Chapter 6

It took Annabeth more time than she thought it would to find Piper. Lou Ellen, the immortal head of Hecate Cabin, was easier to track down.

"I've been trying to find ways to help the quest," Lou said, a frown on her face as she walked at Annabeth's side. "I think between Hazel and Piper, you should be fine with an infinity bag," she added, after handing said bag over to Annabeth. "Magic is needed to open it, but they'll be fine."

"Lou, thank you," Annabeth said, her eyes widening slightly. "Really, thank you." Their relationship had initially been rocky and uneasy, mostly because Lou Ellen was one of the demigods whom had formerly been a member of the Titan Army and the only one who had returned after the war to be given half-immortality. The others had all died within a decade. Clarisse had been infuriated by Chris' death at the claws of the Chimera and had nearly marched up to Olympus to demand why. It had taken use of the children of Hecate, Hypnos and Morpheus to stop her.

Lou Ellen nodded. "Aside from basic protection runes there's not really much else my cabin can do specifically to help," she admitted to Annabeth, looking frustrated with their limitations. "Maybe if we were stronger. But there's no knowing how long they will last."

Annabeth paused briefly, an idea coming to mind. "What about runes to filter the air down there?" She asked, recalling the poisonous air down in the Pit. She hadn't been able to solve that issue with Jason and Nico over the night. "That would help. Then we wouldn't have to worry about that at least."

"That just leaves the thousands of monsters down there with you," Lou Ellen muttered under her breath.

Annabeth grimaced. "Yes, just them."

"I'll see what we can work out," Lou Ellen promised, already looking like she was thinking it over. "I'm not sure how quickly the Pit might remove the protections though. Primordials are completely different to anything else."

Fairly quickly, Annabeth assumed. "Anything you can manage will help," Annabeth said instead, because she'd take any amount of time they'd be safe from the Primordial's breath as a success.

Lou Ellen pressed her lips together. "I… I can see if I can get some advice," she slowly said, dropping her voice as if scared they might be overheard by anyone listening in.

Annabeth eyed Lou Ellen warily, suspecting she knew exactly who Lou Ellen was referring to. "Is he even still alive?" She asked stiffly.

The daughter of Hecate shrugged. "I haven't heard he's been killed," she offered as a vague answer. "I can ask and find out. Maybe he'll have some advice for how to make it work better. How to make the runes last longer and be stronger."

Annabeth stewed over Lou Ellen's suggestion as they approached the Big House, a flurry of organisation occurring out on the porch. "It can't hurt to ask," Annabeth finally agreed. "Just… be careful, please? Make sure you check his advice too if you manage to get in contact with him."

Lou Ellen smiled sadly. "Of course," she agreed. "Though I don't think he'll be interested in harming me. He hasn't before." She inclined her head towards the Big House. "Piper," she said.

Annabeth allowed the topic change to pass unmentioned, even if she didn't agree. "Looks like they're gathering supplies together," she murmured. Annabeth was glad someone was. She'd admit that she was too anxious over the impending descent into the Pit and what they were going to attempt to put much thought into supplies.

"The Romans too," Lou Ellen muttered with clear distaste.

Annabeth's lips twitched into a small smile. "They're here to help."

"First time this century."

It startled a laugh out of Annabeth, one that had Piper and said Romans looking in their direction. Annabeth waved at them, Piper smiling back in return. Jason offered her a curt nod as they approached, while Frank and Hazel were slightly warmer with their greeting. "Piper, can we borrow you?" Annabeth asked. "I thought we could try to make the video shield again with Leo. It'll be useful to have down there."

Piper brightened, firmly nodding her head. "It would," she agreed.

Jason raised an eyebrow, clearly curious. "Video shield?" He asked.

Annabeth nodded. "Back before, I had a laptop from the old Greek inventor, Daedalus. It had all kinds of ideas on it and one was a video shield. It would let the viewer see anywhere light touched. But the shield vanished after the Titan war and I lost the laptop when we… fell the first time. I thought it would be useful to have one when we're down there."

"That's… incredible," Hazel said with wide eyes. "How is it made?"

"Leo, for one," Annabeth said. "And heavy use of enchantments and magic." Annabeth smiled as she nodded to Piper, whom smiled back at her. "Lou and Piper are figuring it out between them."

Jason frowned slightly, looking thoughtful. "Will there be much light down there, enough to let the shield work? You said last night that it was fairly dark, the Phlegethon gave off most of the light?"

