Dear future demigods,

If you're all alone chasing two people through the strawberry fields, don't do it. You'll end up seeing things you never thought you'd ever see.

With not so high regards,

Forest Lyf.

(NICO~(*(NICO)~(NICO*(~NICO*NICO~)*NICO)~(NICO)*)~NICO)

I remember the night clear as any memory. I had been hearing a buzzing in my ears, the sign that someone was dead. My instincts told me to grab my sword and head out to the strawberry fields. But then my younger half brother, Gilbert Gemma, wanted to come too. I had told him to stay in the cabin, "this might be dangerous," I told him. Though like any younger sibling, he became stubborn and followed me to the scene that continued to haunt my nightmares for years.

In the end I'm sort've relieved that I didn't go alone.

When we got to the strawberry fields, it was quiet. Too quiet.

The season was autumn where crickets would haunt your sleepless night with those pesky sounds they call music. The wind would usually be blowing across your face, making you deaf to what other people were saying. The singing from the campfire across Camp would be a faint noise, but it'd still be there. Standing at the edge of the strawberry fields that night, it was dead shot silence. The only sound I got was the sensation of the buzzing. And trust me when the only thing you hear is an alarm of death, there are no wise words to describe how you're feeling.

I glanced at Gilbert, he had his Stygian iron sword in hand like me. The preteen looking ready to fight any monster. "You ready?" I asked.

He shrugged, trying to seem calm but still freaked out of his wits. "Yeah, sure." He grumbled.

We proceeded. Step in step, each breath quiet as possible. Every time a twig snapped under out feet or we tripped over a root, we felt like a bomb was about to be set off. The air between us had been tense and worried. We knew that something was happening in these fields, but there was just no idea of what. With each turn we took a glimpse behind us, we thought at our feet there'd turn up an overkill body. Not exactly something you'd like to see with Halloween getting closer in the month.

"Nico... what's that buzzing noise?" Gilbert asked. His voice may have been deep, but my little brother sure sounded like a little boy.

"Its a child of Hades thing." I explained as we walked along a row of bushes. "The noise lets you know that someone has died. Its coming from over there." I nodded my head in the direction.

"Do you think it'll be some kid killed by a monster?" he whispered.

I shook my head. "Maybe its just-"

That's when we saw them.

Forest was the one who was standing at the edge, her eyes wide as though... as though she could see and comprehend what was there. Vanessa Bass and Alva Bluefyre, those two sword fighters from the championships today, were standing together side by side with their backs to the daughter of Demeter. They both had shocked faces, all three girls frozen in fear staring off at what was in the distance.

It looked like a human only... disfigured. The arms and legs of it were bent and broken, still disturbingly able to work. She was walking along in a bit of a hurry, her dark body covered in ragged black dress from the 1960s. From the light of the full moon I watched in fear because something seemed defiantly wrong about this... woman.

"The hell?" Gilbert whispered to me.

A cold wind blew across the air, it seemed like a warning to get out of there.

"Alva Bluefyre? Vanessa Bass?" I gently touched their backs to set them out of the trance. They responded after a moment and looked at me with shaking eyes. No words were needed to know that they were terrified.

I put a finger to my lips and pointed at the unknown figure in the distance. It had stopped walking. That mere fact freaked me out.

"Forest... Forest Lyf?" Gilbert tried waking her out of the shock. He nudged her shoulder and snapped his fingers in her face, but that girl was frozen as stone. It wasn't until I touched my cold hand to her back did she start responding.

"Nico? Is that you?" She whispered.

I nodded but then remember that she was blind. "Yeah, its me and Gilbert. Remember us? Alva Bluefyre and Vanessa Bass are also here. You remember them?"

She nodded, her hands shaking and eyes still looking at the thing that had stopped walking. "I think I can... see something." she whispered frightened.

I shared a glance with Gilbert. She could... actually see it? "What do you see Forest?" Gilbert asked.

"It looks... dead." My heart skipped a beat. She continued on. "Its bones look broken, but its still walking. There's... this sort of dark glow to it. The moonlight we have here, it not exactly shinning on it. More like that thing has its own personal life source. Light source I mean, it wouldn't be alive... would it?"

She shook her head and rubbed her eyes, not daring to say anything more. I waved my hand in her face but she snapped at it, flinching slightly. "Stop doing that." she said.

"You can see me?"

"No. The ring on your finger let's me know your hand is there."

My eyebrows furrowed together but I didn't say anything more. Forest could see the creature, but she couldn't see us. What was up for that?

Clear your mind. Don't let anything distract you. Focus on the situation.

"We should go back to the Campfire." I said, shaking my head at myself and automatically looking at Gilbert. "We got to get out of here."

"Are you kidding?" Alva hissed. "What if that thing comes and attacks Camp?"

