Hatred causes unfortunate events

[ Luke pov ]

Hanging over a pot with burning water, Luke couldn't help but hate himself. When he heard his father's voice coming from the alley, it was as if his mind went blank with rage and he immediately launched himself at him, only to be met by two cyclops who grabbed him and took him away. He looked at his sides and found Thalia, Christina and Grover dangling over the pot as well, all tied with ropes.

If only he hadn't lowered his guard because of his hatred, none of this would have happened. He already knew cyclops could imitate voices, even if they rarely used this skill, so falling to something like this felt terrible, especially because they had practised this exact scenario countless times over the past months.

Focusing on his family's faces, he could see Thalia looking everywhere, most likely either trying to find an exit or making sure Annabeth, who was the only one who hadn't been caught, didn't appear, while also trying to free herself from the ropes, even though doing it would mean she would fall to the boiling water.

Christina on the other hand wasn't doing so good, her eyes were focused on the boiling water below while drops of sweat made their way across her body. For some reason she seemed scared, terrified even. He couldn't actually blame her though, they were about to be boiled alive to later be devoured by monsters, but still there was something strange about it. They avoided talking about their deepest fears, focusing on more... lively topics, but he had noticed over time that Christina usually avoided getting to deep into lakes or rivers, could she perhaps be afraid of the water? No that didn't make much sense... then afraid of drowning perhaps?

Pulling his thoughts away from this ideas, Luke began thinking of what they could do to survive, of what he could do to save them. Honestly, seeing Christina look down terrified broke his heart, and seeing Thalia desperately struggle against the ropes made him feel miserable.

Suddenly, a scream filled with pain was heard throughout the building, bringing everyone's attention to the same spot. From behind the door, a cyclops stumbled into the room while holding his bloodied feet in agony. A small dagger was launched in the direction of one of the other four cyclops in the room, hitting the monster in the single eye and causing it to drop to it's knees while swinging his hands around and screaming.

One of the monster's movements hit the pot, causing the boiling water to spill on the floor and making the fire underneath it expand through the floor and into the walls. The room in which the fire was expanding was filled with the screams of two different cyclops as well as the angry roars fo the other three monsters.

Truthfully Luke was scared, he had an inkling Annabeth was the one who did this in order to save them, basically causing a distraction to get them out, but things were out of control. The fire was expanding, starting to consume the ceiling as well as the walls, and he had no idea of what to do to save his family.

Two of the three cyclops left the burning room and went outside to fight whoever was responsible for this, the remaining one went to grab their food, a.k.a. Luke and his family, to eat them later. Just as the cyclops was getting closer to them, the walls started creaking and the wood of the floor was beginning to show cracks on it. As the monster made its way closer to them, the floor finally yielded, creating a hole into the lower floor and dropping him into it, however he didn't go alone, managing to grab Christina just before he went down.

"Christina!" screamed Luke, his lungs filling with a bit of the smoke in the air and making him cough.

Luke looked down into the hole created by the weight of the monster that took his sister with rage and despair, while the fire continued growing and started moving down as well, threatening to consume the room to which the monster and Christina had fallen as well.

After what felt like an eternity of waiting, Luke could feel his wrists getting hotter and hotter, looking up he saw the rope which held him on fire. A sudden idea surfaced on his mind, as he began to do his best to break free by moving as much as possible and break the already partially burnt rope.

Smoke continued to fill his lungs, slowly but surely tiring him out. The pain on his wrists became unbearable, forcing him to bite his lip and keep going through the pain. Finally, after what felt like another eternity, the rope yielded and broke, making him fall to the floor, right next to the hole.

Once he was free, Luke got up and went to free Thalia as well, who had been thrusting around in her ropes to no avail. As soon as they were both free, they moved in Grover's direction and freed him as well before looking at each other. Thalia nodded without saying a word while holding the dagger that went through the cyclops eye, it was Annabeth's dagger, which meant she was the one who came to save them.

Thalia left the room after coming to a silent agreement with Luke, she would go out to kill the other cyclops and help Annabeth, while Luke saved Christina. Luke looked at Thalia's back while she was leaving and indicated Grover to go with her, causing the satyr to nod nervously.

When the two left, Luke looked into the hole and saw a room filled with fire, an absolute inferno that promised nothing but pain and death. Clenching his fists tightly while steeling his mind, Luke inhaled the smoke that now filled the room once more before jumping in.

It was his hatred that caused this, so the least he could do was fight thought the pain and save the ones he loved.