Chapter Text
It all starts to fall apart when Enceladus breaks away from Annabeth and her mother.
He only gets the chance because Hippolytus is bodily thrown into the two of them, giving Enceladus the opening he needs. By the time Annabeth reorients herself, Enceladus is halfway across the Acropolis, jabbing his massive spear at an understandably occupied Jason fighting Porphyrion.
Before he makes contact, there’s a massive flash of light, followed in a millisecond by an explosion that leaves Annabeth’s ears and mind feeling like jelly. Zeus’ lightning , she thinks.
She blinks away the spots in time to see Zeus, bolt still sparking in his hand; Jason, pushing his dully glinting glasses up to prod at his eyes; and Porphyrion, rearing up behind Zeus, spear poised for a killing blow. Annabeth feels a shout of disbelief, warning, pure adrenaline, bubble up from within her as Zeus whirls and Porphyrion stabs and there’s a flash and blur of gold -
A figure hangs, suspended, in the path of the spear, white chiton billowing around them, slowly being stained with gold, wings outstretched.
Nike, goddess of victory, coughs up ichor, impaled upon the spear that should have ended the youngest of Kronos’ godly children. She tries for a cocky smile - even as far away as she is, Annabeth can see her lips twitch, dripping ichor - before Porphyrion, crowing triumphantly, rips his spear from her body. Nike hovers for a moment, glowing brighter and brighter and brighter until Annabeth has to look away, the sudden heat searing her skin, cracking her lips, and then it’s over.
It’s that quick - the death of a goddess.
Porphyrion doesn’t get to enjoy his victory for long. There’s another flash, another bang, even louder and brighter than the first, and this time it’s accompanied by a roar that shakes the heavens. The wrath of Zeus hurls the giant king into the air, where a woman in a goatskin cloak materializes. Juno drives an iridescent spear downward, sending Porphyrion back toward the earth. He never meets it, intercepted by purple and gold blur launching itself off of the ground, but before Jason can reach him, Porphyrion casts his spear.
The massive weapon arcs through the sky. Next to her, Athena tenses, and before Annabeth can process it, her mother is standing in front of Zeus, ready to take the blow. Despite everything that’s transpired between them over the past months, Annabeth’s heart leaps into her throat. “Mother-” she croaks.
The spear climbs, climbs, climbs, and Annabeth realizes that something’s wrong. The spear’s trajectory is way off. Unless Porphyrion wasn’t aiming for Zeus -
Even as Jason drives his gladius through Porphyrion, shouting loudly enough to make Annabeth flinch from across the Acropolis, the giant king cackles. The spear finds its mark.
Juno tumbles from the sky, glowing like a second sun. Annabeth closes her eyes, instinct fighting through the shock, as the light and heat fill the Acropolis.
Chaos descends.
Annabeth slashes and stabs her way across the battlefield. Bits and pieces of the violence are all that stick in her mind:
Frank, shapeshifting faster than she can register, bringing Otis to his knees.
Periboia backhanding Hazel off Arion before swinging her sword viciously, slicing Aphrodite across the chest.
Artemis hurling her knives into Otis’ head.
Hippolytus stomping Demeter into the ground, spinning and deflecting Dionysus’ rage-filled strike.
Enceladus batting Piper’s attacks aside and stabbing, sending the point of his spear through her weak shoulder, then withdrawing it and stabbing again.
Ephialtes pirouetting (Apollo applauding for a millisecond) and stabbing Dionysus in the back.
Percy and Hazel, back to back, fending off Enceladus and Polybotes.
Hippolytus catching Jason by the ankle mid-flight and slamming him into the ground so hard his glasses go flying.
Ares brutalizing Periboia as she stands over Frank’s barely breathing body, sunglasses melted over the bridge of his nose.
Poseidon and Artemis getting thrown by an explosion of Greek fire from the Argo II, Artemis landing perfectly within range of Enceladus’ spear.
Hazel sinking her spatha into Polybotes’ neck, a lightning blast from Zeus finishing the giant off.
Poseidon hurling his trident at Ephialtes, but getting jumped by Thoon, who has two old ladies hanging off of him.
Hazel misstepping, Enceladus’ spear a snake striking out and Percy, feet too far, roaring, a wall of water smashing through the resisting earth and blasting Enceladus into Poseidon’s discarded trident, Frank’s unconscious body being swept away, out of Annabeth’s sight.
When she finally starts thinking clearly, it’s only her and Percy, standing shoulder to shoulder. A glance behind her reveals a thoroughly beaten Poseidon, an exhausted Athena, and a furious, panting Zeus.
They are the few that remain.
