It's cold... It's not the kind of cold that might inspire a shiver, like the kind snow brings. No... I feel hollow inside. It's like there's nothing there, no soul, no heart... nothing. The familiar beat of my heart... gone. My chest ached for any feeling to be there, anything to suggest I might be alive. There was nothing, and the dread that pooled into me felt far off and fuzzy. I'm dead... a dead person doesn't feel anything... just a vast emptiness that stretched on for miles and miles in every which way. My eyelids felt so heavy, I couldn't lift them if I tried. Though, not everything was terrible about being dead. A strange sensation of lightness lifted my body, it was like drifting in the dark waters of the ocean. There's no need to breathe, so I can just stay like this forever. I'm dead... maybe eternal slumber isn't so bad after all. I can just sleep like this until the end of time...

"Jackson!"

Someone's calling my name, but I feel too tired. Maybe... a nap will do. Just a little moment, give me a few minutes, I just need a cat nap... that's all. A heaviness like a blanket enveloped my body and I felt like I was being dragged into the ground. It wasn't scary, in fact, it was rather comfortable. The feeling of becoming one with the earth again, that was a nice feeling.

I finally opened my eyes and found myself standing in a room full of people. "Where... where am I?" My voice sounded distant, like the my dulled emotions. A man turned to me, there were crinkles around his eyes that showed he must have been a merry man.

"You're dead, son. We're all dead." I let out a gasp as he turned around fully and I noticed the blossom of crimson that had spread all over his stomach. "Squeamish, are you?" The man chuckled and turned toward a pair of metal doors which slid apart with a ding. It was an elevator, I found it highly amusing how something so normal appeared in a place as strange as this. A robed figure stood inside the elevator and I felt the crowd around me surge forward and cram into the small space. I just barely made it in when the metallic doors closed, shutting the rest of the souls out. I thought I saw American Civil War uniforms among the crowd, some people have been here for an eternity and never gotten a chance to ride to the Underworld. People die every single day, that was just a fact. There was a lurch and the familiar sensation of falling that accompanied every single elevator ride I've been on ever since I was a kid.

The doors opened once again with a familiar ding, and the crowd pushed me outward. I stumbled, but caught myself just before the raging river, River Styx. The robed figure walked, no, drifted to the tiny boat that rested on the river. The boat seemed to ignore all laws of physics and just floated there as if there were no torrents trying to blow it over. A hand stretched out to me, palm up, it was thin and gnarled like a skeleton's hand reaching out to me. "What?"

"I don't suppose you have coins for passage?" Coins? Oh, right, the dead have to pay the ferryman to get across the River Styx.

"Um... yeah... hold on a sec." People grumbled and pushed past me impatiently. I heard the clinking of coins and watched as people boarded the tiny boat. Crap, I don't think I have the coins necessary to pay for the voyage across the river. Quickly, I patted my pockets and felt the watch there. That's not going to help me. Suddenly feeling something in my throat, I choked and coughed out a single coin. What in the actual hell? Whatever, guess I do get to go to the other side. Placing the coin into the man's hand, I caught a look of disgust flash across the ferryman's face before I got onto the boat and sat down. Once the tiny boat reached its capacity, it left the shore with the guide of the ferryman. I remember now, Charon was his name. Somehow, I don't think anything matters anymore though. I'm dead. Somewhere between waiting in that room and sitting on this boat, I've come to accept it. I'm dead, the quest is over.

Feeling the boat grind against the shore, all the souls got off and lined up to get past the gates to the Underworld. A giant three headed dog, Cerberus, paced the front of the gates. He barked and growled at the souls but let them through. The closer I got, the scarier it started to look. I noticed the drool and the random human hand sticking out of his teeth. The smell... don't even get me started on the smell of rotting flesh every time the dog breathes out. I looked away and focused on the gate. It was large, towering above everyone and everything surrounding it. On the other side, there was a large building that looked kinda like City Hall, and to the side there was a whole field of wheat. Hmm, who knew? Maybe the people down here really like bread. All of a sudden, a dark, furry chest loomed in front of me and I ran into it by accident. Oh gods... Cerberus' many heads barked ferociously at me and bared its teeth. "Easy boy..." I could hear my voice quivering, and the fear struck me in a way the other emotions couldn't anymore. Then I heard it.

"Jackson... Jackson! Please... Gods no.... Don't pass through the gate, please..." Annabeth?

"Annabeth, he's gone. His heart no longer beats..." It was Alexia's voice trying to calm down the blonde girl.

"He's still alive! I know he is!"

