A/N: If you haven't seen my updated profile, this story should be done at around 30 chapters. Thanks for the reviews! Enjoy :)

POVs: Percy

Disclaimer: I own this not.

Chapter 23: Iris Message

"Nico?!"

I had never seen Jason more surprised, to be completely honest, than when Nico stepped out of the shadows of the forest. Honestly, the dude wouldn't be so surprised if he had actually paid attention to the shadowy black cloud and magical fighting skeletons a few days ago. There was only one person who the both of us knew who could summon such atrocious, bizarre and nightmarish creatures from the depths of Hell. (Literally.)

Said person was just now revealing himself, stepping out of the thick black fog that shrouded the forest. Nico di Angelo was wearing a black shirt with death written all over it, his silver-black skull ring, and a black jacket that seemed too warm for Italy's Mediterranean climate.

Holy Hades.

I was back in Italy, the worst place a demigod could find himself. I didn't even want to think about Rome and that parking lot that had basically collapsed into Tartarus. Along with me. And Annabeth.

Gods, Annabeth. I would give all the drachmas in the world to see her right now.

But as far as my calculations went, we were safely in the northern part of Italy. We might be near Florence, but Rome was a couple hundred miles south at least.

My mind pulled me back to the situation at hand, and I studied Nico more closely this time. His eyes were heavily shadowed underneath, big purple bags that seemed to me like they'd never disappear. The guy looked utterly exhausted, not to mention his stick-like frame. I doubted he'd eaten more than a pomegranate seed in the past few days. I hoped he wasn't in a death-sleep-mode or whatever Hazel called it again.

"Percy. Jason," he acknowledged, his voice barely a huff and his head slightly bent downwards.

"What are you doing here, Nico?" Jason asked worriedly, stretching out an arm to support the son of Hades.

He waved off the helping hand, wheezing slightly. "Um, you're not going to like this, but I've been following you since you left camp."

"You say what?!" I shouted, making Nico jump and scaring him more than I should.

"Um, well… you see, um…"

"Just spit it out, Nico. How long have you been shadow-traveling? Looks like way too long!" exclaimed Jason, worried and angry at the same time.

"Fine. Annabeth — she sent me to watch over you. Hence why I've been following you for a while now."

I was filled with both anger and a horrible emptiness at these words. Annabeth had endangered the entire mission by sending Nico, but she'd done it no doubt because she missed me. And now, I missed her more than ever.

Jason must have felt the same, because he sighed and placed his hand over his eyes, crossing his other arm over his chest. He sighed again, then dropped his arms. "Okay. Well, now we have a more problematic issue. Exactly how are we supposed to get Nessie out of that hell alive?"

"Who's Nessie?" Nico inquired, a look of suspicion drawing itself on his face while his head retreated into his hoodie.

"Just a half-human, half-vampire, the girl you just saved," I told him, plopping down next to a tree to think.

"What are you doing, Percy? There's no time to sit down, we have to go get her! Otherwise, we will for sure be dead, and by means of friendly vam —"

I interrupted him swiftly, defeated. "Jason, we can't just go. We have to make a plan. A plan that will most certainly require Nico's help. Without him, we'd just as well commit suicide. And Nico needs to rest."

Jason glared at me, so I decided to give him some more reasons to not go.

"Jason, our powers won't help against vampires, especially vampires who will not hesitate to bite our necks and suck us free of blood, especially since demigod blood seems to be way more alluring to them than regular mortal blood. They can move way faster than us, like speed-of-light faster. They can't drown in any water I can make. They won't die of any lightning that hits them. You remember exactly what Renesmee told you: they're already dead. The only beings who can kill vampires are vampires. And we are not vampires."

Jason's expression and glare, which had slowly been falling, deteriorated completely. He sat down next to me, and said, half-sarcastically and half-defeatedly, "Who knew, Percy? You can actually think."

"Yeah, well," I muttered, "it's about time to put those thinking skills to use. Nico? You have any ideas?"

I turned to my other side, where the dark demigod had sat down only minutes ago, but found him so deeply sleeping I feared he might actually be dead. The only thing that reassured me was the light snoring coming from his open mouth. I decided to let him be. The guy needed his sleep.