Before them stand Hippolytus, Thoon, and Ephialtes, all looking the worse for wear but still in fighting condition. The Argo II sinks out of sight, billowing smoke.
It’s just them.
Percy’s arm brushes Annabeth’s, and she swears she can feel an electric spark pass between them. She shifts slightly, pressing up against Percy a little. As long as we’re together.
They lunge as one.
The remaining giants never were the leaders, but they’re still insanely strong. Three gods and two demigods can’t break through their collective guard. Annabeth slashes her drakon bone sword, desperately trying to score a hit, protect herself, and protect Percy.
She slides beneath Thoon’s sweeping cleaver strike, ignoring the burning of her kneecaps, and propels herself to her feet just in time to parry a strike from Hippolytus. The second she does, she sees an opening, and she lets the rebounding force of her block power her swing as she slices into Ephialtes’ calf.
As the giant howls and stumbles to one knee, Annabeth feels a tingle run down her spine. She whirls, ready to block a giant’s attack, but suddenly Percy is there, deflecting Thoon’s cleaver and lacerating the old giant’s face with a pair of quick strikes. The bane of the Fates cries out and stumbles, and behind Annabeth, a crash of thunder and blaze of light and heat tells her that Zeus has finished off Ephialtes.
She throws herself back into the fray, hacking and slashing at the two remaining giants, every once in a while glancing over her shoulder to see Percy guarding her back. His hair flies around every time he swings, his camp shirt is torn and stained with blood, earth, and ichor, and she flashes back to the Titan War, fighting side by side with Percy against the endless hordes of monsters, Percy’s clothes practically in tatters. She misses him having the Achilles curse.
She spins, stopping the cleaver in its downward path. The massive blade cuts a notch into the bone of her sword, and if she had time, she would wince. Instead, she lurches to the side, avoiding Thoon’s following strike. The cleaver sinks into the ground, and Annabeth lunges, hoping to land a hit before the giant can free his weapon. As she moves, Thoon yanks at the half-buried cleaver, and it’s practically ejected from the ground. Annabeth’s eyes widen in realization - Gaea - but she’s already in motion. The cleaver swings around to meet her, and she instinctively flinches a moment before the flat of the blade hits her -
She doesn’t feel the impact at first, just the sudden sensation of weightlessness. A second later, she slams into the ground, and all of the pain hits her at once. She tumbles, rolling head over heels, her entire body throbbing in pain. She’s pretty sure she’s broken a few ribs.
Coughing and wheezing, she manages to crack open an eye. Thoon barrels toward her, cleaver raised above his head for a final blow. Somewhere behind him, she hears a hoarse shout, sees a glint of bronze. Percy’s too far away. Thoon swings.
A blur of motion, and Annabeth feels burning liquid spatter across her battered body. Thoon plants a foot against the back of the figure in front of him and jerks the cleaver free, sending the body tumbling forward in a shower of gold. Annabeth gathers herself and rolls to the side, avoiding the volatile form falling toward her by a hair. She’s left on her side, staring at the spot she’s just vacated in horror.
Athena’s eyes, becoming a duller gray by the second, lock on Annabeth’s face. A rapidly-growing pool of ichor beneath her colors her armor and soaks into the dirt. The goddess coughs, scrabbling at the ground with her left hand. From her position, Annabeth can see too much of the damage Thoon’s cleaver has wrought. From Athena’s right shoulder to the bottom of her sternum, there’s just… gold. Her right arm lies uselessly at her side. Annabeth has to look back at Athena’s face, but the empty gray eyes are so, so much worse -
A hand - she’s not sure whose - grabs her shoulder and pulls her away as Athena’s body starts to glow. Annabeth shakes herself back into action out of necessity, shutting her eyes against the heat and light as she sprints in the direction of Percy and Hippolytus.
She crashes into the giant, swinging wildly, rage and pain overcoming her normal levelheadedness. Percy yelps in surprise, falling back, and Zeus appears in his place. The king of the gods is sparking with fury, arcs of electricity flickering across his skin and bursting from his eyes. He literally glows with power, and it’s all Annabeth can do to just keep up with him as he drives Hippolytus back.
Zeus thrusts out a hand, and the sky rumbles. A streak of light cracks the darkness of the storm clouds above, slamming Hippolytus to the ground in a blaze of heat and sound. Annabeth dives forward, the point of her sword sliding easily into the giant’s shoulder.
“No thrones for you,” Zeus growls. “Not now.” He reaches out, and a familiar cylinder of celestial bronze materializes in his hand. “Not ever .”
