"Percy..." Nico was standing in a meadow of lavender flowers, dark Greek style armor covering his muscular body. He was about twenty years old now, taller, and in the reflection of the small stream that separated him from the person across him he could have sworn at first glance was his father. Like an marble statue carved by the best craftsman, his skin gleamed in sweat, his breath coming out in heavy huffs like he had just ran through fire and brimstone, his greasy black hair tied back in a short ponytail. "Percy Jackson, please, listen to me."

The older boy was across from him, his black hair flowing in waves around his creamy tan skin, his armor stripped off and thrown to the side so he was stark naked in the full moon's glow. He knelt in the soft grass, a dagger in his hands with a something on the very tip of it. A mantary tail. "Nico, I have to..." He looked up at the Ghost King, his normal sparkle dying in is deep sea eyes. "You know how the story goes."

Nico shook his head. "Precious, please, there is always another way! We can find it! Together!" His voice sounded desperate, like a child's. " don't throw away your life to appease your father! Poseidon wouldn't want his own son's death to be in his name!"

Nico set one foot into the stream, daring to cross it to get to his best friend. He wasn't going to loose that one person he cared the most for in his life. Not again. He had lost too many in the past to let this happen in front of him. But as soon as his foot touched the water, Percy set the stream into a frenzy that forced him to step out and back away.

"Please, Nico... Don't stop me." Raising the dagger in the air, he hesitated. He couldn't feel those dark auburn eyes stare into him, burring holes into his already scared skin. Then, he forced his hands to move, to stab himself in the chest.

But just before the blade could get close enough to pierce skin, Nico screamed across the small gap in a final effort to save his friend from himself.

"No! Percy!" Nico was on his knees, eye level with the defeated son of the sea god, pleading with him. Tears were forming in his eyes. "I can't lose you, too!" Percy stopped, looking up at Nico shocked. He stared at his friend, his half-cousin, his right hand in battle, the only one who stood by him when he needed someone the most, with hallow eyes that reminded Nico of the spirits he would call on for guidance. "Don't leave me here on this earth without you!" Nico screamed, his sobs catching in his throat as he tired to speak through them. "I-I- Percy, I-"

Percy's smile caught him off guard, silencing the poor son of Hades in shock. "I know Nico Di Angelo." Lifting the knife again, a tear escaped his eyes as he tried to keep the smile from fading from his lips. "I love you too." And as Nico watched in horror, Percy Jackson stabbed himself through the heart.

Nico bolted upright in his bed, screaming in horror at the nightmare that had he had fallen into. Looking around in a panic, he took deep breaths to calm himself down. He wasn't in the lavender field anymore, but in the Hades cabin safe in a black sheeted bed. The room's darkness enclosed around him like a security blanket as he forced himself to shake off the fear that was clouding his mind. That dream had been too real, too real for his liking.

Nico untangled himself from his covers, whipping off the cold sweat that was covering his body and making his boxers stick to his skin uncomfortably. He began to pace the cabin floor in frustration, the nightmare playing like a broken record over and over in his head. There were too many things that were horribly real, the dagger, the lavender field, the armor, everything! He remembered Grover taking them to the field when they were looking for a place for Percy and Annabeth to go on a picnic a few years back. Nico had always wandered back there when he wanted to be there was the dagger. Last time Percy had him over to the Poseidon cabin, he had noticed the dagger in a glass case, made from the spear-tip of Odysseus' murder weapon. And the armor was hanging in his room, or at least his armor was. It was made specially by Hephaestus himself. Percy and Jason both had matching ones, theirs representing their fathers as well.

"But why did I dream that?" Nico stopped pacing, his overloading mind rummaging through all the reasons before it started to blow a fuse. "Oh, gods. Now I got a headache." Groaning from the splitting pain, he looked at the digital clock by his bed. 12:30 A.M. "Perfect. Jus perfect."

"Well, not the kind of welcome I was hoping for, but I'll take it."

Nico jumped out of his skin, whirling on his heels to see what the hell had said that, when he stopped. In the doorway was Percy Jackson, leaning on the frame like nothing was wrong. Nico's heart skipped a beat as his cheeks began to burn.

