Annabeth's heart thudded to a stop. She skidded to a halt right at the precipice of a cliff looking over a cavern the size of a football stadium. Stretching out in front of her was a gaping pit of boiling, bubbling lava. Steam rose into the air, hissing and dissipating as it reached colder temperatures. Annabeth looked to either side and found she was standing on a narrow rock shelf that circled the cave. In the center of the pit was a huge elevated platform with a Hephaestus-worthy collection of machines, cauldrons, and forges. Weaving their way expertly through the cluttered objects were several creatures she couldn't quite identify.

There was a sudden sound from behind her and she turned around sharply, hand at her knife, to see…Percy. She breathed out a sigh of relief.

His green eyes widened at the impossible sight spread out in front of them. Sweat trickled down his forehead already from the intense heat and he brushed a chunk of hair out of his eyes.

"We'll never be able to sneak up on them."

Out of the corner of her eye, Annabeth spotted a silvery glint and quickly snatched up their spidery escort while keeping her eyes firmly locked on Percy. She stuffed it into her pack and pulled out a crumpled navy blue hat.

"I can," she said. "Wait here."

"Hold it!" Percy, ever the gentleman, protested.

Before she could give him the chance to change her mind, Annabeth stuck the Yankees cap on her head and promptly turned invisible. Biting her lip, she stepped out onto the ledge and began inching her way around, careful to keep her back pressed against the rock wall and her feet away from the edge. She was on her own, now.

As she made her way the center platform she caught a hint of bright green across from her. Squinting closer, she cursed silently. That idiot Seaweed Brain was picking his own path across the opposite ledge. Even dripping sweat and streaked in ash and grime, Annabeth couldn't help feeling her heart flutter in her chest. Abruptly, she shook her head. She shouldn't—no, she couldn't be having those kinds of thoughts about Percy. For the gods' sakes, he was her best friend! Nothing more, it was as simple as that.

Right?

Focus Annabeth! She shouted at herself mentally. She didn't need to be distracted right now. Distraction was the number two cause of death for all demigods, she had learned at camp. (Monsters were number one.)

"Umph!"

Annabeth blinked in shock at the creature before her. It looked like a mix between a dog and a seal with a sleek black torso and stubby legs ending in flippers.

"Where are you going?" A different voice chimed out.

The monster in front of her shook his head confusedly and turned to look at another creature twice his size. Annabeth racked her brains trying to remember what they were. She had definitely seen them before, but their name—

"Get back to class! Lord Kronos has no use for monsters that skip school. Go on! Shoo!" The monster waved a disturbingly human hand at the young creature—who had apparently been playing hooky—and he quickly waddled away in the direction Percy had been heading.

If he had barged in on some sort of monster school…

Annabeth shook her head and focused in on a heated discussion between two of the seal things. They were arguing about the proper temperature for fusing certain metals and the sharpness of sword blades.

Their talk of fusing metals made Annabeth think about Luke and his sword, Backbiter.

Luke.

His smiling face—before he turned evil—appeared in front of her eyes and she felt her insides turn to mush.

She flashed back to earlier on in the quest, when they were still with Grover and Tyson, and Janus had confronted her. At first the two-faced god had looked like a complete stranger, but then he had changed.

The voices and faces became achingly familiar, and she felt like she had been punched in the gut.

It was Percy and Luke.

Luke, with his blonde hair grown longer and messy, like it was before he joined up with Kronos. His blue eyes sparkled and he didn't have a scar. His voice was low and husky and washed over her comfortingly, like it had when she was nine years old and shaking and crying from nightmares at Camp Half-Blood. He was stocky and muscular.

Then there was Percy. His black hair was even messier than Luke's—it looked like it had never met a comb in his life. His green eyes shone with a happiness that she hadn't seen in Luke's eyes for years. His skin was tan and he was finally starting to put some muscle on his skinny limbs. He was as tall as her now (Okay, maybe a little taller. But only a little!) and his voice was cracking and even squeaking—ah, the pains of being an adolescent boy.

Luke had called out to her, begging her to join him, for it to be like old times again. Just like he had that spring in San Francisco. And she wanted to go. She really did. She wanted to believe him and run away and feel safe and loved again.

There were only two problems.

One, Luke was working for Kronos, a.k.a 'The Bad Guy'.

And, number two; Percy Jackson.

He was smiling at her and just talking about Camp Half-Blood and all the hilarious times they'd had there together.

"Come home with me," he'd said.

And she'd wanted to, but she wanted to be with Luke, too. She had begun to sweat and she was panicking and Percy was giving her a confused look and she wanted to scream that it wasn't time yet. Why did she have to choose now? Couldn't she have more time? She was 15 for gods' sakes!

'Choose, Annabeth, choose.'

And then there had been this moment. It was hard to describe but it felt like she had been turned upside down and all the blood had rushed to her head and the world cracked in half and she knew who she was going to choose—

And, just like that, it was gone. Who had she chosen? She shook her head, trying to bring back that moment.

