The Final Prophecy

Annabeth Goes Diving

Clarisse POV

As we got closer to Melinoe's cave the air became colder. I could see my breath as I exhaled.

Around the cave was thick fog making it harder to see.

I kept feeling like someone was watching us, but I guessed that a cave of ghosts would make you feel like that.

Percy marched up to the cave with steely determination, "Melinoe! Get your ass out here!"

"I guess we aren't going for the element of surprise then?" Annabeth murmured.

Suddenly the fog thickened in the area in front of Percy and as it dispersed a figure was revealed.

Melinoe's left side was black and hardened like a mummy, while her right side was pale and chalky as if she were drained of all her blood. Her eyes were empty black voids. She wore a golden dress and a golden shawl.

"Perseus Jackson, do you have any ghosts now?" She hissed.

"Melinoe tell us where Aphrodite is and I won't impale you with my sword," Percy growled.

Then Melinoe began to change, she shrunk and became...... 12-year-old Percy?

He looked exactly as he did the day I met him. A little scared but mostly happy and bright-eyed. Perfect for toilet dunking.

Real Percy laughed at his younger self, "Melinoe is this supposed to scare me? I never died, I'm not a ghost?"

12-year-old Percy smiled, exactly how Percy did, "Some people think ghosts are only made when someone dies, but there are other types of ghosts. Bits of people that have died, not necessarily physically, but emotionally. Parts of their character or their personality. They make for great ghosts. It really rattles people when they see how much they've changed."

We all were confused.

Fake Percy looked to me and Annabeth, "You two have changed a little, but not much, however, Percy here has changed this most."

The twelve-year-old looked back to his 17-year-old self, "Your past self isn't gone completely, but I can feel it slipping away. One day you will be nothing like your younger self, maybe you will become just a shell of a person, or maybe you will become something new entirely."

"Where is Aphrodite?" Percy asked slowly with an edge to his voice.

"Oh but she is not here, and you know that,"

Percy yelled in frustration and pulled out his sword and before me or Annabeth could protest he ran it through his 12-year-old self's chest.

Melinoe transformed back into her own body with the sword still in her, "Something new entirely," she repeated before disappearing into the fog leaving the sword to clatter on the ground.

"What the hell, Percy?" I shouted.

"She's not here anyway." He said looking slightly shaken while picking up Riptide.

"Doesn't mean you needed to impale a goddess. I'm going to make sure Aphrodite's not in there, come on Clarisse." Annabeth said with a scowl.

I followed the daughter of Athena into the cave.

Melinoe had gone back to her cave after the encounter and now sat on a small black chair that looked like a throne.

"Your goddess is not here demigods. Perseus knows where she is but he is afraid." Melinoe said surprisingly calmly considering she had just been attacked.

The goddess of ghosts took a sip from a chalice which I assumed to be full of nectar.

Where was Percy afraid of?