CHAPTER THIRTEEN: LYDIA
They stood in the shadows of Valencia Boulevard, looking up at gold letters etched in black marble: DOA RECORDING STUDIOS.
It was almost midnight, but the lobby was brightly lit and full of people. Behind the security desk sat a tough-looking guard with sunglasses and an earpiece.
Percy turned to his friends. "Okay. You remember the plan."
"The plan," Grover gulped. "Yeah. I love the plan."
Annabeth said, "What happens if the plan doesn't work?"
"Don't think negative."
"I can't think of a single positive." Lydia said, matter-of-factly.
"Right," Annabeth added. "We're entering the Land of the Dead, and I shouldn't think negative."
Percy took the pearls out of his pocket, the three milky spheres the Nereid had given him in Santa Monica. They didn't seem like much of a backup in case something went wrong.
Annabeth put her hand on his shoulder. "I'm sorry, Percy. You're right, we'll make it. It'll be fine."
"She's right," Lydia said, her expression softening. "We'll save your mother, I promise."
She gave Grover a nudge.
"Oh, right!" he chimed in. "We got this far. We'll find the master bolt and save your mom. No problem."
Percy looked at them, appreciation shining in his eyes. He slipped the pearls back in his pocket. "Let's whoop some Underworld butt."
They walked inside the DOA lobby.
Muzak played softly on hidden speakers. The carpet and walls were steel gray. The furniture was black leather, and every seat was taken. There were people sitting on couches, people standing up, people staring out the windows or waiting for the elevator. Nobody moved, or talked, or did much of anything. The campers could see right through their bodies.
The security guard's desk was a raised podium, so they had to look up at him. He was tall and elegant, with chocolate-colored skin and bleached-blond hair shaved military style. He wore tortoiseshell shades and a silk Italian suit that matched his hair. A black rose was pinned to his lapel under a silver name tag.
Percy looked at him in bewilderment. "Your name is Chiron?"
He leaned across the desk. His smile was sweet and cold, like a python's...right before it eats you.
"What a precious young lad." He had a strange accent—British, maybe, but also as if he had learned English as a second language. "Tell me, mate, do I look like a centaur?"
"N-no."
"Sir," he added smoothly.
"Sir," Percy said.
He pinched the name tag and ran his finger under the letters. "Can you read this, mate? It says C-H-A-R-O-N. Say it with me: CARE-ON."
"Charon."
"Amazing! Now: Mr. Charon."
"Mr. Charon," Percy repeated.
"Well done." He sat back. "I hate being confused with that old horseman. And now, how may I help you little dead ones?"
Percy looked at Lydia for support.
"We want to go the Underworld," Lydia said, leaning an arm against the desk.
Charon's mouth twitched. "Well, that's refreshing."
"It is?" she asked, losing the air faux confidence she put on.
"Straightforward and honest. No screaming. No 'There must be a mistake, Mr. Charon.'" He looked us over. "How did you die, then?"
"Well—uh," she nudged Grover.
"Oh," he said. "Um...drowned...in the bathtub."
"All four of you?" Charon asked.
They nodded.
"Big bathtub." Percy added helpfully.
Charon looked mildly impressed. "I don't suppose you have coins for passage. Normally, with adults, you see, I could charge your American Express, or add the ferry price to your last cable bill. But with children...alas, you never die prepared. Suppose you'll have to take a seat for a few centuries."
"Oh, but we have coins." Percy set three golden drachmas on the counter, part of the stash he'd found in Crusty's office desk.
"Well, now..." Charon moistened his lips. "Real drachmas. Real golden drachmas. I haven't seen these in..."
His fingers hovered greedily over the coins. They were so close.
Then Charon looked straight at them. That cold stare behind his glasses seemed to bore a hole through my chest.
"Here now," he said. "You couldn't read my name correctly. Are you dyslexic, lad?"
"No," Percy said, quickly. "I'm dead."
Charon leaned forward and took a sniff. "You're not dead. I should've known. You're a godling."
"We have to get to the Underworld," Annabeth insisted.
Charon made a growling sound deep in his throat.
Immediately, all the people in the waiting room got up and started pacing, agitated, lighting cigarettes, running hands through their hair, or checking their wristwatches.