Annabeth hesitated. "Yes," she admitted. "I'm not sure." The thought had her hesitating. Annabeth admittedly wasn't sure if it would or wouldn't work. Tartarus blocked all else from entering his realm, including other Protogenoi- unless they held residence there such as Nyx had. Would that include blocking Aither, his nephew and the Protogenos of Light? It was likely.

Piper swore under her breath. "Maybe it'll still work a little?" She offered hopefully.

"What about lightning?" Jason asked a little uneasily. "Would that maybe make it still useable?"

Annabeth let out a short breath. It might limit the shield only to the smallest of bursts, but there was a chance it would. "Maybe," she murmured. "Only one way to find out."

Jason smiled slightly and nodded, the movement twisting the little scar over his mouth. "Mind if I come with you all to try to find out?" He asked.

Annabeth glanced to Piper and Lou Ellen. Lou Ellen looked far less eager than Piper did for the Roman to join them. "Sure," Annabeth agreed. "We'll figure it out together. Leo's in Bunker Nine. Come on," she said, looking apologetically at Frank and Hazel. But Leo was likely to only be willing to put up with Jason inside his workshop, any more Romans than him would just be asking for trouble.

The cracks in the wall in his little alcove were memorised by now.

What seemed to be dozens of them were carved into the base of the cliff which stretched far above him. Clouds of vaporised blood hung in the air, a further thick layer of red mist far above their heads.

He had his knees tucked up to his chest, chin resting on top of them, hidden in his small shelter whilst he kept a side-eye on the world past the single exit. The celestial bronze sword at his feet shone, giving him most of the light in his little hole. He'd long since learnt to never hack into the thin purple membrane covering the cracks, lest the Primordial take affront.

Dull eyes blinked at the bronze blood that had dried on his arm, having been trickling down from the gash hidden beneath the drakon-leather tunic over his dislocated shoulder. He'd be shivering if not for it, or for the immortal's presence which lingered just outside and made the air shimmer with heat that warmed his mortal body.

There was a slight shift in the pressure around him, one which had the hair standing up at the back of his neck. His skin crawled, breath hitching slightly and he tucked himself further into the alcove. He heard no noise of the other's arrival, but he didn't need to.

He knew that presence by now; it had stalked him endlessly for years throughout the Pit. Never letting him stop and rest, breathing down the back of his neck every hour he tried to run. He'd made the mistake of stopping to sleep once when he was too exhausted to go on and hadn't sensed it for a while, thinking it would be safe… and he'd woken up to find a Monster staring unblinkingly at him, taunting him from only a dozen feet away. It had let him run then, watching his back as he stumbled away, but had returned trailing him again not long after.

He shifted slightly, peering out of the crack and flinching when he met eyes of fire which narrowed in his direction.

Percy resisted the urge to reach for Riptide at his feet as he risked leaning out further. He caught a flash of movement and jerked back – too slow. A burning hand latched onto his arm and dragged him out, Percy letting out a harsh cry as the tingling in his arm from his dislocated shoulder exploded into an agonising pain. He let out a twisted and muted growl, gritting his teeth and grabbing onto the hand, desperately trying to wrench it away as he heard the clatter of Riptide on the rocky ground. "Get off," he gritted out, voice hoarse and pleading. "Please – it hurts -" His arm was released, Percy grunting as his knees buckled when he hit the ground, hearing rumbling laughter that made the ground tremor. "Assholes," Percy choked out under his breath, tucking his arm into his chest and curling around it on the ground, fighting the violent urge to be sick. Throwing up what little he'd been given to fill his stomach wouldn't help him here.

A hand grabbed his hair, jerking his head back and Percy's face twisted in pain, gritting his teeth and biting his tongue as he squeezed his eyes closed so he didn't have to look into the other's taunting gaze. "What was that?"

He'd heard exactly what Percy had growled out. The immortal Percy was facing chuckled, clearly enjoying Percy's pain. Percy swallowed tightly. "I told you it was dislocated," he bit out.

An amused scoff from above him, the hand on his head tightening slightly into bruising strength. "You're still not a good liar, Percy." Before Percy could reply, the hand vanished from his head and shoved him over onto his back.

Percy's eyes jerked open, the immortal crouching next to him. Percy's breath caught, feeling frozen and pinned in place beneath the weight of the deity's gaze. "Assholes," Percy said. "I said assholes." A smile spread across the deity's face and Percy allowed himself to breathe again at the sight, a heady relief making him feel faint.

