Please don't ask me what this is. I really don't know. Random oneshot that can definitely be counted by you, the readers, as Plot? What Plot? It has no plot. It has no point. But my brain demanded it must be and so here we are. See what you make of it. Enjoy, do not enjoy, I don't mind. I'm just pleased this is posted now so I can sleep.
Set ten years after The Titan's Curse and remember: I own nothing.
Mission to Marzipan.
Nico took another sip of his coffee, only to find that he had pretty much emptied his mug without realising it. He looked accusingly down into the ceramic emptiness, angry with the coffee for deserting him, and swirled the dregs around the bottom like a tealeaf reader. Answers in the bottom of a coffee mug. Now there was a novel concept. He sighed and gently placed it on a coaster on the windowsill then resumed his leaning against the wall and staring aimlessly down into the alleyway below at the frozen peaks of grey slush that passed for snow in the middle of New York City.
He didn't even know how long he'd been here. The sun was taking its time rising because it was so late in the year and it had only just started to make an appearance in the pearly-white sky. It was already veiled with light grey clouds draped across it like cobwebs. He hadn't needed the weatherman telling him last night in the most ridiculously over-chipper voice of someone paid enough to be driven home to an apartment where the thermostat could be turned up as high as he wanted that more snow was on the way.
Nothing seemed to exist besides him and his thoughts for the moment. He was sitting here staring out at an entire city and even that didn't seem to be genuinely there. It didn't seem plausible that everything else could continue to exist when everything had come to a screeching halt for him. It was selfish, he knew, to expect the universe to smack into a brick wall just because he'd lost somebody, but he was passed caring. Over the years he'd learnt to manage his pain and deal with Bianca's death, but occasionally it still turned around and whacked him repeatedly in the chest with a two-by-four. Today was one of those days because today marked ten years since Bianca had left him.
He poked at the base of his mug until it was sitting in the exact middle of the coaster before twisting it so the handle faced the window, then changing his mind and pointing the handle to the left. As he double-checked to make sure it was dead centre, he looked down at the potted plant next to his mug and twisted a leaf between his fingers, plucking it from its stalk. He dropped it to the floor before repeating the motion. The slightly threadbare rug at his feet was soon littered with the plant's leaves as if they were corpses on a battle field, and if there was one thing he knew, it was corpses on a battlefield. There was a leaf on his bare foot and they were threatening to overwhelm the rug. He had no real awareness of what he was doing, or why he was doing it, other than using the age-old, tried and tested method of shredding plants in the aid of divination. There's a point to existing, there's not a point to existing. There's a point to existing… He crinkled his forehead, trying to remember if the plant's last leaf was telling him to live or not, but he'd lost track.
Looking at his mug, he decided that even the measliest of dregs at the bottom had value and took the last frigid half a sip, wrinkling his nose a little at the gritty, granular taste of grounds. He rolled a leaf between his fingers, slowly increasing the pressure until it was crushed and oozed sap, making his hands sticky.
There is a point to existing. Somewhere. Just look for it. Hard. Harder.
There was something about realising that a whole decade had passed since Bianca had died, that he had lived an entire ten years without her, growing ten years older, wiser and more cynical, that had pushed him into feeling like this. She was his older sister and she just plain wasn't here with him anymore. Although he had made peace with her death a long time ago, this particular anniversary was hitting him hard and old thought-patterns he had thought long-buried were re-emerging. Why did it have to be Bianca? Were the Fates really that hell-bent on tormenting him, giving him this entire new existence as a demigod and then taking away the one person he wanted to share it with the most?
He ran a hand through his hair and then dropped it back onto the windowsill. When he reached over for the plant he found that it had finally lost enough men to consider retaliation an option and an empty twig stabbed him in the heel of his hand. Cursing and bringing his hand to his mouth, he sucked gently on the bead of blood welling out of the hole. He took it from his mouth, looked at it and put it back in again. His mouth tasted of copper; his tongue tingled with the depressingly familiar taste. When he was convinced that it had stopped bleeding he toyed momentarily with the idea of giving the stupid thing the special prod of death he seemed to have when it came to all plants. At least it would be blunt and non-threatening then. He'd even raised a hand to do so when a voice from behind him made him practically fall off the windowsill in fright, his heart pumping wildly in his chest.