"That's not a monster?" Forest asked. She was back to staring at the creature.

Alva shook her head, glaring the thing down on the spot. "That's no monster I've ever encountered. And I thought I've seen it all." She sounded wise, sincere. Old even.

"Then what is it?" I spoke up. The thing was still standing still, tensed and silent with its back to us. The fingers on its left hand twitched slightly. I felt a chill run down my back when stronger winds came at us.

"Only one way to find out." Vanessa had been so quiet lately that I didn't realize she was pretty hot for a non-Aphrodite girl. She had stunning blue eyes the color of sapphire and soft golden-brown skin, the mirror reflection of a dark glimmering stone showered in ocean waves. I gulped when she held up a bronze star between two fingers, that grin on her face worthy of a Hermes child. The metal disk she held looked like one of those ninja stars actors use in movies. Only this one was worthy of a martial arts master gone demigod style.

"Aim it at the arm." Alva whispered.

Vanessa nodded and we all held our breath as she flicked it though the air toward the disfigured woman. It sliced itself into the humanoids left arm, cutting the body part off on to the ground from the rest. That was when the wind blew the hardest at us, Forest almost losing her footing and clutching Gilbert's wrist tight. He winced slightly but didn't say anything.

The woman was still standing there, silent and erect. The sliced off arm was laying on the ground twitching in alarm. I let out a deep breath when the wind completely stopped. And I'm not just saying like the wind had died down and become calmer. I'm talking as though someone had put us into an airtight sealed container and proclaimed us to die.

…...

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CRAAAAAAAAAAAAAACK!

That horrible, awful, sinister bone crunching noise as the woman's head twisted in a complete semi circle, unruly hair replaced by a bloody face. She let out what might have been a squeal, but I wasn't so sure. The daunting green color of her skin and inspiring black eyes of hers... They caught me in trance of paralyzing that I couldn't look away.

The buzzing sensation grew stronger in my head, deafening me to near insanity. This was the death the buzzing had been warning me about. This was the thing I had been looking all around for. Why, why, why did it have to be this horrifying?

I didn't have time to react or even scream because Forest beat me to it. She let out an ear piercing shatter that I didn't even think a daughter of Aphrodite could pull off. Her knees started to buckle and Gilbert caught her in his arms, the blind girl unconscious in a heavy faint.

"Dove è mia figlia e figio!" The woman screeched. She moved her entire body to fully face us, the ragged torn clothes on her body containing stains of dirt. Dirt that I knew came from the Underworld, not the Earth.

I gulped. This was bad.

She took a step in our direction. And another. And another. Step after step until she was fully sprinting at us full speed. Alva, having a quick mind and fast reflexes, used her godly powers and sent an electrical current at the thing. It hit it square in the chest but only slowed it down, the woman still amazingly able to run at all.

"πάει μακριά!" Alva screamed. From out of her hands the white light of a magic semi-sphere lashed out toward the thing, this second time stumbling it back on its butt. It let out a frustrated yell but got up again anyway, its skin slowly tearing open that I could see bones that should never be seen. With trembling hands I unsheathed my sword and stepped in front of the group. The buzzing sensation just as strong and loud.

"What is that thing!" Alva yelled. There was panic in her eyes. She was ushering Vanessa and everyone else behind her. "Get back to Camp!" She yelled. "Raise the alarm! Get Chiron! Just do whatever the hell you can and get the hell away!"

Gilbert didn't need to be told twice. With strong arms he lifted Forest up bridal style and carried her away to the Big House, the fainted girl pale and brain dead. Vanessa was left with us so scared that she couldn't move. Her breathing was deep and rasping. Hyperventilation. I realized. She was struggling to breathe. She was going into shock.

"Alva!" She had sent out another white light of magic at the thing when her eyes snapped toward me. "Take Vanessa and get out of here! I can handle it by myself!"

She glanced at Vanessa, fear in her eyes as stinging tears trickled out. "What about you?" she said. Was it me or did she actually sound concerned? Huh.

I held my sword up higher, eyes locked on the target that was getting up to run again. "I got this." I hoped I sounded braver than I was.

She gulped and took a second glance at the disfigured woman, the bright red blood pouring down its face and broken bones still moving. I didn't have to yell at again for Alva and Vanessa to go sprinting out of the strawberry fields.

Do I regret sending them off? No. Do I wish I didn't send them all away? Hell yeah.

Turns out though that Thingy was a faster runner than I thought. Her disfigured shape made her able to move faster as though it had never felt pain before. The random out of socket bones made me think of a disturbing horror movie I had seen once when I was at the Lotus Casino. Though I seriously didn't need to be thinking about Fright Night at the moment.

"dove è mia figlia e figlio!" She screamed again. Gods that voice would forever be burned in my memory.

