Music of the Gods

A Short Story by UndeniablyMe

A/n: I'm BACK!!!! And it's been forever hasn't it? I barely read the Last Olympian a few days ago and can we just say it's ah-mazing!! I loved it, all right down to the... well... okay, I won't say anymore just in case someone reading this hasn't read it, but if you haven't I should warn you there are spoilers... :) I'm just in love with the series all over again!!!

Okay, and now to business. This scene comes when Percy is bathing in the River Styx and Annabeth is with the other campers on their way to the Empire State Building. You got to hear how Percy reacted to it, but did anything happen to Annabeth...? By invoking her image in his mind, did something happen to Annabeth? Well, we gonna find out. :D

See you at the bottom!

-UndeniablyMe ;)

Under the Surface—Marit Larsen

Annabeth swung her knife angrily, impaling the back of a seat in one of the Camp Half-Blood vans. Stupid Seaweed Brain. He'd taken off again, no note, no one knowing where he went and not so much as a goodbye—just some stupid little phone message telling them to get their butts the Empire State Building. If she ever got her hands on that stupid inflated head of his she was going to strangle him.

How dare he leave her without saying where he was going! Didn't he know what it did to her whenever she let the idiot of a hero out of her sight? Didn't he know that she went into panic mode, wondering if he'd been accidentally picked up by some monster or lay dying in the forest somewhere or, worse, was somewhere talking to that Rachel Dare girl?

She stabbed again, forcing the blade in all the way up to the hilt into back of the seat. No one told her off for doing it, in fact, they all looked terrified of her anger. If it had been a monster, it would have disintegrated and if it had been a demigod it would be dead. Yet, staring at it, she felt as if it was her heart she had just stabbed.

Idiot. Where did he go? She yanked her knife out of the seat.

That's when the blinding pain ripped through her body, worse then even the strain from holding up the sky had caused. The pain was so intense it knocked her from consciousness immediately. She slumped forward in her seat. What was going on…?

An image formed before her and suddenly she was kneeling on the shore of the River Styx. She gasped, the pain leaving her, and leaned forward. The river was murky, full of broken dreams and forlorn wishes, but she could still make out the figure of someone in the river, thrashing as if they were going to drown. And she knew. It was Percy, and he was trying to take upon him the curse of Achilles.

"No, no, are you nuts Seaweed Brain?" she hissed, standing up as if to dive in after him.

"Dive not," a voice cautioned behind her, nearly causing her to lose her balance and plunge head first into the water. "For while your hero dwells in the cursed water of the river you may not enter lest both of you be lost forever."

She turned to the speaker. He was burly with large ripped arms, dressed in ancient Greek armor and looked frightening. She didn't need to see the arrow in his heel to know who this was.

"Achilles."

He nodded.

"You shouldn't have let him step in the river," Annabeth said accusingly, clutching her dagger tighter in her hand. "You shouldn't have let him take on your curse."

"I did warn him," the fallen warrior said, his green eyes murky like the river. "But he would not listen. And even now, as he resides under the surface, the river burns him and erases him. In a few moments there will be nothing left of the hero Perseus Jackson." His eyes were anciently sad as he stared at her. "I did warn him."

"No," Annabeth hissed, turning back to the river. "He will survive. You don't know Percy like I do. He'll come out alive."

Achilles inclined his head towards a thin gold string that reached out from the shore into the depths of the river where Percy struggled. His anchor to the mortal world was taut with tension, but even Annabeth could see that it was thinning. So much of it was already disintegrating in the water, leaving him hanging only by threads.

"As we speak, his time grows short. The boy will die, drowned in the water of the River Styx. So peculiar, for a son of the Sea God, to die from drowning."

Achilles turned his luminescent eyes away from the river that he had been watching hauntingly to Annabeth.

"You know what you must do, if your immortal is to survive." His lips barely pulled at a smile, but there was no mistaking the meaning in his words. And, you knew things were bad if even Achilles the Invincible Warrior knew about your love life. Er… well, nonexistent love life that is.

But there wasn't time to wipe that smirking look from his face. Percy was dying, his thread was unraveling, and there wasn't any time.

"You can not touch the thread or the water lest you should burn like your beloved," Achilles cautioned. "This is where I leave you, unfortunate favored of Aphrodite."

