When they finally stopped running, Rachel was hugging her chest, unable to go any further. Annabeth had been crying the entire time they were running and now she collapsed and put her head between her knees, her sobs echoing through the tunnel.
"You stupid, stupid, idiotic, Fish-Faced, Barnacle Butt! He was going to kill you!" Cressida shouted as she slapped Percy's arm with every word as he tried to protect himself.
"Ow! Ow! OW! This is killing me more than Luke would have," Percy said before she crashed into him in a hug.
"I still hate you," she muttered into his shoulder as he squeezed her tighter, but her words made him smile.
"I know."
When they finally let go, Cressida moved to sit next to Annabeth who didn't hesitate to turn and cry on her best friend's shoulder. Percy sat next to Nico who explained that it was Cressida's fault that they all went after him.
Annabeth eventually lifted her head. Her eyes were red from crying. "What ... what was wrong with Luke? What did they do to him?"
Percy then explained that Luke was Kronos. Kronos was Luke.
Luke's body was now host to Kronos' spirit now that Ethan Nakamura pledged his service.
"No," Annabeth said. "That can't be true. He couldn't –"
"He gave himself over to Kronos," Percy said. "I'm sorry, Annabeth. But Luke is gone.'
"No!" she insisted. "You saw when Rachel hit him."
Percy nodded, looking at Rachel with respect. "You hit the Lord of the Titans in the eye with a blue plastic hairbrush."
Rachel looked embarrassed. "It was the only thing I had."
"It was badass," Cressida praised.
"But you saw," Annabeth insisted. "When it hit him, just for a second, he was dazed. He came back to his senses."
"So maybe Kronos wasn't completely settled in the body, or whatever," Percy said. "It doesn't mean Luke was in control."
"Percy," Cressida began but Annabeth interrupted her. She knew that this was a delicate situation and that Annabeth had history with Luke. She may not like Luke but Annabeth did and she guessed that if there was a way to convince Luke to stop, Annabeth would be the person to do that.
"You want him to be evil, is that it?" Annabeth yelled. "You didn't know him before, Percy. I did!"
"What is it with you?" Percy snapped. "Why do you keep defending him?"
"Whoa, you two," Rachel said. "Knock it off."
Annabeth turned on her. "Stay out of it, mortal girl! If it wasn't for you ..."
Annabeth's voice broke as she curled back into Cressida who just held her as she cried. Cressida did send Percy an icy glare that told him that he took it too far.
"We have to keep moving," Nico said after a time, Percy trying to process what happened. "He'll send monsters after us."
Nobody was in any shape to run, but Nico was right.
"Books? Hey, I'm sorry but we have to go," she whispered, and Annabeth sat up again as Cressida began to wipe her tears.
"Make it stop," she begged. "Just until we get to camp, and the fight is over, just please...make it stop."
"Annabeth, are you sure?"
She nodded. "Please make it stop."
"Until the battle at camp is over," Cressida began as her eyes flamed, and her hands glowed as they linked with Annabeth's. "Anytime Luke is mentioned, anytime you think of him, you will feel nothing. No pain, no joy, no anger, nothing."
Annabeth just blinked as the purple light died down, confirming that it worked because she tried to think of Luke, to feel something but it was just numb.
The two girls helped each other up as they began straggling through the Labyrinth again. "Back to New York," Percy said. "Rachel, can you-"
"Stop! Stop! Everyone stop!" Cressida exclaimed.
"What's wrong?" Percy asked as his flashlight illuminated Cressida's figure bending down and reaching for a trampled lump of red fabric on the floor. It was a Rasta cap: the one Grover always wore.
The cave floor was mushy and wet from the water dripping off the stalactites. There were large footprints like Tyson's, and smaller ones – goat hooves – leading off to the left. "We have to follow them," Percy said. "They went that way. It must have been recently."
"What about Camp Half-Blood?" Nico said. "There's no time."
"We have to find them," Annabeth insisted. "They're our friends."
"Cress? What do you think?" Percy asked as she squeezed the cap in her hands, a conflicted expression on her face.
"They're our friends," she said. "We don't leave friends behind."
So they followed the tunnel, though it was so muddy and sloped at weird angles that they were slipping and sliding rather than walking. Eventually, they found themselves in a large cave with an underground river running through it.
Tyson was sitting by the bank, cradling Grover in his lap. Grover's eyes were closed. He wasn't moving.
"Tyson!" Percy yelled.
"Percy! Come quick!"
Grover wasn't dead but he was trembling like he was freezing to death.
"What happened?" Percy asked.
'So many things," Tyson murmured. "Large snake. Large dogs. Men with swords. But then ... we got close to here. Grover was excited. He ran. Then we reached this room, and he fell. Like this."
'Did he say anything?" Percy asked as Cressida knelt by Grover's side.
"He said, 'We're close.' Then he hit his head on rocks."
