A/N: Hi everyone! Um, this is my first fic, but please give it a chance. I guess it's not so bad, considering this my first time. Anyway, enjoy!
Disclaimer: There is an exact excerpt from BoO in the end. I do not own BoO.
Nico stared at the ground. He sighed and looked around. They were somewhere in some kind of hills. Reyna and Coach were sleeping to his right, but he was wide awake, which was ironic, as he was the one shadow-traveling. He looked at the rivers and streams flowing through the hills.
'Percy's eyes are just like the color of that river,' he thought to himself.
'Shut up. Now's not the time to think about him.' another part of him chided.
He continued like that in his mind, arguing with himself, thoughts drifting to Percy every once in a while. Eventually, the sound of shifting shook him out of his internal arguing, and he turned to face Reyna and Coach.
It was Reyna who had woken up, and was currently stretching. She caught sight of Nico and offered him a weak smile. He didn't return it, and went back to staring at the rivers and streams. After about a minute, he started to argue with himself again, eventually turning the grass around him black until it shriveled up, and died.
Reyna stared at the grass around the boy. He always distanced himself from her and Coach, and generally just everybody. His decision to go on the quest had confused Reyna-though she understood his desire to leave the Argo II.
However, she knew that grass wasn't generally black and dead.
She got up, ignoring the ache in her legs, and went to sit next to him on the crunchy, dead grass. He glanced at her, then went back to staring at the landscape.
Minutes passed. An awkward silence had been prominent ever since she had attempted a smile. Now, sitting next to him, it seemed as if it was directly in front of her face yelling at her.
"What's wrong?", she eventually asked, breaking the silence. He looked at her, actually looked at her.
It took most of her willpower to not look away.
Reyna had seen heartbreak. She had felt heartbreak, seeing Jason with Piper, without any memories of his past with her, or being forced to kill Scipio. None of that prepared her for the look of raw, ugly heartbreak in Nico's eyes. She knew he had been through a lot, including literal Hell. Now she knew that wasn't the only thing that had happened to him.
He shook his head. "You wouldn't understand," he said. His voice was croaky, though she had expected that. He hadn't spoken for just about the entire trip so far. It was her turn to shake her head. "Tell me," she urged.
He sighed (he did that a lot, she noted) and turned to her. "Okay," he said, his voice less croaky. "But this may take a bit."
He told her everything, from that first day at the cliff to the day they left for the trip. He explained how he felt when Bianca joined the Hunters, and how he changed when she died. The only person who had accepted him for who he was-dead.
He told her about Annabeth, how much he wanted to hate her but couldn't. He was jealous, to ridiculous amounts, and probably more that what he wanted to admit, but he was. How he watched Percy fall into Tartarus into her, and understood just how deep his love for Annabeth ran. He'd been to Tartarus, and is just a bit ashamed to admit he wouldn't fall in for anybody (alive, that is).
Being forced to tell Jason how he really felt. Isolating himself from everyone else.
And she listened.
Nico stopped talking.
There was a pause, before Reyna drew a small breath and spoke.
"My older sister was wise. She knew more about life at that time than I did. Perhaps now she knows more than what I ever will. Anyhow, she would give me advice on how to live well. Before we parted, she gave me her final words of advice. 'Whenever you feel pain or sorrow or envy,' she had said, 'take your pain, and ignite it.' I go by her final words of advice, and maybe you should, too."
Days and days after their talk, came the battle. He though of Reyna's words and fought, fought to defend his place he would soon call home.
He was facing Octavian, contemplating whether or not to kill him, when a voice behind him said, "Nico?"
He spun, his sword instantly in his hand, and almost decapitated Will Solace.
((21/3/16 edit: still terrible. why does anybody still read this.))