. The higher they got, the harder their altitude became to ignore, and the more her heart started to flutter. She couldn't help herself, she looked down. The city was so far below, now just glittering dots of light from her view. How the rich enjoyed the sight, she didn't know, because all it did was make her panic.

She started to get dizzy. She hadn't noticed exactly how far she'd gotten until she looked down. Pressing her body against the glass, she locked in place, her nerves freezing her in position. Her body was wracked with heaving breaths as she hyperventilated, trapped hundreds of feet in the air, completely out of her element. Clenching her eyes shut, she did her best to fight off the fear in her sternum, all to no avail.

"Hazel!" Percy shouted down to her. She forced her eyes open, looking up to see him staring down at her. Somehow, over the rushing wind and the dangerous climb, he'd noticed her distress. It seems he always did.

"Kind of busy." She squeaked out, doing everything she could to hide the mortification in her voice. She hugged the wall tighter.

"Hazel." He said, his voice piercing through her thin façade like a knife. "It's alright to be scared. I understand. But it's not alright that we lose this one chance to save everyone. To save your mother. But that's what's going to happen if you don't put your fear aside. If you don't keep climbing. We're almost there, you just need to keep climbing. Can you do that for me? For your mother?" His words were intense, but they didn't match the roaring passion of his eyes,

He was right. She had to do this. Swallowing her fear, she pushed her trepidation to the deepest recesses of her mind. She pulled one glove off, slamming it back into the glass almost instantly. A shuddering breath. Next a boot, a sharp pull, a moment of dangling in the air, and it was on glass again. She huffed out another breath. Her other glove this time. Then her other boot. She could do this. She would do this. They resumed the climb

Up ahead, only above them by about a dozen feet now, the elevator came to a stop, the dull ping alerting them. It had stopped right in line with one of the many bridges that connected the upper floors of the skyscrapers like some sort of superhighway. It glowed an iridescent rainbow, made of some strange and murky glass, and expanded across a huge swath of open sky. The doors pinged open, and from underneath the bridge she could make out the shadow of the man sprinting across with heavy footfalls.

A few more seconds and they were on the bridge with him, the chase resumed. He had a head start once again, but he was losing steam, and fast. The man seemed to notice their gaining on him, and he whirled around once more. This time though, he didn't aim for Percy or for her. His gun dropped, targeting the glass bridge between them. He unloaded bullet after bullet, each puncturing the glass with ease. All at once, the middle of the bridge shattered, opening up a gaping hole into the wind below. She came to a stop just before the gap, eyeing the man across the way.

He sent a smug sneer her way, gloating in his escape for a moment, before turning and running again. To her left, Percy was already pulling something from his pocket, cocking back his arm. In one swift motion, he brough his hand forward, launching some object towards the man. Her eyes tried to track it, but it was too small, and the night was too dark. Before she could ponder what it was though, she heard a crack under her feet. One glance down, and she realized what was happening.

"Percy. The bridge." She cried out, pointing under their feet. He glanced down, his face contorting in surprise.

"This is the part where we run, isn't it?"

She nodded furiously, the two of them taking off at a sprint back to the building they'd come from. Her legs burned as she ran faster than she ever had, pushing herself to her limit. In front of her, Percy was inadvertently pulling ahead, increasing the distance between them without even noticing. Behind her, she could hear the bridge slowly crumbling, pieces of glass dripping from the sky like drops of shrapnel rain. The worst part, the sound was getting closer, and she still had too far to go.

"Percy!" she cried out, drawing his attention as she ran.

He was already to safety, but her voice hit him like a truck. He turned quickly, seeing how close the quickly disappearing edge of the bridge was. It was hot on her heels now, licking at her boots like the tongue of a flame. She was almost there, just a few more feet, and for a second there was hope. That was when the glass broke.

Feet dangling over open air. A moment of free fall. Her own scream. Gravity pulling her into its embrace. All that she felt in the span of less than a second. Then, there was the sound of a chest hitting glass. A hand gripping hers. A powerful yank on her shoulder as her fall was stopped before it truly began. One glance up and she saw Percy, face contorted in pain.

