"Your thoughts become your enemies

When you're locked inside this cage

Life can feel dead to me

And all that's left is rage

...

I keep telling myself

That I can take you

From this God-forsaken place."

~ Alive by Andy Black featuring Matt Skiba from the album The Shadow Side

(Snippet of the song is on the side. It can be found on Spotify, Itunes, etc.)

...

...

"Nico, do you think he will be okay?" Thalia asks while eating her hamburger at the McDonalds. "Who?" Nico asks while eating his smaller hamburger from the Happy Meal. "Santa Clause!" Thalia shouts sarcastically, making some other customers of the fast food restaurant look at her in confusion. "Percy, of course!" Thalia shouts a bit softer this time. "Of course. He's Percy." "Yeah, I know, but..." "Thalia." Nico looks up from his hamburger and looks straight into the blue eyes of the daughter of Zeus. "Try not to worry. We are going to check at the cemetery if someone else has... arrived." Thalia looks down and goes back to eating, thinking about what could happen. Who could be next? What would happen if they were caught? What if they had to go back?

...

"Fuck," Thalia says as she sees the son of Apollo crying at the graves of their friends. "Nico..." And as she looked back she saw some tears in the eyes of the son of Hades as he looked at Will. "Nico..." And she pushed him behind the bushes, so they were not seen. "Is s... someone there?" Will stands up and looks around him, wiping away the tears from his eyes. He did not want to be seen like this. this. "Someone?" He whispered in the nothingness of the world. He looks down and sighs. He looked back at the graves and thought to himself, 'I think it's time to go.' As he walked away from the graveyard where the graves of the heroes laid, he did not know that two of the people he was crying over were watching him leave.

The moment Will was out of sight, Nico started sobbing. "Aw Nico..." Thalia wraps her arms around Nico and tries to comfort him as he just saw his love walk away. Crying over his death. Mourning over the loss of friends who might be or were alive.

...

"Sir?" Poseidon looks up at the mentioning of his name, there was a servant looking at him. "The doctors have finished." Poseidon stood up from his chair and walked over to the room, his heartbeat fastening with every step. When he entered the doctors bowed, but did not matter, not for Poseidon, not now. His son was what mattered. Percy. "So, tell me. What did you find?" Poseidon asked with the most monotone voice he could have right now, making sure his voice was not shaking in nervousness. "We found some wounds on Perseus' body that indicate he was attacked. In the wounds, mostly slashes, we discovered a rare type of poison called Merizi, this poison is also the reason he is still unconcious." "Well, did you get it out of his system?" "We... Are working on it." Poseidon looked at the doctor with a deadly fire in his eyes. "What do you mean?" "We need more time. This poison takes more work before it is fully dissapeared from his system." "Take all the time you need, as long as you heal my son." The doctors bowed and went to back working on Percy, trying their hardest to save Percy from the unspoken destiny that might be on his path.

"Dad?" Poseidon wakes up from his thoughts in a shock and looks behind him to see Tyson standing there. "Tyson," Poseidon says with a weak smile. Tyson looks over his father's shoulder and sees his brother laying on the bed. Paler than he has ever been before, his hair sticking to his forehead because of the sweat and lots of doctors going around him or poking needles or other stuff in him "Tyson, come." Poseidon points to the door of the room as a sign that it is better to leave. Tyson walks out, Poseidon following him. When the door was closed, Tyson turns around and hugs his father. Poseidon is shocked at this gesture, but wraps his arms around Tyson.

After 30 seconds of standing like this, they step away from each other and walk over to the chairs to eventually sit on them. "Dad, how is he?" "To be very honest Tyson, I have no idea." Poseidon looks down at his hands. "They found some kind of poison and now they are trying to get it out." "How did he get it into his system?" "Some kind of attack." Tyson leans back in his chair and looks at his dad. "Should we inform Sally and Paul?" Poseidon bites his lip and feels tears welling up in his eyes. "They... They are in Elysium." Tyson's eye widens and looks at his father. "Oh no..." "Someone killed them." Tyson sighs and starts looking around. "Where has he been living, dad?" "Some kind of mortal... Tony Shark or something..." "Stark." "Yes, that's him."

...

"Tony, he'll be okay." "There was a friggin' teenager ranting to me about shitty relatives, Steve! That means something!" Tony shouted as he walked around in his living room. The little trip to find this camp had lead to more questions than answers. They tried to ask this Chiron stuff, but after Will dissapeared through the trees, the man was not there anymore. "First off..." "Yeah, yeah, language! Fuckin' language!" "Tony, calm down," Steve says calmly. "No! I won't! My nephew is out there, maybe dying! And our friend, Thunderhead is not back!" "Of course, he is not! He knows you will be like this!" "That does not give him any reason not to return and at least tell me where Percy is!"

"Well, he's not somewhere you can get with a car." An unknown voice says. Tony jumps at the sound of the voice and sees another teenager with sunglasses standing in his living room. "What is it with weird teenagers just appearing in my Tower!" The teen raises his eyebrow and shakes his head. "Don't worry about Percy. He's with us." "Who is 'us' exactly?" Tony asks. "Me. Some people you don't know." "Well, give me some names and I will know." "I'm afraid that's not possible, Stark." "Give me your name." "Tyson." "Well, 'Tyson', how do you know Percy?" "You don't want to know that. You want to know where he is." Tony grumbles in anger. "Well, could you tell us?" Steve interrupts, standing up from the couch. "He's in safe hands. You have to trust me." "Why should we trust you, Mess Hair?" "Because I'm the only one who knows where Percy is in this room." "That does not mean we can trust you." Tyson sighs. "Just do, 'cause right now, the only thing we should be caring about it Percy's health..." Tyson starts walking away, but stops as he suddenly hears, "Wait!" Tony walks fastly over to Tyson and stands in front of him, a worried look has replaced the angry one from a couple of seconds ago. "How is he?" Tony sounded like he was about to cry, but he did not care. Not now. "He will be fine. Our best doctors are doing everything they can and trust me, they are great," Tyson said. The last part with a kind smile. "Will you promise me something?" Tony asks. "It depends what you are going to ask from me." "Will you keep me posted?" Tyson smiled widely this time. "Of course." And then he walks away into the already opened elevator doors. "Thanks Jarvis," Tyson says while the doors close.

"How the heck does he know about Jarvis?"

..._..._..._..._..._..._..._...

Keep on smilin', cuties!

Xoxo'

Maria