Who We Used to Be

Chapter 1

Percy skidded down after her, his descent only slightly safer than hers, and was kneeling at her side within minutes.

"Annabeth! Are you okay?!".

That was a ridiculous question. Of course she's not okay. You're in Tartarus! And she just fell down the hill from hell and his now practically covered in blood!

Without waiting for an answer he began scanning their surroundings before his eyes settled on a small outcropping in the hill behind them and he scooped her broken body up into his arms.

He knew for a fact that Annabeth hated looking and being so weak. She wanted to help! She wanted to prove to them all that she could do it, that she was strong! But after that fall, her pride, her last defense, too shattered completely and fell away, and dark reality began to set in. She was going to die. Right here, right now, with her Seaweed Brain in the middle of hell. And she was surprisingly calm about it.

She was sick of this constant pain, her fear, her slight anger at her parents for taking her Percy away from her just to reunite them again so that he could be the stupid idiot he was and sacrifice himself for her and fall into Tartarus with her. Something that she knew, even then, she wasn't going to survive.

Percy carried her over under a small ledge of rock jutting out from the side of the hill they had just fallen down and gently laid her on the ground, her back leaning against the hill behind her.

She could feel her life force and energy draining. It had been for the last few days or so (or what counted as days down there), it had just taken her this long to realise what it was and what was happening. She could hardly feel anything anymore, her entire body was numb and she sighed in relief as for the first time in days her body wasn't racked in complete agony. She knew she should feel pain, in fact, it should be even worse than it was if the jagged bone sticking out of her leg was anything to go by. But it wasn't, she didn't feel a thing. And that was the just more evidence of what was coming.

Percy lowered himself to the ground beside her and gently pulled her into his lap, his hands automatically running through her now completely matted and dirty blonde curls.

"Well I guess this is as good a place as any to take a rest", he said, his signature lop-sided grin gracing his features, "I mean—".

"Percy...", she cut him off gently but firmly. He knew what was coming too, and he was trying to avoid it. "Percy, you know I don't have much longer—".

"No! You can't die, Annabeth, you just can't! You can't leave me here...", he said, his voice cracking painfully. "I'll protect you".

"This isn't something that you can fight, Percy".

He shook his head, unshed tears forming in his eyes. "I don't care".

"Percy please... I'm so tired, so tired...", she trailed off brokenly and he met her eyes.

What he saw there she didn't know, but it was obviously enough to make him come to the same realisation she had.

"You can't fight death, Seaweed Brain. It doesn't matter if you rescued him after he was kidnapped".

A sad smile broke out on his face as it always did whenever he talked about their friends on the surface. "Actually that was Frank, I just protected him, he was the one who burned his life away to free Thanatos from the chains".

She, too, smiled at the mention of their friends up on the surface, but it didn't reach her eyes completely, and the somber mood soon returned.

He hugs her close to him, bringing his lips to her forehead and giving her a kiss before burying his hair in her curls that still somehow smelled like lemons and strawberries.