It was supposed to have just been a regular quest. 'Quest' was possibly even too grand a term. Micro-quest maybe. The problem should have been solved within an hour or two. It was just a small gryphon infestation; more of a pest issue than full-blown monster conflict really. They didn't even need a full team to deal with it.

Jason and Leo were distractedly chatting as they made their way through Washington Square Park. There had been a rather amusing spectacle that morning involving Mr. D and a beverage mix-up that still had them sporadically snorting into bursts of laugher.

"Did you see his face?" Leo's own face was red from laughing so hard. "Did you see his face when he mistook Coach Hedge's prune jui—" he didn't manage to finish his sentence before breaking out in another fit of snickers.

"He deserved it." Jason was grinning. "He definitely had that coming." He twirled his gladius casually as they walked along the tree-lined path. "He was lucky it wasn't filled with lead filings or something—"

A rustling caused Jason to still. He and Leo simultaneously looked up to see flapping wings on top of the park's stone arch.

"Gotcha," said Jason, keeping his eye trained on their target. The joking banter evaporated from both of their minds as their attention narrowed to the quest.

"You distract it," said Leo. "I'll toast it when it attacks."

Jason signaled agreement and backed up to a less crowded part of the walkway. He swung his gladius in a high arc, expecting the glinting metal to attract the attention of the predatory beast. As he worked he absent-mindedly wondered just what the Mist was causing this scene to look like to the surrounding pedestrians. They probably thought he was a street performer.

The gryphon went for the bait, gracefully leaping off the arch and rocketing straight at its prey. Jason held his blade ready, just in case Leo's fireball missed.

"Jason!"

He turned; the surprise of hearing a distressed voice that definitely wasn't Leo's overrode Jason's training to stay focused on his target.

The very last person Jason would have expected to see was barreling straight at him—or straight at the gryphon, more accurately.

Nico di Angelo—wide-eyed in uncharacteristic terror—was swinging a broken section of a drainpipe and running in wide uneven strides towards them.

"What—?" Jason didn't get a chance to finish his question. Sharp talons slashed his shoulder, causing him to double forward from the impact.

"Styx!" he heard Leo yell. "He distracted me! Hang on—" A burst of flames narrowly missed Jason's ear. He heard Leo mutter another curse.

"Run!" Nico was screaming. "Oh my god do you have any idea what that is I can't believe there's a freaking GRYPHON in New York City what the freaking HELL Jason oh my god why aren't you running get the hell out of here what the hell where did you get a SWORD since when do you do things with swords what the hell is going on I—" his panicked tirade bled into a shriek as the gryphon swooped, narrowly missing Nico's head.

"Nico? What are you doing?" Jason cringed and prodded at his shoulder, tentatively testing to see how deep the wound was. His skin burned as he felt poison seeping into his bloodstream. He hastily pulled out a square of ambrosia and choked it down before the poison could spread far enough to cripple him.

The ambrosia kicked in immediately and almost as soon as it had started the fiery burn began to ebb. He snapped his attention back to the skirmish, tracking the gryphon's movement with one eye, but keeping the other one trained on Nico.

Nico was still swinging the drainpipe in frantic uncoordinated circles. He was doing more to impede Jason and Leo than he was effectively threatening the gryphon. What was he thinking?

"Nico, get out of the way! We're taking care of it!" Jason yelled. "It's just a gryphon. We're on it already."

"Just a gryphon?" Nico's sudden laughter was sharp and manic. "Just a gryphon. Why aren't you running? You're going to die!"

"Only if you keep getting in the way!" Jason snapped back irritably. Any other time he would have actually been sincerely glad to see that his long lost teammate had decided to reappear from his self-imposed exile, but his timing quite frankly sucked.

And his erratic hysteria was worryingly un-Nico-like but Jason didn't have time to dwell on that part yet.

"You get the gryphon," he muttered to Leo. "I'll remove the impediment." Leo nodded and poised to release another burst of fire.

Jason tackled Nico, easily ripping the drainpipe out of his shaking fingers. He braced himself, expecting Nico to violently retaliate. Nico didn't fight back as Jason dragged him out of the gryphon's path.

"Oh my god," Nico kept repeating like a broken record. "Oh my god did you see that? A gryphon. We just almost got turned into roadkill by a goddamned gryphon!" Nico's fingers were painfully digging into his arm and Jason couldn't tell if he was laughing or crying. "What the fucking hell, that's so fucking cool."

A strangled squawk rang out and the scent of charred fur and feathers wafted through the square.

"What the Hades, di Angelo!" Leo was fuming as he stalked towards Jason and Nico, gryphon efficiently dispatched. "Is that your idea of some sort of joke? Cause let me tell you, I'm the expert on jokes and that one sucked. What in the everlovin' Underworld were you thinking?"

"I was thinking I didn't want to watch you guys get turned into cat food!" Nico was significantly calmer now that the gryphon had been vaporized. "Why are you yelling at me? I'm not the one that made it attack!"

"Stop playing dumb di Angelo," said Leo in annoyance.

"Who are you anyway?" Nico asked Leo.

"Are you kidding me?" Leo threw up his arms in exasperation.