"Nico?" Sally asked, clutching her robe a little tighter round her. "I didn't know you were here. Is something the matter? Is it monsters?"
Nico had only had the one cup of coffee, it was early and last night it hadn't been exactly easy to sleep with all of these dark thoughts swirling round inside his head. The only answer to them seemed to have been tequila, not that that had done much. Ancient heroes always seemed to be drinking barrels of wine to no effect, so he guessed a high tolerance to alcohol must just be a demigod thing. It meant that he wasn't hungover per say but he was still in a less than good mood.
"Do you really think I'd just be sitting here drinking my coffee if I had Medusa on my tail?" he bit out derisively, wincing as soon as it had come out. Sally had never been anything but kind to him and there was no reason to act like a total dick to her except for the fact that she was simply there and right now he had to be a dick to someone.
Sally blinked, opening and closing her mouth and actually taking a step back before composing herself. "Of course not. Sorry, I didn't think. Demigods turning up in the living room, I just assume monsters," she said with a weak laugh and a shrug. "Not that you can blame me, of course," she added, thinking less than fondly on past instances of Nico's sudden appearances.
Nico sighed, closing his eyes and sliding off the windowsill. "Sorry. Ignore me. I didn't exactly have a good night. And something tells me that today might be a little worse." He smiled wryly and picked up his mug, inspecting the stain on the bottom. "I didn't know you were here," he said, looking up at her. "Did I wake you up last night when I came in?"
"Nope, we didn't hear a thing," Sally said with a shrug to cover up the crashing and swearing she had heard as Percy fought to get what seemed like a very-intoxicated guest onto the couch. Apparently that had been Nico. She should have put two and two together and assumed that it had been Nico that had stayed the night and been less surprised to find him in the apartment, but hey, it was really early. She glanced over at the sofa and found it covered in a wadded-up blanket.
"I sort of drunk Iris-messaged Percy," Nico admitted with a wince, rubbing the back of his neck sheepishly. "It seemed like a good idea at the time, but of course he insisted on coming to find me. Something about being an easy target for monsters whilst sitting paralytic against a Dumpster in an alleyway having been kicked out of a bar for knocking out the bouncer." There had, in fact, been a lot more choice words than that on Percy's part: naturally the son of Poseidon could curse like an actual sailor but they weren't things that you repeated in polite company. Or, in fact, any company really. Especially not to the mother of the guilty party.
"Paul and I are staying with Percy and Annabeth for a little while," Sally explained. "Our upstairs neighbour decided to leave the bath running and his bathroom ended up in the middle of our kitchen along with about a thousand gallons of bubbly water. The apartment's a wreck and what is the world coming to when you can't blackmail your son and future daughter-in-law to scrimp on the cost of a hotel?" She paused when this didn't procure a reaction from Nico, nervously plucking at a loose thread on her robe before eventually psyching herself up to continue. "Nico, sweetie, is something… the matter?" She saw pain flash across his face and immediately regretted asking but it was out there now and it was too late to take it back.
"It's… the ten year anniversary of my sister dying," Nico said quietly, shrugging. "It's weird. I don't know, it kind of messed me up more than I expected, you know? I wasn't expecting it to hurt this much."
Sally was actually taking a step forward to hug him when she remembered herself. She was not his mother and the last thing he wanted right now was mothering. He was a grown man now, even if she still saw him as the kid with blue frosting clinging to his upper lip the first time she had ever met him and Percy had demanded he stay for cake.
"Anniversaries," Sally said heavily, remembering the way she felt, even all these years later, on the day her parents' plane had crashed. "Not so much fun, huh? Don't apologise to me for hurting, Nico, or for missing her. It's perfectly natural. You never truly get over someone you love leaving you and it comes back around to haunt you sometimes. Especially when you realise just how long they've been gone." The way Nico's throat was bobbing and the fact that he was glaring so hard at the bottom of his mug made her heart ache for him and once again she had to stop herself from reaching out and giving him a hug. Instead, because he looked like he might cry, she changed the subject abruptly. "Did you put coffee on?"
