[3] 𝐋𝐎𝐕𝐄𝐑𝐁𝐎𝐘𝐒 ― p.jackson, l.valdez

003.

「003. humming to misery」

PERCY JACKSON heard humming as he fell. but honestly, that wasn't the strangest thing. he didn't know how long they'd been falling, quite frankly he hadn't bothered counting- mostly because he had bigger things to deal with. falling down into tartarus was no joke, and in general percy assumed it wouldn't be too fun considering the fact that they were falling into the homelands of the monsters. in small words, they were practically screwed.

but honestly, even that wasn't the worst thing about it. the worst... (or perhaps best?) thing was he remembered barbie. they all came back to him at once, in one big violent wave. first, how they met (or the first time percy remembered seeing barbie and being like hey: let's not die today). he remembered how snappy she'd been, scoffing and rolling her eyes. truthfully, as the memories came back- percy remembered how pretty he'd thought of her. even if they had sort of hated each other- his awkward young teenage self had thought of her as amusing.

and the memories continued- showing their quest. percy felt like he was in the front row of one of the most enjoyable yet embarrassing movies ever. he cringed at things his young teenage self, snapping at barbie. gods why was he so dumb? the fall didn't even register to him, the flashes of memories slipping into his brain, slotting themselves into a timeline.

the game with the scorpions... he couldn't remember it- the laurels. they were trying to fight scorpions- then they fell. the labyrinth- they'd found it. they'd... travelled through it together. the kiss- the marooning, battle of manhattan.... his sixteenth birthday- the underwater kiss. he wondered if somebody had smiled whilst falling into the literal pit of hell before- perhaps he was first. because the mushy feeling of love he felt when his mind replayed the memory over and over again was enough for him to smile with glee.

plunging into tartarus wasn't that bad- not when he found himself remembering barbie allen. gods... barbie. the thought of her made him feel like an idiot. cringing, he remembered the argument they'd had after leo accidentally set fire to new rome. he'd shouted at her (a wonder as to why she hadn't killed him then and there), he'd told her he didn't love her (which was fucking false. seriously amnesiac percy- what the fuck dude?). but he found himself smiling, remembering when barbie had been singing.

percy jackson officially remembered barbara allen. barbie allen. barbie doll. whatever you wanted to call her- he remembered her. he remembered every tear they'd shed together, every shouting match, every awkward in between lover and friend moment, every soft moment and every single thing about her. he remembered how much he loved when she smiled, when she laughed, even when she was angry (because call him crazy, but there was just something really attractive about her when she was angry- perhaps the anger not directed at him, though). in summary, he remembered just how much he loved barbie allen. and that somehow brought some sort of solace to the dark pits of hell they were falling down.

only problem.

barbie had fallen too. and now percy had no idea if she was alive or not.

annabeth had once told percy that approximately, according to hesiod (when he first read the name he thought it was the name of a robot) a greek poet, that it took nine days to fall from earth to tartarus. which was honestly sort of creepy. did he just loose nine days of his life just falling down to tartarus? that was creepy, fucked up and just a little bit cool.

ever since the both of them had dropped from the chasm- they'd been free-falling beside each other. percy wondered to himself if barbie was alive, how he'd possibly explain how annnabeth and himself just fell down with her. she'd done something so selfless, sacrificing herself- trying to save them. she'd given them a way to escape, but they hadn't taken it. instead, as percy remembered perfectly, the two of them had made the conscious decision to just drop down after her. but not before yelling to nico- telling him they had to meet them on the other side. but honestly, that seemed like more of a blur than anything else.