Scared to Death by Its Son

Five words: Wow, you people are mean.

That's all I have to say, although there's so much more that I could.

Disclaimer: I don't own HP or PJO

Annabeth's POV

I paced up and down the drawing room, the others watching my progress. Finally, Ron groaned, frustrated, "Annabeth, you're giving me a headache. Sit down."

Scowling at him, a plopped down on one of the two couches in the room, next to Percy. I spoke, "Obviously, we have a bit of a problem. Magic doesn't seem to work against monsters, or at least, the Stunning Spell and Laser Curse do not work against dracaena. We need a solution, because obviously, when it comes down to it, Percy and I can't do all the monster fighting. You four need to learn hand-to-hand combat. However, we can't teach you if you don't have a weapon. Even if we contact camp, asking for supplies, how would we get the weapons here? I know you've got magic, but, transporting objects? Is that even possible?"

Silence followed my statement. After a few seconds, Percy suggested, "Why don't we just message camp. They might have some ideas. I mean, you've got some fully qualified wizards over there, plus Chiron – one of them has got to think of something."

I sat up straighter, liking the idea. "How do we do that?" asked Ginny.

"Do any of you know of a spell that makes a rainbow?" I asked.

All but one of us looked to Hermione. For once, she looked unsure, "I…don't." All of her time spent looking up spells with a real purpose to them; she never once bothered to learn simple ones, like making rainbows.

"I do," Ginny inserted. All heads spun in her direction, and her cheeks flushed. Ron's jaw dropped, and even Hermione looked surprised. Harry just grinned at her with pride evident on his face. She mumbled embarrassedly, "Charms is my favorite subject…"

"Could you cast it for us, please?" I requested.

Ginny drew her wand and pointed across the room, "Iride."

Beside me, Percy dug in his pockets for a drachma. I did the same. Finally, Percy's hand came out of a pocket with a small golden coin. He held it up for me to see, smiled toothlessly, and crossed the room so he was in front of the rainbow. I walked up behind him, and he said the words, "O goddess, accept our offering." He tossed the drachma into the rainbow, and it disappeared in a shimmer of gold. "Camp Half-Blood."

An image formed in the rainbow, of a dark-haired teen lounging on one of the banisters of the Big House. He sat up straight when he saw the Iris Message, swinging his legs over the edge of the white railing, "Percy? Annabeth?"

"Hey Nico," I greeted.

"Where's Chiron?" Percy asked.

"Ah…," Nico di Angelo scratched the back of his neck, his face screwed up in thought. "He should be teaching archery right about now. Is something wrong?"

"No, we just need to ask him a question, and possibly a favor," Percy replied, frowning lightly. "Do you know when he'll be back?"

"Not until after lunch," he replied.

"After lunch? Its –," he went to check his watch, I grabbed his wrist and gave him an amused grin.

"We're five hours ahead, Percy. They haven't eaten lunch yet," I replied, trying and failing to hide my amusement at his adorable lack of common sense.

His face colored lightly, but he simply gave me a little smile in thanks for my explanation, cleared his throat, and turned back to Nico. The son of Death was not trying to hide his amusement at all, his smile split into a rare, yet admittedly feral, grin. As Percy opened his mouth to speak, Nico interrupted him, "I can try to help, though. What did you want to ask Chiron?"

"We wanted to know if there was any way to get an assortment of weapons over here for the wizards to try out. They need weapons training if they're going to be fighting monsters. As far as we know so far, magic doesn't work against our monsters," I explained.

Nico frowned, "Chiron and Dumbledore'll want to know that. Did they try the Laser Curse?"

"Yeah," Percy said, a matching frown on his face.

"I'll be sure to pass that on," Nico said gravely. "But the weapons, yeah, that can be done. Just give me a minute or two. Five tops."

"What?" I asked, suddenly confused. "You can't possibly mean that the weapons will be here that quickly!"

Nico's feral grin returned, "Patience, O Wise One. All good things come to those who wait."

With that last piece of quoted wisdom, he reached out and swiped his hand through the IM, ignoring my continued protests for more information. I turned to Percy with my mouth hanging open, "That's impossible. There is no way he can get those weapons here in at most five minutes!"

