the great wave | percy jackson

𝑖𝑖 - annabeth

Nine days.

As she fell, Annabeth thought about Hesiod, the old Greek poet who'd speculated it would take nine days to fall from earth to Tartarus. She hoped he was wrong, but it felt like she and Percy had been falling for eternity. Then she thought about Ash. She said no way would it take that long to plummet to "Hades' butthole" (as she called it) if she could do the jump in 60 seconds or less.

Hesiod had never been one of Ash's favorites. She always did prefer Virgil, Sappho most of all because her and Percy insisted on being walking bi stereotypes. Gods, Ash was such a little nerd for poetry. But Annabeth supposed that was her own fault anyways. During those terrible few months after Thalia died, all she'd wanted to do was escape, burying herself in other worlds through the extensive library of Cabin Six. Instead of trying to make friends and throwing herself into camp activities as Luke did, Ash stayed by her side, silently flipping through pages or occasionally taking naps when she got bored. And the poetry books had usually been the only ones with pictures...

Fuck. Her thoughts were becoming unbearable. They'd been holding hands since they'd dropped into the chasm, but now the daughter of Athena pulled Percy close, hugging his body tight as they tumbled through absolute darkness.

Gradually the air began to grow hotter and damper. Her recently broken ankle throbbed, and Annabeth cursed the monster Arachne for dragging them both into this hell. Despite her doing literally everything possible to defeat her, the spider managed to get her revenge nonetheless. And the worst part was, that eight-legged beast was probably still kicking below, kept alive by her infernal father Tartarus. Percy and Annabeth, on the other hand, would most likely be flattened on impact.

She never expected her life to be easy. Most demigods died young at the hands of terrible monsters; like come on, the Greeks practically invented tragedy. The greatest heroes never got happy endings, and the greater she became, the bleaker her future looked.

That didn't mean it was fair though. It was so unfair it was ridiculous, honestly. Annabeth had gone through hell and back to retrieve that stupid statue of Athena, and the moment things were looking up, like they actually might have a chance at doing this damn thing, she'd gone and gotten dragged into hell again, this time taking her best friend with her. Even the gods couldn't devise a fate so twisted.

But Gaea could. Her great-great-grandmother wasn't like other gods. The Earth was much older, more vicious, more bloodthirsty, primordial. As they tumbled through her depths Annabeth could almost hear her laughing.

Every limb trembling, she pressed her lips to Percy's ear. "I love you, Seaweed Brain."

She wasn't sure he could hear, but if they died, Annabeth wanted her last words to be the purest kind of truth. She imagined sending them to everybody she loved–Ash and Pipes, her siblings and parents, all her friends...

Suddenly the chute they'd been falling through opened into a vast cavern. This was the moment the grey-eyed girl had been dreading for who knows how long. Darkness faded into a sickly red murk, revealing a landscape of rocky black plains punctuated by jagged mountains and fiery chasms. Directly below the ground dropped off into a series of cliffs, like colossal steps leading to a river of black oil.

A river. Water.

"Percy!" Annabeth yelled. "There!"

He hadn't moved an inch since they'd fallen, his face difficult to read in the dim light. But despite looking utterly shell-shocked he nodded like he understood.

Well Annabeth certainly hoped he understood. Ash had told her about the rivers of the Underworld, how they could take your memories, burn away your soul, draw out the most broken parts of you and more. She decided not to think about that. What she decided to think about was the one thing each of them still came from.