Now that the stress of a botched gryphon cleanup had subsided, Jason was having time to grow worried about Nico's confusing behavior. There was something very off about him. True, it had been quite a long time since they'd seen each other, but the change in demeanor was far too drastic to be excused merely by the time aspect of Nico's absence. "Nico?" he asked more tentatively. "Are you okay?"

"Okay?" Nico started laughing again but there was a crazed quality to the peals. "Okay? I'm having the most fucked up day ever. Like, Jesus, Jason, you're not even going to believe how fucked up things have gotten."

Jason raised an eyebrow, since when did Nico talk to him like that?

"Okay so get this," Nico was still babbling. "I swear I was in my apartment this morning. Just making toast, okay? Getting ready for class. And the next thing I know I'm freaking outside six blocks away. A homeless dude grabbed the bread right out of my hands. The hell? And of course my keys and phone are still sitting on my freaking dresser. Like, how did I manage to wander out without them and not even remember? I thought I might have had a stroke or something. I know what you're thinking, right, I'm too young to have a stroke but you'd be wrong did you know that one in four strokes occurs in people under the age of 65? Yeah that's right and that shit cuts off your oxygen, you can just get brain damage without even feeling it, hey I could have been having them for weeks without even knowing that my head was a time bomb of death or something. But anyway, yeah, seemed like a good theory until I went back to my apartment and you know what happened? Some strange lady opened the door and said that she lived there and when I looked in the door all my stuff was gone! Gone. I haven't even figured out how she possibly could have switched everything so fast. It was definitely the right apartment, the door even had that scratch on it from the time I got locked out and you helped me jimmy the lock. So. I don't know what to do so I start walking towards school because where else would I even go? And that monster bird-cat came swooping down out of nowhere. I couldn't freaking believe it! So I did the only logical thing, I followed it of course."

"Uh." Jason was having trouble following Nico's rushed account.

"I can't believe I don't have my phone," Nico continued, arms flailing in frustration. "That's like the worst luck of all, I could have gotten video!"

"Since when do you use phones?" Jason finally asked. It was only the tip of the iceberg of questions he wanted to ask Nico. Nothing he had just said made any sense.

"Since when do you use swords?" Nico countered. "You've totally been holding out on me if you've been like a closet LARPer this whole time. Not cool, dude. But anyway, am I ever glad to see you. Can I crash at your place till I figure out what the hell is going on with my apartment?"

Jason looked at Nico in utter bafflement. Then he looked at Leo. Leo was silently twirling his finger in a circle next to his head in a wordless statement of Nico's gone to crazy town.

"Can I see your sword?" Nico continued, utterly oblivious to how disturbed Jason and Leo were at his reactions. He tugged at Jason's sword arm. "Sweet, a gladius! I've never seen one of those in person before, no wait, yes I have, they had one on loan at the Walters Gallery—I like to go there when I'm visiting dad, their medieval weapons display is seriously kickass—hey you should go with me some time, I didn't know you liked that stuff. We can go to the Smithsonian too, have you ever been there? I love the Air and Space Museum they have all these sweet planes from World War II. Have you ever seen a real P-51 Mustang? You're actually allowed to touch them—er, okay, you're probably not actually supposed to but no one caught me—It's so cool, you should check it out with me, dad wouldn't mind a guest."

"Huh?" said Jason, seriously overwhelmed. He had definitely never heard Nico talk this much at once before. "Nico, I can't go with you to visit the Underworld, I'm not allowed."

"Hahaha, the Underworld? I've never heard the South referred to as that before, good one." Nico snorted. "DC's not that far south though, you should save that name for Florida or something. Although all the evil politicians and lawyers live in DC, I guess. It's probably appropriate." He laughed again.

"Something is wrong with Nico." Jason stated the obvious.

"Brainwashed," agreed Leo with a nod.

"I haven't been brainwashed!" Nico leveled an irritated gaze at Leo. "Damn straight something's wrong with me, I just saw a motherflippin' gryphon in Washington Square Park! That's kinda a biggie! Why aren't you guys freaking out? Did you even get that? A G-R-I-…" He paused, his attempt to dramatically spell out the monster's name thwarted by his dyslexia. "…G-I-R? No. G-R-I…F…P" He frowned, struggling with arranging the letters. But then his brow furrowed. "No, wait. Is that right? There should be a 'Y' somewhere in there. It's g-r…y…p-h-o-n? There's more than one way to spell that? But that's right, they spelled it with a 'Y' in Mythomagic. Damn, I wish I could get into my apartment to look up their stats. Never memorized that card because it's not very valuable—unless of course it's a golden gryphon from the expansion. Those are rad; they do something like 700 damage while the regular kind are only a lame 200. This one wasn't one of those though, right? Nah, it was black. Besides the rare ones live in Africa. I can't believe I missed getting a photo. Hey can I borrow your phone? I need to tell my conspiracy message board about what just happened!"

The question was directed at Jason.

"What? I don't have a phone."

"Don't be stupid of course you do. Your ringtone is the opening theme from 300 you freaking dork."

"Nico, I don't have a phone, and last I checked you don't either."

