A/N:
Hey guys, I already know what you're thinking. I'm sorry for not updating quicker! I have no excuse except for my week has been super hectic with coronavirus and having to go into quarantine at my house, and I am a procrastinator. I hope this extra long chapter I wrote will make up for it! By the way, this chapter is kind of... odd. I'm experimenting and trying something new, and this idea was on my mind so, I wrote it. Please tell me what you think in the comments!
-Echo
Chapter 29: A Dance of Souls
My eyes snapped open to the sound of music.
It was faint, but it echoed through my very being, lulling me with its hypnotic rhythm and tune. It was the kind of music that makes you feel put together. It was the kind of music that makes you feel lost yet found all at once. It was the kind of music that makes you feel like nothing else matters.
I had the sudden desire to follow the sound.
I moved briskly towards the heavy wooden doors. I passed through them as if I were made of nothing and everything. My sights were met with a grand ballroom of luxury and taste. It was a ballroom of chocolate fountains, crystal chandeliers, and bustling guests.
The orchestra boomed in volume, awaiting my arrival.
I gazed down from the balcony at all the little people below. The guests gazed back at me with their faceless faces and luminescent souls. They gleamed like embers of a kaleidoscope fire, circling the center of the room where a fissure of glowing green light welcomed them home.
Home.
A memory flashed before my eyes. A man upon a pedestal overlooking applauding guests in a fancy ballroom. Mama, Bianca, and I next to him, his hand on my shoulder and a smile on his face. "Someday you will become quite the ambassador as well, mio nipote," I recalled him saying.
An irresistible feeling washed over me. I want to go home. I need to go home. I stared at the glowing green fissure in wonder. An energy deep inside of me seemed to pull me towards it, like a moth to a flame.
I want to go home.
I descended the staircase and joined the crowd, dancing and losing myself to this séance of music. The orchestra played on, coaxing me towards the fissure like a lullaby coaxing a child to sleep.
A lullaby.
A memory—a sound—joined the melody of the orchestra. Mama ran her fingers through my hair as she sang me a lullaby in the midst of a storm. "Do not be afraid, amore mio," she whispered in the dead of night. "I am right here."
I caught my reflection on a silver platter. I was another ghostly ember among the hundreds of others. But I was different. I was more corporeal, brighter, and the spotless white among the painted canvas.
The shadow of concern loomed over me. Do I belong here?
Before I could think much of it, an unnamed ember of tickle-me-pink pulled me close and twirled me around, making me laugh my worries away.
The laughter echoed with the music through my very being, reminding me of a simpler time: Two children laughing—Bianca and I, as we raced each other on the pathway of the Venacian Canal, the sun never shining brighter.
Wait. The sun.
Where is the sun?
I glanced up, hoping to catch a glimpse. But before I could, another ember of forget-me-not-blue took my hand and dragged me along. The percussion sounded, the sonorous echo of drumming.
The sound was familiar.
An image implanted into my brain. The thumps of carved staffs in a land of sand. A place where the sun was still shining. A place where I was a different person. The memory was hazy, like the mirage of the desert sun.
Then it went away, making me question if it was ever real.
Is this place real?
Where is the sun? I want to see the sun.
Another memory flashed before my eyes. A sliver of sunlight danced across the living room carpet as I painted a field of white chrysanthemums on a canvas. I recalled the strange premonition I got every time I glanced at the picture, as if the flowers weren't as innocent as they seemed.
Flowers…
Wildflowers. All the wildflowers in the field.
A field of broken bodies and dull eyes. A blood red sky looming just over the horizon. An awful ringing piercing my ears. A sinister laugh taunting me, reminding me who's really at fault here. "Little Angel, why do you still fight?"
Why do I still fight? I don't want to fight anymore.
I want to go home.
I danced with the other souls and laughed with them because they know how to forget. They know how to lose themselves to the music and that is exactly what I want to do. They pranced and frolicked without a care for the world. They twirled in a swirl of all the prettiest shades—the shadows of their souls and the ugly truth of the end they wish to mask.