He looked up at her confused, rightly so given that he was holding a coffee mug, and she mentally kicked herself. She didn't know why she asked. The aroma of freshly-brewed coffee was permeating the entire apartment and soon it may even coax Percy out of his bed, no mean feat to say the least. It was conversation, though, which was classed as better than awkward, stretching silences in anyone's books, so she persevered purely because every second they weren't talking seemed to ache for an eternity.
He hadn't replied, so there was a gap to plug, and she groped wildly around for a new topic. "Di-did you eat anything?" Safe topics were good. The further she stayed away from what was really going on the better if it was going to make him cry. This was all she had to offer right now if he didn't want to talk about Bianca. She trusted that he would when he was ready so she let it slide.
"No," Nico allowed, shifting his foot off a leaf.
"Well, do you want something? I filled the cabinets when we moved in so there are bagels and croissants if you're interested… Or, or I could make pancakes or something? What do you like? I know that Percy likes blueberry, obviously, but we don't have to do that. I think we have strawberries… I could make chocolate chip, or apple, or—"
"I'm not really hungry," Nico said. "Thanks."
Sally chewed on her bottom lip, deflating as she was shut down. Once again, she was just reminded of how grown up Nico was now, how grown up Percy was now — a mother was obviously not something they needed. A friend, some support, perhaps. It was just that she seemed to be discovering that, when you took the mothering part out of her personality, there wasn't much left to give. The thought actually physically depressed her.
Nico gave yet another shrug, leaning back against the windowsill as he did so. He started picking at his nails, totally absorbed in his task. As nice as Sally was being to him, he was worried that any minute she was going to drag the Bianca issue back out of the woodwork and so she was best kept at a distance right now. Anyone who wanted to talk about Bianca was best kept at a distance for now, and he was going to make his best effort to make sure that it stayed that way.
"Hey, you know I think I saw Annabeth bringing the waffle iron home from the shop yesterday. I think that's the last time she'll let Percy use it… Do you want waffles? Banana waffles? I could put cream on top?"
"No thanks." Whilst breakfast foods weren't the most fascinating of subjects, they were most definitely not Bianca's death and so he listened to Sally babble, almost grateful for the distraction and change of topic.
"Sure? Now would be the perfect time to take it for a test run, what with Percy safely asleep and all…" She tried to make her voice sound as tempting as possible, but she could tell that Nico wasn't going to take the bait. He didn't want to eat, she got that. What she did get, though, was that he had to, whether he liked it or not, because otherwise he was going to make himself ill. It wasn't like he had much stored fuel to burn after all — every time she saw him she was always shocked all over again at how painfully thin he looked. So she wasn't going to rest until he had eaten something. She knew, somewhere in her mind at least, that she was overcompensating, but that was what she had been born to do, it seemed. So dammit, if that was the single thing that she could do she was going to do it and do it right.
"Don't let me stop you making them for you," Nico said monotonously. "I just don't have much of an appetite."
"Waffles are only good for breakfast if they're made for someone else as well," Sally said a little gloomily. Seeing Nico cock an eyebrow at her logic she continued, "Oh, it's just that, otherwise, you kind of feel like a glutton when you eat an entire batch by yourself. Even if you only make a couple, which, yeah… that is weird, huh?"
A small smile quirked Nico's lips. His body sagged a little in defeat and he exhaled heavily. "Fine. What does me having another mug of coffee buy you for breakfast?"
Sally looked at him stonily, unimpressed. "A Cheerio," she deadpanned, before snapping out of it a little and reaching for his arm. "Look, come on. Come into the kitchen." Her fingers wrapped around his forearm. "Nico! You're frozen!" she chided, recoiling.
Nico looked down at his arm. All of the hairs were standing on end, puckering the flesh into a rash of Goosebumps. His eyebrows shot up, registering mild surprise. Now that Sally mentioned it, he was kind of cold. He'd been standing at a window with about four inches of snow on the outer sill with nothing to stand up against it but the pair of boxers and the black t-shirt that he'd slept in. "Yeah… I guess I am a little…"
Sally rolled her eyes at him. "One minute. Don't go anywhere or contract pneumonia on me or anything." She disappeared back into the guest bedroom and came out again with a huge college hoodie of Paul's and threw it at him. "Put that on before you start to lose your extremities."
