yey! it's me back again with a hero's of Olympus fanfic! anyway this is gonna be an ongoing story so when people review, I will post. hope you like it!

oh, and just letting you know that this isn't really set in any particular time in according to the book... just sort of ignore how the books are while you read this :) it'll make more sense that way.

disclaimer: anything that sounds familiar to you IS NOT MINE! like nico and leo for instance... :(

Seeing Through The Mist

Chapter 1

"Can't you go any faster?"

"Don't you think if I could pull a rocket booster from my tool belt, I would? Besides, can't you just shadow travel us somewhere?"

"Already used that trick this morning, or don't you remember?"

"Oh, how could I forget that lovely experience…Quick! Into there!"

"Are you crazy?"

"Yes! Just do it man!"

Val's point of view

"Oooh! Val, look at this one!" squealed my best friend from behind a rack of clothes that had swallowed her up.

Her blond head popped up over top of the rack and she held aloft a cute grey tank top with a black skull design on it.

"It would look perfect on you."

She walked around the rack and held it up against me, considering how I would look in the top. I shook my bangs out of my eyes, glanced over in the nearby mirror and did as she was, frowning at my reflection. My long brown hair was standing on end from all the shirts I'd been pulling over my head to try on as per Clara's orders. I think the fact that she had helped me straighten my hair before we came here had just made it even more vulnerable to static electricity. I smoothed it down and glared at myself without even meaning to. It was just something I did, with my dark brown eyes (that I've been told randomly turn green from time to time) and the shadow cast across them from my bangs, I just always looked grumpy and vaguely scary.

Back to the shirt. I liked it, I really did. But after almost four hours at the mall lugging around six shopping bags, I just couldn't seem to keep up the same energy level as Clara.

"Yeah, it's cute," I sighed.

"Humph, if you don't like it you can just say so you know," she grumbled.

"No, I do. I'm just-"

CRASH!

The next thing I knew Clara and I were both on the floor. I peered up through my bangs to see a boy about my age dressed all in black steadying the clothing rack which must have been knocked into us. There was another boy sitting on the floor a few feet away rubbing his curly head.

"You're crushing me!" came Clara's muffled cry from somewhere beneath me.

I tumbled off of Clara as she shoved me to the floor.

"Oh man, I'm so sorry!" the curly haired boy scrambled to his feet and helped Clara up with a sheepish grin.

She blew her bangs out of her eyes and glowered at him as best she could. Not that she was very intimidating with her fluffy blond hair, blue-grey eyes and petite frame.

I, on the other hand, easily glared daggers at the boy who's feet I'd been hurled at. But oddly enough, he had no trouble returning it, and made no move what-so-ever to help me up like his friend had with Clara.

With both of us still glaring, (or, I think I was still glaring, his eyes were such a deep black that I'd never seen before that I kind of zoned for a minute there) I climbed to my feet and back over towards Clara.

She was still standing with the boy who'd knocked us down, who she was assuring that she was totally fine.

When I walked over he looked at me and started all over again.

"Hey, I'm really sorry. I wasn't looking where I was going and I just ran right into the rack! You sure you girls are alright?" as he talked he fiddled with what looked like a wrench in his hands.

"We're fine."

"Okay, well that's good. Cause it would seriously suck if some pretty ladies such as yourselves got hurt."

I couldn't help but snort as Clara coughed and the boy looked over at death breath (as I'd decided to call him) and raised his eyebrows with a grin like, Can you believe our luck? But his friend just crossed his arms and scowled, like he was in the middle of something important that he wanted to get back to.

"Anyway, I'm Leo, and bone boy over there is Nico." He grinned again as he slipped something out of his tool belt and started fiddling with it. Why this kid was wearing a tool belt in a mall, I did not know.

But that wasn't exactly the weirdest thing about him. He was wearing a stained white collared shirt with suspenders holding up ripped black slacks and scuffed up leather shoes. His face was grimy and impish, with his brown hair curled around his ears and over his forehead. He was short too, not much taller than Clara was, who stood at about five foot three.

Clara and I both looked over to Nico. Like I mentioned before, he was wearing all black. Black trench coat (who wears a trench coat?), black tattered jeans, black boots and a black t-shirt that looked almost two sized too big for him with dancing skeletons on it. From my standing vantage point I couldn't even see his eyes anymore because they were covered by long, unruly-you guessed it!-black hair.

"Look, Leo," Nico began, "Don't you think we should-"

That was all he managed before the front window of the store exploded.

Okay so, I guess it didn't really explode, it just…shattered explosively. And I know that store windows don't usually explode for no reason, but I guess it all depends on what you can see through the mist.