"Leave while you can," Charon told them. "I'll just take these and forget I saw you."
He started to go for the coins, but Lydia snatched them back.
"I don't think so." Lydia sang, sizing him up. She could take him, she decided.
Charon growled again—a deep, blood-chilling sound. The spirits of the dead started pounding on the elevator doors.
"It's a shame, too," she sighed. "We have so much more where that came from."
Percy held up the entire bag from Crusty's stash. He took out a fistful of drachmas and let the coins spill through his fingers.
Charon's growl changed into something more like a lion's purr. "Do you think I can be bought, godlings? Eh...just out of curiosity, how much have you got there?"
"A lot," Lydia said. "And we're generous."
"I bet Hades doesn't pay you well enough for such hard work." Percy added.
"Oh, you don't know the half of it. How would you like to babysit these spirits all day? Always 'Please don't let me be dead' or 'Please let me across for free.' I haven't had a pay raise in three thousand years. Do you imagine suits like this come cheap?"
"You deserve better," Percy agreed. "A little appreciation. Respect. Good pay." With each word, he stacked another gold coin on the counter.
Charon glanced down at his silk Italian jacket, as if imagining himself in something even better. "I must say, lads, you're making some sense now. Just a little."
Percy stacked another few coins. Lydia gave Charon a look that said 'This is as good as you're gonna get, old man.'
"I could mention a pay raise while I'm talking to Hades." Percy offered.
He sighed. "The boat's almost full, anyway. I might as well add you three and be off."
He stood, scooped up their money, and said, "Come along."
They pushed through the crowd of waiting spirits, who started grabbing at their clothes like the wind, their voices whispering things they couldn't make out.
Charon shoved them out of the way, grumbling, "Freeloaders."
He escorted them into the elevator, which was already crowded with souls of the dead, each one holding a green boarding pass. Charon grabbed two spirits who were trying to get on with them and pushed them back into the lobby.
"Right. Now, no one get any ideas while I'm gone," he announced to the waiting room. "And if anyone moves the dial off my easy-listening station again, I'll make sure you're here for another thousand years. Understand?"
He shut the doors. He put a key card into a slot in the elevator panel and they started to descend.
"What happens to the spirits waiting in the lobby?" Annabeth asked.
"Nothing," Charon said.
"For how long?"
"Forever, or until I'm feeling generous."
"Oh," she said. "That's...fair."
Charon raised an eyebrow. "Whoever said death was fair, young miss? Wait until it's your turn. You'll die soon enough, where you're going."
"We'll get out alive," Percy said.
"Ha."
Lydia got a sudden dizzy feeling. They weren't going down anymore, but forward. The air turned misty. Spirits around me started changing shape. Their modern clothes flickered, turning into gray hooded robes. The floor of the elevator began swaying.
She blinked hard. When her eyes opened, Charon's creamy Italian suit had been replaced by a long black robe. His tortoiseshell glasses were gone.
Where his eyes should've been were empty sockets—like Ares's eyes, except Charon's were totally dark, full of night and death and despair.
He saw them looking, and said, "Well?"
"Nothing," Percy managed.
Lydia thought he was grinning, but that wasn't it. The flesh of his face was becoming transparent, letting her see straight through to his skull.
This was giving her the heebie jeebies. Lydia shuddered before grabbing Annabeth's hand. She squeezed back.
The floor kept swaying.
Grover said, "I think I'm getting seasick."
When they blinked again, the elevator wasn't an elevator anymore. They were standing in a wooden barge. Charon was poling them across a dark, oily river, swirling with bones, dead fish, and other, stranger things—plastic dolls, crushed carnations, and soggy diplomas with gilt edges.
"The River Styx," Annabeth murmured. "It's so..."
"Polluted," Charon said. "For thousands of years, you humans have been throwing in everything as you come across—hopes, dreams, wishes that never came true. Irresponsible waste management, if you ask me."
Mist curled off the filthy water. Above them, almost lost in the gloom, was a ceiling of stalactites. Ahead, the far shore glimmered with greenish light, the color of poison.
Panic closed up her throat. What was she doing here? These people around her...they were dead. She squeezed Annabeth's hand again.
