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“A slow death!” The goddess of misery snarled viciously. “A death from a thousand poisons!”
All around her, poisonous plants grew and burst like overfilled balloons. Green - and - white sap trickled out, collected into pools, and began flowing across the ground towards Percy. The sweet smelling fumes made his head feel wobbly.
“Percy!” Annabeth’s voice sounded far away. She sounded worried, desperate.
The goddess of misery was fixated on Percy. He feebly tried to retreat, but the poisonous ichor was flowing all around him, making the ground steam and the air burn. Percy was stuck in the toxic sludge. He had nowhere to go, no method to escape.
Percy fell to his knees. He desperately wanted to tell Annabeth to run, but he couldn’t open his mouth. More of the poisonous air would get inside him. His throat was already as dry as dead leaves from the little he was inhaling through the t-shirt over his nose and mouth.
Percy wished there was water in Tartarus - some nice pool he could jump into to heal himself, or maybe a river he could control. Anything to put between him and the poison that was slowly but surely killing him.
“You will feed the eternal darkness,” Akhlys declared, with glee. “You will die in the arms of Night!”
The white-green poison kept pooling, little streams trickling from the plants as the venomous lake around him got larger and deeper.
Pools. Streams. Lakes.
It was a mad idea but Percy was literally out of options. Poison was a liquid. If it moved similarly to water, there was a fair chance that it was partially water. Percy remembered a science lecture about the human body being mostly water. He remembered extracting water from Jason’s lungs back in Rome…
If he could control that, then why not other liquids?
Part of him whispered that Poseidon was the god of the sea, not of every liquid everywhere.
The other part of him whispered that Tartarus had its own rules. Fire was drinkable. The ground was the body of a dark god. The air was acid, and demigods could be turned into smokey corpses.
Compared to that, the idea of controlling poisons was… easy.
Percy had nothing to lose by trying, and everything to lose by not trying. He could practically feel his life slipping away as he sunk further and further into the poison.
Percy glared at the poisonous lake around him. He focused on the poison flowing like water, like a stream. He focused, and reached with the part of his mind that allowed him to control water.
Abruptly, something inside of him cracked - as if a crystal ball had shattered in his stomach. Utterly shattered, and irreparable.
Every part of him that was touching the poison immediately stopped burning. Instead, Percy felt a warm, gentle heat coming from the poison. His head cleared. Percy stood up, and looked at the puddle beneath him.
The poisonous tide stopped. The fumes blew away from him and back towards the goddess. The lake of poison rolled toward her in tiny waves and rivulets.
Akhlys took a hesitant step back. “What is this?!” She looked alarmed, scared even. Percy thought it was a good look on her.
“Poison,” Percy snarled at her. “That’s your specialty, right?” The urge to fight, to survive morphed inside Percy. It grew and turned to anger. The poison reacted to his emotions and rolled towards the goddess, and the fumes started to make her cough. Her eyes watered and grew red.
Seeing the tears, Percy smiled. Oh good. More water. Percy imagined her nose and throat filling with her own tears.
Akhlys gagged, “I-” The tide of venom reached her feet, sizzling like droplets on a hot iron. She stumbled back and wailed.
Percy didn’t like the sound of her wailing. It would draw unwanted attention from much more powerful beings in Tartarus. He imagined the tears filling her throat and nose turning into the white-green poison that was surrounding her feet.
Akhlys made a tortured howl, not unlike a dying animal. Steam started coming out of her nose and lips. She fell onto her knees, looking at Percy, eyes pleading and crying.
Percy had no mercy to give. Mere minutes ago, Akhlys was about to kill Percy and Annabeth in the same sadistic fashion. Percy looked at the tears pouring down her cheeks and imagined it turning into the white-green poison.
It did, and Akhlys’ face turned a bright shade of red as the surface skin burned off. Soon after, steam covered her entire face. She swayed back and forth before falling face first into the pool of poison. Her body trembled for a moment before going still.
Percy didn’t waste a moment. He raised his arm, palm open and faced upward. While focusing on Akhlys and the poison, Percy closed his fingers into a loose fist. The poison immediately reacted. It crawled up the sides of her face, neck, torso and legs until completely covered her body. Steam continued rising from the disfigured body on the ground
Percy tightened his fist until his nails were digging into his palm. The poison reacted accordingly. It moved all over her, pushing her down, down into the ground. Percy could feel what the poison was doing to her. He knew that it entered her nose, mouth and ears, and was moving down her throat, into her stomach, her intestines. It was like a sixth sense.
It was burning her up, inside out. Just like he intended.
Akhlys didn’t make a sound; her vocal chords were long destroyed. In fact, the only sound was the poison sloshing around her body, and the roar of power and anger in Percy’s ears.
Distantly, Percy heard someone shouting, begging, pleading but he couldn’t make out what they were saying. It was like they were stuck behind a wall, uselessly hammering and shouting.
Akhlys’s chest caved in. Her face and throat were long gone, burned and dissolved in the poison. Percy tightened his fist impossibly tight and grinded his teeth. He focused all his attention on the poison, and the steam increased twice fold.
At last, it was time. Akhlys’s life force was nearly gone. Percy dropped his fist, and most of the steam eased up. Percy walked over to the disfigured blob covered in poison. He reached into his pocket, grabbed Riptide and uncapped it. Riptide glowed in the gloomy darkness in Tartarus.
Percy placed a foot on the blob. Something cracked and it sunked a few inches down. With one fluid motion, Percy pointed Riptide down and drove the blade into the blob.
Almost immediately there was a seering white light. Percy grit his teeth and kept his eyes on the blob beneath him. He had utterly defeated Akhlys in both body and domain. She couldn’t harm him, not even with her death. Percy refused to look away.
For a moment, Tartarus was filled with a bright blinding light. It slowly faded, leaving Percy staring at a pool of white-green poison. Percy straightened up, capped Riptide and put it in his pocket. He waved his arm, and instantly all the poison, plants and fumes immediately disappeared.
Then he turned around to Annabeth, and smiled.