The House of Hades

Chapter 1: Jason

Rick Riordan owns PJO and HoO - not me! I'm just writing a fanfiction!

CHAPTER 1: JASON I

Jason was starting to get sick of the skeletons. Sure they were helpful, taking watch at night, and doing most of the work, but for dead people they were very high-maintenance. He knew that Nico had just been trying to help when he had summoned them yesterday, but by the time the Union and Confederate skeletons had tried to re fight the Battle of Gettysburg over breakfast, Jason had had enough.

He remembered what Percy had told him about his own experiences with the dead. Much use Percy was now, falling into the depths of Tartarus, along with...

Jason sighed with frustration. He didn't want to think about it, didn't want to remember how it was all his fault. But it ran deeper than that. Jason had spent the last six months preparing himself to lead the quest, but he felt as though the other demigods had had to carry him the whole way. It seemed as though the only time he had been of any use was fighting the giants Ephialtes and Otis, and even then he would have been easily defeated without Percy. And in the end, he couldn't even save Percy and Annabeth when he should have.

The door to his cabin opened. Jason looked up and saw, silhouetted against the doorway, his girlfriend and fellow demigod, Piper, daughter of Aphrodite. She smiled a him, that warm, endearing smile that always made him feel better.

"It's time for dinner," she said softly. Jason didn't have it in him to answer but he tried to rearrange his face into something that resembled a smile.

Nevertheless, Piper's smile melted away as she took in the state of him. "Have you slept all these last couple of days?" she asked softly.

Jason said nothing. The truth was, he hadn't. Not since two nights ago, when he had gotten that horrible dream, full of torturous visions. Jason hadn't understood much of what he had seen, but the meaning had been clear, and Jason didn't want to see those horrible scenes ever again. Solution? Don't sleep.

Piper sighed. "Just come to dinner when you're ready, OK?" she said gently, and got up and left the room. Jason followed her to the mess hall, where the other four demigods and satyr were sitting.

Everyone was picking at their food. Even Coach Hedge, the maniacal satyr, was sitting and eating his plate, not even swinging his club and yelling "DIE!" every few seconds. Finally, Nico broke the silence.

"Guys, we need to snap out of it"

No one said anything. Nico tried again.

"Look, Percy and Annabeth wouldn't have wanted us to forget about our real mission. We need to focus on the task ahead. We have less than a month until Gaea rises, and Percy and Annabeth would never forgive us if we didn't stop Gaea because because we were too busy feeling bad about them."

"Yeah, well, I'm pretty sure Percy and Annabeth would never have wanted to fall into Tartarus in the first place," snapped Hazel. Frank put his hand hers and said softly, "Nico's right. We need to focus on the task ahead. We've wasted too much time thinking about how we could have saved them and not enough time on how we still can rescue them."

"But we don't even know if they're alive!" cried Piper from next to Jason,"We don't know what they're enduring down there, or if they've been captured by Gaea and are going to be used as sacrifices." Nico opened his mouth to speak, but Piper cut him off, "Nico, you said that Gaea's army is guarding the Doors of Death. We can't defeat them with only seven demigods. We need to go back to Camp Half-Blood, convince the Romans to help us now we've retrieved the Athena Parthenos, gather an army of demigods, and then march to the Doors of Death. As Piper spoke, Jason noticed Leo slipping out of the room.

Everyone started arguing at once.

"- the prophecy said only seven demigods"

"- we can't waste time going back"

"- it's my fault Percy and Annabeth fell into Tartarus, I should have killed more!". That part was from Coach Hedge.

Jason put his head on the table, his head pounding. He wanted to go to sleep, but he knew that if he did, the visions would come. And not just regular demigod nightmares. Horrible dreams and visions from the gods...

To late. Jason felt his eyes close, the sounds of his fellow demigods subside, and he was plunged into a dream.

Jason was falling, falling into the ocean. He hit the water so hard it felt like he had fallen onto asphalt. He couldn't breath, and he didn't know which way was up. Then, someone touched their index finger to his forehead, and suddenly he could breath. Floating in front of him, was a suntanned man with black hair and a beard, wearing Bermuda shorts. His eyes were sea green just like...just like Percy's eyes. Jason knew instantly that this was Poseidon. Poseidon looked at him, then spoke,

"My son and the girl, Annabeth, are falling into Tartarus."

"I''m sorry - I- ,"Jason didn't know what to say.

"They are falling into Tartarus, and Jason Grace, I know whose fault it is!" said Poseidon, his voice rising with every word,"I know, all of us gods know what you did in Charleston!"

Jason was horrified. How could the deal he had made in Charleston have caused this?

"I don't know-" He stuttered.

" I don't want to hear it," said Poseidon, thankfully not shouting anymore. When a god screamed at you, it tended to turn your brain to mush. "The only way you can make amends is by leading the Argo II to the House of Hades immediately. Am I understood?"

"Yes" said Jason, finding his voice.

His eyes flew open. Someone was shaking him hard.

"How long-," Jason began.

"A couple hours. You need to get above deck. There's a huge sea monster attacking and for some reason Hazel says you would know how to defeat it," answered Piper.

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