#just a scene thats been boiling in my head rhe last couple days

[happyk44]

Nico agreeing when Percy first suggests he stay at camp. Percy wakes up in the middle of the night to a cold chill dripping down his spine. Panic hits him - more monsters?

But, no.

It's Bianca. She's standing, ghostly, on his floor. Her form is flickering in and out. Her gaze is firmly planted on the window, staring out at something.

He grabs Riptide and joins her. She says nothing as he pushes back the seashell curtain and catches sight of what she was looking at, what she wanted him to see.

Nico. Trudging off towards the trees.

Shit, Percy thinks as he rushes out the door. Nico doesn't even startle when he grabs his shoulder and pulls him to a stop. There's a sleeping bag tucked under his arm. His lips are downturned. He won't meet Percy's eyes.

"Where-" He exhales sharply. "Where you going?"

Nico kicks the dirt. "Home."

Percy grits his teeth and focuses on his breathing. "I thought you said you were gonna give it a shot. You know - staying here, being a camper." He gives Nico a friendly punch to the shoulder. "Making some friends."

"The friends thing was you," Nico mutters. He glanced past Percy, to Cabin Eleven. "I don't want to stay some place I can't sleep."

Brows furrowing, Percy crosses his arms. "What are you talking about?"

"Travis asked me to leave," Nico says, and a strange sense of calm washes over Percy like the trickling of water right before the burst of a dam. "Some of the others aren't comfortable with me there. They won't go to sleep. Or can't. I don't know." He stares at the ground. "He suggested I go sleep in the Big House."

"Then why-"

"I already asked Chiron about that," Nico cuts in. He tilts his head upwards, eye angry, defiant. They're like the endless void. "He said no. Can't show favouritism or something like that." He shoves the sleeping bag into Percy's hands. "So I'm going home. To my father."

Percy squeezes the bag in his hand so tight he fears it might burst on him. What's even in a sleeping bag, he wonders. "But-"

"But nothing. I don't need to try with these people." He slaps his chest firmly. "My siblings tried for centuries to fit in and all it got us was ostracized, bullied, or dead." Angrily, he points over to Cabin Eleven. The ground tumbles under his feet. "You think this is the first time we've been kicked out of that stupid cabin?"

Percy squeezes the bag tighter. Behind him, he can feel eyes watching him. Staring. Bianca, or maybe someone else, hidden deep in the shadows. Just waiting.

Nico stares at Percy with vicious eyes and sharper teeth. "Everyone thinks my father is some kind of inherent danger, and that, as his child, I must be too. Don't pretend you don't agree."

The bag drops from his hands as the air turns cold and frosty on his skin. "I don't believe you're dangerous!"

"You thought I wanted to kill you!" Nico seethes through clenched teeth. Percy withdraws and catches his breath. Anger has turned to pain, sadness, in Nico's eyes, his lips trembling. "You thought-" His voice cuts out with a strangled little noise that burns like a geyser right through Percy's core.

Bianca shimmers behind him. Her eyes are a void, drowning Percy as he looks at her. If Nico senses his sister, he doesn't show, but still Percy feels something watching his back.

Her voice echoed inside his head. Didn't you say you'd protect him? The darkness around them seems to come alive, tickling at his senses. Goosebumps litter up his arms. If you want him as safe as I do, let him go home. We have never been welcome here.

She disappears and the void breaks. Percy breathes.

"Okay," he says. With wet eyes, Nico blinks up at him. "It's not like I can stop you and... I go home at the end of every summer too so. Unfair for me to tell you not to. Just. Don't go around befriending anymore creepy ghosts, okay?"

It's quiet for just a moment. Then Nico nods sharply and turns on his heels. The darkness beckons him forward with twisted ink.

Percy runs and catches him on the shoulder once more. "I didn't think you wanted to me kill because I thought you were dangerous. I had this dream..." He trails off, unsure of how to explain.

"Dreams can lie, Percy," Nico says. He tilts his face away from him. Shadows cast across his pale skin, almost hiding him from view. "My dreams lie all the time."

"Yeah, but." Percy swallows. He shakes his head. "It doesn't matter. Everything- We're fine, okay? I. You- Just. Stay safe and call me. If you need help."

The shadows don't pull back from Nico's face and his stony silence as Percy pulls away from him is as unreadable to Percy as a college level textbook. The shadows pull around Nico, almost like a hug, and he's gone. The darkness fades and spreads out.

Like nothing happened.