"I got you." He groaned out, his face in a tight grimace.

She couldn't find her voice. Instead, she managed a light squeak, reaching with her other hand to grip his forearm, eyes shut tight. Her feet kicked wildly in open air, searching for purchase, but all they found was empty wind.

A drop of liquid landed on her face as she dangled. Then another. And another. Was it raining? She peeked open a single eye, the sight of a wounded shoulder dripping crimson directly overhead. It wasn't rain cascading down on her. It was the blood of the only thing keeping her from falling.

"Percy your shoulder! You can't pull me up. You have to let me go." She sobbed, tears bursting to join the blood on her cheeks. He shook his head vehemently at her.

"Bullshit." He hissed out through gritted teeth. And that's when he started to pull.

She heard his yell of pain. Saw the veins in his forehead bulge. Saw the sweat dripping down his face as he pulled with all his might. Slowly, she started to rise. A hair's width, then centimeters, then inches at a time she was brought closer. Determination on his features, he fought against his pain, willing her upwards.

With one last surge, she was over the edge, tumbling onto the last of the steady glass with him. Wasting no time, she scrambled over to him, wrapping him in a hug before he could even think. She sobbed heavily into his shoulder, pouring her relief and gratitude into the hug. Not even just for saving her life. For him caring enough to go through so much to do it.

"I told you…" he breathed out, his chest heaving. "We're saving everyone. You and me. You're not allowed to die until we're done."

She felt herself laugh into his shoulder. A wet laugh that was drowned in her own tears; a laugh as hollow as a pumpkin in late October. Maybe she was delirious, maybe her nerves were so fried from her near fall she couldn't separate laughter from fear. Either way, she wasn't okay, not by a long shot, and she knew Percy could tell. One of his hands rubbed her back soothingly, somewhat easing her still racing heart.

"How?" she croaked out; voice hoarse. "How can we stop them now? He got away, and now we have nothing." Percy rolled his eyes, like the question was silly.

"I threw a tracker at him." Percy said with a small smile. "He'll take us right to where we need to be." Her brain flashed back to just before the breaking bridge. His arm cocked back. The thrown object she hadn't been able to follow.

"Are you sure you hit him?"

"Remember what I told Jason at the shipyard?" he said, eyebrows raised.

She shook her head. Percy's eyes twinkled as he dug around in his coat. He pulled out a small black box, a bright screen illuminating his face in the darkness. Turning it slowly towards her, she saw it was a map of the city. Slowly moving through the streets was a beeping red dot, flickering like a lightning bug on a summer's night.

"Remember. I never miss."

XxXxX

"That should do it." She said, sealing the last stich in his shoulder.

Percy rubbed his arm, giving it a few test swings. He nodded, seemingly finding her work satisfactory. With a grunt, he tugged his shirt back over his head, once again hiding his torso from the cool night air.

"I knew having Will teach you some battlefield medicine would come in handy." Percy chirped, rising from his spot on the ground.

"Yeah, well, I don't see why you couldn't just use some nectar." She commented drily, pouring a bottle of water on her hands to clean off his blood. There was a lot of it, and it was uncomfortably warm and sticky on her bare skin.

"Hazel, you and I both know how rare that stuff is. It's for emergencies only. Besides, you did a good job." He said, patting his shoulder emphatically. "I'm ready to get back into action."

Turning around, he stepped onto a box beneath a window. A window that went right into where they'd tracked the man. A window that had all the answers hidden behind it. She wanted to know what was on the other side as badly as he did, but she knew going alone was risky. Almost too much so.

"Are you sure we shouldn't be waiting for backup?" Hazel questioned carefully, eyes on Percy as he fiddled with the window above.

"Absolutely." He said cheerfully, shaking a can violently in his hand. "We're not storming the castle. We're just… Doing recon. It'll be fine."