Percy shone his light around the cave, eyeing the entrance to another cave, flanked by gigantic columns of crystal that looked like diamonds. And beyond that entrance ...
"Grover, wake up!" Percy urged as Cressida placed a glowing hand on the satyr's forehead.
"Remember," she ordered. "Remember and wake up."
His eyes shot open as he sat up, almost head-butting Percy in the face.
"Percy? Annabeth? Cressida? Where ..." he murmured once he took in his surroundings.
"You're ok," Cressida said.
"You passed out. the presence was too much for you," Percy added.
"I- I remember. Pan."
"Yeah," Percy said. "Something powerful is just beyond that doorway."
Once they got Grover back up to his feet, Percy made quick introductions since Tyson and Grover had never met Rachel and Tyson never met Nico. Tyson called Rachel pretty which seemed to irritate Annabeth before Tyson fully registered the fact that Cressida was there.
"Pretty Girl!" he'd exclaimed before rushing forth and dwarfing her with his massive hug. Tyson felt much better as he walked with Cressida on his arm as Percy and Annabeth helped Grover up and they began wading across the underground river, Cressida hissing at the cold water that soaked through her clothes and she death glared Percy and his little ability to stay dry.
"I think we're in Carlsbad Caverns," Annabeth said, her teeth chattering. "Maybe an unexplored section."
"How do you know?" Percy asked.
"Carlsbad is in New Mexico," Cressida shivered, taking Tyson's warmth as the cyclops reached a hand out to Nico to keep him floating away with the current. "It would explain last winter. I-I told you it was-wasn't coffee."
And when they got to the other side of the river, everything changed as they entered the next room. It was like all their tiredness was wiped away, they felt more alive and stronger than before. And the scent coming from the cave was nothing like the dank wet underground. It smelled of trees and flowers and a warm summer day.
Grover whimpered with excitement. Everyone else seemed a bit too stunned to speak as they stepped into the cave.
"Oh wow," Rachel marvelled.
The walls glittered with crystals – red, green and blue. In the strange light, beautiful plants grew – giant orchids, star-shaped flowers, and vines bursting with orange and purple berries that crept among the crystals. The cave floor was covered with soft green moss. Overhead, the ceiling was higher than a cathedral, sparkling like a galaxy of stars. In the centre of the cave stood a Roman-style bed, gilded wood shaped like a curly U, with velvet cushions. Animals lounged around it – but they were animals that shouldn't have been alive. There was a dodo bird, something that looked like a cross between a wolf and a tiger, a huge rodent like the mother of all guinea pigs and, roaming behind the bed, picking berries with its trunk, was a woolly mammoth. On the bed lay an old satyr.
His eyes were blue as the sky as they approached, horns so enormous that they couldn't have been covered with a cap like Grover's. The goat hair on his legs and the hair on his face and head were all frosted with white, the same shade as the strands in Cressida and Annabeth's hair. And around his neck was a set of reed pipes.
Grover fell to his knees in front of the bed. "Lord Pan!"
The god smiled kindly, but there was sadness in his eyes. "Grover, my dear, brave satyr. I have waited a very long time for you."
"I ... got lost," Grover apologized.
Pan laughed. It was a wonderful sound, like the first breeze of springtime, filling the whole cavern with hope. It would be nice to stay here - a place where stress and anxiety couldn't exist.
Percy only realised that everyone else was kneeling until Cressida reached up to tug his sleeve. "You have a humming dodo bird," he said stupidly as he fell to his knees.
The god's eyes twinkled. "Yes, that's Dede. My little actress." Dede the dodo looked offended. She pecked at Pan's knee and hummed something that sounded like a funeral dirge.
"This is the most beautiful place!" Annabeth said. "It's better than any building ever designed."
"I'm glad you like it, dear," Pan said. "It is one of the last wild places. My realm above is gone, I'm afraid. Only pockets remain. Tiny pieces of life. This one shall stay undisturbed ... for a little longer."
"My lord," Grover said, "please, you must come back with me! The Elders will never believe it! They'll be overjoyed! You can save the wild!" Pan placed his hand on Grover's head and ruffled his curly hair.
"You are so young, Grover. So good and true. I think I chose well."
"Chose?" Grover said. "I – I don't understand."
Pan's image flickered momentarily as it turned to smoke, the animals freaking out for a small second before the god reformed.
"He's fading," Cressida whispered barely loud enough for them all to hear and the god nodded.
"I have slept many aeons," the god said forlornly. "My dreams have been dark. I wake fitfully, and each time my waking is shorter. Now Miss Lynn is right. Now we are near the end."
"What?" Grover cried. "But no! You're right here!"
"My dear satyr," Pan said. "I tried to tell the world, two thousand years ago. I announced it to Lysas, a satyr very much like you. He lived in Ephesos, and he tried to spread the word."
Annabeth's eyes widened as she turned to Cressida.
"The old story," Cressida said.
"What story?" Percy asked.