"See?" He asked, directing his voice towards the other now – whom was still laughing at Percy. "He can be tamed after all." The smile dropped an instant later and the tension returned. Percy stilled, meeting the deity's eyes, his skin crawling. "Broken is not what we want with him." The demigod didn't dare to speak, feeling like a rodent or a disease being inspected. "At least not yet." The deity stood, striding over to Riptide and retrieving the blade. Percy warily propped himself up on his elbows, hissing in pain and tensing sharply as his dislocated shoulder burned with pain, but he only tensed further as the point of his own sword came to rest at his throat.

"I'm bored, Percy Jackson," the deity said. "Let us play a game."

"A game?" Percy echoed hesitantly. The immortal's games never ended well for him, usually with Percy gaining an extra broken bone or several. That was the downside to the twisted form of immortality he'd been given as a 'gift' – with a mortal's body, Percy found his bones were easily broken still.

Riptide was flipped in the air over Percy's frozen body, the hilt of the blade pressed into Percy's palm. "Run," the deity said, his eyes glowing with a malice that had long since been burnt into Percy's nightmares. "And run far, little demigod. We will see how long it takes me to catch you this time."

Percy let out a tired and pained groan as he dragged himself to his feet. "I really hate it when you guys do this." He only heard the two laughing at his back behind him as he stumbled, catching himself then dragged his heavy feet forwards and forced himself into an unsteady jog away from the warmth of the fire and into the dark mists of Tartarus.

As a child of Rome, Jason Grace had made his decision three centuries ago in the wake of the war with the Giants. The Titan War not long before it had also left its mark on New Rome and Camp Jupiter. While Frank Zhang had been given a field promotion to the rank of Praetor during the war, Jason had to admit that the son of Mars was woefully unprepared and inadequate to be assigned to the rank, since he'd only been at Camp Jupiter for 6 weeks before his quest to Alaska had begun. Jason had made his decision to return to Camp Jupiter, more than a little due to the way that Camp Half-Blood lingered over Percy Jackson's fate.

First Camp Jupiter had moved on from Jason's disappearance and raised Percy on a shield, and then Camp Half-Blood had ignored Jason's existence in favour of Percy's perceived death. Jason understood it, he'd understood it even back then – Percy was a Greek and was both an incredible person and demigod – but it hadn't made it any easier for Jason to deal with.

Octavian had been a significant figure in New Rome and Camp Jupiter both, with immense influence and control over the Senate and Legion, as much as Jason hated to give him any credit. His death had opened up a vacuum in New Rome's politics that would've been dangerous if left unfilled, especially so for New Rome – a legacy of Rome itself, the nature of which left it open to military coups and civil wars. Jason decided to step up and fill that vacuum, acting as an advisory figure to Frank as the son of Mars had stumbled his way through his Praetorship and trying to keep New Rome steady.

Too many Romans had been calling for the invasion of Camp Half-Blood again after they'd fired the Pontifex Maximus of New Rome into the sky using their own onagers and it had taken the intervention of both Lupa and a message from Jupiter himself to stop them.

Now, three hundred years later, having to return to Camp Half-Blood for a quest down to Tartarus of all places to rescue Percy Jackson was dragging back all kinds of unwelcome feelings for Jason. As he followed the three Greeks through the Camp to Leo's Bunker, the uneasy glances from the Greek campers were difficult to miss.

The renewed split between the Romans and the Greeks had been difficult, but Jason knew it had been necessary. It had kept both Camps safe from each other and themselves.

Would Percy have the same greeting in Camp Jupiter that Jason received in Camp Half-Blood? Probably not, since the proto-worship of him had spread there too. Jason swept the bitter thought aside before it could take root and fester.

None of it was Percy's fault, Jason knew that.

The three Greeks had fallen into an awkward silence as they led the way, even though Jason was sure he could remember the route to Bunker Nine himself. "So this shield," Jason said in an effort to break the silence. "It can see anything light touches?"

Annabeth glanced back to him, dropping back slightly to join him behind the others. "Yes," she confirmed. "We used it when we were defending Olympus from the Titan Army to see where they were."

"Smart," Jason mused. "What happened to it to make you need another?"

Annabeth' expression twisted in frustration. "It just vanished overnight," she said tiredly. "After the Titan War – well, I'm sure you remember hearing what happened?"

Jason grimaced. "Not as much as I probably should," he admitted to her. "I've been… busy in New Rome lately." Particularly with the rumours and tensions stirring, whispers in the streets and in the darkened alleys of New Rome. Many were suggesting in privacy that Camp Jupiter and New Rome were no longer what they should be. Jason, Reyna, Frank and Hazel weren't oblivious to the reported desertions.