For instance, regular mortals probably wouldn't see the giant beast come crashing through the display window like I had. They probably just saw a faulty window breaking, or a renegade animal from the pet store bursting in. No four headed serpent monster entered their line of vision, though something did judging by the way everyone was staring at the beast, but it definitely wasn't the hydra that we saw.

"Dude, is this thing for real?" Leo complained. "Doesn't it ever give up?"

"Get down!" Nico yelled, shoving me back to the ground along with Clara.

I landed with a grunt on top of some of my dropped shopping bags beside Clara as Nico and Leo both stepped in front of us.

Clara and I shared a look as the two boys split up to divide the monsters' attention.

"You see it too right?" she mumbled.

"Kinda hard to miss if you ask me."

The hydra definitely looked real enough. It had a fat, lizard-like body with sharp talons meant for shredding meals. The thing had obviously seen better days, because it was missing half of one of its hind legs-which gave it a strange sort of limp-as well as two heads. The residue left over from the decapitated heads was just two stumps burned to a crisp at the ends that dangled limply from the body of the monster.

Clara and I both scuttled backwards to the nearest clothing rack before we slowly got up. We watched as Nico and Leo taunted the beast until they were within striking distance.

Leo wielded a huge hammer that he swung from side to side and yelled crazy things in an attempt to keep the monsters' attention focused on him. Meanwhile Nico had armed himself with an obsidian sword at least three feet long that he must have pulled it out from underneath his coat.

I guess that's why he wears a trench coat…

As Leo kept the monsters' attention, Nico snuck up behind the thing and leapt onto its back, aiming to send his sword straight through its chest. But the hydra reared up and whipped its tail around and lashed Nico across his back, sending him tumbling off its back and under a circular clothing rack which toppled down on top of him as he took out the support.

"Nico!" Leo yelled, and as his focus was currently on his downed buddy, the hydra's tail whipped around and swiped Leo off his feet.

It raised one of its clawed forelegs and prepared to disembowel Leo. Just before he was ripped to shreds, he rolled out of the way and laid both his hands on the hydra's scaly leg.

"That's it buddy! You mess with us, you're gonna get burned!"

As soon as his hands made contact with the monsters' flesh, a white hot blaze started.

Clara made a strangled noise from beside me as the hydra withered and hissed as Leo burned it.

It finally managed to bat him away with its other leg, and Leo went flying towards a wall full of clothes hanging from metal bars protruding from the entire surface.

He hit one of the highest bars, colliding with a mass of t-shirts and scarves twisted around hangers and started to fall.

Clara covered her mouth and I felt my eyes bulge. He was at least ten feet up in the air and if he fell he would probably break more than a few of his bones.

But just as gravity took hold he jerked to a stop and was suspended nearly upside down as the collar of his shirt caught on the bar.

"Leo!" Clara shrieked, surging forward to help but I pulled her back as soon as the hydra turned in our direction at the sound of her voice. I didn't want my best friend becoming hydra chow.

"Leave him! He'll be fine!" Nico yelled from where he'd apparently dug himself out of the clothes pile and was fending off hydra heads.

"Oh, thanks bro!" Leo yelled as he struggled not to slip out of his shirt from atop the wall. "Just let me fall out of this stupid thing why don't you? Or, better yet," he continued as there was a ripping sound and he jerked downwards an inch or two, "Let's wait until my shirt rips! Shouldn't be long now, don't worry!"

He squirmed around more trying to disentangle himself from the bar, making his shirt rip even more.

"Stop squirming you idiot!"

"Yeah! You're just making it worse!"

Know him or not, Nico was busy fighting the monster, so someone had to take charge and yell at this kid.

He looked down at us and pouted.

"But then how am I going to get down?" he complained.

"Oh, I didn't know you wanted to fall down, did you Clara?" I asked sarcastically.

"You know, I didn't," Clara mused. "But I mean, you could if you wanted." She shrugged as she glanced up at him.

Both of us stared up at him as his shirt ripped even farther.

"Grr! Okay fine! What do I do?" he cried.

"Just wait! We'll get you down!" I turned to Clara. "Do you see a latter?"

She pursed her lips and scanned the store anxiously. She made a nervous sound as she spotted Nico and the hydra battling it out on the other side of the store. Everyone else had fled, and I was sure that mall security would be here soon. Nico and the monster had already trashed about three quarters of the store, only leaving a small part of it unscathed. Since Clara and I had stopped tracking the fight the monster had gained two heads and was gaining ground on Nico.

I was shocked though. Nico couldn't have been more than a hundred and fifteen pounds, but he was doing exceptionally well against a beast twice his size and weight. But he was obviously tiring. His strikes were getting sluggish and his rolls a bit more confused. As I watched, one hydra head lashed out and sunk its teeth into his thy.

