Chapter 28: Memories of Laughter
Nico
"Hazel, how are you?"
She smiled. "Fine Nico, isn't it around midnight in Britain?"
"Yes, and…?"
She sighed. "How are you Nico?"
"I kinda fell asleep in a very dangerous forest last night after meeting a wise centaur named Firenze."
She laughed. "Figures."
"I should go."
"I know. Goodnight Nico. I'm going to dinner."
"Night Hazel."
I threw my hand through the message.
I smiled.
I laid down and closed my eyes.
The dream was about me, me as a little kid.
"Does Zeus really have lightning bolts that do six hundred damage? Does he get extra movement points for—"
"Nico, shut up!" Bianca said "This is not your stupid Mythomagic game, okay? There are no gods!"
It's only my life that times like those are good memories.
"Big collection."
I was showing Percy Mythomagic.
"I've got almost all of them, plus their holographic cards! Well, except for a few really rare ones."
"You've been playing this game a long time?"
"Just this year. Before that…"
"What?"
"I forget. That's weird."
"Hey, can I see that sword you were using?"
He pulled it out, explain how it worked.
"Cool! Does it ever run out of ink?"
"Um, well, I don't actually write with it."
"Are you really the son of Poseidon?"
"Well, yeah."
"Can you surf really well, then?"
"Jeez, Nico," He said. "I've never really tried."
The childish part of my brain wanted to ask him the question the next time I saw him.
"Never really tried." I muttered and opened my eyes.
Harry
I couldn't help wondering about what Nico had asked me yesterday, and what he had said.
'Except I'm not sure there are people like me.'
I sat by the fire in the common room doing an essay for potions.
"I've got it!" Hermione lifted up the giant book she had been reading in triumph.
"What?" Ron asked.
"Come here." She pointed to a spot in her book.
"What is it?" I asked.
"Remember a while back Nico said something about Ambrosia, I've found it!"
"In Greek Mythology," I read, "Ambrosia was the food of the gods."
"So?" Ron asked.
She turned to another page. "Hades, Greek god of the dead." She flipped again. "Fields of Asphodel, a place in the Greek afterlife where the souls of average people remained forever." She kept flipping. "The fates, incarnations of destiny that controlled the string of life, in GREEK mythology. Do I need to go on?"
"No!" Ron and I said in unison.
"What's this mean then?" I asked.
"I'm not exactly sure. He definitely ties to Greek Mythology somehow. He confirmed that when he said he swore to the gods. And death, he seems to have plenty to do with death. Hades, Fields of Asphodel, knowing ghosts. It all ties in."
"And…?" Ron asked.
"I don't know. Have you heard any other phrases or words that seem… weird?"
"Camp Half-Blood," I said. "In a dream I heard him say that."
"Half-Blood? That's not strange." She asked. "But camp? What on earth…?" Her voice faltered. "I have no idea, alright?"
"The world must be ending! Hermione doesn't have an idea!"
"Shut up, Ron!"
Nico
All those childhood dreams reminded me of Bianca. What didn't?
Bianca who was always there. Bianca who protected me.
"Nico, homework done?" I remembered a day so many years ago.
"Yup!" I had proudly said. "I bet I got them all right!"
"Oh really?"
"Really!"
She had laughed.
My eight year old self hadn't understood what was funny.
I understood now.
Bianca. Oh Bianca.
"Leave me alone, Nico!" A later memory.
"But I have no one to play with."
"Play with yourself!"
Like the nine year old he was, I had sat down and cried.
"I'm sorry." It hadn't taken Bianca long to apologize. It never did.
"It's okay."
"Let's play."
"Yay!"
My favorite memory of Bianca was only days before she joined the Hunters.
"Nico!"
"Ow."
"What did you do?"
I had a huge scrap on my leg.
"I fell."
"No really?" She laughed.
"Don't laugh! It hurts!"
"I'm sorry."
"Then why'd you laugh?"
"I'm very sorry Nico." She looked ready to laugh again.
"No you aren't."
"I think you need to laugh."
She tickled me.
I laughed.
"Stop it!"
She stopped.
"Your turn to laugh!"
"Nico?" Trevor jolted me out of my thoughts. "You've been staring into space for ten minutes."
"I'm hungry. Let's go eat."
"Nico?"
"I'm very hungry."
He threw his arms up in the air. "Whatever!"
I laughed.
(A/N Happy Valentine's Day. Go check out my Valentine's Day one-shot Your Heart Is a Vital Organ. Review.)