Nico gave Jason a puzzled look. "Dude, of course you do. You call me all the time. And don't think I didn't notice you switched your ring for me to 'This is Halloween.' Ha ha, very funny, smartass. I demand you put it back to normal. If there were something wrong with anyone I'd say it's you. I'm sorry I'm spazzing out but you don't exactly see a damn mythological beast crashing through the city every day, do you? You're the one acting weird. You should be freaking out too."

He frowned and suddenly looked around. "Hey, why isn't anyone else freaking out? Is everyone crazy but me? What's wrong with everyone? What's wrong with you?"

"Nothing's wrong with us," said Leo. "You are definitely the one who's flipped their lid." He turned to Jason. "We need to take him back to camp and get him checked out."

Jason nodded in agreement.

"I don't need to get checked out, I am totally fine," insisted Nico. "I took my meds this morning and everything. Not that I needed them, it's total BS they make me take them. I don't need anti-depressants if you ask me. I mean seriously, who wouldn't be depressed after what happened? Do drugs bring people back from the dead? Noooo. I keep saying that but does anyone listen? Even my psychiatrist will tell you there's nothing wrong with me. He says my coping mechanisms are perfectly valid." Nico rolled his eyes and made air quotes with his fingers as he said the words 'coping mechanisms.'

"That's probably too much information," he said as he took in Jason and Leo's increasingly shocked expressions. "Am I over sharing? I do that sometimes when I get too wound up. It's the ADHD. My brain just won't stop firing in ten thousand directions. But christ, can you blame me? There was a gryphon. It almost killed us. I've never had a near death experience before."

"He's mad as a hatter," muttered Leo, shaking his head in bewilderment. "I wonder what the heck happened to him?"

"Something major from the sound of it," said Jason, worriedly staring at Nico. "I wonder if this is the real reason we haven't seen him in so long?"

"Jason? What are you talking about? You saw me three days ago. We got falafel at Mamoun's after class on Friday."

"No we didn't," said Jason in confusion. "What class?"

"What do you mean what class?" said Nico. "The one you have in that building." He pointed directly across the street.

"Nico," said Jason, concern growing. "I have never taken any class outside of Camp Jupiter or Camp Half-Blood. I've certainly never set foot in that building. Something has messed up your memories."

"Do you think he took a dip in the River Lethe?" asked Leo, scratching his head. "I mean how else could he forget someone as memorable as me?"

"I fell into the Gowanus once," supplied Nico helpfully. "Not recommended, by the way."

"That couldn't be it," said Jason, ignoring Nico's comment. "He knows who I am. The Lethe would have turned him into a blank slate, right? His memories don't seem to be gone, just screwed up."

"We need to bring him to Chiron," said Leo.

"Who?"

"Don't worry about it," said Leo, patting Nico on the shoulder. "We'll get you fixed."

Nico swatted his hand away. "Don't touch me! I hate when strangers touch me! Who the hell are you anyway? Jason, since when do you hang out with people without introducing us? I thought I knew all your friends."

Jason was utterly baffled by the injured look that accompanied Nico's offended question. Since when did Nico give a damn about Jason or whom he was friends with? And what on earth would erase Leo from Nico's memory but not him? Sure, Nico and Leo had never been on the friendliest terms but they still knew each other.

"We should go back as fast as possible." Jason sighed. "Leo, hold on." Jason held out his arm and Leo grabbed it knowingly. "Sorry about this," he apologized, looping his other arm around Nico's waist. "I know you hate flying but this is an emergency."

"What—?"

The rest of Nico's objection was cut off by the rush of wind as Jason went airborne.


Nico's eyes were as big as dinner plates.

"I knew it," he kept muttering under his breath. "I knew this stuff was real."

Chiron was carefully examining the clearly overwhelmed young man.

"Hmm," said Chiron, rubbing his chin. "This is very peculiar."

"Now that's an understatement," muttered Leo.

"Can you figure out what's wrong?" asked Jason. "Did someone do something to him? Are there any monsters that make people go insane? Do you think maybe he's possessed?"

Chiron was slowly shaking his head. "The problem isn't just his mind," he explained in an awestruck voice. "It's his whole body. He isn't a demigod."

"What?" Jason and Leo's disbelief was simultaneous.

"Don't be ridiculous," said Jason, looking at Nico carefully. There was not a single detail about the guy that didn't match his memory of the last time they'd met. The person sitting in the chair before him had the same tousled hair, same dark untrusting eyes, same morose style of clothes as the Nico di Angelo he remembered. This had to be Nico. "Don't try to tell me that isn't Nico di Angelo," he objected. "That is very clearly Nico di Angelo. He has to be a demigod."

"Duh," said Nico. "That's my name."

"I by no means said he isn't Nico di Angelo," Chiron corrected. "Clearly this is Nico di Angelo."

"Does it count for nothing that I said I'm Nico di Angelo?" Nico muttered.

"How can he be Nico and not a demigod?" asked Jason.

"That's a very good question," agreed Chiron.

"…And the answer is…?" interjected Leo.

"I have no idea," Chiron announced regretfully. "But his energy is completely different than it was the last time he was present at camp. He smells different too."

