Chapter 2

When he woke up, groggy and disoriented, Nico heard a loud knock at his door. He groaned and smashed his face back into his pillow, hoping that whoever was at his door would just go away. When he didn't hear a second knock, Nico thought he was in the clear and began to fall asleep again. Just as he was drifting off, there was another knock, and this time the person began shouting at him.

"Nico! Get up! You have been in your cabin for an entire day and you should at least eat something!" Ugh. It was that annoying son of Jupiter. Somehow, he had managed to forget that he would see Jason here, and then Nico repeatedly smashed his face into his pillow, because how could his life always get worse than what he thought it would be?

He rolled out of his bed, still dressed in the clothes that he arrived in, which were now all rumpled and twisted around his body, and he grouchily opened the door.

"What do you want, Grace?" He spat; he did not need the other boy bugging him right now, or ever, for that matter. He did have to give Jason credit, though; the other boy had been trying to hang out with Nico more ever since the incident in Croatia, even when his presence was unwanted by the Ghost King. But Nico could tell; no matter how friendly Jason acted toward him, Jason was still wary and afraid of the son of Hades; and Nico thought it was better that way.

Breaking out of his stupor, Nico just managed to catch the end of Jason's rant.

"...Percy and Annabeth, and Hazel and Frank will be there. Hazel wanted me to come get you because she felt that you should join us, and I have to say that I agree."

Nico just stared at him blankly. "What?"

Jason sighed. "You weren't listening to a thing I said, were you?" At Nico's pointed look that said, Of course not, Jason explained-again- "Okay, well, we are having a meeting up at Thalia's Tree to wait for Mrs. O'Leary, Percy, and Annabeth to show up, and then we are going to go out with them and Hazel and Frank and do something fun. Sound good? Good. Now get dressed and meet me out here as soon as you can; maybe twenty minutes?" The son of Jupiter shoved Nico back into his cabin and shut the door without even waiting for Nico's response; but of course he was going to go; he had been neglecting Hazel lately and if she wanted him to hang out with the rest of them, then so be it.

He quickly showered and dressed, then walked out the door while simultaneously strapping his Stygian iron sword to his side.

"Hey! You actually came out! I didn't think you actually would…Hey, Nico, wait up!" Jason shouted at Nico as soon as the younger boy walked out of his cabin; it took Jason a couple seconds to realize that Nico had just kept on walking past him and up toward Half-Blood Hill. When he reached the top, he spotted Peleus the dragon guarding the Golden Fleece, which was still hanging from one of the lower boughs of Thalia's Tree.

He heard footsteps behind him and the panting of people-what sounded to be two people.

"Hey, Nico! How have you been? I haven't seen you in so long!" As soon as they finished speaking, Nico was locked in a bone-crushing bear hug; when he looked down, he noticed it was Hazel. Jeez, she's strong for such a little person, he thought.

He looked past his sister, who seemed as if she was not going to let go of him for a while, and saw Frank. He waved, well, he waved as much as he could with his sister pinning his arms to his body, and greeted her boyfriend.

"Hey, Frank." Frank looked surprised that Nico had addressed him, and he warily waved back, making Nico chuckle. He liked Frank, he really did, because he treated his sister right and he didn't try to touch Nico all that much.

After Hazel was done with her hug-fest, she began to berate him for not hanging out with her sooner, he could've at least sent her an IM, or sent a letter or something.

"Yeah, Hazel, I know I'm sorry; Dad has been keeping me pretty busy in the Underworld and he only barely let me come up here." More like forced.

Jason stepped in before Hazel could go off on another rant. "Okay, Hazel, I think he gets your point, he should contact you more." It looked like Jason was about to say something else, but something caught his attention over Nico's shoulder and his eyes widened considerably. Uh-oh.

"HELP! HELP US, PLEASE!" At the sound of the shouts Nico whipped his head around to look down at the base of Half-Blood Hill, and was actually...confused at what he saw. There was a girl, with long dark brown hair, olive-tan skin, and brown eyes, and she was carrying a satyr over her shoulder, who looked to be unconscious. The girl had screamed because there was a giant-something attacking her, but it was a monster that Nico had never seen around camp, mostly because they never ventured this far. The girl was battling, all by herself plus the added weight of a satyr, with a chimera. And she was starting to slow down.

Snapping out of his daze, Nico sprinted down the hill and toward the girl, freeing his Stygian iron sword from its scabbard on his way. He leaped up onto the head of the lion and began slashing at it. The lion roared loudly and dumped Nico off its head. He now had the attention of all three heads, plus the double snake tail. As he charged the monster again, he saw the girl out of the corner of his eye. She had stashed the satyr away somewhere safe and was...fighting the monster with him?

He had thought that as soon as they had appeared, the girl would run. But no, she was holding her own, and had already blinded the goat head of the beast with what looked to be a large shard of glass. Together, with the added help of Jason, Hazel, and Frank, they took the chimera down.

Breathing heavily and bleeding from a few shallow scrapes, Nico approached the girl, who was in much worse shape than he was. Her shirt was a torn up rag, revealing deep, nasty cuts across her abdomen, and she had other lacerations all over the rest of her body. It seemed that she was just a mess of blood and dirt; she was barely conscious, probably having lost too much blood already. Nico quickly sheathed his sword, picked her up, and raced back up the hill, on his way to the Big House. Upon arriving he just shouldered his way through the front door and barreled toward the infirmary, trying to get there before it was too late.

In no time, he had the Apollo kids working on her and he just collapsed in the chair outside on the porch. The other three soon caught up with him and, after Jason had carried the satyr into the infirmary as well, they all sat around on the porch, silently waiting to hear if she was okay.

Chiron came out just as the sun was setting, waking each of them up gently.

"Before you ask, yes, she and the satyr are alright, but they are sleeping now. Why don't you go back to your cabins and get some rest; you can visit her tomorrow. I'm sure she'd like to meet you four." They each trudged off, waving their goodbyes. Hazel and Frank went to go stay in the Roman Ambassador cabin together, so Nico had the whole cabin to himself.

He threw the door open and then slammed it shut. He collapsed on top of his comforter, pausing only to kick off his muddy boots before falling into a blissfully dreamless sleep.