Alone; A Percy Jackson Fanfiction

Chapter 3; 9 days

9 days. That's how long Annabeth said the fall takes. 9 days. "Stop thinking about her," I said to myself aloud. It hurt too much. I couldn't let that rage which overcame me happen again. If I tried to kill Annabeth, the (former) love of my life, who knew what I would do next. 

I looked down and realized I could see the ground. And it was coming up fast. Great. First, my girlfriend cheats on me, then I get banished to Tartarus, and now I get to be flattened like a pancake. Huzzah. 

I took my backpack off my shoulders. Inside was a canteen of water, a canteen of nectar, a few squares of ambrosia, a few blue cookies, a sleeping bag, a rope, and an extra sheet. Not much to work with. Oh, and Riptide and the shield Tyson gave me. 

I sighed in frustration. I didn't know what to do. I could sit on my shield and hope for the best like I did trying to escape the gorgons. No- that was a bad idea then, and it was a bad idea now. Then a crazy, idiotic idea popped into my mind. It was a horrible idea, but the alternative was to be smashed flat. It was better than nothing. 

I glanced back at the bag and took out the rope, gripping it tightly. I couldn't afford to lose it. I tied the rope around my waist and shoulders. Then I took out the extra sheet. I cut two slits on either side of the extra sheet. Fun fact; trying to cut slits in a sheet with a sword while falling into a deep abyss is not easy at all.

I gritted my teeth. I tied the ends of the rope to the slits to make a parachute. I opened it up. I didn't float down and land on my feet, but it slowed me down enough that I didn't break anything.

I looked around. Everything here was designed to kill me. The poisonous air, the jagged rocks, the red fog that seemed to be everywhere. And it was so, so dark. Even when your eyes adjusted. 

I wasn't sure what to do. Part of me wanted to lay down and sob and wait for death. The other part of me wanted to scream and kill everything in sight. I decided that setting up camp in a cave was a much better idea. 

I decided on a medium-sized cave a few yards to my left. I entered the cave and after making sure no one was home, I started to unpack.

First I put my sleeping bag on a ledge towards the back of the cave. I put my backpack next to me, in case I need to escape quickly. I was about to crawl into my sleeping bag when I realized I still had my parachute on. I took it off and placed it by my bed. 

The air in Tartarus is hot, thick and heavy, but I felt cold. After 5 minutes of shivering in my sleeping bag. I went back over to the parachute and wrapped it around me. I slipped back into my sleeping bag and waited for the nightmares to come.