"A sailor passing by the coast of Ephesos heard a voice crying from the shore, 'Tell them the great god Pan is dead,'" Annabeth said.
"But that wasn't true!" Grover said.
"Your kind never believed it," Pan said. "You sweet, stubborn satyrs refused to accept my passing. And I love you for that, but you only delayed the inevitable. You only prolonged my long, painful passing, my dark twilight sleep. It must end."
"No!" Grover's voice trembled.
"Dear Grover," Pan said. "You must accept the truth. Your companion, Nico, he understands."
Nico nodded slowly. "He's dying. He should have died long ago. This ... this is more like a memory."
"A god fades," Pan began, "when everything they stood for is gone. When they cease to have power, and their sacred places disappear. The wild, my dear Grover, is so small now, so shattered, that no god can save it. My realm is gone. That is why I need you to carry a message. You must go back to the council. You must tell the satyrs, and the dryads, and the other spirits of nature, that the great god Pan is dead. Tell them of my passing. Because they must stop waiting for me to save them. I cannot. The only salvation you must make yourself. Each of you must –" He stopped and frowned at the dodo bird, who had started humming again. "Dede, what are you doing?" Pan demanded. "Are you singing 'Kumbaya' again?"
Dede looked up innocently and blinked her yellow eyes.
Pan sighed. "Everybody's a cynic. But as I was saying, my dear Grover, each of you must take up my calling."
"But ... no!" Grover whimpered.
"Be strong," Pan said. "You have found me. And now you must release me. You must carry on my spirit. It can no longer be carried by a god. It must be taken up by all of you."
Pan looked straight at Percy first and they realised that Pan wasn't just talking about satyrs, but the half-bloods and humans as well. Everyone.
"Percy Jackson," the god said. "I know what you have seen today. I know your doubts. But I give you this news: when the time comes, you will not be ruled by fear."
He turned to Annabeth. "Daughter of Athena, your time is coming. You will play a great role, though it may not be the role you imagined." Then he looked at Tyson. "Master Cyclops, do not despair. Heroes rarely live up to our expectations. But you, Tyson – your name shall live among the Cyclopes for generations." He looked to Nico. "Son of Hades, you are not as alone as you feel. There are those who care for you. Remember that. And Miss Rachel Dare ..."
Rachel flinched when he said her name. She backed away like she was guilty of something, but Pan only smiled.
He raised his hand in a blessing. "I know you believe you cannot make amends," he said. "But you are just as important as your father."
"I –" Rachel faltered. A tear traced her cheek.
"I know you don't believe this now," Pan said. "But look for opportunities. They will come."
And last, was Cressida, who already had tears in her eyes.
"Cressida Lynn, Daughter of Dionysus," he announced and a lump formed in her throat. "This world has been cruel to you, people have been cruel to you, and yet you keep moving forward, yet you chose to see the beauty in things and the beauty in life and in your friends. Remember that, for your road may be more difficult than anyone else's. Do not lose hope. You must keep moving forward no matter how hard it seems."
The tears that spilled over the edge of Cressida's eyes were full of fear and disbelief - why her? Her life had been bad enough and it was actually going kinda good. Not counting the attack on camp, she had amazing friends, the best brothers she could ask for, and whatever the hell was happening between her and Percy. She didn't even want to think about what kind of hardships she would have to face if the God of the Wild was telling her to not lose hope and to keep moving forward. Why her?
And she lowered her head as she took a shaky breath, everyone respecting the fact that she just needed a moment to herself.
Finally Pan turned back towards Grover. "My dear satyr," Pan said kindly. "Will you carry my message?"
"I – I can't."
"You can," Pan said. "You are the strongest and bravest. Your heart is true. You have believed in me more than anyone ever has, which is why you must bring the message, and why you must be the first to release me."
"I don't want to."
"I know," the god said. "But my name, Pan ... originally it meant rustic. Did you know that? But over the years it has come to mean all. The spirit of the wild must pass to all of you now. You must tell each one you meet: if you would find Pan, take up Pan's spirit. Remake the wild, a little at a time, each in your own corner of the world. You cannot wait for anyone else, even a god, to do that for you."
Grover wiped his eyes. Then slowly he stood. "I've spent my whole life looking for you. Now ... I release you."
Pan smiled. "Thank you, dear satyr. My final blessing."
He closed his eyes, and the god dissolved. White mist divided into wisps of energy that filled the room. A curl of smoke went straight into Percy's mouth, and Grover's, and Cressida's and the others'. But if anyone asked, they'd all say they saw the biggest wisp go into Grover.
The crystals dimmed and the animals turned said. Dede the dodo sighed. Then they all turned grey and crumbled to dust. The vines withered. And they were alone in a dark cave, with an empty bed.
Grover took a deep breath.
"Are... are you okay?" Percy asked him. He looked older and sadder as Cressida presented him with his cap, tears still on her face.
"We should go now," he said, "and tell them. The great god Pan is dead."