I just got the House of Hades yesterday. And I finished it. I'm still speechless.

Title: Countdown

Word Count: 1,047

Rating: T

Disclaimers: I don't own anything.

Darkness. The air whistling through her ears, all she could see was darkness. She was faintly aware that she was falling. Falling, how long until she met the ground?

She was holding on to his hand. Warmth. She longed for warmth, the burn of the bright sun far above them. Still, she held on to his hand, all words wiped from her mouth. The smell of dry blood, the smell of the sticky wet substance blocked away fresh air, like it was trapping any breathable oxygen inside an airtight container.

At first it left her wanting fresh air. Made her lungs burn like fire, the only air in Tartarus seemed to be smoke, and blood. She wasn't even in Tartarus yet. Minutes passed, and her lungs seemed to be more comfortable. She got used to the warmth that seemed to come from nowhere at all. She almost felt relaxed, comfortable.

Just thinking about that made her uncomfortable, that she could feel comfortable while falling into Tartarus. The seemingly endless pit of doom.

Maybe she was going insane. Not that she cared. He was here with her, and everything would be okay.

A small part of her mind was shouting at her. Shouting at her like she was on the verge of death. Maybe she was.

Telling her to stay aware. To know, to remember that if she didn't get out, everything she cared about would be destroyed.

That jarred her back to life. She couldn't fall forever.

They had to get out. They had to complete the quest.

Her eyes were closed.

She may have been unconscious, the constant feeling that her breathing was slowing was almost all that she knew. She felt almost dead, like she was halfway between life and death.

Half-dead. She knew that feeling to well. Maybe after dying, then coming back to life, the feeling didn't really bother her. Still, it was the unsettling feeling that if she didn't wake up, Camp Jupiter, Camp Half-Blood, and all of humanity, (Counting the gods,) would be destroyed.

She didn't like it. And as many times she told herself to wake up, she didn't. Almost as if something was keeping her from waking up, although she couldn't quite remember what.

Think.

She remembered monsters, monsters that had poisonous breath and would be toxic to any mortal that breathed it. The poisonous breath. Of course. That's why she couldn't wake up. And why she felt half dead, and more dead than ten seconds ago.

What now? Not like she could do anything while being unconscious and poisoned. They must be worried.

She hoped they were worried.

Maybe she was panicking, the fact that she had never been more desperate for life, hoping that her heart would maybe speed up a bit, and the poison would be washed away.

Not like that would ever happen. She had to wait.

Wait for help.

He had to keep what he had just learned a secret. But what his friend needed to understand was that there was nothing wrong with what he felt.

It was hard to convince the guy.

But either way, he had to keep it a secret. Until his friend was ready.

Maybe for some time they didn't consider each other friends. Maybe they just didn't trust each other. Either way, they respected one another. And that was all that mattered. For now.

For friends.

For family.

For everybody.

He knew he was stupid.

So very stupid. But it wasn't like he cared, he would find a way to get back to the island.

Swearing on River Styx was a big thing. He didn't care. He just wanted to go back, after Gaea was defeated. To see her again.

An oath to keep with a final breath.

He might as well jump off of a cliff to kill himself. Which was surprising, because he 'chose' the cliff over the other choice. Making a promise like that, basically meant his doom. At least some people would stay alive.

Even if he didn't die, he would find the island again. Even if it cost his life.

People didn't deserve to be trapped on the island because of something that they didn't do. Or worse, something their parents did.

People that had a heart didn't deserve torture like that. Nobody did, unless they did something bad.

Like Gaea. She definitely did. Maybe he could come up with a way to keep Gaea contained on an island. Many people would want to see that.

But him, he just wanted to get back on that island, and free the person living on it.

He'd promised. And he wasn't going to break it.

He stared at the stars in the dark sky, bright against the vast endless space behind it.

The sadness in his chest, the guilt that he had left a friend to die. The reminder that he had to deliver some words, some words he didn't want to say.

The guilt was almost chocking him, it made him feel like he was a horrible person, like someone who wouldn't give a second thought to killing. Monsters sure like cursing him after he killed them, but it was almost sad that he had never thought about how the monsters felt.

He didn't want to think about how many living creatures he'd killed before. The thought made him guilty.

Guilt. Maybe that would be all he would bring home after the war. Guilt that many deaths would be on his hands, guilt that he'd left so many people behind, guilt that the blood of people he cared about would stain his clothes and their souls be in his mind forever.

He stared back up at the stars, the beautiful lights that shone over the world, that saw everything there was to see. The constellations that would stare down over humanity. A constellation far too familiar, seemed to look back at him, eyes that were kind and forgiving, when they shouldn't have been.

He looked down, then looked back up into the sky, refusing to look in the direction of her constellation, and said:

"Bob says hi."

He choked on the words, even though he'd said it every night since.

Maybe he wouldn't ever be able to say it without feeling guilt.

End