"He's already paid the ferryman, the coin disappeared." Oh, so that's why I had a coin in my mouth.

"Wake up, Jackson! You're not dead! Wake up!!!" I turned around and saw Charon looking out into the distance and then back at me. I felt something wet on the back of my neck and I looked back to find Cerberus using its noses to nudge me toward the gate.

"You are still tied to the mortal world, child. Once you pass those gates, you can never return to the body you possess." Charon spoke in an echoing voice, his lips barely moving and his dark eyes -full of despair and darkness- were trained on me. I stumbled as Cerberus pushed me and I was at the boundary between life and death. It would be so easy to cross over into the wheat field and bask in sunshine forever. It drew me, called to me, and I desperately wanted to be there. I just want to stand there and feel warm again. I want to feel something taking up space in my chest once more.

"JACKSON!!!" Annabeth. The image of a young girl with her hair up in a ponytail, running toward me, suddenly flashed in my mind. Something in my chest throbbed painfully and I grasped it, falling onto my knees as I gasped out.
"Come back to me!!!" It hurts so much... I looked up to see Charon, he was looking upon me with no emotion.

"I choose... TO LIVE!" I yelled out, reaching my hand out toward the robed figure. I felt his fingers wrap around my wrist, his skin was like paper and jutted out like bones. In that instant, I felt something pulling me. My soul was being recalled to my body, and the world started to spin around me, the ground no longer solid underneath me.

"Not many have the chances you do, Son of Time. You must cherish every single opportunity to live." It was a whisper like the sigh of the wind as I felt myself getting pulled across the River Styx and through the elevator shaft. It was like the fastest roller coaster ride I've ever been on as the tunnel suddenly widened into an opening and light poured forth. I shielded myself with my arms and let out a yell as the light engulfed and blinded me.

I gasped out and I found myself staring up at the ceiling of the RV. My chest felt warm once again, like something was there. I listened for it...

Ba-dump... ba-dump... ba-dump...

My heart was beating once again, strong and constant, and I could hear the whooshing of air into my lungs. Suddenly an overwhelming feeling of relief crushed me, involuntarily tears burned the back of my eyes. "Jackson?" I felt something shift and realized Annabeth had been resting her head on it. Her normally stormy gray eyes were clouded with tears.

"I heard you. You called for me and I heard you." I spoke in a whisper, reaching for her and her hands clasped mine. She was warm, it felt so nice to have something warm touching me again.

"You told me you'd always come as long as I called your name." She pressed my hand against her flushed cheek, they were splotchy from tears. Annabeth, headstrong, independent, someone who needs no one and would be happy that way... she was crying because of me. I must mean more to her than she lets on.

"Don't... cry..." I gasped out and with my other hand, I placed my hand on her head. "You're a strong girl, Annabeth, a strong girl like you shouldn't be crying; especially if those tears are for me. What's your boyfriend going to think?" I chuckled and she wiped away her tears with her sleeve. "Real classy." I echoed her sarcasm from before when I had wiped my mouth with my hand.

"Sorry... just the thought of losing something that's been so constant in my life-"

"You won't lose me, I'm stubborn like that. Even if I die, I'll just come back again and again. I won't die... not until this quest is over, at the very least."

"Jackson... I-"

"Well, well, it seems Annabeth does have the ability to call back the dead. Are you sure you're a child of Athena?" A familiar feminine voice cut through the atmosphere. Alexia. Annabeth quickly let go of my hand and scrambled a safe distance away from me so that it wouldn't have come off as intimate, but Alexia already saw the gesture.

"Positive." Annabeth replied, her voice was stony again and she stood up, facing the other girl down. I feel like there's some tension in between them, it's probably better not to get mixed up in it. Alexia smirked and then walked toward me, kneeling down by my side.

"How are you feeling, Jackson?"

"Um... I've had better days, but I guess I'm fine. I feel alive... heh." I chuckled and she nodded, placing a hand on my chest.

"And here? Does it still hurt?"

"It feels fine, I-" I was cut off as Alexia tore the hole in my shirt open a little bit more and to everyone's astonishment, the wound was gone. The only evidence that I had ever been stabbed was the circle of blood that stained my clothes... and that wasn't all "What in the...?"

"Jackson... what are you?" Alexia whispered and looked at me with eyes full of shock and suspicion. In the wound's place was a tattoo of a clock face, right over my heart.

Notes

I actually had this typed up a few days ago but I wanted to be evil and leave a cliffhanger. Jackson is alive and well, don't you worry.

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