Under normal circumstances, this would've been weird, Annabeth wasn't a fan of being touchy with anyone. But Lydia understood that she felt the same way she did. She wanted reassurance that somebody else was alive on this boat.
Lydia muttered a prayer to her mother, and to Aphrodite—she thought Aphrodite was cool. Lydia doubted whatever she prayed for mattered because down here, only one god mattered, and he was the one they'd come to confront.
The shoreline of the Underworld came into view. Craggy rocks and black volcanic sand stretched inland about a hundred yards to the base of a high stone wall, which marched off in either direction as far as they could see. A sound came from somewhere nearby in the green gloom, echoing off the stones—the howl of a large animal.
"Old Three-Face is hungry," Charon said. His smile turned skeletal in the greenish light. "Bad luck for you, godlings."
The bottom of their boat slid onto the black sand. The dead began to disembark. A woman holding a little girl's hand. An old man and an old woman hobbling along arm in arm. A boy no older than they were, shuffling silently along in his gray robe.
Charon said, "I'd wish you luck, mate, but there isn't any down here. Mind you, don't forget to mention my pay raise."
He counted the golden coins into his pouch, then took up his pole. He warbled something that sounded like a Barry Manilow song as he ferried the empty barge back across the river. They followed the spirits up a well-worn path.
The entrance to the Underworld looked like a cross between airport security and the Jersey Turnpike. There were three separate entrances under one huge black archway that said: YOU ARE NOW ENTERING EREBUS. Each entrance had a pass-through metal detector with security cameras mounted on top. Beyond this were tollbooths manned by black-robed ghouls like Charon.
The dead queued up in the three lines, two marked ATTENDANT ON DUTY, and one marked EZ DEATH. The EZ DEATH line was moving right along. The other two were crawling.
"What do you figure?" Percy asked Annabeth.
"The fast line must go straight to the Asphodel Fields," she said. "No contest. They don't want to risk judgment from the court, because it might go against them."
"There's a court for dead people?"
"Yeah. Three judges. They switch around who sits on the bench. King Minos, Thomas Jefferson, Shakespeare—people like that. Sometimes they look at a life and decide that person needs a special reward—the Fields of Elysium. Sometimes they decide on punishment. But most people, well, they just lived. Nothing special, good or bad. So they go to the Asphodel Fields."
"And do what?"
Grover said, "Imagine standing in a wheat field in Kansas. Forever."
"Harsh," Percy said.
"Wheat field?" Lydia shook her head, her lower lip jutting out. "That's not so bad."
"Well, I'm sure we can all agree that's harsh," Grover muttered. "Look."
A couple of black-robed ghouls had pulled aside one spirit and were frisking him at the security desk. The face of the dead man looked vaguely familiar.
"He's that preacher who made the news, remember?" Grover asked.
"Oh, yeah."
"Who?" Lydia butted in.
"He was this annoying televangelist from upstate New York who'd raised millions of dollars for orphanages and then got caught spending the money on stuff for his mansion, like gold-plated toilet seats, and an indoor putt-putt golf course. He'd died in a police chase when his "Lamborghini for the Lord" went off a cliff."
Lydia laughed at 'Lamborghini for the Lord'.
Percy asked, "What're they doing to him?"
"Special punishment from Hades," Grover guessed. "The really bad people get his personal attention as soon as they arrive. The Fur—the Kindly Ones will set up an eternal torture for him."
The thought of the Furies made her shudder. Her almost healed burn ached from the memory, she was practically in their home territory now.
"But if he's a preacher," Percy said, "and he believes in a different hell...."
Grover shrugged. "Who says he's seeing this place the way we're seeing it? Humans see what they want to see. They're very stubborn—er, persistent, that way."
They got closer to the gates. The howling was so loud it shook the ground at their feet, but they still couldn't see who or what was responsible. Then, about fifty feet in front of them, the green mist shimmered. Standing just where the path split into three lanes was an enormous shadowy monster.
They hadn't seen it before because it was half transparent, like the dead. Until it moved, it blended with whatever was behind it. Only its eyes and teeth looked solid. And it was staring straight at them.
Percy jaw hung open. "He's a Rottweiler."
Lydia snorted. "I imagined something a bit less...common."