Nico smiled and pulled it over his head. It drowned him but he was grateful to be warm now that he'd realised that he was cold. "Better," he admitted, rolling the sleeves back so he could find his hands. Sally gestured at him with the carafe of coffee and he placed his mug on the breakfast bar separating the kitchen and the living area for her to fill it up. When she had topped him off he wrapped both hands around the mug, taking a fortifying sip of the strong, hot coffee. He slid onto one of the stools and sat at the breakfast bar as Sally rounded it into the kitchen area.
"Eggs on toast?" Sally asked sunnily, already halfway to the refrigerator. She could stand there all morning firing off dishes in his direction until she eventually wore him down enough to make him accept something. If that was what it took, then that was what she would do.
Nico shook his head wordlessly, gazing at the vase of flowers on the counter. They were lilies. Someone, no doubt Sally, had already picked out the stamens off and discarded them so that they wouldn't stain anything with pollen, so he had nothing to pick at but petals and leaves. His fingertips seemed to itch and he reached up to the pink-flecked petals but Sally rescued them quickly, whisking the vase away and placing it on the counter behind her.
"I saw what you did to the one by the window," she groused, spinning the vase so that the flowers' best sides were facing outwards. "These lilies don't deserve that."
Nico wrapped his hand back around his mug tightly, trying to burn off the itch in his fingers with the scalding ceramic. The biting heat was welcome. "Sorry. About the plant, I mean. I wasn't really thinking about what I was doing, I was just…" His words sputtered to a halt and he heaved a sigh, bringing his mug to his lips again.
"Doing? Yeah, I know. I'm not mad. Not that I should be. It's not even my plant." She shrugged satisfactorily at the positioning of the vase and poured herself a cup of coffee, resting against the breakfast bar opposite Nico with her forearms and biting her bottom lip as he gazed into his coffee. "Oh! I just remembered!" She grimaced guiltily as Nico jumped, startled, and spilt a little coffee. "We have pastries. Paul brought pastries home yesterday. Apple and pecan? There's some with cinnamon on. Or custard ones, I think… Am I tempting you yet?"
Nico rolled his eyes and gave her a half-smile. "No. I'm fine. Really."
Sally picked up her coffee mug and took a drink, narrowing her eyes a little at him and cocking her head. She smiled a little at his panicked, deer-in-the-headlights look and put her mug down. "I know. Boiled egg and toasted soldiers?"
Nico groaned and leant his forehead in the crook of his arm. Muffled, he warned, "I swear, if you ask me about breakfast foods one more time, I won't be responsible for my actions."
Sally laughed. "I'll take the risk and offer you bacon, I think."
"No bacon," Nico said in a tortured voice, still hiding in his arm.
"Sausage?" Sally suggested immediately as an alternative. "Come on, I didn't stock Percy's kitchen for the fun of it."
"Please stop," Nico begged, only half-joking as he looked up at her. "Just stop trying to feed me."
Sally only smiled and hummed quietly to herself as she opened the fridge. "Oh! Yoghurt!" she said suddenly over her shoulder after inspecting the contents. "You look like you could use a nice yoghurt. Very good for your bones."
Nico shook his head. "I got a good view of my tibia last year when it came poking out of my leg after a monster shoved me off the fire escape outside my apartment. Seemed pretty strong to me. I think I'm good on the calcium front."
Sally wrinkled her nose partly in disgust and partly in concern at his blasé attitude to a compound fracture, then flipped her hair back over her shoulder and laced her fingers through her mug's handle so she could take it with her. She walked over to a cabinet and opened the door, stretching on her tiptoes to reach the cereal packets on the top shelf. "Okay… We have Cheerios… Cornflakes… Raisin Bran if you feel like being nutritious, which nobody ever is unless they're me, so…" She reached up and grabbed two boxes down with one hand before setting her coffee down so she could brandish both boxes. "We have Lucky Charms and Trix here, as well as Captain Crunch up in the cupboard. Which one do you want?"
"As much as I appreciate the vast and splendid array of choice on offer, I'm okay," Nico said a little sarcastically.
Sally smirked. "Ah… So that would be a yes vote for the Raisin Bran, huh?" Nico pulled a face of such disgust that Sally laughed, setting the two cereal boxes down on the counter in front of her so she could pick up her coffee again.
