Chapter Text
Percy had learnt the hard way that if things appeared to be going well, then the worst possible outcome was just about to happen. He also knew that if something could go wrong, it would definitely go wrong, as wrong as possible (also known as Murphy’s Law for demigods). Though he really should’ve remembered a third fundamental law: prophecies never mean what you think they mean.
For a moment, everything seemed to be fine. The giants had been toppled, the gods had come to their aid, Hades banishing them back into the Pit, and now Gaea was suspended aloft, away from her source of power, being charmed to sleep by a certain daughter of Aphrodite. Then they figured that the next step was getting Leo to destroy her physical form with fire, scattering it far and wide like her spouse and son, never again to reform a consciousness. “Seven half-bloods shall answer the call, To storm or fire the world must fall.”
Or, that had been the plan, until accursed Tartarus himself arrived.
Apparently the Father of the Giants had taken offense to the defeat of his children and had decided to take matters into his own hands. If Percy weren’t so frightened by the whole situation, he would’ve laughed at the mental image of the Giants running home to Daddy, crying about getting beat up by the mean nasty gods. But all thought of humor evaporated from his mind (faster than spilt water in the desert) as a vast chasm yawned open in the centre of Camp Half-Blood (and oh, the horrible sound it made!) and the Protogenos of the Abyss climbed out in a blaze of darkness.
The sun dimmed, the temperature plummeted, and the green grass turned to ash wherever Tartarus’ withering gaze fell. His form was as terrible as the last time Percy saw him, (in fact, even more grotesque in the light of day), rippling muscles under glistening purple skin, wearing armor woven of the souls of wretched monsters (making Hades’ soul-robes look positively joyful in comparison). But worst of all, his face—or the place where his face should’ve been—a swirling whirlpool, a tunnel to the abyss, a black hole to Chaos.
Who dares slaughter my offspring – kill my creations – and attack my Beloved?
The voice-that-wasn’t-a-voice thundered, for the sound seemed to be sucked towards him instead of radiating outwards. Raising one massive, clawed fist (a blur of purple and obsidian-sharp talons blacker than night) he swatted Leo, Jason and Festus out of the sky, and the beloved earth goddess tumbled to the ground.
She jerked awake upon contact with her domain, (a distant part of Percy’s mind that wasn’t too busy screaming with terror surmised that of course the Earth Mother would be immune to fall damage), and after a moment as long as eternity, both her eyes cracked open (verdant as all the earth’s forests distilled into a single drop), and she smiled.
(The earth groaned in response, sending out land-waves in all directions, toppling buildings like card houses—except his own cabin, Percy absently noted. The cabin of the Earth-Shaker.)
Smiled up at her consort – partner – monstrous spouse (what even do you call their relationship?) and now rescuer. Percy had just enough time to think gee, help me to survive this deadly love (like the Berlin Wall he’d once seen on TV) and also OH GODS GAEA’S AWAKE OH NO THIS IS THE END— before the embodiment of the Pit turned on him and Annabeth beside him saying YOU – you little demigods – you think yourselves so clever having escaped the Pit, but none ever escape Tartarus. (Voice scraping like a million nails on chalkboards and roaring like the deepest undersea volcanoes.) You shall never see the light of day again – nor your little band of allies.
And that was the beginning of the end.
The Gods had joined the fight at some point, appearing in the air without Percy noticing when (in his defense, he had bigger things to worry about), but it was a losing battle. Not even the might of all Olympus could hope to stand against the combined wrath of two Primordials. “You cannot kill me! I am the pit itself,” mocking words resurfaced from Percy’s memory, “You might as well try to kill the Earth. Gaea and I - we are eternal,” Tartarus had boasted to Damasen a lifetime ago.
Still frozen in place with horror, he could only watch as one by one the Gods were swallowed by the Pit, engulfed by the Earth, overrun by endless hordes of monsters still crawling out of the abyss. A Doors of Death on the doorstep of Camp. His own vision swam, stars appearing, feeling faint, floating, swirling flecks multiplying, a galaxy of sand before his eyes until he was pulled backwards into a spinning vortex of gold,
losing his
conscious-
ness.
Percy awoke feeling as if he’d been slam-dunked onto the ground. Upon further reflection, he supposed he had indeed been dumped here (wherever here was) by a sand vortex (a sand-nado?), and was now sitting on a pile of sand. Blinking groggily and getting to his feet, he noticed he was in a dimly-lit golden cavern, grainy as the sand of the sea (like the sandcastles he imagined living in as a kid). Blinking again, he realised he was not alone. There were also three very ancient women and an extremely complicated tapestry in the cavern.
The Fates.
“Perseus Jackson,” intoned the middle lady, picking up a loose end of shimmering sea-green thread from the unfinished edge of the tapestry with her bony, calloused fingers. Clotho the spinner.
Percy gulped, suddenly hyper aware that his life was literally hanging by a thread. (On second thought, perhaps his life had always been hanging by a thread).
“You know why we have brought you here,” said the one to her left with a knowing look. Lachesis measured the length of his thread with a tape measure (a cheap flimsy plastic one, perhaps the gods ran out of budget during the war) and frowned, furrowed eyebrows further creasing her already very creased face.
“The world has fallen at last!” cackled the third. “The time has come!” She—it must be Atropos—rocked in her chair, waving a skeletal hand in the air, and plucked out a gossamer-thin golden strand. With her other hand, she then picked up a pair of fine scissors and cut through the warp threads holding the tapestry together.
Percy opened his mouth to protest, to say something, anything at all, but found that no sound would come out, so he awkwardly shut it again like a goldfish.
“Indeed, the World’s rising has caused the world’s falling. Events unforeseen have occurred, for the actions of the Protogenoi are beyond even Fate’s jurisdiction,” Lachesis elaborated. Percy scoffed. Fancy way to say they messed up and Tartarus ruined their meddling.
She ignored him and continued, “Now, Perseus, we offer you a choice: you shall become our Champion and relive and rewrite history,” she pulled out the cut strands, and the end of the tapestry rapidly unravelled.
“With the help of Time,” Clotho added, picking up the golden thread and spinning it with a skein of the same sea-green, forming a new thread, green and gold, strong and unfrayed, “clarity and knowledge, you shall unite ancient foes, bring concord and justice, and subdue the Earth.”
Atropos picked up a large pair of shears, the same pair that Percy had seen her use to cut the blue thread by the highway so many years ago, turned her gaunt head and looked him straight in the eye, saying, “Or you shall refuse and be returned to your own time.”
A shiver ran down Percy’s spine. Despite the cryptic language, he got the impression that they wanted him to go back in time and prevent Gaea’s rising (“subdue the earth”), or if he refused, they’d put him back on the battlefield with Tartarus. Was that even a choice? Of course he’d choose to fix everything instead of returning to the end of the world. But unite what foes? And bring justice to whom? (He privately mused that it wouldn’t matter, as long as he got a chance to undo Gaea’s waking, and Kronos, and all the deaths, and all his mistakes.)
So he found his voice and whispered, “I accept.”
“Then you shall be our Champion,” the three sisters replied in unison, and Atropos cut his sea-green thread with a Snip. The last thing he saw was the new gold-green thread being woven into its place, before the whirling sands of Time swept him away.
Seven half-bloods shall answer the call,
To storm or fire the world must fall.
An oath to keep with a final breath,
And foes bear arms to the Doors of Death.