InsaneJournal

Annabeth strained to hold one door while Percy held the other and tried to focus on that and not Bob and Damasen. They were down there, dying for her and Percy. It went against Annabeth’s every instinct to leave them behind to face the danger like that while she and Percy escaped, but she also knew that’s what they’d needed to do. The alternatives - her or Percy staying in Tarturus or them not getting the Doors closed - were worse. That didn’t make it any easier, though, thinking of their friends. It didn’t make it any easier for Annabeth to step back and let others fight for her.

“Just a little longer,” she grunted at her boyfriend, concentrating on holding the door closed. Before long, they’d reached their destination. Twelve minutes passed and the doors opened. Annabeth thought she saw Hazel as she stepped out, reaching for her sword, but then the scene around them shifted. The doors were gone, everything that had surrounded them a moment ago was gone and as Annabeth looked around she realized they were now standing in what appeared to be an old graveyard.

“What in Hades?” she muttered. Her grip tightened on her sword as she looked around. The names on the gravestones were unfamiliar to her. The snow on the ground and the leafless trees indicated they were in a completely different part of the world than the one they had just left behind. They weren’t in Tarturus anymore. That much was obvious. Annabeth paused, taking in several deep lungfulls of fresh, cold air. It felt amazing to her lungs after the toxicity they’d both been breathing in Tarturus. Grateful as she was to be out of that place, though, she needed to figure out where they were.

“Uh, Percy?” she asked, “are you seeing this, too?”

***

The elevator ride was the longest twelve minutes of his life as he tried not to think about the fact that they’d left their friends behind to die. They hadn’t had a choice but that didn’t make it any easier to accept what they’d done. And it didn’t mean he had to like it. When the doors opened, showing them the House of Hades and their friends he stepped out - Riptide in hand, ready to fight and then - they were somehow in a graveyard. There didn’t seem to be any enemies around but that didn’t make him feel any better and he adjusted his grip on his weapon as he looked around, stepping closer to his girlfriend.

“Yeah I am. I don’t like it. We need to figure out how to get back - they need us.” His voice was quiet as he answered her, still on edge and it showed in his tone. He’d told Nico to lead the others to the House of Hades and they’d meet them there - he’d promised and he wasn’t going to break his promise. Especially not with Bob and Damasen giving up their lives so he could keep it.

***

Well, that was a relief in a way. If she was seeing something Percy wasn’t, it was a good sign she wasn’t imagining it. Unless someone was manipulating the Mist to make them think they were seeing this instead of what was really going on around them. That would be a really powerful illusion, though, give how completely changed their surroundings were and the fact that there was no one else, here.

“There’s got to be a logical explanation,” she said, nodding her head. She and Percy were in agreement there. They really needed to get back to Rome and to their friends. They just had to find out what had happened and how so they could find a way to reverse it and get out of here.

“Let’s go this way,” she suggested after surveying the area for a moment and finding what seemed to be an exit. It was cold and neither of them were dressed for this weather. Getting inside somewhere or getting some warmer clothes wouldn’t be a bad idea, but Annabeth didn’t have much money on her and she didn’t think Percy did, either, so that might be easier said than done.

***

“That’s your area of expertise wise girl - finding the explanation to this stuff,” Percy told her trying to calm down some since there were no obvious threats in the area. Riptide changed back into it’s normal pen form but he didn’t put it away. No he wanted his weapon readily available in case things changed.

He looked around before agreeing with her suggestion, the cold starting to get to him a little. There didn’t seem to be any other exits and even if there had been he probably would have agreed to Annabeth’s suggestion - she was better at strategy and just thinking things out in general, and he wasn’t sure how much of that was thanks to her being a daughter of Athena and how much of that was just her. And either way it didn’t matter much to him.

“We need to find someplace to stay until this gets figured out. Problem with that is I don’t have much money on me,” he told her, looking around them as they walked for any threats or places where they could get out of this cold. He saw something on their right with the lights on and he tried to figure out what the sign read but gave up after a minute. His dyslexia was bad enough under normal conditions - right now it was impossible for him to figure out what the sign said - he just couldn’t put the letters in any order that made sense. “Try our luck over there?”

***

figure it out.” Annabeth was confident of that, even if she had no leads and no way of knowing where they were or how they’d gotten here. The answers had to be somewhere. She just had to find them and she would.
Annabeth studied their surroundings, looking for exits and anything else that could tell them where they were. She knew Percy was doing the same. For all their teasing about how she made the plans and constantly had to get him out of trouble, but the truth was that they worked well together. They’d been fighting monsters together for so long that they hardly needed to say what they were thinking out loud.
She nodded at his suggestion. It was the same direction she’d been planning to suggest, anyway. “Yeah, let’s go that way,” she agreed, not waiting for any further discussion before she started that way.