"Hey, I took a shower this morning," said Nico.

"You smell hopelessly mortal," Chiron clarified.

"But he was able to see the gryphon," Jason pointed out.

"As you know, some mortals cans see through the Mist. Apparently Nico is one of them. Perhaps because he retains some trace of his former self."

"Did one of the gods do this to him?" Jason continued to ask. "Is that something they'd do? I guess they could if they wanted to, I mean if they can turn mortals into gods then they can probably transform a demigod either way as well. Would they do that?"

"Possibly," said Chiron thoughtfully. "Although I would imagine that if such were the answer he would have retained his memories of his life as a demigod. It is also rather difficult to imagine what purpose such a transformation would serve. Although the gods are often mysterious in their will. It is certainly not unfathomable and it would not hurt to ask. I'll put out an inquiry on Olympus."

"What's all this talk about demigods?" asked Nico, looking kind of wary and kind of excited at the same time.

"It's what everyone at this camp is," explained Leo. "Like us." He pointed at himself and Jason. "And you're supposed to be too but apparently you're not."

"Are you sure?" Nico still looked cautiously excited.

"Quite certain," said Chiron. "You are one hundred percent mortal human."

Nico's face fell. "Rats," he muttered. "That would have been awesome." The unhappy set to his face deepened. He looked up at Jason suspiciously. "Why didn't you tell me?"

"Tell you what?" asked Jason, thrown for a loop.

"All this time? All this time you were a freaking demigod? And you never told me? You knew how much I'm into that stuff. You've been my best friend for years but this whole time you didn't trust me at all. I wouldn't have told anyone." His words were bitter.

"Best…friend?" Jason was dumbstruck.

"Oh so I'm not even that anymore am I?" Nico sprang up. There was a scary look on his face, and for the first time that day he somewhat resembled the air of the Nico Jason remembered. "Fuck you, Jason Grace!" He swiped clumsily at his eyes and then tore out of the room.

"What the Hades just happened?" said Leo. He turned a disbelieving look at Jason. "Since when are you two all buddy-buddy? Did I miss something?"

"Whatever memo you missed, I didn't get it either," said Jason in confusion. "Last time I checked he just barely tolerated me."

"It would be unwise to allow him to leave camp in this state," said Chiron. "I would advise following him."

"I guess that somehow just became my job," Jason announced with a sigh.


From the air it wasn't difficult to track Nico. Especially considering that he didn't seem to have any idea where he was going. Jason was able to overtake him in minutes.

"Don't even!" Nico spat, trying to back away from Jason's approach. "Don't think you can fix this! I can see through you now you big fake! You can't fix this! I want to go home!"

"Nico…." Jason put his hands out in an attempt to placate him. "Nico, I think you're confused."

"I am not confused!" He yelled. "I have never been less confused in my life! I get it now. Are you happy? I GET IT. I've just been a big joke to you all this time haven't I? How could I be so stupid. How could I go that long thinking that someone as popular and cool as you actually likes ME. Stupid, stupid me, huh? All this time you've been a fucking superhero, and ignorant me's just been your stupid comic relief sidekick! You've been laughing at me for years I guess. I deserved it, letting you trick me into thinking there was one thing in my life that didn't completely and utterly suck. That should have been a big red flag!"

"Nico—"

"When did this start, huh?" Nico continued to rave. "When? Was it before Bianca or after? How long have you been fucking with me? Did someone put you up to it?"

"Nico—"

"Was it that fire guy? How long have you been friends with him? Has he been your real best friend this whole time? When were you going to drop the bombshell, huh? At my eightieth birthday party?"

"Nico, no, you don't—"

"Shit!" Nico bawled his hands into fists and pressed them against his eyes. "Shit shit shit, I can't believe this! I've told you so much stuff! Do you have any idea how much I trusted you? Do you have any idea how much I don't trust anyone else? It was just you! How could you do this to me?"

"Nico, I haven't—"

"Just forget it!" Nico screamed. "Leave me alone!"

There had been plenty of times in the past where Jason would have been grateful for the opportunity to leave Nico alone. Nico was intimidating when upset. It was usually a relief to be given an excuse to stay out of his way. Right now he had never wanted to leave someone alone less in his life. No one had ever looked at him with such sharp hurt and betrayal splayed across their features before. Each venomous word Nico flung at him burrowed into his chest and painfully lodged there, making him ache sympathetically for this guy who he'd wanted to have as a friend but whose friendship had never solidified, and who now seemed to be shattering for that very lack.

It made no sense. He knew he hadn't done any of the things Nico was accusing him of but he felt awful anyway. As if he still deserved the acidity for lack of trying. He could have made more of an effort to be friends with Nico before. Heck, the guy had disappeared for ages and he hadn't even gone and looked for him. He probably could have prevented all this somehow.

"Nico, listen to me!" he pleaded. "Just stop for a second and listen!"

"Why, so you can lie to me some more?"

