Chapter Text
"Nico, I need you to understand." Nico wakes up again. He has been having weird dreams lately, most of which he cannot seem to remember. He listens to the shuffling of the other cabin mates. While the Hermes cabin had been welcoming… it was also overcrowded.
When he first arrived, it was great. He is still annoyed at his sister. But he got to learn cool new stuff that will definitely be useful next time he plays Mythomagic. But lately, he has been feeling weird. It feels like he has lost something that he cannot recall. He has lost most of his belongings. He doubts the camp will send campers to get some clothes and books. Besides, he has only had that stuff for a while, anyway.
No, this felt different than that. It is almost like grief, but he does not know why. This is not the first time he has felt this; he feels it quite often, but he does not like to think about it.
Nico decided to get up from his sleeping bag. He wondered what time it was. He walked past the other sleeping boys and tip-toed outside. He did not even have shoes on. He walked on the grass with just socks on. He probably was not supposed to be doing this. At school, he would be breaking the rules. He was not even cold. He should be freezing, but he could not shake the other feeling—the dread in the pit of his stomach.
He sits down on the grass outside and feels the night air. He has never been scared of the dark, and besides, the moon is out now. He closes his eyes. Nico starts to whisper a prayer for his sister and the others on their quest to St. Christopher, the holy patron of travelers. He falls asleep shortly after.
"Nico. I am sorry ."
The dream again.
They are in The Hotel. They stand next to the Dance Dance Revolution arcade game. He starts to type out 'NBDA' on the high score. He turns to show her. Bianca looks different now tho . She is not wearing the clothes they used to wear. He looks down and is wearing a bright orange shirt. She is wearing the outfit she left on the quest with. This doesn't seem right.
Bianca grabs him and hugs him. She is talking to him, and he tries to make out what she says. She is no longer clean; she is dirty.
"I didn't mean to," she tells him, squishing his face with her hands. She looks desperate.
"What are you talking about? we got the high score?" Nico looks at her closely now. She is pale, but is that blood or dirt? Bianca hated dirt.
"I thought I was coming back. I thought you would be safe." She is almost frantic. He had never seen her like this before. He notices it is blood; her nose is bleeding.
"What are you talking about?" He's scared. She holds his face tightly, and he wants her to let go.
"Nico. I am sorry. I'm not coming back."
Nico jerks awake; sweat covers his body despite the chill in the air. As the sun rises, he looks around; there is low light. Bianca's voice remains in his head: I'm not coming back. The first of many nightmares he started to remember.
****
"I know more now."
"Know what? Where are you?! What do you look hurt?!"
****
"Tell me where you are?"
"Nico, you won't be able to find me. Ever."
****
"I love you, Nico. Don't think I did not love you."
"I love you too."
***
"Nico. I am dead. I am not coming back."
"You are lying."
***
Nico does not understand the dreams. He has never had this many nightmares before. He prays every night for his sister and her safety. He starts to try not to sleep after the last nightmare. He does not know why he is having these nightmares. They don't make sense. He never had dreams at all, and now all he does is see his sister. She always looks sad. She always tries to tell him she loves him. She always tries to tell her she is dead.
But that cannot be true. Percy Jackson said he would protect her. Percy promised that he would keep her safe. Nico had asked the other's about Percy Jackson. He had done the impossible. He was a son of Poseidon (which is rare). He had gone to the Underworld and retrieved Zeus's stolen lightning bolt. He had brought his mom back from the Underworld. He had brought Thalia back from the dead, too. So, there is no way he let Bianca die. Everyone in the camp agrees he is the best hero.
"Did you hear Percy and the others? They are back!" Nico does not even know who told him this. The second he hears it, he runs to the Big House. He smiles to himself as he runs. He cannot wait to see his sister and hear all about her quest, and then he will tell her about his dreams. She would call him dumb for believing in his dreams. He jumps up the stairs of the porch two at a time.
He burst into the room, attempting to catch his breath. He sees Percy, Annabeth, Chiron, and older campers he has not met. He does not see any of the Hunters or his sister.
"Hey! Where's my sister?" Nico looks at Percy because Percy would know where she is. He looks pained. Maybe he got hurt.
No one spoke for a second.
