Defeat – Jason
I trudged back to camp, sword extended for anyone attempting to question or console me. I knew I was being selfish, but Pipes would have to deal with the questionnaire herself. I. Was going to sleep, and wake up to find that
a. Leo was alive
b. Quest achieved, world saved.
Neither of those happened, but just then I didn't give a flying unicorn crap about saving the world. I just wanted my best friend back. I would rip the world apart if I could.
Inside my cabin, I threw myself onto my bed and laid there without breathing for as long as possible. I was glad I wasn't Percy. It would be harder to kill myself. "STOP THAT, YOU IDIOT." An extremely unexpected voice. I wish Leo were there, we would've thrown a little party. The Huntresses were back, and my sister was poking my head repeatedly with an oddly decorated spear she had probably gotten from the spoils of some badass hulk of a monster. My curiosity in the spear caught me off guard. "Leo! I'm sure you've already tried to hit on some of them, but the-"I stopped short. Thalia's voice got softer. "Hey, I heard what happened. Want to talk about it?" "Try the 'I'm so sorry' thing, and I'll do you a favor by pushing you down a flight of stairs. Maybe, then you'll get my hint. Go away." The sympathetic look melted out of her face like a snowman headed for the Sun. "Well, maybe, I was trying to be nice" she scoffed back. "I was maybe trying to be like Leo to you. You need a friend." This just pissed me off. "GO AWAY UNLESS YOU KNOW HOW TO BRING HIM BACK." I buried my face into the bed so she couldn't tell I had started crying. "Yeah, yeah, I know you probably feel like the world ended," her words showed increasing sadness and nostalgia. "I lost you once, when I… When you were the world's soul, the one thing that showed warmth enough when mom was a wreck, okay? I know how you feel."
There were a million things I could have said to her. Secrets were exposed when she got emotional. Instead, I told her to shut the Hades up. "LOOK!" she screeched. "We… heard a story, from an old satyr who had lost his lyre. Apparently, there's a place you can go to get back anything you've ever lost. A house that even the Gods, all of them, Greek and Roman, Titan and Giant alike have to return anything stolen or lost." I turned to look at her. I guess she could tell I wasn't mad at her anymore, because she smiled. "That includes everything in Tartarus, and I know where it is. As long as he didn't die, anything can return." Skeptically, I glanced at her. "There's no way. It's impossible!" "Okay, so when do we leave?"
Immediately after dinner, I explained to Chiron that Pipes and I needed… a break, and Thalia wanted to make sure we were okay. In reality, off I went, following my sister to a probably non existent place where we were going to get Leo back.