open the door to heaven or hell | start of kalirius (also known as "ur butt and my butt look great 2gether")

asphodel.
there was no denying that when kalina thought of death, she had been hoping for elysium-- she'd also been hoping she would have enough courage to stand before the judges. life (or death?) however, was funny like that. she had stood in the queue, and she'd realized just before entering their tent... she couldn't go through with it. she couldn't run the risk of the fields of punishment, and she couldn't get to elysium without going through the judges.
and so, she had ended up in asphodel.
there were a lot of places she would have preferred to be. if she had stayed above ground in camp, sure, she would have been haunting everyone and she'd never have been seen again-- but she would have been in sunlight. she would have been able to imagine the warmth, the breeze, the smell of strawberries. here, all she was surrounded by were thousands, millions of souls, all of who had one defining trait-- they were miserable.
she hoped she was different, in a sense. she hoped she was happier. yet, there was no denying the truth-- if you leave a sunflower in a darkened place for too long, it will wither. and kalina was withering. her smile had long since fallen, her drive to speak to as many people and ease their suffering was slowly being extinguished. instead she wandered, like all of the other souls. she walked, and she walked, and even when she felt that she could walk no more, she continued-- because there was nothing else to do.
sobs, however, stopped her. she had been wandering for what felt like eons, yet the sound of someone crying... someone else crying, that is, because there was so many people here crying-- it drew her. there was something different about these sobs. something she couldn't quite pinpoint, and she allowed the sound to lead her through a grove of dark and wretched trees, laying eyes upon a dark haired boy who was much too familiar.
"tiberius?"
a fellow cabin leader, he was nothing more. he didn't need to attend her funeral-- but he had. and kalina owed him for that, she owed him for his kind words. moving forward (or, more like floating forwards-- she felt as if she could fly down here, yet the one place she couldn't fly was up, up towards life), the brunette girl fell to her knees beside him, one hand reaching forward to rest upon a wet shoulder... there was a moment she thought she would go right through him, because surely he couldn't be dead too, but it rested there in place.
"i'm sorry that you're here."

tiberius winters wasn’t surrounded by water. tiberius winters was dead. and now, tiberius winters was falling. 

falling miles and miles through seemingly endless blackness did not do anything to dry his clothes or body, for when he landed on the cold hard ground, his clothes still stuck to him. when he stood up, people were staring at him, and ty stared back. where was he? what would become of him? it was dark. so dark. dark enough that it turned your bones to shadows and your words to ashes. a boat stood in obsidian water, smooth as glass. tibs got in the long line, sticking his hand in his wet pocket, feeling around for money to distract himself. what would charlotte think when he never returned home? who would care for his siblings now that he was dead? who would run the cabin? he tapped his foot on the slate coloured ground, and after a couple of minutes a stern, weathered old looking man jabbed him in the back. “could ya stop that, laddie? me ears cannot take another one o’ yer bloody taps.” his voice was rough like rocks, grumbling like a terrible machine. tiberius’ voice was weak and high pitched compared to his, lacking the authority it needed.

“yes, sir. sorry, sir. won’t happen again, sir.” ty looked at the ground, standing completely still, afraid that if he made even the slightest movement the man would get angry again. even in death, when no harm could come to you because you were already… well… dead, tibs still hated the idea of getting hurt. he stood there, moving only to climb up the line. he paid the ferryman with his last gold drachma and boarded the boat. lake water dripped from his hair and into his eyes, which were red and itchy and hurt. ty rubbed them and found tears to be coming out from them. he hardly ever cried, but he supposed this was the only instance in which it was okay. when he got off the ferry, he saw a big building, greek fire pouring out of torches, lighting the way. the judges were in there, and tiberius couldn’t face them. he was always a coward, and nothing had changed. he could imagine their long, horselike, bony faces, sticking out from behind dark veils, laughing and mocking him. besides, there was no room in elysium for a skinny, gaunt boy who had done nothing heroic in his life. so ty just ran into the fields of asphodel. he ran and ran and ran. his feet never hurt, and the only wetness that fell from his face was from the water. it was damp and cold in the underworld, not hot as most people would imagine. 

eventually tiberius tripped over a tree root and somersaulted into the trunk. he sat there, at first screaming. screaming because he had let so many people down. screaming because he was a coward. just screaming at everything. and then, when his vocal chords, like everything else, had failed him, he cried. ty didn’t know how long he had cried for, only that at some point, a familiar voice came to him. a hand was placed on his soaked shoulder. and tibs looked up from his self made ball of pity, trying to find the face that the voice belonged to. it was kalina. the former cabin leader of hera. even in death, she still looked lovely. “k-kalina?” tibs pulled her into a tight hug, forgetting that it wasn’t appropriate to hug a girl you’d only talked to when she was in a coffin. but right now, tiberius just needed comfort. he needed to know that somebody he knew was here, however cruel that may have sounded. “you’re… you’re here… oh my g-gods… you’re here…”