But they are masking it well and that's all that matters.
My eyes locked with the fissure. It was so hauntingly alluring.
I want to go home.
"Nico! Nico, where are you?" Someone asked.
The words uprooted another memory. I was a little boy again, walking through a grand museum of marble and gold in the section displaying the pharaohs of Egypt. Strangely enough, I seemed to know my way around. I gripped my stuffed animal dog closer to my chest as I passed some artifacts radiating a foul energy. "Nico, where did you go?" The voice asked again.
That voice… Why does it sound so familiar?
I tried to search for the noise, but a rose colored ember grabbed my hand and carried me away. The ember carried me away to a faraway place where I can never return. The orchestra grew louder with intensity, as if it demanded my attention. I closed my eyes and obliged, letting the melody lull me back home.
"Nico?"
I opened my eyes, my curiosity overwhelming the irresistible feeling inside me. There, staring at me with a look of utter disbelief, Bianca di Angelo could only gape at me silently as glassy tears streamed down her face like falling stars.
I frowned in confusion. Why is she crying?
We can both go home now.
She walked up to me silently, her mouth set in a hard line. Her form was incorporeal and ethereal; wisps of silver light radiated off of her as if she were made of moonlight itself. Finally she spoke. "I was the one lost in the land without rain, wasn't I? That's why you wanted to come along on the quest. You planned to prevent my death."
Death? Quest? What is she talking about? My head feels so fuzzy. Maybe if I keep remembering, I'll feel better.
She hugged me and brought me close. "Nico, you must listen to me. Your soul is in a stalemate. It refuses to reside in your body, but it isn't in the Underworld yet either. Thalia and the others are trying to shock your heart back into rhythm as we speak, but the only way to bring you completely back is to bring your soul—your life force back into your body." She pulled away from the hug and brought a hand to my cheek. "You have to let me guide your soul back to your body, okay? Or else we will lose you for good. I can't lose you for good."
"Bring me back? To where? I'm already going home." I pointed at the fissure of glowing green light excitedly. I turned to my sister. "We can go home, Bianca. Together." I smiled. "We can see Mama and Nonno!"
My sister's look of horror puzzled me. What is she so afraid of? Why is she looking at me like that?
It was only then that I noticed the shattered look in her eyes. The cracks of her soul splintering and fracturing into thousands of pieces, showing every flaw and every imperfection in a distorted mirror of madness. She's breaking inside, but I cannot for the life of me understand why. It's as if we're seeing two sides of the same world, one that is both beautiful and broken. Now, all she sees is the broken side. But why?
The maddening glint in her eyes… it reminds me of someone.
A haze of a memory overcame me. A man stared down at me from a dark throne. There was an indescribable glint of madness to his eyes, a fury so penetrating it made me want to give in and curl up until I sleep forever. He glared with seething resentment, though I had a feeling this wasn't his most terrifying glare. "Bianca would've done better," he spat.
I blinked, snapping out of the memory and regarding Bianca curiously. "Bianca, what are you doing here?"
"You don't remember, do you?"
"Remember? Remember what?"
"Nico, you died. You ran into the automaton, remember? Talos killed you. I felt it," she whispered as more tears threatened to fall from her eyes.
I frowned. Talos? What is she talking about?
"But I'm right here." I felt so confused. What is she going on about?
"Nico, you have to listen to me. You are dying." She pointed to the fissure of glowing green light. "Don't you see? The closer you get to it, the more you lose yourself to it." She gestured to my form. Tiny shards of light—like stars—fragmented off my spirit and seemingly floated in a trail of stardust leading into the fissure. "Once your life force is completely gone, I cannot save you."
"But I want to go home," I said. Why isn't she understanding? We can go home now.
She suddenly grasped the sides of my head urgently. "Nico, listen to me. The Underworld is not your home. Your home is up on the surface with Percy, Annabeth, Thalia, Grover, Will, and Zoe. Not there." She pointed to the glowing green fissure once more. "Don't you remember?"