He stepped forward and grabbed Nico by his forearms. Nico predictably struggled, but he didn't seem as strong as Jason remembered. Jason looked down at Nico's arms in confusion. He had definitely lost a lot of muscle mass since when he'd last seen him during the war. That didn't seem like something Nico would have let happen. He might have witnessed Nico declining in those last weeks before he'd vanished, but he had also noticed that Nico's withdrawal from his friends had gone in hand with an obsessive focus on training. He'd been getting stronger, not weaker. This Nico felt like an entirely different person in Jason's grip.

He yanked Nico's arms closer to eye level.

"What are you doing?" yelled Nico. "Leggo of me!"

Jason's eyes trailed over the pale appendages in his grasp. They weren't just weaker. They were unblemished. The washed out expanses of skin were flawlessly unscathed.

"You don't have any scars," Jason observed.

"Of course I don't!" Nico snapped. "I'm not that depressed!"

"No, that's not what I meant," said Jason, still staring intently at Nico's thin wrists and undefined biceps. "You should have battle scars. The Nico I knew was in two wars. He had battle scars. We all do."

Jason released his grip on one of the arms to point at a groove in the side of his head where the hair had never grown back due to scar tissue.

"Like this," said Jason.

Nico stilled. "You didn't have that last week," he said. Some of the vitriol had left his voice. He stared at Jason hard, tracking his features with his eyes. "You shouldn't have any scars except the one on your lip."

"That one's not a battle scar," said Jason.

"I know," said Nico quickly. "I know how you got that. Thalia teases you."

Jason raised an eyebrow at that. He didn't see Thalia much. They definitely didn't have the sort of sibling relationship that would involve casual teasing.

"Is that so?" he asked. He held up his own arm to Nico. It was crisscrossed with a faint tracery of pale lines. Nothing too noticeable or ghastly—but his lifetime of skirmishes had not left him completely unmarked.

Nico tentatively ran his finger down one of the scars. Then he blushed and quickly jerked his hand away.

"That's weird," he said, biting his lip. "It's almost like you're—"

"Nico!" Percy's voice cut through whatever Nico had been about to say. They both turned to see the black-haired boy enthusiastically approaching. "You came back! I knew you'd eventually come back!"

Nico's eyes widened as Percy pulled him into a hug. "This is so great, everyone's going to be so glad to see you!"

Jason stepped back, expecting Nico to react badly. He waited for Nico to shove Percy off and lash out in red-faced embarrassment.

Nico did extract himself from Percy's embrace but the only expression he held was one of confusion.

"No touchy," he muttered awkwardly. "And since when do you give me the time of day?"

"Nico?" Percy's face twisted in concern. "What—? Did something happen? I know things were getting kind of weird between us when you left, but I didn't want you to leave. We all missed you!"

Jason looked at Percy, then back to Nico. Then back to Percy before settling on Nico. Nico was looking at Percy with complete indifference. There was no heartache swimming in his eyes as there'd been the last time he'd seen the two interact. There wasn't even a hint of nostalgia. Nico was acting like he barely knew Percy.

A suspicion that had been slowly niggling at Jason for the last hour or so finally solidified.

"Don't take it personally, Percy," he said, all remaining doubt fleeing his mind. "That isn't Nico."

"Of course I am!" Nico immediately interjected. "I already told you I'm Nico!"

"You are but you aren't," said Jason. "You're a different person than the Nico we knew."

"But—"

"And I'm a different person than the Jason you knew. I think there's been a switch or a mix-up of some sort."

Nico froze, mouth open mid-objection. He clamped it shut and frowned. "You are different," he said slowly. "And—my apartment..." his frown deepened. "There was a gryphon. You expected me to be a demigod..." he seemed to be talking to himself more than to Jason.

Suddenly he looked up, a mixture of panic and excitement on his face. "I'm in the wrong place!" He said breathlessly. "I don't belong here!"

"No," agreed Jason. "I don't think you do."

"What?" Percy was now looking back and forth between Jason and Nico in a similarly confused way. "I am seriously missing something here."

Nico frowned again and took a step backwards. He was eyeing both Jason and Percy even more suspiciously than before.

"We should go back to Chiron," Jason said. "We need to discuss what we should do about this."

"I'd rather not," said Nico crisply. "May I leave?'

"What? No, you can't leave. We need to sort out what's going on. Don't you want to go back home?"

"So you're holding me against my will?" asked Nico, voice raising.

"What? No. We're not forcing you, I just think you should consider—"

"I knew it!" Nico pointed a trembling finger at Jason and then swung it around to point at Percy. "I knew it! Evil doppelgangers! Mirror worlds on TV are always filled with evil doppelgangers! Don't think you can fool me just because you haven't got a goatee!"

"What?" said Jason and Percy at the same time.

Nico crossed his arms and scowled. "I refuse to become a nefarious super villain. You're going to have to kill me."

"He's gone crazy," whispered Percy.

"No," sighed Jason. "He hasn't. We've already covered this. I'll fill you in later." To Nico he said, "Nico, we're definitely not evil. We're the good guys."

"Bad guys always think that they're actually the good guys," Nico muttered. "But you killed that poor gryphon!"

"It was attacking you!"

"Not until after you provoked it. I was just peacefully watching it until you showed up! It wasn't bothering anyone!"

"We provoked it because it's a menace to have gryphons in New York City. We were protecting people," Jason attempted to patiently explain.