Why couldn't she remember? She needed to know! She needed to know so she could ease all the guilt and indecision weighing down on her chest, suffocating her. Everything would be clear then, but she just…couldn't…remember!

"Annabeth!"

She jumped in surprise and brought her hand down on none other than Percy Freaking Jackson's mouth, wrestling him down behind a huge, bronze cauldron.

"Shhh!" She hissed. "You want to get us killed?"

His hand groped around finally grasping her cap and whipping it off her head, mussing her curls. She scowled.

"Percy, what's your problem?"

"We're going to have company!"

He started rambling about some monster orientation class he had interrupted. The only useful bit of information he had picked up was the monsters' name.

"So that's what they are! Telkhines. I should've known. And they're making… Well, look."

Together, they peeked over the cauldron to see four of the sea demons hammering away at a long piece of lowing hot metal.

"The blade is almost complete," one spoke. "It needs another cooling in blood to fuse the metals."

"Aye," a second agreed. "It shall be even sharper than before."

"What is that?" Percy whispered.

Annabeth shook her head. "They keep talking about fusing metals. I wonder—"

"They were talking about the greatest Titan weapon," Percy cut in. "And they… they said they made my father's trident."

Annabeth turned to look at him. She could tell this was clearly the part that was bothering him.

That his father's symbol of power had been crafted by beings as evil as this.

"The Telkhines betrayed the gods," she explained. "They were practicing dark magic. I don't know what, exactly, but Zeus banished them to Tartarus."

"With Kronos."

She nodded. Which explains why they're now allied with him…

"We have to get out—"

All of a sudden a door flew open and tons of young telkhines came rushing out. They tripped and stumbled over each other, shrieking, as they attempted to discern which way to go.

"Put your cap on," Percy demanded. "Get out!"

"What?" Annabeth practically screamed. "No! I'm not leaving you!"

"I've got a plan. I'll distract them. You can use the metal spider—maybe it'll lead you back to Hephaestus. You have to tell him what's going on."

And with those words she was flashing back again to years ago, when she was just a little kid.

She was about to drop from exhaustion as she stood on a hillside, rain pouring down around her and lightning flashing. In front of her was Thalia, screaming words eerily similar to those Percy had spoken mere seconds ago. Annabeth couldn't tell if the water streaming down Thalia's cheeks was the rain or her tears. Next to her were Luke and Grover. Grover was reduced to anxious tears and Luke was arguing vehemently. Behind them was a horde of monsters, roaring and hissing and calling out for demigod blood. They were coming closer…closer…

"But you'll be killed!"

She could feel the raw emotion in her voice as she pleaded for Thalia—Percy—not to leave her.

"I'll be fine."

It was Percy she was seeing now, and she was back in the boiling hot volcano, and one of them wasn't going to make it- just like before.

"Besides, we've got no choice."

She was about to punch him and knock some sense into the idiot, when she felt this terrible pain crawling up her throat, tickling her eyes, mixing up her stomach. It was unlike anything she'd ever felt before and it sent a new rush through her, a new want.

She took a deep breath then, adrenaline pounding through her veins; she grabbed his face and smashed his lips against hers.

The kiss wasn't a real kiss by any account. Nothing like the kids at Annabeth's school gossiped about in the hallways.

It tasted of blood and ash and dread and all the wrong things. It was her first kiss and all she could think about was if this (amazing, amazing, amazing) boy, who she may or may not like as more than a friend, was going to die.

And she would run away like the coward she was at heart.

"Be careful, Seaweed Brain."

Still tasting the saltiness of his lips (she couldn't tell if it was from the blood on his lips or if it was just a son of Poseidon thing), she jammed her hat back onto her head and took off.

As she pounded towards the exit, she pressed her fingers to her lips, savoring the sensation of kissing Percy Jackson.

As she passed back into the tunnel leading to the dreaded Labyrinth, she hesitated. Glancing over her shoulder, she watched Percy standing there calmly, as telkhines jeered and began throwing globs of –oh my gods, lava—at him.

She opened her mouth to scream, to cry out for help, but the plea got caught half-way up her dry throat. She had made a promise. She activated the spider and tossed it on the ground, where it scuttled away instantly, making its way down the dark cavernous hall leading towards Hephaestus' lair.

She began to run after it, silent tears streaming down her cheeks.

A/N: Hey guys! I'm back. Sorry I've been gone. I recently became a Beta reader so I've been busy with that and I've had SO MANY IDEAS and I can't write all of them so I was picking the ones that were worthwhile and this was one of them! I'm also editing and trying to continue my story Half-Blood District. If you haven't seen it yet, please check it out! I'm hoping to post the second chapter soon, I'm a quarter finished with it and it's like 10 pages on Microsoft Word, so...

Anyways, I'm also working on one-shots for Taylor Swift's new songs, Ronan and Begin Again. So watch out for those! :)

Yours in demigodishness,

~WizardMuggle~