Annabeth pulls her sword free and backpedals, averting her eyes. Still, the blast rocks the Acropolis, throwing Annabeth to the ground and deafening her. A ringing in her ears, she pushes herself to her feet unsteadily, just in time to see Thoon deflect Riptide with enough force to knock it from Percy’s grasp and pivot faster than she thought possible, cutting upward as Poseidon lashes out with his trident.
Shunk.
Poseidon yells, Percy shouts, Zeus roars, and Annabeth stares, watching as the sea god’s trident thuds to the ground in a mess of gold and flesh. Poseidon’s hand flies to his new stump, clutching at the bleeding wound desperately, and Zeus thunders past Annabeth, bolt raised. He rears back, preparing to smite the giant, but Thoon brings his cleaver up to block. The crackling blast rebounds into the sky, but Zeus doesn’t stop. He casts bolt after bolt, forcing Thoon back inch by inch. Annabeth skirts around the fight, but she can’t get close without the blast hitting her. Instead, she switches objectives, running over to where Percy kneels beside his father.
Percy glances up as she approaches, and without a word, he rises and meets her with a hug. They rock back and forth for a second, relishing the moment of relative tranquility in the middle of the battle. In the moment, there’s nothing but them.
Then Percy’s eyes widen, and Annabeth turns around. Thoon has stopped giving ground, deflecting another blinding blast off the blade of his cleaver before swirling it around and stabbing at Zeus. The god jerks to the side, but Thoon spins, letting the cleaver drop and bite into Zeus’ ankle. Zeus roars, whipping around and smiting the place Thoon had been standing, but the giant is already gone, maneuvering behind Zeus and positioning his cleaver. The second Zeus stops moving, Thoon thrusts, a victorious grin on his face, and the king of the gods is transfixed by the massive blade painted gold with ichor. The master bolt slips from suddenly numb fingers, clattering to the stones of the Acropolis, and light and heat erupts from Zeus’ form.
Annabeth’s body is starting to give up on her. The adrenaline of battle is slowly fading into exhaustion, but she grips it with all her mental might. Poseidon wraps his shortened arm around Percy’s shoulder and stands shakily, holding his trident loosely in his left hand. They’re a battered, lackluster shadow of what was once a group of the most powerful beings of the generation, and Thoon, despite his missing hand, has seemed nothing but invigorated throughout the entire battle.
Annabeth inhales, exhales, glances at Percy. He looks at her in the same moment, and she takes a second to memorize those sea green eyes she knows so well. They’re horribly tired, aged beyond his years, as she’s sure hers are, but she can barely see a glint of the snarky, happy kid she had feuded with for a whole quest.
She moves.
—
The three Fates lie on the stones of the Acropolis, thrown aside and cast away by their bane.
Destiny hangs in the balance, torn between two influences.
Thoon, destroyer of the Fates, author of Gaea’s victory.
And…
One old woman stirs, slowly planting a hand on the ground and pushing herself up.
They do not call Atropos the Inflexible for nothing.
She knows that her sisters are gone. Clotho and Lachesis have met the void that lies beyond death, as have all but one of the official Olympians. She can sense Hestia, the eldest and wisest of the gods, the Fates’ unacknowledged favorite, shivering, struggling to keep the embers of Olympus’ hearth alive, and deep within her soul, there is a feeling of wrongness.
It was not supposed to go this way. That much she is sure of. She and her sisters had so much more to weave, much more to say. Their basket had been full just hours earlier.
But as she drags herself toward their discarded spinning materials, their overturned basket of yarn, she sees that their command of Fate has become obviously wrested from their control. The beautiful tapestries of life are unraveled, socks and mittens formless lumps of thread.
She digs through the yarn, the ichor smeared across her front dying the blue into a sickly light green, and extracts three intact bundles of string with a sigh of relief. There’s still hope -
One spool of thread suddenly splits, falling into a heapless mess, the fibers making up the yarn pulled apart as if by invisible shears. She stares in shock, a heartbroken, disbelieving scream and a rage-filled, broken bellow with all the power of the sea behind it echoing through her ears as the son of Poseidon’s life string pulls itself apart.
She must act quickly.
It goes against her very nature - destiny, in her eyes, is very much immutable, and what she is about to do defies her own name - but now, more than ever, there is no other choice.
She seizes the smaller of the two remaining bundles, searching feverishly for the end. It’s fraying, and she licks the tips of her fingers and presses them together over it in an attempt to preserve it for as long as possible. She runs her other hand along the expanse of yarn connected to it, and tangled as it is with the other lives spilt across the ground, she can still sense which belongs to the daughter of Athena.