"I—" The orchestra reached the climax of the song and all of the instruments played simultaneously. I closed my eyes, relishing the sweet crescendo, but Bianca snapped me out of enjoyment just as quickly.
"No, no, no, no! Focus on my voice, not the music. I need you to remember, okay? I need you to remember me!" She searched my face frantically, as if looking for some hidden sign before wrapping her arms around me in a hug. Her body trembled as she sobbed into my shoulder. "Gods, why won't you remember? Why did you have to run into that stupid machine?! Don't you know I need you too?! Please, come back to me! I need my little brother back!"
There was something about the sound of her sobs that were evoking. The way she made you feel her pain, whether you wanted to or not. It was… heartbreaking. Utterly and unspeakably heartbreaking. This pain, it was a being of its own right; lurking, looming, and always there. It's the kind of shadow that would not leave your side. It's the kind of shadow that would follow you, no matter how much sunlight shines over you or how much darkness consumes you.
It. Never. Leaves.
It's the kind of pain I'm all too familiar with.
That's when the realization dawned over me. As if my eyes opened for the very first time, as if I woke from a dream, I finally understood. The rose colored lenses lifted and everything was suddenly so much clearer.
The memories came flooding in one by one.
The war. The ringing. The wildflowers. The quest. The automaton. My death.
So many thoughts were running through me all at once.
This pain… It drives me. It fuels me. It inspires me. When all hope is lost, when the sun is gone, when chaos has seeped through the cracks, pain is always there. Like a shadow, it never leaves your side. It's the everlasting reminder of what you have lost, but it's what keeps you fighting. What am I fighting for? Revenge. Love. My family. The future.
Hope.
These souls have lost their pain and therefore have lost their motivation. They will never remember what it feels like to fight for what they believe in. They will forever be numb with lies and illusions. When they finally wake up, their whole world will come crashing down.
I made a terrible mistake. I should have never tried to hide the truth from Bianca. This is her world crashing down. This is her illusions shattering. Now I have to help her rebuild.
Now I have to help her remember.
"Bianca? It's okay. We're okay. I remember now." Bianca lifted her head, staring at me in astonishment. There seemed to be a silent question written on her face. I hugged her back, answering just as silently. "I'm so sorry I left you, Bia. I'm so sorry I put you through that."
"You're okay now?" She asked, sniffling.
I nodded and smiled sadly, gently wiping the tears running down her cheek. "We're okay now."
Bianca took a deep breath. "Good." Then she started hitting me. Like, full blown hitting me. "What were you thinking?! Running off into the freaking murder machine like that! Buoni dei! What is wrong with you?! Do you know how worried I was?! You're lucky your body was found outside of the wreckage or we wouldn't have found you!"
I grimaced in pain. "Yeah, I deserved that." I took a deep breath. "Look, I'm really sorry, but I had to make sure you wouldn't sacrifice yourself! As strong as you are, there was no way you would've survived that!"
"So, you thought it would be okay to sacrifice yourself instead?!" She screamed hysterically. The embers around us didn't even stir. They must have a lot of selective hearing. "Don't ever do that again or I swear to all the Gods I will drag you out of the Underworld myself!" She pulled me into a hug again. "Gods, you scared me."
I returned the hug. "Bia, you can chew me out later. Right now we need to find a way out of here."
"Right." We looked around, watching the souls dance to their doom. The orchestra played on, luring them to their new home. Somehow, the orchestra now sounded like nothing more than a sad song of farewell. Without warning, Bianca screamed, "I, BIANCA DI ANGELO, DAUGHTER OF HADES COMMAND YOU TO STOP!!"
The embers didn't even flinch. They didn't even turn our way for a second. They just kept dancing, pulling us along for the ride. I held on tight to Bianca, afraid if I let go, I'll lose myself again. "That should have worked," I mumbled.
Bianca frowned. "Maybe if we try stopping the music?"
I pointed to the fissure. "It's coming from the Underworld. We won't be able to stop it down there."
"What if we tried just pushing them—" Bianca struggled against the tide of souls. "—out of the—" I helped her shove the embers, but it was no use. "—WAY!" We ricocheted to the ground, falling with a loud umph.
