Percy- My immortal life goes to hell

"Agghhh, what?" I rubbed my eyes, and looked around.

"Oh no…" I was in a small ditch in the ground, the ground of my least favourite place in existence: Tartarus.

Yet, something was different. It all seemed less painful; horrible and dark and gloomy, yes. But the air no longer burned my throat and the ground no longer cut my flesh.

I sat up and took in a great lungful of air. I felt a slight tickling sensation in the back of my throat, but other than that, I felt none of the burning that had tortured me and Annabeth last time we I was here.

I got to my feet, and peered around.

"It appears," I said, to no one in particular, "that I am in the middle of freakin nowhere. Great."

"It sucks, doesn't it?" said a female voice from behind me. I turned, and standing there was a lady… with snakes for hair. I instinctively covered my eyes.

"Ha! I knew it! I am the most hideous gorgon! Wait till Euryale hears this!"

Wait, I thought, I know that voice. I removed my palms from my face, and pulled riptide from my pocket, relieved that it stayed with me, even down here.

"I remember you. What was your name again? Stefany? Steven?"

"Stheno."

"Right…" I uncapped my sword, and raised it. "So are you gonna leave me alone, or you wanna die all over again?" She raised her hands in surrender.

"No! I- I mean… I'd rather not, th- thanks. Prefer to head back up soon."

"Not so confident when you can't instantly reform, are you? What? You want to live long enough to get back to your job at Bargain Mart?"

She hastily nodded, her eyes fixed on the celestial bronze sword in my hand.

"Yes, that would be n-nice."

How was she here? It usually takes decades, if not centuries, for monsters to reform. Fear gripped me.

How long did it take me to reform? Will I resurface and find myself a hundred years in the future? No friends, no Annabeth, no Mum. What will I find up there? What about the war?

Surely Ares didn't beat the Olympians, even with Zeus's lightning bolt.

Nothing I can do about that now, first order of business: getting out of here.

"I want to get out of here. You wouldn't happen to know how to do that, would you?"

"Not quickly, n-no. Get ready for a couple centuries in this hell before you form up there again, just the way it is," she shrugged.

"But there is absolutely no other way to get to the surface from here?"

"Not unless you climb up one of the entrances to Tartarus from the mortal world. But you'd have to be crazy to do that; more likely you'd fall and die all over again," she said.

"That'll have to be a last resort, but if it's possible… Is there really no other way?"

"Unless you can fly, no," she said, with a hint of humour in her tone. It's easy for her, she's probably done this a few dozen times already.

"Great. Just great."

A long, awkward silence followed.

"Sooo…" She began.

"Where are we?" I asked

"Tartar-"

"Yea, but where in Tartarus?"

"Uhhh… the Delta of Despair is that way," she said, sticking a thumb over her shoulder, "across the River Acheron. And behind you is the swamp… where that giant lurks."

"Giant? You mean Damasen?" I felt a little excited to see Damasen, and possibly Bob again. We didn't get to say much in the way of goodbyes while escaping Tartarus. It would be a weight off my conscious to see them again.

"If you say so, but it seems he's as much a giant as you are a demigod."

"You radiate power, boy," she said darkly. "It'll make some of the residents here back off, but it'll draw others towards you; monsters who want a challenge."

"Ok, thank you for your help…" I raised my sword again. "Now scram."

An incomprehensible (although it seemed short) amount of time later- I stepped into the clearing, and gazed upon Damasen's home.

The large hut, made of drakon hide and bone, stood in the centre of the clearing, surrounded by shrivelled black husks of what slightly resembled trees, and wart clumps growing from the ground.

Small leftover drakon bones deemed unusable were piled up next to the hut, towering above the domed roof of the giants home. But there was only one noticeable change in the scenery.

Shackled to the ground, tied up with chains was one very defeated looking drakon. It lay, right in front of the hut, unable to move, bound by it's own bones. It must have taken Damasen forever to devise this; every chain link, the shackles and even the pegs pinning it all to the ground, were all carved from the drakon's bones.

I suspect each shackle alone was carved from a drakon skull, even it's jaws were bound, it's neck pinned to the ground. I almost felt sorry for it… almost.

I knelt down to the still creature, and it's eyes opened and stared at me like: Don't look at me like that. Even from down here, I can still rip your face off.

"He finally got sick of killing you every day, huh?"

Shut up, it's death stare told me.

"Yea, yea," I patted it on the head, like it was an angry child, then stood and walked to the huge door of Damasen's hut.

I knocked on the door. No answer. I knocked harder, but was yet again greeted with silence. I knocked harder once more, and the drakon bone door rattled on it's drakon bone hinges and for a second I thought it would tumble from the drakon bone hut and land on the drakon that was pinned to the ground. Once more, in case you aren't sick of hearing it yet: Drakon.

Suddenly, the door flew open, and the tip of a white spear was mere centimetres from my face. I carefully directed the bone spear away from my nose with the flat of my blade, and looked up at the giant. He was 20 ft tall, although pretty short by giant standards, he was towering above me, with human-like skin from the waist up and red dragon legs from the waist down. I noticed that his dreadlocks were as mighty and flowery as ever.

"Oh, it's you."