"It was probably endangered," said Nico stubbornly. "There's probably a nest somewhere filled with orphaned baby gryphons. I bet they're really cute. And now they'll all die too 'cause you killed their mom. How do you guys live with yourselves?"

Jason rubbed his temples. He was starting to get a headache. "Gryphons are most certainly not endangered, Nico. And we didn't really kill it. You can't truly destroy monsters. It just got sent back to Tartarus."

"Oh fabulous." Nico threw his hands up in the air. "Now you're trying to tell me Tartarus is real too? Is that what you're planning to do to me? Send me down there with all the innocent gryphons you slaughter? I don't think I can take much more of this. My head is going to freaking explode."

Percy flinched and paled slightly at the mention of his least favorite place. Nico didn't notice. He'd shut his eyes and was pressing his hands against the sides of his head as if he could mentally will everything to go back to normal.

"Of course not! You've already been there, anyway. We'd never do that to you."

"I've actually been to Tartarus?" Nico asked, cracking open an eye.

Jason and Percy both nodded.

His distressed frown softened. Nico silently considered this revelation for a moment.

"Well that's pretty metal, isn't it?" he mumbled, half to himself. His unstable mood moderately perked up. "I must be badass. Who'd you say my god-parent was again?"

"We didn't say." Jason and Percy exchanged a wary glance. Nico's godly lineage was often a touchy subject.

"It's Hades," Percy announced.

They watched Nico expectantly for a reaction. A wide grin slowly crept across his face.

"Now that," he said, rubbing his hands together, "is seriously the coolest thing anyone has ever told me. Where's the demigod orientation? I'm ready to sign up. When do I get a sword?"


Nico was significantly calmer by the time they made it back to the Big House. Unfortunately, not everyone else echoed his demeanor.

"He can't stay here!" Clarisse was having a fit in the center of the counselor meeting that had been called. "He's not a demigod! Camp Half-Blood is for half-bloods. That's the whole point of this place! We can't let it get all filled up with normals."

"I'm not a demigod," Rachel Dare calmly pointed out.

"Oh don't even get me started on you," Clarisse snapped, making a face. "You're still a freak, anyway."

"In high school someone wrote the word 'freak' on my locker at least twice a week," Nico reluctantly offered. "I'm qualified."

"You're qualified to shut up," replied Clarisse angrily. "You don't get to make the decisions."

"Neither do you!" Percy jumped up and glared hard at Clarisse. "Chiron said he could stay! He's staying. He's still Nico. He's family whether he's a demigod or not."

"No, actually," Clarisse retorted. "Actually him not being a demigod means he isn't family. He's just some creepy loser that has nothing to do with us."

Percy actually looked like he was about to start a physical fight with Clarisse. Jason glanced worriedly at Nico, expecting him to be upset. The Nico he was used to was fairly sensitive about people's negative opinions of him. The old Nico would have been the one chomping at the bit to fight Clarisse instead of letting Percy beat him to it.

Instead of lashing out he seemed to be withdrawing into himself. Nico had slouched significantly lower in his chair and his arms were crossed tightly across his chest. The fingers of his right hand left deep indentations in his upper arm where he kept gripping himself in aggravation.

"Can't we just like...find a radioactive god and have it bite me or something?" Nico asked through gritted teeth.

All eyes turned on Nico.

"That has got to be the stupidest thing I have ever heard anyone ever say," complained Clarisse.

"We can't just get you turned into a demigod," said Annabeth gently.

"Why not?" Nico asked. "I mean these are actual gods we're dealing with, right? Can't they do pretty much anything?"

"Well...yes. They can do a lot," Annabeth conceded. "But they don't usually take requests."

"You'd probably have to save the world for them a couple of times before they'd offer a favor like that," agreed Percy. He looked apologetic as he said so.

"Technically he already has," said Jason. "Maybe they'd grant a retroactive favor."

"Yeah and maybe Mr. D will become a teetotaler and Zeus will win a 'Family Man of the Year' award," muttered Leo. "Don't hold your breath."

"It wasn't him that saved anyone," huffed Clarisse. "Stop acting like they're the same person. This is just a useless copy."

Nico glared daggers at her but didn't rise to the bait. Jason was impressed by how calm he was remaining throughout this. Maybe he'd simply burned himself out on overreacting to the gryphon. Jason kept expecting any minute for one of Clarisse's verbal barbs to result in jagged stone spikes rising up through the floorboards or some other dramatic display of Nico's powers. He had to keep reminding himself that this Nico couldn't do that. It really was pretty hard to wrap his mind around that. Without extremely close scrutinizing, they just seemed so similar.

"I could totally save the world," muttered Nico under his breath. "Train me," he added more audibly. "If you think I'm not good enough to be here, then show me how to be good enough."

"Don't you want to go back to where you came from?" Jason asked. "We should probably be putting our energy into solving that problem."

Nico's scowl intensified at the mention of the word problem. "Are you anxious to get rid of me?" That hurt that had been shining in his eyes as he'd exploded in Chiron's office was back. He looked at Jason as though he'd just betrayed him.