Next to her, Poseidon’s spool unravels a bit more. The only reason it’s holding on is its ancient power, and, Atropos suspects, the sea god’s pure determination and anger. The ocean’s immensity lends itself to defiance, even to fate. She hurries, knowing that she is losing time.
Her hand flits over the mess of thread and stops. This… this is the place.
Not wasting a moment, she plunges the end of the thread downward, looping it around itself at her selected point. Heedless of the other threads tangled with it, she carefully works the splitting yarn into a knot, and takes a moment to grasp carelessly at the trailing threads. Their lives are not necessary to the plan.
A half roar, half scream reaches her ears as Poseidon’s yarn breaks down yet again, and she abandons her meticulous process, gripping both sides of the unfinalized knot and putting all of her remaining divine power into the action. She may survive this battle, but ultimately, none of the gods will live. Gaea has won this war. Fates of the past willing, she will not win it again.
With the last vestiges of her energy, fingers slick and slipping with ichor, Atropos the Inflexible knots the thread.
—
She’s swinging her drakon bone sword -
The rivalry ends here. I love you, Wise Girl.
Rolling between Thoon’s legs -
Stop thinking about it. Just feel.
Vaulting over the swiping cleaver -
Tell the sun and the stars hello for me.
Shifting to Poseidon’s right as he lunges -
Poison. That’s your specialty, isn’t it?
Spinning, focusing on Thoon’s weak side -
You’re not getting away from me again.
Thoon’s foot lashing out -
I kept thinking about you and me… and maybe someday when this war with the giants is over…
Flying through the air, uncontrolled, pain in her side -
Consider me warned. I missed you, too.
Tumbling, rolling across the ground -
You are so not making this easy for me.
Planting her sword in the ground, hurling herself to her feet -
No one touches her!
Charging back into the battle, where both god and giant refuse to give ground -
Put your cap back on. Get out!
Poseidon’s trident almost hitting her as Thoon deflects it -
We were just looking at maps.
Stabbing, landing a glancing blow on Thoon’s intact arm -
I think I owe you a dance.
Poseidon catching her eye, a message obvious in those irises so close to Percy’s -
No. My friends talked me out of it.
A geyser bursting from the ground beneath her, catapulting her into the air -
Oh my gods, you were looking in my bedroom window?
Driving her sword down into Thoon’s shoulder with all of her strength -
You too, Wise Girl.
Thoon writhing, throwing her off and turning away from Poseidon -
I am impertinent.
The cleaver swinging, Poseidon’s eyes widening -
Silence, Annabeth. He’s still conscious. Bring him inside.
Her body explodes in pain, heat spreading across her front, haziness overtaking her mind. She can’t move, can’t see, but at the same time she can see flashes of the world around her, confusing, misguiding, unordered, even nonsensical; far from her normal state of mind, and she can’t help but wonder if this is how Rachel feels sometimes.
Percy stands over a goddess, cold rage overpowering his features.
Nico. smiling, hugs his sister, who looks younger than him.
Piper and Jason soar away from the Isle of Hercules, food flying after them.
Thalia, a scar running down her cheek, holds up the sky.
Jason is impaled by a man in battle armor and a toga, both seated atop a steed.
Jason crackles with power, exchanging blows with Luke - Kronos - in Olympus’ throne room.
Percy stands yards away in a toga, and her heart swells.
Frank and Hazel face a drakon - the drakon - in the streets of New York.
Luke stands in front of her, golf club raised, every inch a hero.
Reyna and Percy, atop a mountain and backed by a gold-clad army, charge at an enormous man, helmet adorned with ram’s horns.
Frank chokes the same man who had been stabbing Jason, firewood in hand.
Hazel, in the woods at camp, outstretches her arms, calling a tide of earth and minerals up from the depths and blanketing a group of monsters flooding through a crack in the earth.
The sky explodes in a burst of gold.
A hurricane tears apart the figure of a woman.
Percy sits on the ground in scorched gym clothes, shocked.
An older version of her raises a bronze-and-steel sword.
Thalia, wreathed in lightning, holds off an army.
A younger her, Grover, and Luke laugh hysterically above a river as a Hunter looks at them, confused.
She sneaks through a soft orange hall held up by endless pillars toward a sarcophagus, pushes the lid off, sees blond hair, a scar -
Dark, spiky hair, a smattering of freckles, and a mace canister -
Black, unruly hair with a streak of gray, a scar on the back of his hand -
Blue eyes -
Electric irises -
Kaleidoscopic -
Gray -
Sea green -
Gold -
Help them. Save the world.
And Annabeth Chase bolts upright in her bed, sheets tangled, surrounded by her sleeping siblings, twelve years old, and screams.