The dead walked right up to him—no fear at all. The ATTENDANT ON DUTY lines parted on either side of him. The EZ DEATH spirits walked right between his front paws and under his belly, which they could do without even crouching.
"I'm starting to see him better," Percy muttered. "Why is that?"
"I think..." Annabeth drew her lips between her teeth, giving Lydia's hand another squeeze. "I'm afraid it's because we're getting closer to being dead."
The dog's middle head craned toward them. It sniffed the air and growled.
"It can smell the living," Percy said.
"But that's okay," Grover said, trembling next to him. "Because we have a plan."
"Right," Annabeth said, her voice sounding small. Lydia never knew Annabeth to be so unsure "A plan."
They moved toward the monster.
The middle head snarled at them, then barked so loud the ground shook.
"Can you understand it?" Percy asked Grover.
"Oh yeah," he said. "I can understand it."
"Well?" Lydia asked.
"I don't think humans have a four-letter word that translates, exactly."
Percy unzipped Ares' backpack and took out a big stick. Lydia recognized it as the bedpost from the bed that almost literally tore her into pieces.
"Why did you think to take a bedpost?" Lydia asked incredulously.
"Hey," he shrugged. "You never know what you'll need."
Lydia didn't argue. He held up the stick. She wondered if Percy was about to do something stupid again.
"Hey, Big Fella," Percy called up. "I bet they don't play with you much."
"GROWWWLLLL!"
"Good boy," he said weakly.
He waved the stick. The dog's middle head followed the movement. The other two heads trained their eyes on him, completely ignoring the spirits. He had Cerberus's undivided attention.
"Fetch!" He threw the stick into the gloom, a good solid throw. They heard it go ker-sploosh in the River Styx.
Great, Percy doesn't disappoint when it comes to stupid things.
Cerberus glared at him, unimpressed. His eyes were baleful and cold.
So much for the plan.
Cerberus was now making a new kind of growl, deeper down in his three throats.
"Um," Grover said. "Percy?"
"Yeah?"
"I just thought you'd want to know."
"Yeah?"
"Cerberus? He's saying we've got ten seconds to pray to the god of our choice. After that...well...he's hungry."
Lydia screamed internally, before walking up to Cerberus with absolutely no plan. She kept repeating the same words in her head, 'dogs are cute, dogs are cute, dogs are cute'.
"Five seconds," Grover said. "Do we run now?"
"Heeyy, buddy." Lydia said, a nervous smile on her face. She could hear Percy asking Annabeth what the hell she was doing.
She stuck out her arm and Cerberus knelt down to bite it off...wait, no. He just sniffed it. She hoped she didn't smell musty. She'd just cleaned up at the Casino, she couldn't smell musty. She tried to reassure herself.
Cerberus seemed to like whatever smell she had because his head was getting closer. Lydia screamed and fell to her butt as he got impossibly close, but rather than eating her, he licked her face. His tongue was the size of her entire body, though, so she got a good bath. It was fair to say that she was definitely musty now.
"Oh, ha ha, good boy." She said nervously.
Just when she was about to run out of ideas, her angel came to the rescue.
"Wait!" Annabeth said, rifling through her pack.
Annabeth produced a red rubber ball the size of a grapefruit. It was labeled WATERLAND, DENVER, CO. Percy reached to stop her but before he could, she raised the ball and marched straight up to Cerberus.
"Why take a ball, too?" Lydia mumbled to herself as she stood up. She wiped dog drool off her brow.
Annabeth shouted, "See the ball? You want the ball, Cerberus? Sit!"
Cerberus looked stunned. All three of his heads cocked sideways. Six nostrils dilated.
"Sit!" Annabeth called again.
Lydia was holding her breath; she was ninety-nine percent sure Annabeth was about to become a chew toy. But instead, Cerberus licked his three sets of lips, shifted on his haunches, and sat, immediately crushing a dozen spirits who'd been passing underneath him in the EZ DEATH line. The spirits made muffled hisses as they dissipated, like the air let out of tires.
Annabeth let out a relieved sigh, grinning, "Good boy!"
She threw Cerberus the ball.
He caught it in his middle mouth. It was barely big enough for him to chew, and the other heads started snapping at the middle, trying to get the new toy.