"Somehow, I don't think I'm that geriatric," Nico said with a small smile and an eye-roll. "Despite my birth certificate. I didn't say I minded the choices; I just don't want to eat them. Demeter has made sure I can never willingly eat another bowl of cereal in my life. It's got to the point where if I ended up in the Fields of Punishment I'd just be tied to a chair being force-fed cereal. Seriously, I have cereal-themed nightmares. So thanks, but no thanks."
Sally nodded wisely and began shoving the packets back in the cupboard. When she was done she twisted her mouth in thought for a few moments. "Oh, I know. Omelette?" Sally asked. "Cheese and ham?"
Nico made an exasperated noise and sunk down lower on his stool, throwing his head back and groaning once more. "I'm sorry, I'm just really, really not hungry. So no thanks."
Sally gave a light shrug and began to rummage around in the breadbin. Nico was looking at her back suspiciously when Paul came in, stretching and yawning and making a beeline for the coffeepot. Nico was perpetually surprised that there wasn't a rut in the floor from the door to the coffeemaker.
Paul unhooked a mug from a mug tree and set about pouring himself a coffee, stirring in milk but no sugar. He turned around, leaning against the sink to take the first sip and his eyes landed on Nico. "Hey… Nico. What are you doing here?"
Sally elbowed him in the side. "Hey, he has every right to be here if he wants. It's not our apartment, remember?"
"Right," Paul said. "Of course. Sorry, I'm still a little bit shell-shocked from finding a bathtub in our kitchen. But hey, at least the upstairs neighbour wasn't in it at the time. How are you?"
"You know," Nico said with a grimace. "Alive, I guess."
"So… not good?" Paul asked curiously. "What's wrong? Monsters? Anything we can do?"
Sally cut him off with a look, one that he understood to mean she would explain later. "We can persuade him to eat," she said firmly, pulling a spatula from a drawer and jabbing at Nico with it. "He's decided he's not hungry." She got out a frying pan from a cabinet and placed it on the top of the stove.
Paul regarded the cooking implements Sally was gathering. She had readied enough food and equipment to create a fourteen course breakfast at least. "What's for breakfast, anyway?" he asked warily, wondering if she actually was going to whip up a banquet in his stepson's shoebox of a kitchen.
"Ask Nico," Sally said dryly, cocking an eyebrow at the demigod and smirking at him when he grimaced. She glanced back down at the stove and wrinkled her nose, grabbing a dishcloth and cleaning each of the knobs on the front in turn.
Paul frowned a little in confusion and turned to Nico with his head tilted. "Uh… what?" He turned back to Sally, the answer he had arrived at totally confusing him. "He's going to cook?"
Nico rolled his eyes for what felt like the hundredth time that morning. It probably was. "She wants me to have breakfast," he said tiredly to Paul. "And, for extra guilt, apparently none of you get to eat until I do. Sorry. She's persistent, I'll give her that."
Paul grinned then held up his hands, denying any part in the morning's events. "Okay, fine. I can just about deal with that, but you know you better choose something before Annabeth appears, okay? Friendly advice there for you."
"Paul, come on," Sally chided. "That's not fair. She's not that bad."
Nico scoffed. "I'd rather face the Hydra than Annabeth with low blood sugar," he said into his coffee mug. "She tends to get a little… punchy. You know, more so than normal."
"Don't be mean," Sally said. "At least she has a healthy appetite, unlike certain other demigods I could poke with a very short spatula right now…"
Nico groaned again. "Don't you get that I'm really not hungry?" he said almost desperately. "Is that such an alien concept to you? Just coffee. Sugar, fat from the milk and caffeine. You know: the three basic food groups."
"I have no words for how much that sentence just irritated me," Sally told him with a snort. "Solid foods, Nico. That's what you need. You look like a gust of wind could snap you in half."
"Yeah, thanks for that boost to my self-esteem," Nico muttered dryly, looking down at the countertop.
Sally rinsed out the cloth under the faucet and wrung it out, taking the time Nico was using to inspect the scarred wooden countertop to scrutinise him. Although she couldn't see his face she could tell he was more relaxed than earlier and more open, but probably feeling guilty about it. She knew that for a long time after her parents had died, especially on the anniversary, she had hated herself for simply living life because she had felt like it meant she was slowly forgetting them. Paul went to stand next to Sally and put an arm around her waist for solidarity, snapping her out of her reverie.