Treat this like any other monster attack. That voice in my head said. Trick it, corner it, then kill it. Its just another monster trying to kill you.

"Hey dummy!" I yelled. The grip on my sword tightened when she fixed her gaze on me. "Over here!"

Thingy screeched into the air and hurled herself at me, my sword stabbing straight into the heart like I would with any other monster. The Stygian iron blade wedged itself perfectly in its chest only a foot away from me. The bloody thing could've easily reached out and squeezed my neck with her hands.

"The hell...?" I glanced around its body, its blood not even affecting me anymore while it spurted onto my clothes. There was no gold dust explosion like there would be with regular monster. She barely even reacted to the metal sword impaled in her chest.

"DOVE E MIA FIGLIA E FIGILO?" Thingy took a step closer to me, my sword deepening through her body. I became stupid and panicked, dropping my weapon to skirt out of its reach. Where the hell was Percy when you needed him to save the day?

"Crap!" I dodged its swinging arms, Thingy's blood flying everywhere as she walked on with a sword in her heart.

"MIA FIGILA E FIGLIO!"

Think man, think! "I don't know what you're saying!" I blurted out. "I don't speak you're language!" I waved my arms at her but she didn't react. I took a risk and looked up into its eyes, another memory of them scarred on my mind:

Where her eyes should have been were black holes, empty sockets that didn't even have eyes. Oh gods. Thingy was blind.

I had a couple of ideas that could defeat it then, maybe using fire or shadow magic. But then I remembered Forest Lyf: She was blind too, but she was just as deadly as anyone else."Never underestimate your opponent." Clarisse had once told me. "Every one has a trick up their sleeve if you're stupid."

"Dad..." I said stepping away from Thingy. "Some big heroic godly intervention would be great right now y'know..."

But before I knew it Thingy had tackled me down on the dirt. She pinned her dislocated knee on my chest and held my shoulders down, my sword long gone. The smell of sulfur caught in my nose and I gagged, a piece of jewelry hanging from her neck scraping against my face. A quick glimpse told me that it was a string of pearls, one of those old fashioned white necklaces that women would wear back in the 60s. I had a wild idea to grip the necklace and tear at it, snapping the clasp and sending pearls flying everywhere.

Thingy screamed again but she let go of me, going hysterical over her necklace. "le mie perle!" She shrieked. "mia madre collana!" She tried feeling around the dirt for them, coming up with empty hands as the pearls become lost inside the strawberry bushes.

"tu!" she yelled at thin air. I didn't understand many Spanish dialects, but I was pretty sure she was talking to me. "come hai potuto! Voglio solo il mio Nico e Bianca!"

I froze when she said those names. Nico and Bianca? Bianca and Nico? Who was this woman? I was about to send my sword flying down on her neck but something stopped me. That disfigured woman wasn't an enemy. She was just looking for two people. She was looking for-

"Nico!" Somebody yelled.

I turned around and saw Gilbert, his sword tip down in the air. He looked scary standing there, dangerous and frightened. Not a good combo for a demigod. He must've gotten Forest to safety but then come back for me, a brother looking out for a brother. That boy had more bravery than I gave him credit for.

I glanced between the creepy woman and my brother. They both looked desperate. Two different types of desperate. Gilbert was the type that needed a solution, a way to keep on surviving. Thingy was the type who just... who was just needing of something for reassurance.

"Get back!" Gilbert yelled. Before I could protest he slammed his sword in to the ground and opened up a crack inside the earth; the starting point at his sword, the ending point at the base of Thingy's crouched body.

"Gilbert no!"

Too late. The break out in the ground separated, an automatic canyon leading down to the Underworld. The creepy woman let out a shriek and tried to scramble away when she felt the ground shake beneath her. No such luck though. The gruesome creature slipped on her hands and plummeted into the hole, screaming something in a language that I didn't understand; the fracture came back together like a mouth that had just taken a bite. I felt the air suck out of me when my body trembled and spots danced in front of my vision. "Gib-" I couldn't even talk before I fell to the ground.

"Nico!" Scramble of feet. Rush of air. Gilbert coming to my aid. "Nico, are you okay?"

The last scene I got was of Gilbert's face: his pointed down mouth. his scrunched up eyebrows. His emerald jewel eyes. His face a reflection of our father's.

"Nico? Nico can you hear-"

Blackness exploded and I heard no more.

Sorry for the long wait! These chapters take so long because i never really know what to write or how to write it. I usually just follow my instinct and try to play out the movie in my head. Review for more chapters and i promise you that i will update the next chapter faster than this one because well... if you know me as author, you know that I never let anything become boring. I always have those shocking surprises come at the right moments ;)
Review! Anyone got something to say about the creepy woman that attacked Nico and the gang? P.S Google translate is a great tool ;)
-Emmi