A push of his finger and the can unleashed a torrent of freezing air, hissing against the lock as it made contact. Faster than water in the arctic the metal froze. With one quick strike from the butt of the can, the lock shattered. Percy pumped his fist in celebration before slowly pushing the pane of glass open. It gave a shrill shriek, the hinges groaning in protest of their first use in what must have been ages.

"Relax, Hazel." He said, turning back to look at her one last time. "What could go wrong?"

And with that, he pulled himself through, disappearing in a flash. She waited a few seconds, expecting an alarm, a scream, the sound of gunshots, something to come from the other side. The chaos never came though. It was quiet. Disturbingly so.

"Are you coming? Or are you going to wait outside?" Percy said from within, breaking the silence. His voice was muffled as it passed through the only slightly cracked window.

Seeing no other option, she hopped onto the box, reaching for the windowsill. She was much shorter than Percy, so she wasn't able to see in. She was going in blind. She jumped and grabbed the bottom of the window frame, pulling herself up with a grunt. She wasn't as graceful or acrobatic as Percy, so when she fell through the other side, she landed in a grumbling heap. The metal floor was chillingly cool beneath her fingers as she went to push herself to her feet.

"A nice jump, but you didn't really stick the landing. I don't think the judges are going to like that one." Percy joked, extending a hand to help her up.

"Oh, shut up." She mumbled, accepting his help anyways. He hefted her to her feet like she was made of paper.

As she was rising from the floor, she took in her surroundings. They were in a metal hallway, dimly lit by blue lights on the wall that traced some intricate pattern her mind couldn't follow. On either end of the hallway, cold black steel doors stood intimidatingly in their path. The room made her feel like a sardine in a can.

"Which way? You can pick." Percy chirped, interrupting her dark thoughts.

She wondered how he could be so callous about infiltrating this base without backup. Then again, she doubted they had the necessary firepower to storm this place even with everyone they had. Even from outside, the building was enormous. Whatever Percy was looking for, it would take time to find. Maybe he was right. Maybe subtly was their best option.

"That way I guess." She said, pointing towards the further door. Something in her gut said that was the way to go, and Percy told her to always trust her gut.

Percy nodded, leading the way. Although his demeanor seemed casual, she could see through it. His pistol was drawn, although at his side, and his eyes were steely. His jaw was tightly clenched, and a vein was protruding on his neck. He may be giving off an air of nonchalance, but she could tell he was ready for a fight at a moment notice.

The door opened for them when they reached it, sliding into the floor with a low hiss. Even though it was clearly automated with motion sensors for convenience, the movement filled her sense of dread. It made her feel like she was being watched. Like the building itself had eyes, and all of them were on her.

"Up or down?" she asked slowly, taking in the sight of the stairwell hidden behind the door.

"Down." Percy said without hesitation. He must have noticed her surprised look, so he elaborated. "Bad guys always keep their evil secrets hidden away in the basement. Don't you watch any movies?"

Not knowing how to argue with that reasoning, she merely shrugged in compliance. They descended for a long while, going deeper and deeper into the bowels of the building. The staircase seemed less like stairs and more like a plummet into a dark abyss with each step, sending an eerie chill through her bones. If Percy felt the same thing though, he wasn't showing it.

When they finally reached the bottom, they were met with another steel door. Like the first, it slid open on its own, inviting them into the room like some sort of mechanical butler. Percy stepped through first. His next words beckoning for her to follow him inside.

"I told you." He breathed out. "Evil secrets are always hidden in the basement."

Her mind struggled to process what she was seeing. It was a lab of some sort, with a vaulted ceiling. The entire room was a cold black metal, dimly lit by faint fluorescent lights from the rafters high above. Most of the light though came from the edges of the room. Lining each and every wall were massive tanks, large enough to hold a person, glowing with some strange blue liquid on the inside that cast a blue hue over everything in sight.