"We need a new plan," I said as we helped each other up. If I'm a spirit just like all the others, I doubt I came here by physical means, and I don't think Bianca came in that way either.
I watched the souls dance with finesse, smiling behind their faceless masks. The music carried them along, lulling them with a lullaby of lies and illusions, wishes that they thought came true and nightmares dressed in dreams.
The music.
That's it.
"I have this idea, but it's crazy."
"The last crazy idea you had got you killed."
"This is a different kind of crazy."
"Somehow I doubt that, but shoot."
"I… I think we need to give them a new song to dance to." I looked at Bianca, a spark of hope igniting inside of me. "One that will wake them up from the trance."
"That… That might actually work. But what song can we sing? What song will work?" She asked.
The perfect song came to mind, one that was both sad but a little hopeful. It was a song I used to listen to a lot after Percy and Thalia introduced the albums to me.
I didn't answer her. Instead I held out my palm. "Take my hand."
She took it without hesitation, uprooting another memory. A pair of bright molten gold eyes among a field of dazed spirits watching me closely. A girl about my age leaning against a poplar tree in the Fields of Asphodel, her eyes sparkling with awareness and intelligence. I walked up to her and held out my hand. "You deserve to live," I recalled saying as I watched her life flash before my eyes. "Come with me. You're my sister too."
"Nico, what was that? Who was that girl?" Bianca asked wearily, snapping us out of the memory. "Was she our… our sister?"
I nodded, smiling sadly. "Her name is Hazel Levesque, Daughter of Pluto. She is, without a doubt, the most selfless and kindest person I know."
"She sacrificed herself to save everyone. Then she went into Asphodel even though she deserved Elysium to save her mother from going into the Fields of Punishment. She's a hero." Bianca's gaze was distant, as if she were trying to find Hazel among the other embers.
"I'm resurrecting her first chance I get. I don't care if you don't—"
"I'll help you," my older sister interrupted. "You don't come across someone like that everyday. Hazel deserves a second chance at life." Bianca finally looked at me. "Please, show me everything."
"I haven't been completely honest with everyone. Some secrets are too much to bear," I said looking down in shame. "But it's time you knew the truth. I was wrong to hide it from you. You need to know. They need to know. I'm going to show you everything, the good and the bad." I squeezed Bianca's hand. "Are you ready?"
Bianca squeezed back. "I'm ready."
I took a deep breath and began to hum the tune of the song. It was quiet, but the melody carried through the room.
Suddenly the orchestra was silent.
Suddenly every ember stopped dancing to listen.
It was nerve wracking, having every eye on me. But I can't stop. I won't stop. I brought us into this mess and I'm going to get us out of it.
I squeezed Bianca's hand and closed my eyes. When I opened them, I no longer saw a ballroom of souls, instead a field of wildflowers with the backdrop of the blood red sky. In the memory, Hazel died all over again, her once bright molten eyes dulling to a deep copper—the everlasting shade of her soul. Tears slid down my cheeks as I watched my greatest moment of guilt unfold. Bianca gently wiped away the tears on my face and kept watching, even as the ringing reached its crescendo.
The scene played on and I finally sang. My voice was a high soprano delving into a certain clarity of emotion that seemed to draw you in, perhaps even more than the orchestra ever could.
"So long to all my friends.
Every one of them met tragic ends."
Will. Megan. Reyna. It was if they were meeting their tragic ends all over again. Bianca exhaled sharply and put a hand over her mouth in shock as she witnessed the horrors of war. My voice cracked as I sang the next lines. I wanted to throw up with all of the fear and guilt churning in my stomach, but I kept going.
"With every passing day
I'd be lying if I didn't say
That I miss them all tonight.
And if they only knew what I would say."
I'm sorry, I thought. I'm sorry for everything.
The memories flashed by. Hazel and I on the roof of Pluto's temple. The Seven and the Argo II. Reyna, Hedge, and I shadow traveling the Athena Parthenos. All the black lies I told to prevent a red war.