Annabeth side-eyed him, clearly curious about what might be keeping Jason so busy, but the Roman offered up no explanations. Annabeth looked vaguely amused, before her smile fell. "After the Titan War, to appease the minor gods, Lord Zeus decreed that any of their children whom had fought for the Titans and had survived the war would be pardoned and could return here to Camp. During the war we also had a few escape from the Titans and come back to us." Annabeth's eyes flicked briefly to Lou Ellen's back and she continued, her voice lowered. "The thing is, very few of them took the offer. I heard from them that Lord Zeus' appeasement offer only came after most of them had been tracked down and killed, some of them disintegrated on the spot by lightning strikes."

Jason grimaced. "What happened after the offer?"

"Very, very few of them took the gods up on it. I heard most of them preferred to try their luck by themselves rather than come back to Camp - they still worshipped and supported the Titans and knew that wouldn't be accepted back here. They thought that the Titans they'd fought with would keep them safe, despite so many of them being killed since."

Jason frowned heavily. "How many were there?"

"Hundreds of them joined the Titans," Annabeth admitted. "More than we had. Most were just little kids they'd found and brainwashed. From what I've heard? Over one hundred survived Manhattan and struck out on their own. Zeus' appeasement offer came with less than twenty left. One was Alabastor Torrington," Annabeth added. "He was the only one not allowed to return, since he'd been the General of their demigods. Of the eight that took up Zeus' offer, two were killed by the harpies here at Camp." Annabeth grimaced, her gaze darkening slightly. "The other six left again within a few months, before the Giant War – and my video shield vanished the same night they did," she said bitterly.

Jason thought that over to himself, eyes furrowed. "You never heard anything further about it?"

Annabeth shook her head. "Nothing," she said tiredly. "My guess is whichever of them took it died after leaving Camp. But naturally, it meant we didn't have it when Gaea stirred."

"Naturally," Jason agreed. That was usually how things tended to go for them. "What about Torrington? I've heard of him before," he added. Had done more than hear of him, in fact. That demigod's name had materialised seemingly randomly over the years. "Son of Hecate, right?"

Annabeth's eyes flicked to Lou Ellen again. "Yes," she said. Annabeth just shrugged slightly. "We haven't heard he's been killed," she finally said.

Jason raised an eyebrow. "It's been over three hundred years," he said.

"Lady Hecate was… unhappy with us being given immortality and gave her son the same type as us. If he's not been killed, he'll still be alive," Annabeth said with clear disappointment.

That at least explained why the Romans had been hearing that name come up for so long. Jason nodded, dragging their conversation back on track. "Do you think the shield will work down there?"

Annabeth hesitated, clear indecision crossing her face. "I think it's worth trying it." She sighed, glancing to Jason.

"What?" Jason asked, catching sight of the signs of her having a question for him.

"Has Thalia spoken to you?"

"No," Jason said curtly, leaving it at that.

"Hades' underpants, Thals," Annabeth swore under her breath.

It startled a laugh from Jason, eying her in faint disbelief. "I thought you two got along."

"Oh, we do," Annabeth said. "Doesn't mean she'll listen to my advice or that I won't try to twist her arm for her own good sometimes."

Jason's lips twitched up into a half smile. "Thank you," he said slowly. "But… I don't think it'll work."

Annabeth scowled. "It will, eventually," she said firmly. The Greek shook her head slightly. "But, Jason – I know how you feel about all of this. And I'm sorry for asking for this, I really am. But like the rest of us, you're one of the best." Annabeth hesitated briefly, looking torn herself for a long few seconds. "I don't even know if I remember Percy properly anymore. He might be a completely different person anyway. But I do remember that he deserves this, at least. And… I hope that the tensions between us – between Greeks and Romans – won't get in the way? We could put them aside once before."

Jason' gaze was firm and unwavering as he nodded to Annabeth, if not a little uneasy with how much Annabeth seemed to know about the disagreements between Jason and Thalia. "I know my duty," he reassured her. "Don't worry, we'll be able to work together down there. Life or death situations are good for that."

Annabeth's lips twitched up. "They are," she agreed, though the smile didn't last long. "But this is nothing like what we've ever done before."

"We'll be fine," Jason repeated. "We'll find Percy, and get out. It'll be simple."

Annabeth shot him a look of disbelief, and Jason heard Piper laugh from in front of them. Piper turned to look back at them. "Simple?" She echoed. "Gods, we can hope."

I'm planning on kicking them down into Tartarus probably at the end of the next chapter to start their fun little adventure down there... so figured I'd get some semi light-hearted moments in now while I still can XD.

Hopefully the next chapter won't take so long to write? I'm veryyyy slowly getting back into it.