In the center of the room, there were a few surgical tables, with straps to hold down any 'patient' that found themselves there. Drills, surgical tools, and blood were scattered haphazardly across the tables, showing signs of recent use. The tanks may have been empty, and the tables clear of humans, but it was extremely clear this lab hadn't been abandoned for very long.

"What is this place?" Hazel managed to get out, stepping further into the room.

Percy joined her, his footsteps heavy on the ground, a first for him. His face was contorted in pain, his hands clutching his temples. He took a few wobbly steps as he groaned in displeasure, scowling as if he was being force fed a spoon of something unpleasant.

"Are you alright?" she said hurriedly, rushing to his side. He waved her off, bracing himself against a desk.

"Yeah I'm fine. Just a…" he paused, wincing for a moment. He pinched the bridge of his nose, locked in combat with the pain that was assaulting his mind. "Just a headache. We should… We should figure out what was going on here."

She nodded her agreement, moving to examine the room. She glided quickly passed the surgery tables; afraid she'd throw up if she looked at them. Imagining her mom strapped down to one of those as she faced a spinning sawblade or twirling drill wasn't at the top of her bucket list. Instead, she made her way to the walls. She rubbed her finger along the base of one of the many tanks, pulling it away to find no dust. Another sign of this lab's recent use. Her eyes trailed up the wall, eyeing the tanks themselves, along with the strange liquid inside.

It was a strange cobalt blue, speckled with little flecks of white like twinkling diamonds. Upon closer inspection, she noticed a little tube on the inside. At the end? A breathing mask, like a scuba diver would wear. Her initial guess had been right. They'd been keeping people in there. The only question was why.

"Percy, I think they were keeping people in these things." She called out to him, voicing her discovery with horror.

"I know." He said, his voice carrying over to her in the quiet. He sounded pained and sad. Disturbedly so. She turned to find him, being met with his form, shoulders hunched, his face bent over a computer screen. His eyes were crunched in confusion, and his face was contorted in horror. She rushed over to him, squeezing into his side to get a look at what he was reading. It only took a few seconds before her face matched his.

At the top of the page, in bright bold letters, the phrase 'Project Genesis' was traced out in a liquid gold font. Below it, pictures of the lab they were sitting in decorated the page, only in the images there was actually personnel in the lab. They were all dressed in biohazard suits, masks covering their faces. No one was milling about; everyone was hard at work with whatever sinister project they'd been assigned.

Even worse than that, lining the walls she could see people in the tanks, their eyes closed, and their faces still. It was probably just a result of the frozen images, but they all looked dead. Their faces were pale, and they looked at peace. They couldn't be dead, could they? They wouldn't be keeping dead people for study, would they? And if they only wanted living subjects, where was everyone now?

As Percy scrolled further, they were met with more images, and then a massive wall of text. The font was small, and he was scrolling too fast to read it all in one go, but one word kept drawing her attention. It was everywhere she looked. Genesis.

"What the hell is project Genesis." Percy said beside her, eyes still following the screen.

She didn't have an answer for him. She was as entranced as he was, her golden orbs flickering across the screen much like his. There were endless pages of information. Too much to take in all at once, even if they had the time. It was a train wreck she couldn't look away from. That was until she heard the voice behind her, deep and cold.

"Funny that you of all people would be asking that question, brother."

XxXxX

AN:

How the hell is that for a cliff hanger? Things are only going to get more mysterious before they get clearer in this story. Next chapter, you'll have some questions answered, as always, but similarly more will be raised. Hopefully you guys enjoy that, because I'm having fun dangling the truth in front of you like this. Now, I know one question you're probably asking is "Really Percy, sneaking into the bad guys secret evil base with no backup, really?" and the answer is yes. Really. This whole time, Percy has been reckless and impatient, even with Hazel to reign him in a bit, and this was always going to come back to bite him eventually. Now, once again, sorry for the wait, I did my best to get this out as soon as possible, but getting it just right took some time, as it sometimes does. As always, please review and tell me how I did, I love the feedback. Anyways, until next time,

Peace