"Of course not," replied Jason. "You're welcome here. I was just thinking that there might be people you left behind that you'd miss." He refrained from also adding, and I'm kind of worried about the other Nico. No one seems very focused on what happened to him.

Nico held Jason's stare for a long time. "Yeah," he finally said. "One or two." His eyes dropped away and he frowned. "Doubt they'll miss me too much," he muttered under his breath. Then he jerked a little and looked up again. "Oh!" he said, suddenly remembering something.

"What?"

"You're in both places," Nico said, pointing at Jason. "And so are you." He pointed at Percy. "There's doubles of everyone? I need to find my sister!"

The room went silent. Nico couldn't have missed the uncomfortable looks people were exchanging.

Percy broke the silence first. "Nico," he said, guilt written all over his features. "I'm really sorry. Really, really sorry. Your sister died."

Nico looked sick. He wrapped his arms around his stomach and leaned forward until his hair fell across his eyes. "No," he said hollowly. "No, that can't be. No. I can't go through that again. Hazel's dead here?"

"Oh!" Percy immediately started backtracking. He frantically waved his hands. "No! No no no no. Hazel's fine! I thought you meant—"

"Hazel's at Camp Jupiter with Frank." Jason cut Percy off before he could say the name that would probably trigger Nico into getting more upset.

"Oh. Good." Nico visibly relaxed. "What's Camp Jupiter?"

"Another demigod group," Annabeth explained. "On the West Coast."

"Oh. So I guess I can't see her then," Nico sighed. "Nothing's changed there then." He looked disappointed.

"Sure you can see her," said Percy. "You can just shad—oh. No, I guess you can't. But never mind, Hazel can. Let's call her."

With so many people present it didn't take long to scrounge up a drachma and a prism. Within a few minutes Hazel's image was summoned. Her eyes had barely focused on the group before the pleasant smile she'd been wearing dropped off her face. "What's wrong?" she asked anxiously. "I can tell something's wrong. What's going on? Nico?" Her eyes lit up at the sight of her brother. "Nico? You came back?!"

"Can you shadow travel here?" asked Jason. "It would probably be better to tell you in person."

Hazel didn't even take time to answer. In seconds she had joined them in the room.

"N-Nico?" She didn't come up and hug Nico like she normally would have. Her brief happiness was gone again. Hazel looked scared. "You're not Nico, are you? Your life force feels different."

"I'm Nico, but I'm not your Nico," he said. Jason could tell by his demeanor that Hazel's aborted hug had hurt him. His posture slumped even more.

They took turns quickly describing to Hazel what had happened. A range of emotions flickered across her face as they talked. She was quiet for a moment once they finished, then she briskly strode across the room and kissed Nico on the cheek.

"I haven't seen my brother in a very long time," she said, looping her arm around Nico's shoulders. "Please excuse us, we need some time to catch up."

Nico was weakly smiling as Hazel lead him out the door.


"So this is where you stay when you're here."

Jason had volunteered to be the one to show Nico around since he seemed to be the person this Nico was most comfortable with. Although saying he was 'comfortable' was a bit of a stretch. A silent tension also stretched between them, born of unmet expectations. Nico had still seemed glad though when Jason had offered.

"Awesome," said Nico, taking in the black obsidian walls and the eternally flickering torches. "I love it. You say the other me doesn't actually stay here much? I can't imagine why. I would want to stay." He left the silent I do want to stay unsaid.

"There's a lot of reasons for that," said Jason. "Not all of which I even know."

"But you know some of them," said Nico.

"Yes."

"You know stuff about me. So you're not not friends with me then," Nico clarified.

"No, we're not not friends. We're friends." Jason paused. "Sort of."

"But we're not friends either," said Nico, placing meaningful emphasis on the word 'friends.'

"Not really," Jason admitted. "You didn't stick around enough for that."

"Well this is awkward then," Nico sighed and flopped down on one of the identical vampiric beds. His face looked significantly less happy than it had when he'd first stepped into the cabin. "I'll try not to bother you then."

"You can bother me," said Jason quickly. "I told the other you that you could bother me. I never said I didn't want to be friends. I did want to, actually."

"So it's my fault we're not?"

"I wouldn't necessarily use the word 'fault'," said Jason diplomatically. Even though in his mind that was exactly the case. He had tried pretty hard there towards the end to reach out to the younger demigod. Nico had pushed him away. "There were a lot of very complicated things going on. You had reasons."

"Care to fill me in?"

"Well…." He paused, thinking things over. "The biggest reason is something I promised to never tell anyone. I'm not sure if telling you counts as breaking that promise or not."

"Well now I definitely want to know," said Nico, looking at Jason anxiously. "It's probably pretty important I know, right?"

Jason let the memory of Nico's confrontation with Cupid run through his head: the agony on Nico's face as his confession had been forcibly extracted; his unhappiness that Jason had witnessed that; his desperation that Jason never repeat what had happened. He was fairly certain that his Nico would not want him to tell, even if it was just telling himself. He wouldn't want his other self burdened by something that had caused him so much angst.

"No. I don't think I should tell you," Jason said apologetically. "I don't think the other you would want you to know. You're better off not knowing."

