ɪ'ʟʟ ꜱᴇᴇ ʏᴏᴜ ᴀɢᴀɪɴ ᴡʜᴇɴ ɪ ᴇꜱᴄᴀᴘᴇ

Everything Wants to Kill You

HE DIDN'T DIE THE MOMENT HE HIT THE WATER, but the freezing cold nearly killed him. Freezing water shocked the air right out of his lungs. His limbs turned stiff, and he tried to control the water, but it was no use. It wouldn't listen to him, it almost felt like the water itself was fighting back. He began to sink. 

Strange wailing sounds filled his ears—millions of heartbroken voices, as if the river was actually made of sadness. The voices were worse than the cold. They weighed him down and made him numb. What's the point of struggling? they told him. You're dead anyway. You'll never leave this place. He could sink to the bottom and drown, let the river carry his body away. That would be easier. He could just close his eyes.... 

Nobody loves you... one of the voices whispered. But that wasn't right. He remembered her saying something, "We're staying together, you're not getting away from me. Never again." Yeah, that's what she'd told him. Annabeth. 

Suddenly, he didn't want to die. He kicked upward and broke the surface. Percy gasped, grateful for the air, even if it smelled like Gabe on a bad day. He seized control of the river, refusing to take no as an answer, creating a whirlpool to keep himself up. Though Percy couldn't make out his surroundings, he knew this was a river. Rivers had shores. 

Land. There must be land somewhere, if he went sideways. Percy was nearly dead with exhaustion. Most water gave him energy, but controlling the this river was slowly sapping his strength. It was different from normal water. The whirlpool slowed, and began to disappear. He struggled to stay afloat as thousands of voices whispered in her ears. Life is despair, they said. Everything is pointless, and then you die.

Pointless. Yes, everything is pointless. His swimming slowed as he thought about it. There's no point, it'll all just be a waste. Everything you do will mean nothing once he dies... nothing will matter. He should just die, let the river claim him. Nothing matters anymore. He'll just forever stay with Annabeth in the underworld, and everything will happen without them. Annabeth... Annabeth!

New Rome, he'd had plans for them there. A future... Architecture, she would have liked all the houses, the parks. That one street with all of the cool fountains. He struggled against the current. He couldn't die, he needed to get back to his Wise Girl.

He could see the dark line of the shore about a stone's throw away. College, the college in New Rome. He wanted to go there go there with her. Y-yeah, he wanted to go to college with Annabeth! He would study... well, he didn't know. Marine science, or maybe Oceanography? Surfing?

He laughed, thinking about what she would have said about that suggestion, and the sound sent a shock wave through the water. The wailing faded to background noise. Percy wondered if anyone had ever laughed in Tartarus before—a real, happy laugh, not an evil monster cackle. He doubted it.

He used the last of his strength to reach the riverbank. His feet dug into the sandy bottom. He pulled himself ashore, shivering and gasping, and collapsed on the dark sand. Percy wanted to curl up next to Annabeth and go to sleep. He wanted to shut his eyes, hope all of this was just a bad dream, and wake up to find himself back on the Argo II, safe with his friends (well...as safe as a demigod can ever be). 

But, no. He were really in Tartarus, and worst of all, he didn't have his Wise Girl. But he would fall into the pit a million times if it meant he could keep her safe. At his feet, the River Cocytus roared past, made of sadness itself. The harsh air stung Percy's lungs and prickled his skin. When he looked at his arms, he saw they were already covered with an angry rash. 

He tried to sit up and gasped in pain. The beach wasn't sand. He was sitting on a field of broken, black glass, some of which were now stuck in Percy's palms. So... the air was acid. The water was crying. The ground was broken glass. Everything here was designed to hurt and kill.

He would've curled up and cried until he became another ghost, melting into the river of misery. But he needed to get back to Annabeth. He'd promised he'd see her again when he escaped. And that meant he couldn't give up. He forced herself to take stock. He had... well, pretty much nothing. No ambrosia, or nectar, not even a weapon. He'd lost Riptide when he'd cut the silk dangling from Annabeth's ankle. 

Normally it would have returned to him by now, but maybe something to do with Tartarus messed with the sword's magic. He didn't have Riptide. The realization almost broke him, but he couldn't let himself dwell on it. Time to grieve later. Right now, he needed a weapon. 

He looked around. He could use a rough rock, or a piece of glass, or... wow. Was that really all he could use to fight? In a place designed to kill, it really didn't have any good tools to make a weapon. Percy looked around and grabbed the longest, sharpest glass shard he could. It would have to do.

His dark hair was stuck on his forehead, his T-shirt ripped to shreds, and he was shivering and his lips were blue. He needed to keep moving or he'd freeze to death and become a meal for a random monster. He both struggled to his feet. He scanned his surroundings. Above, he saw no sign of the tunnel he'd fallen down. He couldn't even see the cavern roof—just blood-colored clouds floating in the hazy gray air. It was like staring through a thin mix of tomato soup and cement. Ew, gross.

The black-glass beach went into the land for yards, then dropped off the edge of a cliff. From where he stood, Percy couldn't see what was below, but the edge flickered with red light as if lit up by huge fires. He remembered something- Annabeth telling him about Tartarus and fire.

 Before he could think anything of it, he suddenly spotted something. A hundred feet away, a familiar-looking baby-blue Italian car had crashed head first into the sand. It looked just like the Fiat that had smashed into Arachne and destroyed the floor, causing Percy to fall into the pit.

 Percy hoped he was wrong, but how many Italian sports cars could there be in Tartarus? Part of him didn't want to go anywhere near it, but he had to find out. He stumbled toward the wreckage. 

One of the car's tires had come off and was floating in the river. The Fiat's windows had shattered, sending brighter glass like frosting across the dark beach. Under the crushed hood lay the tattered, glistening remains of a giant silk cocoon—the trap that Annabeth had tricked Arachne into weaving. It was definitely empty, unless he had turned blind. Slash marks in the sand made a trail downriver...as if something heavy, with multiple legs, had scuttled into the darkness.

"She's alive." Percy whispered to himself. He was so horrified, so mad by the unfairness of everything, he had to suppress the urge to throw up. In Tartarus, it's monster home court. Down here, maybe they can't be killed. He hoped that she was badly wounded, and that she crawled away to die, but he couldn't jinx it. Everytime he said it couldn't get any worse, it somehow did.

Percy was still shivering, even though the air was hot and sticky. The glass cuts on his hands were still open and bleeding, which was unusual for him. Normally, he healed fast. His breathing got more and more labored. This place would make him drop dead, literally, unless...

 Tartarus. Fire. That distant memory came into focus. He gazed inland toward the cliff, illuminated by flames from below. It was an absolutely crazy idea. But it might be his only chance. 

Well, what's new. Percy was a master at coming up with insane plans, and they worked. Usually. Sometimes. Okay, they barely ever worked. But didn't someone once say that when a terrible plan is your only plan, it becomes a great plan? Well, this was his only plan. He needed to find the River of Fire."

1418 words 

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