Favored? HA! More like marked for death by a broken heart or Aphrodite's scapegoat! Annabeth thought. And he's not my beloved!!!

Achilles disappeared.

Percy's pain became her own again and she fell back to her knees, fingers inches away from the golden thread. It was slackening, as if what it had been holding had almost been completely washed away. How was she supposed to pull him back to safety if she couldn't even touch the stupid thread?

Below the surface, Percy was doing worse. She could feel him slipping away into nothingness, forgetting who he was. But she'd be confined to the darkest pit in Hades before she let him forget who he was, who Annabeth Chase was.

We're a packaged deal, idiot, she thought maddeningly, reaching out for him with her thoughts. You can't leave me again—not when I can save you.

He pulled farther and farther away, the burning waters of the Styx wiping away his whole identity like the ocean did with footprints in the sand.

The cord, she screamed, holding her head. It was going to explode with all of the pain. Remember your lifeline, dummy!

He stopped bobbing around so much in the water and she knew that she had reached him. She pulled his consciousness with her, pulling him back to one of his favorite places at Camp besides the beach.

You are Percy Jackson, she tried to tell him. The words didn't go through to him. He couldn't hear her thoughts anymore and he started fidgeting in the water once more, threatening to snap his line as if he were one big fish.

"Hold on Seaweed Brain!" she said clearly, shaping the image around her to something familiar, somwhere safe. "You're not getting away from me that easily."

The cord strengthened, the scene took full effect.

Annabeth had imagined the canoe lake and she was standing on the pier, looking down as Percy floated eerily below the surface. He'd just fallen out of the canoe, that was all. He wasn't burning or dying, but floating, safely in the water. All he needed was a hand up to get back up onto the pier. She held out her hand, restraining a laugh.

"You're such an idiot sometimes." The smile got bigger. "Come on. Take my hand."

He stared, uncomprehendingly at her, his eyes fogged and out of focus. She stared back at him, still smiling. Take my hand.

Recognition flashed in his eyes and his hand shot out of the water. He took her hand and everything around them disappeared.

Annabeth was lying on the ground in the van—twelve other demigods looking at her with alarm and concern—, feeling winded and holding her stomach. Large fat tears rolled out of her eyes and down her cheeks and she could hear the alarmed whisperings going around her. Argus's eye on his shoulder blinked at her.

"Annabeth!" Malcolm said, putting his hand on her shoulder. "Annabeth, what is it? Are you alright?"

Percy was in trouble, her mind told her, locking away the memory of what had just happened so that she couldn't analyze it. Every thought of what had just transpired was wiped from her mind until she remembered nothing, not even the pain. And now, it is done.

In her pocket her phone rang, startling the other campers in the van, staring down at the proud daughter of Athena who had only moments before been screaming bloody murder. They flinched away from the phone as if it was a deadly enemy and Annabeth picked it up hurriedly.

"Hello?"

The voice she heard on the other line made her stomach flip.

"Hey. You get my message?" He sounded tired.

"Percy, where have you been? Your message said almost nothing! We've been worried sick!"

"I'll fill you in later. Where are you?"

"We're on our way like you asked, almost to the Queens-Midtown Tunnel. But, Percy, what are you planning? We've left the camp virtually undefended and there's no way the gods—"

"Trust me. I'll see you there."

The line went dead.

"Annabeth?" Malcolm asked again, looking worried. "What's going on? Why did you collapse? Is everything okay?"

Annabeth made a face. Truth be told, she didn't know why she had collapsed. She didn't even remember what had happened. Just a lot of black…

"I'm not sure," she admitted. "Probably just a very vivid dream that I can't remember." No one looked convinced but she pushed on. "The plan is still a go. Hit it Argus, we got to pick up the pace."

The other campers nodded, afraid to go against her. She sighed and turned to look out the window at the speeding scenery. The war was coming.

A/n: Now, before you guys get all jumpy on me and start saying, "There's no way that Annabeth was there with Percy!" let me explain. Now, obviously Annabeth wasn't there, but I thought that Annabeth deserved a little say in the scene too. Hence, Annabeth was there in 'spirit', but forgot everything afterwards.

Haha. It makes no sense to me, and I really don't like this chapter, but I couldn't help but write something for this after finishing The Last Olympian. Leave me a review and let me know what you think! Thanks all!

-UndeniablyMe ;)