"You mother-"

"Keep it PG-13, Nico." Percy interrupted, smirking a little as he looked him up and down. "Nice boxers by the way. Red suites you."

Nico blushed a little darker, going to his closet and pulling out a pair of pants. "I swear to the Gods, you have to be shadow traveling with how silent you are now." Nico said as he slipped on his ghost pajama bottoms that Percy had given to him for Christmas the year before.

"I learned from the king of Sneak himself, so I take your sass as a complement." Percy said with a big grin on his face. Nico sat on the bed, rubbing his temple in one hand and beckoning Percy to come in with the other. Percy plopped down on the bed beside him, a little closer than Nico was comfortable with. "Now, you gunna tell me why you were screaming, or am I going to have to really start worrying?"

Nico groaned a little more, this time from embarrassment. "You heard me scream all the way from the Main House?"

Percy smiled a little. "Nah." Nico couldn't help but notice that his friends ocean colored eyes glowed in the darkness of the room. "I actually had a bad dream and was walking around to try to shake it off when I heard you scream."

Nico arched an eyebrow. "Oh?"

"Yeah," Percy said, little uncomfortably it seemed. "You were in it."

Nico's eyebrows shot up, his hand onPercy's shoulder. "What happened?" Nico had a sinking feeling he already knew, but decided that it should be Percy to say it out loud.

"Well... you know the story of how Orpheus tried to bring back his wife Eurydice from the Underworld?" Nico nodded. "Well, and this is going to sound completely silly and stupid, but imagine that you were Eurydice and I was Orpheus on the last leg of the adventure."

"You mean when he looked back and lost her forever, right?" Nico asked.

"Yeah. That part." Percy sighed. " I turned my head to see if you were behind me, and I watched in horror as you were dragged back down into the Underworld. I woke up with the sudden urge to chase after you." Nico blushed a little.

"Well, at least you didn't dream-" Nico stopped. He didn't want to tell Percy he had seen him die. That would explaining a little bit and he wasn't going to tell him exactly what the dream had taken a turn to.

"My dream didn't what, Nico?" Percy asked.

Nico kept silent a few minutes, Percy waiting patently as his younger demigod friend to figure out how to tell it. " You know the tale of how Odysseus died." Percy didn't like were this was going. "Well, you kinda used that dagger to kill yourself to appease your dad... it was... horrible." Nico could feel Percy's gaze on him.

They sat in the darkness in silence for a little bit. Percy twiddled his thumbs while Nico chewed on his bottom lip. "We really need to stop teaching Mythology 101 together." Percy finally said.

"Hey, the campers like it." Nico stated. "And besides, its Chiron's idea to have us teach mythology and fighting here. Not ours."

"I know." Percy said, messing up Nico's hair like he used to, laughing a little. "But hey, maybe mythology is getting into our heads a little too much."

"Percy, we are living mythology." Nico said sarcastically. "We are the Mythology tales we tell for Hades sake!"

Percy sighed. "Yeah... Hey," Percy looked at Nico a little, a small blush on his face. "Do you think those Aphrodite girls are the ones giving us these dreams?"

Nico did a face-palm, groaning in complete annoyance. "I wouldn't be surprised. They have been shipping us like fangirls all summer long."

"Maybe we should talk to them about that obsession... It's probably not a healthy one for them."

"Yeah. Maybe..." Nico looked at Percy, a small little smile on his face. "Hey, can I ask you something?"

"Sure." Percy said without hesitation.

" Do you, you know, 'ship' us?" Nico asked, to Percy's surprise.

"Uhhhhhh, I guess? I'm not sure that were an OTP or whatever the term they use is, but I wouldn't mind that." Percy stated, a little uncomfortably as he admitted it.

"Really?"

"Yeah. I mean, the basics of a good relationship is a strong bond of friendship." Percy smiled a little, blushing a little. " And, well, it wouldn't be that weird since we are, like, practically like brothers-" Nico hugged him, squeezing him tightly. "Wow, wow, wow! What's the meaning behind this!?" Percy asked in surprise, stiffening under his friends surprise embrace.

"Percy, I love you!"

"WWWHHHHHHHAAAAAAATTTTTTT?!"

"Oh shit."