House of Hades (completed)

Jason

After the Maniae incident, everyone was a little on edge. Jason and the others who had been possessed were especially skittish, as they could remember nothing from that night and Nico had sworn that the spirits had said, "We'll be back."

Nothing can ruin an exciting adventure quite like spirits of madness possessing his friends, and even himself.

The adventurers continued heading full speed for the Underworld. For all they knew, the quest could be meaningless. For all they knew, Annabeth and Percy could be dead by now.

But they all tried not to think about that. Lately Jason had found his mind wandering toward the Roman camp, and all of his friends there. Specifically Reyna.

Though he was officially dating Piper, Jason still had shadows of feelings for Reyna. But their "anniversary" was coming up, so Jason would have to put aside his feelings and plan a nice date for Piper.

His mind also wandered to Victoria, the goddess who had taken both his and the hydra's blood. Nico, Leo, Piper, and Jason had held many meetings discussing the matter. They hoped that hydra blood would hurt the system, not help it.

Jason as pretty sure that Victoria wasn't going to use the blood to make a new sword. She was a minor goddess, and since she was joining Gaea, who knew who else would.

Suddenly, interrupting his train of thought, Jason heard a crash and a scream. Then more screaming and the sound of something hitting something else. One more scream. Silence.

The sound seemed to come from the Mess Hall, so Jason rushed towards it. Pushing the door open, he glanced at the scene in front of him before turning away. He couldn't look... but he had to. He had to find out what happened.

The room was still ruined from the Maniae, but now there were quite a few more red stains than before. Not to mention the bodies.

Lying before him on the hard marble floor were Hazel, Frank, Nico, and what looked like a very mangled Piper. Hazel's face was ashen white, and one of her fingers was lying on the ground next to her.

Frank's hand was so close to being completely sawed off, Jason was sure that if Frank could stand, his entire wrist and below would be severed from his body.

Nico's shirt was slashed, but thankfully he had been wearing armor underneath and he seemed to be unhurt except for the whole 'not breathing' part. Upon closer inspection, Jason discovered that there were blue fingerprints on his neck which could only mean one thing - he had been strangled to death.

Now weeping, Jason finally turned to Piper, the worst damaged of all. There was a knife jabbed in her stomach. Both of her feet had been hacked away, until they were no longer on her body. And, worst of all, her head was five feet from her neck.

Surveying the room one last time, Jason came to a grim conclusion: whoever had done this would die.

***************

20 hours later, after much hard work and no sleep, Jason sat at the dinner table with Hazel, Frank, and Nico. Hazel's finger was wrapped up and she had an ice pack situated on her hip, which she said she had fallen on in the 'battle'. Frank had one arm in a cast and a temporary IV stuck in his arm (which still made Jason wince whenever he looked at it) slowly feeding Piper's blood into Frank as he had lost much of his own.

Jason hadn't wanted to disturb Piper's body, but Hazel said that if they didn't take her blood and give it to Frank, they would have two dead bodies on their hands.

Hazel had gone to a short but memorable medical session in Alaska, as her mom wanted her to be prepared for the worst at all times. And because she was getting pelted by rocks and bullied daily, and her mother had grown tired of treating the gashes and abrasions.

Nico was currently sitting across from Jason, with no scar, save the emotional scarring hidden deep in his heart. They were having a mini-meeting, discussing the new problems their situation brought them.

Nico, Hazel, and Frank also told Jason what had happened.

Apparently, the three of them plus Piper and Leo were just watching TV in a corner of the Mess Hall (note: they moved a table from storage into the Mess Hall after the Maniae incident and have been using it as a dinner table. It's in a different part of the room than the little accident) when a flash of light occurred and six giant worms the length of a cow intestine and the width of about two feet appeared, along with a few evil dryads.

Hazel said that these slithery snake-like creatures were from an old Mongolian myth, and their official name was the Allghoi Khorkhoi, or Death Worm. The myth states that the Death Worm lived under the Gobi Desert, slithering to the surface on rainy days to devour livestock and humans.

Their defenses are spitting acid and shooting out enough electricity to kill 100 men or keep a moderate refrigerator running for three hours.

Though Hazel said,"If you are out in the wild and encounter some huge, murderous acid-vomiting hellmaggots, and if they start farting electricity at you a propos of nothing, the best course of action is to get back in the car. Drive until you get across the border, then call the military and have them nuke the area into molten glass," Many people from the past enjoyed chasing these creatures and, unfortunately, none succeeded in catching any and all humans died.

Hazel said that soon after intruding the Mess Hall, the dryads took axes out and chopped right on Piper's feet. There were three, and while one worked on Piper, another battled with Nico, and a final one picked up Leo and disappeared in a flash of light.

Soon Piper was unconscious, lying on the ground with both feet severed and the dryad moved to Frank. All three worms focused on Piper, tearing off her head and they also discovered the creatures had torn through her back.

Though none of the campers had focused on each other during this, they managed to piece together the story and finally came to the part with Frank's arm severed, Piper very dead with a new Dryad knife stuck in her stomach, and Hazel passed out on the ground.

Nico tried to fight the Dryads, but while everyone else on the other side left, one last girl stayed behind to strangle Nico. The campers had only recovered him with lots of ambrosia and a good amount of help from his dad.

After a very long two days, Jason and the rest of the adventurers finally went to bed with a knot in their stomachs and the missing campers in their minds.

(A/N)

I'm really sorry, everyone. Half of you have probably deleted my book from your library. It's been.... my goodness, I think it might have been THREE MONTHS since I've written. THREE MOTHERFRIGGIN MONTHS. I have no other choice but to blame it on writer's block. Sorry. This probably won't happen again.

And btw, don't you worry, I WILL NOT let ANYONE on the Argo II die. But I also won't make it a Disney ending, like "oh he got shot in the heart and fell off a cliff but he's still alive because THE MOTHERFRIGGIN WATER SAVED HIM." Note to Disney "He was already DEAD when he fell off that cliff!"

Is anyone else mad about that?

Enough rambling.

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