Cabin 13

46| The Fall

And with a flourish of his hand, they all fell into the darkness, "Good luck in the Netherlands young demigods. May Thanatos take mercy on your souls."

Everyone's body lurched as they descended into a free fall in the impending darkness.

Leo's screams could be heard the loudest, but Nico's were a close second.

The darkness was genuine black, Piper couldn't see her hand an inch in front of her face, the darkness was practically solid... and inescapable.

"I can feel the ground coming!" Hazel yelled, trying to be heard over the wind, "It's close! 20 feet... 15!"

Piper winced, tightening her body around herself, but her mind was all over the place, What about Jason?? He's still unconscious!  Images of his shattered, bloody body flashing through her thoughts. Then Percy's voice, 'Please stop crying, I promise everything seems worse than it really is.'

She prayed to the Gods Percy was right, but tears still fell freely, she was out of strength.

"Brace yourself! " Her voice only raw terror, Hazel screamed her last warning.

. . .

Silence. Darkness. Peace.

Then there it was... that sound. That laugh.

Her laugh was so genuine and... beautiful. But oh, so faint.

He felt like the memory attached to the heavenly sound was far, far away. But the more he tried to hone in on it, the harder it was to hear. But it was so laid back, and familiar, the laugh sounded like... something he couldn't quite put his finger on.

But it was quickly overpowered by more recent memories of desperate screams.

Percy's eyes snapped open, jerking himself upright. His body still in shock from the fall, Hazel's voice still ringing in his memory, Leo's screams still echoing.

His eyes snapped around, they were in... a hotel room?

Percy lay on the floor, with a pillow and blanket, in between two beds. One with Piper and Jason sound asleep in and the other with Will and Nico, to the side there were two cots, on one slept Leo and on the other Hazel.

Percy scowled, "How accommodating, I get the floor."

Realizing he was the first to regain consciousness he went to the window to see if he could figure out where they were. 

Stepping outside, he took a deep breath. Looking back at his sleeping friends he shook his head, "Nah, they shouldn't be up too soon," and slipped out the window.

It was another 10-20 minutes before the wind picked up and slammed the shutters of the window, jolting Piper, who was closest to the window, wide awake. 

Her breath heaving, she blinked and frantically looked around whimpering, "Jason?" She instantly went to throw herself around him, before thinking she'd better let him rest. 

Sliding out of the bed she went to wake Will, hopefully he could make sure Jason was okay and then they could all figure out exactly where Eros had dropped them.

Knock, knock.

A soft tapping came from the door, Piper froze. 

Surely it's just the housekeeping or something, she thought. But still she hesitantly cracked open the door, "Yes?"

A young man in a suit in tie stood outside the door, nodding his head, "Daughter of Aphrodite, I have strict orders from Eros to deliver this to you," he held out a small package.

"Uh," Piper took the package, giving it  quick once over, "What is--" she looked up and the man had disappeared, "Oh, okay then."

Shutting the door she went into the bathroom to make sure she didn't wake anyone up as she tore open the package. 

Inside there were two things, red liquid inside a fancy clear bottle with a stopper and a piece of parchment with extremely loopy handwriting across it. 

"Dear Miss McLean, 

Given the circumstances concerning your friend I thought I might offer an alternative option to you. Inside this bottle is a little concoction that's been sitting around collecting dust on Mt. Olympus for ages. To whomever drinks even a single drop of the elixir will become infatuated with  any person of your desire. Just whisper the name of the person of desire into the bottle before you slip a drop into their drink. Quite simple really."