When the third head realized it wasn't having any luck, it picked up Lydia by her shirt, wagging her around in the air. She'd become the chew toy.
"Aaaaaaaaah," Lydia screamed. "Nooooo, not me, not me! The chew toy! I'm not a chew toy!"
Percy looked like he was in between deciding whether to laugh or start crying. He did both.
"Drop her!" Annabeth ordered.
Cerberus's heads stopped fighting and looked at Annabeth. Lydia was hanging by the hem of her shirt. If her shirt ripped, A) it would be really embarrassing to meet Hades like that, and B) she'd fall from a decent height, and that would hurt.
The ball was wedged between two of his teeth like a tiny piece of gum. He made a loud, scary whimper, then dropped the ball, now slimy and bitten nearly in half, at her feet.
"My turn, please." Lydia said. "Gently, preferably."
He listened, not completely though because he just dropped her. She fell on her stomach with a wee and then a dull thud. Lydia's hand went to feel around her back and make sure her shirt was intact before she stood up and flashed everybody.
Percy and Grover each grabbed one of her hands and hauled her up.
"Impressive." Percy chuckled.
"Be quiet." Lydia gave him a brutal side eye.
"Good boy." Annabeth picked up the ball, ignoring the monster spit all over it. She turned toward Percy. "Go now. EZ DEATH line—it's faster."
Lydia said, "But—"
"Now!" She ordered in the same tone she was using on the dog. But then, her voice softened, and she said: "I'm right behind you."
Her three friends inched forward warily.
Cerberus started to growl.
"Stay!" Annabeth ordered the monster. "If you want the ball, stay!"
Cerberus whimpered, but he stayed where he was.
"What about you?" Lydia asked Annabeth as they passed her.
"I know what I'm doing, Lyd," she muttered. "At least, I'm pretty sure...."
Percy, Grover and Lydia walked between the monster's legs.
"Good dog!" She held up the tattered red ball and came to a sucky conclusion—if she rewarded Cerberus, there'd be nothing left for another trick.
She threw the ball anyway. The monster's left mouth immediately snatched it up, only to be attacked by the middle head, while the right head moaned in protest.
While the monster was distracted, Annabeth walked briskly under its belly and joined her friends at the metal detector.
"How did you do that?" Percy asked her, amazed.
"Obedience school," she said breathlessly, feeling tears come to her eyes. Lydia went to grab her hand again.
Annabeth gave Lydia a look before withdrawing her hand and Lydia gave her a slow nod of understanding. With all the dog slobber on her, she wouldn't wanna hold her own hand either.
"Never mind that," Grover said, tugging at Annabeth's shirt. "Come on!"
They were about to bolt through the EZ DEATH line when Cerberus moaned pitifully from all three mouths. Annabeth stopped. She turned to face the dog, which had done a one-eighty to look at them. Cerberus panted expectantly, the tiny red ball in pieces in a puddle of drool at its feet.
"Good boy," she said, but her voice cracked.
The monster's heads turned sideways, as if worried about her.
"I'll bring you another ball soon," Annabeth promised faintly. "Would you like that?"
The monster whimpered. Lydia didn't need Grover to translate to know Cerberus was still waiting for the ball. She felt really bad him. He was so cute.
Lydia waved her hand goodbye and Cerberus lifted his paw and waved back.
"Good dog. I'll come visit you soon. I—I promise." Annabeth turned back, walking forward. "Let's go."
Percy and Grover pushed through the metal detector, which immediately screamed and set off flashing red lights. "Unauthorized possessions! Magic detected!"
Cerberus started to bark.
They burst through the EZ DEATH gate, which started even more alarms blaring, and raced into the Underworld.
A few minutes later, they were hiding, out of breath, in the rotten trunk of an immense black tree as security ghouls scuttled past, yelling for backup from the Furies.
Grover murmured, "Well, Percy, what have we learned today?"
"That three-headed dogs prefer red rubber balls over sticks?"
"No," Grover told him. "We've learned that your plans really, really bite!"
"Literally," Lydia agreed. She lowered her head to sniff her shirt before gagging.
She noticed Annabeth wipe a tear from her cheek, listening to the mournful keening of Cerberus in the distance, longing for his new friend.