"Hey, Nico." Percy got up from a chair. "Let's take a walk, okay? We need to talk."
****
"She died saving us."
Nico did not speak—not the entire time. It was not that it was a long explanation, but it felt like an internality. Percy kept looking at him, like he wanted Nico to say something.
"She wanted you to have this." Percy pulls out the little god figurine Bianca had found in the junkyard.
Nico held it in his palm and stared at it. Tears fill his eyes.
Even with the camp's magical weather protection, the wind was bitter cold. Snow fell lightly against the marble steps.
"You promised you would protect her," Nico said. He stopped looking at the figure and looked up at Percy.
"Nico, I tried. But Bianca gave herself up to save the rest of us. I told her not to. But she—"
"You promised!" Nico screamed. Tears were now flowing down his face. He glares at Percy; he grips the god figure in his hand hard. He wanted it to hurt, but it did nothing to stop the pain he already felt. "I shouldn't have trusted you...My nightmares were right!"
"Nightmares, what nightmares?" Percy asked Nico.
"What does it matter now?" Nico throws the god figure on the ground, and it slides across the marble floor. "I hate you!" he screams, but he is not sure if his scream is directed at Percy or the figure.
"She might still be alive... we cannot be sure." Percy tries to walk closer to him. Nico backs away, shaking.
"She's dead." He closes his eyes. His whole body trembles with rage. "I should've known it earlier. She told me she wasn't coming back." He can feel it. He can feel her soul. He has never felt this much of anything before. "She's in the Fields of Asphodel, standing before the judges right now, being evaluated. I can feel it."
'I'm not coming back.'
"What do you mean, you can feel it?" Percy asks him.
Nico could no longer hear him. He could only feel rage and sadness. He felt something new. He wanted to feel nothing at all. He pressed his hands into him, trying to focus on feeling nothing. He felt the tears from crying. The ground felt like it was shaking. He looked up to see Percy. He was standing there with his sword out, and a skeleton was behind him. Both of them were coming at Nico.
Nico could not breathe, and more skeletons appeared.
"You're trying to kill me!" Nico screams. "You brought these… these things?"
"No!" Percy is shifting between looking at the skeletons and looking at Nico. "I mean, they followed me, but no! Nico, run. They can't be destroyed." Percy puts himself between Nico and the skeletons, who move closer and closer.
"I don't trust you!" Nico backs himself towards a corner.
"Nico! Run and get help." Percy slashes at the skeletons, but they are either unfazed or picking themselves off the ground.
Nico is still struggling to breathe. He cannot move nor stop the ground under his feet from shaking. Where would he run? His sister is dead, and Percy Jackson cannot be trusted.
"No!" Nico shouted louder. "Go away!" Nico throws his hand in shoving motions.
The skeletons froze and turned their heads to look at Nico. A few seemed to nod, but the ground was shaking so much Percy could not tell if that was what was causing it.
Percy saw the ground start to crack and roll out of the way just as a crack opened at the feet of the four warriors. The ground ripped apart, flames erupted from the fissure, and the earth swallowed the skeletons.
Silence.
A twenty-foot-long scar wove across the marble floor of the pavilion where the skeletons had stood. Otherwise, there was no sign of the warriors.
Percy looks at where Nico is. "How did you do that?"
"Go away! I hate you! I wish you were dead!" Nico covers his ears. "Why won't you stop?" he yells again.
"Nico!" Percy starts to move towards him.
Nico glares at him and runs out of the pavilion towards the wood.
Percy attempted to follow but slipped on something and fell to the ground. He watched as Nico disappeared into the darkness of the woods.
"Nico!"
Percy reached for the figure that Nico had thrown, and Percy slipped on it. He honestly had not looked at it til now. He read the craving on the figure: Hades God of the Dead.
Percy looks back at where Nico had run.
***
Nico did not know where he was going. He ran deeper into the woods. He had nowhere else to go. He just knew he did not want to be here. He wanted to be anywhere but here. He would take The Hotel over Camp Half-Blood any day. He wanted his sister, but she wouldn't come back. He could hear Percy and Annabeth call for him.
"I'm not coming back."
Her voice rang in his head.
"Neither am I."
Nico stepped into the shadows and felt himself disappear.
***