"Hello, Damasen," I said, ignoring his warm reception. He didn't appear that surprised to see me.

"How… uh… how are you?" I asked.

"Really? I'm cursed to be stuck down here for all eternity, and you're asking how I am?" He said.

"Ok, I guess-"

"I'm alright, I suppose. All considering," he gestured to the bound drakon. "I've been a lot better, but I've been worse."

"That's… good to hear, Damasen.

"Come in. We have some things to discuss."

I took a seat, on a small stool made of the same things as everything else in the hut: Drakon bone and hide.

"You have no idea just how lucky you are," he said.

"Lucky? I don't think anything about my current situation is lucky."

"Well, you were lucky enough to reform right outside my swamp. I was just able to conceal your existence, although you definitely didn't make it easy."

"Conceal?"

"I have power here. Tartarus doesn't even know you're in his realm."

"But how long can that last?"

"Long enough for you to escape," he said.

"Escape!" I said excitedly. "You know how I can get out?!" His frown was obvious.

"Escape being the definitive word, boy. There is no escape from Tartarus, but you… have a different advantage."

"I don't under-"

"You're on your way to godhood. I can sense it. I can feel the power coursing through you. No doubt all your mortal blood has already been exchanged for that of an immortal. It is only a matter of time before you're powerful enough to just… leave."

"What do you mean 'leave?'" I asked.

"Disappear, reappear somewhere else. Gods have the power to travel long distances instantly, you know that. How do you think the first generation of gods got here to free the Elder cyclops and the Hekatonkheire? A simple godly power… one that giants don't possess, as much as we wish we did."

I felt a little bad. Whilst I apparently had almost a certainty of escape, he would be stuck here, forever more. However this guilt was combated by the fact that I can actually escape at all, and that joy won out… until I had a more important question to ask.

"How long did I take to reform?"

"Remarkably enough, not long at all. You were reforming for what passes as a week here in Tartarus, counting by drakon attacks of course. But up there, that could be anytime between a day and a year, maybe two. I don't know," he shrugged.

For the rest of the night, we continued to talk over bowls of drakon meat broth. He explained that after Annabeth and I escaped, Tartarus had indeed defeated he and Bob. Tartarus discarded his son in the River Acheron, the river of pain. Only through strength and sheer willpower he managed to escape. Willpower that, until then, he didn't know he had. But Bob… Bob got a different punishment.

He's hanging over chaos itself, enduring the painful and sadistic torture of Akhlys, my least favourite poison primordial.

"We have to do something. We can't leave him like that," I said, after I took my last sip of broth, and placed the bowl on the table, both of which were made of bone.

"I… I know, but what can I do?" He said, sadly. He felt just as guilty about Bob as I did.

"I think you mean, what can we do," I pointed out.

"We? You leave my swamp, and Tartarus will find you. No. There is no way to save Iapetus without springing Tartarus."

"But-"

"No." I didn't feel like I was in position to argue with the gigantic figure before me, so I clamped my mouth shut.

Three Tartarus days later- Once again, I faced the might of the terrifying drakon… pfft. It was all proving a little too easy. The monster stood, some yards away from me, thinking over the best way to go with attacking me. Since I 'died,' I think most of whatever mortality remaining within me died with it. I was strong. Stronger than a giant, and I possessed years of experience in monster fighting and swordsmanship, and while Damasen isn't bad, he's never been formally trained.

But there was something else too. Although riptide has always been a light and comfortable weapon in my hands, I quickly found that the sword had become an extension of myself, now more than ever. I swung it with inhuman speed and agility. My reflexes had quickly become so fast that the beast would always be a step behind, no matter what the circumstances are.

Eventually, tired of waiting, I turned, and walked back towards Damasen, who was standing in his doorway, observing.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

"Dropping my guard to fool him into coming over." Sure enough, as I said this the beast was already coming up behind me. I spun around, and swiped my sword upwards, just as his taloned hand was coming down. The drakon roared out as it's arm was taken from the elbow, riptide ripping through armoured scales. Before it could flee, I jumped up, metres through the air, and grabbed at it's neck.

I shambled up it's long neck like a monkey, while the drakon desperately tried to shake me off to no avail. It wailed out as I grabbed at it's jaw, and I pulled with all my might. Even Damasen, who makes a habit of pinning it to the ground by shoving a tree down it's throat, winced as the drakon's head parted with it's long body, and the beast dissolved. I brushed the yellow powder from my pants and I turned back to Damasen, the drakon's skull still in my hand.

"I think it's working, I can practically feel the godliness oozing out of me," I said, jokingly.

"Well I think… that you don't need help at all. The problem may be you simply need to…"

"To what?"

"You may need to simply learn how to release your power, power that is already inside you."

Three Tartarus days later- I sat by the fire, as Damasen snored loudly in his bed. Probably tired from watching me kill the Drakon, again. I'm afraid of what I will find when I get out of here. Above all, I'm afraid that I won't find Annabeth. Tears stung my eyes as I thought of the possibility. I took the last sip of my broth, and layed down on the floor, listening to the crackling of the fireplace. My eyes felt heavy.

"I will get to you, Annabeth," I said to myself, as I closed my eyes.

"I will see you again, soon. I promise."

Little did I know, that it would be sooner than I thought.