PERCY POV
When we finally reached the Doors of Death with Bob by our side, I never felt more relieved. I was exhausted, honestly starving, and in so so so much pain. All I could do was look to my left and see my Wise Girl right next me. Our clothes were torn and filthy from wearing the same thing for the past two weeks and her hair was singed from the Phlegethon, but she couldn't have looked more beautiful.
She gave me strength.
The death mist covered us, but I was terrified that it wasn't going to work. Me and Annabeth didn't fight our way through this hellhole all this time just for this stupid thing to not work and for us to be eaten by the millions of monsters crowding the door.
I felt so small... so insignificant.
Usually it's justified, you know? Up there, I'm the one being hunted. It's fight or die. Survival. It's all about survival. They're in my home, threatening my friends, my family, and my life. Killing them wasn't an issue.
But tartarus is their home.
And for once, I genuinely felt like the prey. I fell into their land. This is their home court. None of the rules applied.
But I've never been one to follow the rules.
We fought our ways to the door and we somehow managed to cut the chains... but that's when everything went down. Cutting the chains removed the death mist shrouding us and suddenly we were exposed.
Now. I am very well aware of my hotness. But these were eyes I did not want on me. And suddenly all of the monsters snarled and launched themselves and Annabeth and me.
Let me make this clear: I was terrified.
Bob fought so hard for us, even Damasen made an appearance and helped fight, but the four of us were no match for the hundreds of monsters waiting outside the elevator that looked freakishly like the doors to Olympus.
Not gonna lie, actually, we were killing it at first. We were slaying the monsters, my Wise Girl and I fighting back to back, working as one team, moving in a fluid motion as if we were one. I flashed her a smile that may have looked like a grimace because of the grime and blood on my face (sprinkled with a touch of yellow glitter), but my heart swelled when she returned it.
And then things went to shit.
Tartarus appeared, in his ugly, purple, swirly body. He looked so deadly and terrifying that... I dropped my sword.
I snatched it up in a few seconds, but the embarrassment crept up my face as I continued fighting. It was still going well. Damasen and Bob went to go fight Tartarus while Annabeth and I went to fight off the monsters.
And then Bob and Damsen were killed.
Annabeth was held hostage by Tartarus who grabbed her from behind when she was battling a few telkhines and wrapped her in some weird vine thing that he grew out of the ground (which is freaky because that's his skin... wait... was that hair???)
I surrendered myself because a) I cannot leave Annabeth alone and b) I had nowhere else to go. Annabeth and I were dragged off into a separate fold of Tartarus, where the mist covering the area was removed and I saw this hell as what is was (the way Nico probably saw it, I realized). We were gagged and then chained to the wall, guarded by all of the monsters we had slain in our short life of only 17 years.
"Bob says hello"
But I can't tell the stars until many many years later.