It was his turn to try and fail to suppress an amused smile as he rested his hands on my shoulders and gently guided me to sit on the couch. "Relax, Annabeth. What do you always say? There's an explanation for everything."

I harrumphed and leaned back into the couch, folding my arms over my chest. Percy merely grinned at me and leant back with me, resting his arm along the couch behind me as if it was the most natural thing in the world. The wizards and witches had been completely silent throughout our conversation through the IM. Ginny had cancelled her spell once the message disappeared, and now Ron spoke up, "So that's it? We just wait?"

"Nico said he'll get the weapons here. I trust him," Percy replied.

Hermione looked like she was bursting with questions, probably about what we had just done with the rainbow. The others looked ready to accept the whole concept, but Hermione, curious by nature, was probably dying to know how we did it and how it worked and all the whos whats and whys along with it. Deciding to satisfy her curiosity, since I respected her thirst for knowledge as a daughter of Athena, I spoke up, "That was an Iris Message. They're controlled by Iris, the Greek goddess of rainbows. Anyone who throws our currency, the drachma, into a rainbow and asks the proper way can contact anyone they want. Our image, in a rainbow, appears in front of whoever we asked to contact."

"That's amazing," Hermione commented, her eyes alight with fascination.

Very suddenly, our quiet moment of either relaxation in the cases of Percy and Ron, or concentration in the cases of Hermione, Harry, Ginny, and I was interrupted by the very sudden appearance of one son of Death, the duffle bag he was carrying clanking. Ginny, Hermione, and I made various squeaking and squealing noises, but all of us, including the boys, jumped to our feet, drawing our respective weapons: wands for the wizards and witches, a knife for me, and Riptide for Percy.

Nico didn't seem to notice the danger he was in right away, "Wow, this room is filled with shado-o-o-ws, guys! Put those down!"

I sheathed my knife and bitterly stated, "Well, if you had told us how you were getting the weapons here, maybe you wouldn't have been put in that situation!" I was already planning what I would say to deny that I had actually squealed in shock to anyone who asked.

Meanwhile, Percy capped and pocketed Riptide and gave Nico an apologetic grin, "Sorry about that. And," he glanced over at me, his smile widening slightly. I couldn't stop my lip from twitching in response, but I rolled my eyes at him to attempt to maintain my annoyed look. "She just can't stand not knowing something. Don't let her get to you."

My jaw dropped and I backhanded his arm lightly. He just grinned at me, along with Nico, "Trust me, Percy. That's never going to happen." He held up the bag he had brought with him, "Someone order 'an assortment of weapons'?"

"Not so fast," I interrupted. "How'd you do it?"

He smirked, "I don't know…I was going to tell you, but you were so rude to me once you knew it was just little old me doing you a favor…"

"Nico…," I said in a warning tone.

"Shadow travelling," he simply replied, not looking concerned at all with my threat. "It's an ability of being the son of Hades. It allows me to use shadows to teleport from place to place."

"Wicked," Ron murmured. His companions looked to be in agreement.

"But back to the weapons?" Harry prompted, eyeing the bag with a hint of apprehension.

Nico smirked again and unzipped the duffle, turning it upside down to let its contents fall to the floor. I winced at the loud clanking and scratching sounds that followed his actions. Swords and knives of varying sizes and styles rained from the bag, along with four bow and arrow sets. I was glad that Nico had the sense not to bring some of our more…interesting weapons, like the clubs, axes, and maces. Once all of his cargo had fallen to the floor for the now wide-mouthed wizards to see, he instructed them, that amused little smirk still on his face, "Pick your poison."

Well, that's it for now. Zgogery has offered to take over this story, and I told him (her?) that I'd let you know. For now, though, I'll continue to write whenever the mood hits me, not whenever someone tells me I'm obligated to do it. Also, my best friend has written her first fanfiction; it's really good and she worked hard on it, but she's not getting any reviews. I would really appreciate it if some of you could read and review her story. Its complete, if that helps! It's called Broken Boundaries, by IliveforRavenclaw.