"If I could be with you tonight
I would sing you to sleep,
Never let them take the light behind your eyes."
The embers suddenly parted in a trail of kaleidoscope fire leading up to the stairs. Bianca led me through the trail as I sang. The memories darkened into the depths of Tartarus and the struggles I faced. Bianca watched in silent terror as Gaea's giants overwhelmed me and imprisoned me in a jar.
"One day I'll lose this fight.
As we fade in the dark
Just remember you will always burn as bright."
The scene morphed into the streets of Venice, Italy. Two children laughed—Bianca and I as we raced down the path of the sparkling canal. I turned to my sister, knowing very well what comes next.
"Be strong and hold my hand.
Time becomes for us, you'll understand."
The hotel in Washington D.C. emerged, two children playing tag around the marble pillar as the mother and father spoke fearfully in the background.
"We'll say goodbye today.
And I'm sorry how it ends this way."
The lightning bolt. The explosion. The ringing. My father's curse. Bianca screamed as our uncle took our mother's life and left our family in pieces. We watched as we were submerged into the Lethe and taken into the Lotus Hotel and Casino for 70 years.
"If you promise not to cry
Then I'll tell you just what I would say."
It's going to be okay, I thought.
I squeezed Bianca's hand, hoping to somehow convey the message. I led us along the spiraling path as the scene changed. Bianca becoming a Hunter, her sacrifice, and the Hades figurine she meant to give to me. Minos' manipulation, the Labyrinth, and how I kept trying to resurrect her as her ghost guided me.
"If I could be with you tonight
I would sing you to sleep.
Never let them take the light behind your eyes."
The memories morphed into the encounter I had with Cupid. Bianca and I watched as my darkest secret was revealed. All of the pain, the shame, and disgust I felt with myself seemingly exploded out of me in waves of death and darkness. I turned my head away in fear. What is Bianca going to think of me now? Bianca squeezed my hand and smiled at me, a silent message of reassurance in her eyes.
"I failed and lost this fight.
Never fade in the dark.
Just remember you will always burn as bright."
We finally made it to the steps. One by one, the embers reached out to us, hoping for one more dance. I could feel their anticipation, their hopes, and their dreams rolling off of them in waves. But this time, it wasn't to go home, it was to remember.
Ignorance is an illusion; a veil, a mirage, a fantasy. That's all it is. People try so hard to hide from the truth, but sometimes it's just better to face it. The truth is bitter and history is not always kind, though it is a lesson that everyone must be taught eventually.
No matter how hard you try to hide it, the truth always comes out in the end.
So I turned away from the embers because some lessons cannot be expressed in words. Some lessons you have to find out on your own, but not all of them. I glanced at Bianca, who was staring at the embers in wonder. A ghost of a smile crossed my face.
Sometimes you just need someone to help you learn it.
Bianca and I walked up the steps together. When we reached the balcony lift, I glanced back at the ballroom of souls. The kaleidoscope embers stared back at me with their faceless faces and luminescent souls. This time they weren't dancing and the orchestra wasn't playing.
The party is over, I thought. The harsh reality of the end has finally set in.
Bianca turned to me and squeezed my hand. "Let's go home."
I squeezed back and took a deep breath. The illusions have finally shattered. The bitter truth of the past has resurfaced. She knows the truth and yet, she hasn't judged me for it. Seeing my past, seeing all of my memories flash by, it wasn't easy to face, though with Bianca beside me it made it bearable. Bearable is definitely an improvement to unspeakable.
"Yeah, let's go home."
Together, we passed through the heavy wooden doors as if we were made of nothing and everything. A blinding white light filled my vision as I finally came home.
More A/N:
Right, so I told you this chapter was really different. What did you think? The song I used was The Light Behind Your Eyes by My Chemical Romance. I thought that a) listening to this kind of music would fit Nico's character, b) the song fit the chapter and Nico's character arc in general in my story—or at the very least the experiences he went through, and c) I thought it was a cool song in general. Anyway, yeah. Next chapter should be up soon! (And by soon I mean within the week.)