Festus, who up until now had been romping through the forest (doing Zeus knows what), stomped noisily over to us, and lay down as best he could, being a robot dragon and all. He remained alert.

Jason fell asleep only an hour later (a very unproductive, silent hour), leaving me awake alone. My mind was racing millions of miles a second, coming up with plans to flush the Volturi out of their ancient castle and rescue Nessie and then immediately discarding plan after plan. It was the ADHD acting up, and I soon felt an irresistible itch to do some walking around.

So I got up, made sure Festus was watching the two other demigods closely, and wandered off into the midday woods.

I felt an empty hollow space somewhere in my ribs, but it wasn't from hunger. In fact, I knew exactly what it was.

I fished around in my pockets and came up with two drachmas. I put one away in my pocket and held the other, biting my lip.

"O, Iris, Goddess of the Rainbow, accept my offering." And with that, I tossed the drachma out in front of me like I always did.

A rainbow spray appeared in front of me. "Show me Annabeth Chase, Camp Half-Blood."

The spray of the water became an image: the inside of a cabin at camp, the air in the cabin lit by a very soft golden sunlight drifting in through the window. Cabin 6 was empty, all the beds neat and tidy and lined up against the wall, except for one. It was not made, sheets strewn everywhere, with papers and sticky notes scattered over the mattress randomly. There was a laptop sitting there, a Delta sign glowing bright on its back as the computer hummed away. And lying belly-down on the untidy mattress, her head fallen on the laptop's keyboard and her eyes closed, was Annabeth.

She was sleeping too; why was everyone suddenly taking naps in the middle of the day? "Annabeth," I whispered. "Annabeth?" The second time was a bit louder, and Annabeth stirred slightly.

"Annabeth!" She opened her eyes clumsily, then rubbed them and suddenly focused on me.

"PERCY?!" she yelled when she saw my image. She clambered off her bed and rushed over to the Iris Message, her messy blond hair falling out of its ponytail and her orange Camp Half-Blood shirt twisted awkwardly.

"Oh, gods, what happened to you?" she exclaimed, eyes full of worry. I only then realized what a mess I was; jeans and t-shirt torn, a scar on my forehead and my arm slightly bleeding.

"Well, there's been quite a lot going on here. We ran into one of the Volturi guard."

"Gods. Edward told me about them. They're awful! Did he get to you, Seaweed Brain? Bite anyone?"

"No," I said, "but he took Renesmee." Annabeth's mouth popped open and she put both hands over it. "Yeah. The only reason we're alive is because of a certain son of Hades who showed up, saying you sent him."

Annabeth's hands dropped away. "Oh, gods, Percy, I'm so sorry. I couldn't deal with being away from you!"

"I get that, Annabeth, but you didn't have to endanger Nico by doing so!" I boiled up with rage.

"Percy, I honestly am sorry. I wouldn't have if I could've gone myself!" She looked so lost and hurt that I softened immediately.

"It's okay, Wise Girl. Just don't do it again. Nico was tired to death from shadow-travel."

"So what's your plan to get Renesmee out?" she asked.

"We don't have one yet. We're working on it. I'll try to IM you again as soon as possible, but we're running out of drachmas."

"Come back home, Seaweed Brain. Don't lose anyone." Her eyes were full of longing, and I felt her pain within myself too.

"I promise, Wise Girl. I wish I could be there with you. I love you." The words slipped out of my mouth so easily.

"I love you too, Percy. Come home, please." She blew me a kiss, her eyes teared up, and cut her hand through the fountain to cut off the Iris Message.

There was no way to describe the pain. All I wanted was to be back home, to be safe, to be with her. But I had a friend to save.

It suddenly occurred to me that there were four people on this quest now. The last time I'd gone on a quest with more than three people (excluding with the Seven, that was called for by a prophecy), only three had returned.

And suddenly, the last line of Rachel's prophecy came back to haunt me.

You shall endure the conflicts between water and fire

But lose the one you greatly admire.

It seemed inevitable that we'd be returning to Camp Half-Blood with three instead of four half-bloods. And the thought struck me that I might be the one not returning.

A/N: Check out my Valentine's Day Harry/Ginny one-shot, A Candle in the Darkness! Review, please? Next chapter will be up soon!