"Cereal?" Paul suggested, half to her and half to Nico.
Sally shook her head. "Tried it. He has issues with cereal."
"Pancakes?" Paul tried. "If you turned down her pancakes, I might never speak to you again," he said to Nico. "You have no idea what you're missing."
"Pancakes are also off the menu," Sally said.
Paul's face fell in disappointment, then suddenly lit up as he snapped his fingers. "Doughnuts!" he said. "Did you not offer the boy Krispy Kremes? That's what I was living on when I was twenty-one."
"Yeah, and it's catching up with you now," Sally said teasingly, patting Paul's stomach. "I'm not going to feed him doughnuts."
"I am shocked and appalled that you, my wife, would make such comments on my physique," Paul said, faking hurt but grinning at her. "This is what the 'worse' part of for better or for worse looks like, honey. Sorry but you promised." He grabbed the hand that was on his stomach and held it in his, feeling the engagement ring he had slid onto her finger all those years ago pressing against his palm.
"No one should have to go out on a doughnut run when it's about fifty below out there," Nico said. "Even if I was hungry which, again, I'm not. By the way. In case you didn't get the memo."
"You're turning down Krispy Kremes?" Paul asked, much of the horror in his voice genuine. "Are you sure you're human?"
"Uh, only half," Nico reminded him. "Have you not been following?"
Paul laughed. "Oh, yeah. Wow, I deserved that one." He paused, considering. "Wait, so what: are you saying gods can't enjoy a raspberry-filled glazed doughnut?" he asked with a scoff. "They're all wise, all-knowing from what I understand. Doesn't seem likely they'd be saying no. Oh! I know what you can make him. Waffles!"
Nico opened his mouth to retort and caught the expression on both of their faces as he looked up. His eyes switched between them and he suddenly knew that there was no hope for his cause. His pause had brought a glint of triumph to Sally's eyes and Paul was smirking because he was on the side of someone whose eyes could glint with triumph, so Nico just looked down into his coffee and mumbled reluctantly, "I'll have some toast."
"Good choice!" Sally said, perking up immediately and clapping her hands together as she spun on her heel to grab a loaf of bread. Paul got the box of Lucky Charms out of the cupboard and poured himself a large bowl as Sally slotted slices of bread into the toaster.
"I'd just like to make it clear I am eating under duress," Nico grumbled. "You know, for the record. And only so you'll leave me alone."
Not that he needed them to leave him alone. Scanning the room for shadows big enough to slip into was an automatic thing for him and Percy's apartment had a plethora of them that he could have vanished into in a split second if he had actually wanted to get away. He had been by himself in the window and he had been by himself in the bar last night and it hadn't helped. Just to be around other people that cared that he simply existed was actually making him feel better and he'd take better over constant reminders of Bianca's death any day, thanks.
"Duress?" Paul said, adding milk to his bowl. "Please. You're lucky she didn't get out the thumbscrews to persuade you. She's scary like that."
"They were the next option," Sally said brightly, fetching a plate from the cabinet and setting it down next to the toaster. "What am I putting on this for you, Nico? Jelly? Peanut butter?"
Nico's forehead creased slightly with the effort of deciding. Normally when he scorched himself a slice of toast the choice of condiment was butter heavily peppered with the charred, black crumbs of the last slice of toast he'd failed at. And that was if he was lucky and had remembered to go grocery shopping and frankly there were much better things to do. "Uh, surprise me?" he said tentatively, shrugging.
Sally only smiled into the toaster as she watched the elements inside heat up. She was pleased that she had managed, at least temporarily, to liberate him from dwelling on Bianca and his pain, his survivors' guilt. Not only that but she hadn't gone into full-on mothering mode, which would probably have sent him running for the hills feeling worse than before. Granted, she was forcing breakfast into him but she had managed to keep her distance, abandoning her default programming for once, which she figured she'd have to do a lot more of now Percy was practically married. Maybe mothering wasn't her only strength after all.
The bread began to brown and she sneaked a glance over her shoulder at Nico. Sometimes, it was just good to remind someone how important it was that they were alive even when those they loved weren't anymore. And if a side effect of that was getting a balanced and nutritious breakfast inside someone then, well, so be it.