"That sounds ominous," Nico muttered.

"It's not relevant to you," Jason said. "No one else knows. If you don't know then it's something that won't matter. Don't worry about it."

"Too late," said Nico. "I'm worrying. That's what I do."

"Well don't. It's really not important."

"It must have been pretty important if it caused me to make you promise not to tell anyone and then run away."

"It was very important to him. But you're not exactly the same. So it won't affect you."

"Maybe we are the same enough that it would. Maybe it's something I should know about."

Jason sighed. He didn't blame this Nico for being so curious. He would be too. "It had to do with your feelings for someone. They were unrequited. You needed distance to deal with it."

"Oh." Nico looked somewhat horrified as he took in Jason's statement. "You…know…about that?" he asked shakily.

Jason raised an eyebrow. After having witnessed this Nico's reaction to meeting Percy, he highly doubted that the person in front of him right now shared the same romantic aspirations as the Nico he knew. He wasn't willing to give out more details about his Nico's situation though, so he had no way to verify that. Who did this Nico think he was talking about? "Um. I know about 'that' in regards to my Nico."

"I can't believe he told you," mumbled Nico, no longer making eye contact. He tugged awkwardly on the hem of his shirt.

"He didn't tell me," Jason explained. "I found out under circumstances out of his control."

"Oh." Nico was busily looking at just about every object in the room except for Jason. He was growing visibly more distressed. "This is more awkward than I realized," he said. "You don't have to hang around any longer. You can leave. I don't want to make you uncomfortable."

"Were you not listening when I said I wanted to be friends?" said Jason. "I already knew Nico's secret when I said that. It's a non-issue."

Nico very slowly looked up and suspiciously regarded Jason. "I find that kind of hard to believe," he said quietly.

"Why?" asked Jason. "Is the other me a jerk?"

Nico snorted. "As if. You're so nice it borders on annoying."

"Then I can't image why you're so hung up on thinking I'd mind."

"Because—" Nico studied Jason's face and his eyes narrowed. "Wait. Who were my feelings for here?"

"I can't tell you that," said Jason. "But if you tell me who you're thinking of, I'll let you know if it's the same person."

"No," said Nico quickly. "I'm not talking about that. I am never ever talking about that." He crossed his arms over his chest defensively and stared at the floor.

"Well that's one thing you have in common with the old Nico," Jason said good-naturedly.

"I probably seem really lame compared to him," Nico sighed. "I'm sure he could do all sorts of awesome stuff that I can't. You should tell me more about him."

"Well he had the same unjustifiably low self-esteem," said Jason. "But he's one of the most powerful demigods I ever met. He could control and communicate with the dead. And manipulate earth and stone. He could call shadows to himself and use them to travel pretty much anywhere. He was a pretty formidable foe in battle. I'm glad I never had to fight him. He probably would have kicked my ass."

Nico's eyes grew wider and wider as Jason talked. He uncrossed his arms and turned his palms up, looking down at his hands and frowned. "Well if I didn't have an inferiority complex before I sure do now," he muttered.

"You shouldn't," Jason assured him. "You really shouldn't. You seem better off than the Nico I knew."

Nico let out a humorless laugh. "That's a bit hard to believe. I'm totally pathetic."

"First of all, you're not," countered Jason. "Second of all, you seem happier than him."

"Me," said Nico flatly. "Happy? Those two things do not belong in the same sentence. Now I pretty much know not to believe anything you tell me."

"I didn't say 'happy' I said 'happier'," said Jason. "You seem more…" he'd been about to say 'stable' but then questioned his word choice, remembering the way this Nico's mood had been boomeranging all over the place when they'd first run into each other. In retrospect a lot of that seemed to have been due to shock, as once Nico figured out what was going on he'd significantly sobered. So far he'd also not gotten the impression that this Nico was likely to physically lash out due to emotional distress. Being able to broach the topic of 'unrequited feelings' in his presence without giant fissures springing up in the ground was a testament to that. But still, 'stable' didn't seem quite right. It was difficult for Jason to articulate his impression. "You seem more…anchored, I guess? I don't know, it's hard to explain. My Nico was so unhappy that you could stand next to him and palpably feel the misery rolling off him in waves. It was heartbreaking to watch. You don't project that same sort of aura."

"Huh." Nico chewed on his lip. "That's hard to believe. He sounds so much better off than me. I wish that I could talk to the dead. I'd…give anything to be able to do that."

Jason watched as Nico's eyes glazed over and went distant, a sadness settling over his features that could have rivaled the other Nico. He immediately regretted sharing what he'd just told him.

"Hey," he said, alarmed that he had worsened the other boy's mood. "Hey, I didn't tell you that as a challenge to try and match him. His powers were a burden to him as much as an advantage. They made people nervous. You're going to have an easier time making friends than he did. I think you're better off."

"Yeah right. I don't make friends easily," Nico muttered.

"Really? I find that hard to believe. You just made one now, didn't you?"

Nico tilted his head and looked at Jason skeptically. Jason flashed him a smile that he hoped came off as sincere.

"I guess you're not an evil doppelganger," was all Nico said. One side of his mouth quirked up though, betraying a hint of a smile.