"No!" Clara and I both shrieked.

He crumpled to the ground with a moan and his sword clattered away from him.

The hydra stalked forward, in no hurry to finish off his prey now that he knew it was done for. Nico groaned and tried reaching for his sword.

But it was too far.

Clara and I exchanged a panicked look as Leo wailed from above us, "What happened? What's going on?" and thrashed around, worsening his situation even more.

"Val…his sword…" Clara muttered.

"Brilliant!"

As I ducked behind a shelf and slunk around towards the back of the store, Clara stepped out into the open and yelled, "Hey ugly!"

The monster spun around and snarled. The thing was pretty beat up, with sword cuts on its scaly hide that oozed golden blood, two gouged out eyes and steam still coming off the foreleg that Leo had burned with his hands, but it was still going.

Clara kept yelling and to her credit, her voice was strong and clear, not a hint of fear penetrated it.

"Hey you big scaly dork! Come and get me!"

She picked up a sandal from a tipped over rack and threw it at the monster, hitting one of the heads and rebounding right into another.

The hydra hissed in six part harmony and regarded her uncertainly out of three of its slitted snake eyes. The other half of its attention was still on its next meal.

But I needed all of the monsters' attention on Clara so I could reach the sword that was, of course, right in the middle of one of the few clearings in the whole store. Nico moaned again and attempted to drag himself closer to his sword, attracting more of the hydra's attention.

Grr! Stupid boy! Couldn't he see me? I was only about seven feet away and directly in his line of vision. I crawled closer to him, ducking behind the different debris that littered the store. Nico looked up, and at that moment, we locked eyes. Hazel meeting pitch. Understanding flashed in his dark eyes and he relaxed, going completely still.

Now that Nico wouldn't be a distraction, all Clara had to do was get the beast's full attention so I could make it to Nico's sword.

I poked my head out around the rack of scattered sunglasses and looked at her. She looked scared but she was still standing out in the open waiting to see what would happen next.

With Nico no longer moving, the monster seemed to decide that Clara was the one to focus on at the moment. It turned fully towards her and slithered over obstacles, aiming straight at her. She looked at me in panic before she fled in the opposite direction of both the hydra and me.

Before the hydra could get too far from me, and too close to Clara, I dove for the dark sword as it lay there glistening in the bright florescent store lights.

Time seemed to slow as I neared the sword and I noticed that the light seemed to be sucked into it, disappearing into the blade. Shadows seemed to pool around it as the light was absorbed.

Just as I started to wonder what would happen to me if I touched it, if I would get sucked into it just as the light was, I clasped the hilt and did my signature ninja-roll over the sword and carried my momentum until I found myself on my feet staring at the destruction that Nico and the hydra had left in their wakes.

I stood in the very center of the clearing and glared at the beast that was chasing my best friend across the store. The leather grip of Nico's sword pulled comfortably at my hand. For some reason it felt all too natural to let out an angry yell and charge the monster, sword raised high.

It turned as I neared, zeroed in on my sword and forgot all about Clara.

Good.

It hissed and spat as I leapt, dodging its thrashing heads and driving the sword straight in between the base of two of its necks.

The monster howled and bucked the best it could to try and throw me. Unfortunately for both of us, it worked.

I flipped over the sword, somehow keeping my grip on the hilt as I was jerked towards the monsters' rear. Ignoring the fire like pain in both my shoulders as I held onto the sword as tightly as I could, I brought it with me as I was torn backwards and off the monster.

The hydra wailed and hissed and withered before it dissolved into a pile of steaming yellow powder.

I watched as it disintegrated before my blurry eyes from where I'd been thrown against the wall, smacking my head with a loud crack which could have been either my skull or the plaster. Not sure which though…

The last thing I remember before I blacked out was Clara leaning over me while yelling something I couldn't hear at someone I couldn't see.

She looked angry as hell and quite frankly, I felt bad for whoever was on the receiving end of her fury.

Next I saw Leo and a half-conscious Nico hobble into view behind Clara. Nico muttered something, his white face now a sickly shade of grey, and Leo's white shirt ripped so much so that is hung off one shoulder and the other part met up just below his elbow.

Then Clara moved back and Nico reached out. I'm not sure why I didn't want him to touch me, I just felt like something would be taken from me if he did, like something would end.

I managed to turn my head before his finger made contact with my forehead, and he faltered.

"Val, calm down, he's gonna help," Clara scolded from somewhere far away.

With a scowl I decided to trust Clara for once, and I slowly turned back to Nico with a wary gaze. He extended his index finger and placed it to the middle of my forehead.

With that, it seemed I fell into his eyes, and everything went black.

thanks for reading! don't forget to review! XD