Chapter 8: Infiltrating Mortals

Digging your way in

"You have got to be kidding me", Reyna muttered as she looked at the highly secured shack. It had been a long walk, since Nico still couldn't shadow-travel that far, so both were already worn out.

They had expected it to be concealed, but they hadn't expected this. Apparently, the flatter area was a small park on the west side of Treasure Island. Considering the time of the year, the grass was greener than usual and the trees were full with leaves. Thanks to that, they had barely missed the wooden shack in the middle of the park. They would've seen it, if it weren't the guards roaming the area, so Reyna and Nico couldn't go into the park. Their view from their position in a dark alley was the best they could get.

Reyna looked at Nico, whose body was just like her's half in the shadows. It was as if the shadows were eating him alive, but she knew that wasn't the case. After all, she had seen him like that a couple of times before. It was the best way to conceal them from the guards. "Can you tell what's underground?", she whispered.

Nico frowned, but nodded. The shadows released his body as he rested one knee on the ground. The palm of his right hand touched the ground and Nico closed his eyes. At first, Reyna thought that nothing was happening, until Nico opened his eyes. He was staring at the ground with wide eyes, which made Reyna frown. "There is a huge center there", he spoke up after a moment of silence. "It's as if the entire city resides there. Yes, it's that enormous. How in Tartarus have they been able to build such a thing without the citizens knowing?"

Reyna shrugged. "I don't know. That is also not necessary. Did you find a way to sneak in? Going head on with only two people is practically suicide, so we need to find another entrance. Air has to come from somewhere, right? I doubt that only that shack gives them oxygen. Maybe ventilation shafts?"

The son of Hades sighed and touched the ground again, while closing his eyes. A frown from concentration appeared on his face as he searched for any possible entrance. Then, he opened his eyes and stood up. "No need. There is a second entrance a few blocks away from here. Maybe an emergency exit. It's still guarded, but much less secured. The two of us can take them on with ease, I think."

The praetor nodded and gave him one of her rare smiles. "Lead the way, heir of Pluto."

"No way I'm going with this nitwit", Megan snorted as her grey eyes glared at Jack, who was doing the same as she did. Her death glare would've killed any stare on the spot, but not the son of Mars'. Jack had already endured her death glare many times, which infuriated Megan even more. "Why do I always have to stick with the dumb ones?!", she exclaimed as she looked at the sky, as if it held all the answers.

"Who do you call dumb, wacko?!", Jack sneered between gritted teeth. He looked like he was about to hit her, but an arm around his shoulders stopped him from doing so. The son of Mars looked to his left to see his best friend grinning from ear to ear.

"Now, now", Brandon shushed. "Let's not insult or kill each other before the day is over, shall we? Let's just search for Jack's half-brother and get out of here." The daughter of Athena gave Jack a final glare, before she sighed and nodded. "Meg, where do you think we should go?"

Megan thought about that for a second. She looked at the ruins which were high buildings just a few hours ago. Those bombs truly took it's toll on the city. Megan guessed that the mortals had become truly desperate, since they had never done something this big before, even if it was just to not harm any citizens. Now, Megan wondered if there were still humans left in the city, except for the soldiers of course.

She shook her head and looked at the son of Apollo. "If praetor Zhang is still alive, I doubt he would stay at the same place for long. Is it true that he can morph into any animal?"

"Yeah, so?", Jack grunted.

"So, he won't be beneath any heaps, since he would just change into a cockroach or something and crawl his way out", she stated as if it was obvious. "We have to look for places where he could hide."

"Which is…", Jack gestured at the area before them. Except for the rubbish heaps and some walls, it was nearly flat. There was absolutely no place to hide.

"Uh…"

Malcolm was extremely annoyed. First, Percy had given him the responsibility to be in charge. Him! He had always shoved that task to Percy or Annabeth, so why would Percy let him be in charge? It was an extreme pain in the ass. Especially now, which was the second reason why he was annoyed. Apparently a part of being in charge was solving other people's problems. He wondered how Percy hadn't gone mad after being their leader for so many years. One day more of these whining and arguing children and Malcolm would've gone crazy.

Before him stood a boy and a girl, who were around 6 years old. Both had a piece of the broken teddy bear in their hands. They had been arguing who owned that doll, which had escalated into a tug of war with the stuffed animal in between. Now, both were a crying mess.

Both children were mortals, who were found close to a burned down orphanage, together with around a dozen other kids. With the area being a war zone and no adults to take care of them (apparently they had been killed in the fire), the demigods had given them shelter in the Empire State Building. Sadly that also meant that the one in charge would have to take care of them. Malcolm hated Percy for doing this to him.

"It's all your fault!", the girl exclaimed as she ran away to her room. Malcolm sighed and sat next to the still crying boy. To his surprise, the kid hugged him and snuffled against his chest.

"There, there", he soothed the boy. The kid sniffled and Malcolm ruffled his brown hair. No point in telling that it was "just a teddy bear". He knew from his own childhood that a stuffed animal was just like a best friend for little children.

"I just wanted to play with it", the boy confessed to Malcolm's chest. The son of Athena smiled slightly and pulled the boy away from his body. The kid's hair was in every direction that was possible and his eyes were red from crying. He wiped some tears away from his cheeks and bit his underlip. "With her", he added with a slight blush on his cheeks.

Malcolm chuckled and nodded his head to the door, where the girl had just ran out of. "Then go and apologize to her. I'm sure she won't stay angry for long." The boy looked up to him with a hope in his eyes.

"Really?"

"Really", he laughed a bit when the boy ran out of the room.

"Never knew a punk like you could handle children", Malcolm turned and looked at the mist figure of Clarisse. He sighed and stood up.

"What do you want, Clarisse?"

The daughter of Ares went serious. "I've wanted to Iris Message Prissy, but couldn't contact him. When I tried his little girlfriend, she said he was in DC, is that true?" Malcolm nodded and she sighed. "Anyhow, I've already said this to her, but she said I also had to say this to you, since you're closer."

Malcolm frowned. "What's wrong?"

"The Fleece has lost its power."

His eyes widened. If the Golden Fleece had lost its power, it would mean that the camp was now completely vulnerable to monsters. The only save place for the demigods to train would be attacked. Their home would be attacked. Malcolm shuddered as he thought back to the Battle of the Labyrinth. There was no way he would let that happen again. "Do you have enough people to defend camp?"

Clarisse shook her head. "Almost only trainees. I doubt they would be able to hold any monsters up."

"I'll send you some people to help. If the camp gets attacked before that, just… leave camp, okay? No need to get people killed for the camp." Clarisse seemed troubled by this, but nodded nonetheless. Malcolm slashed his hand through the mist and the image of Clarisse disappeared.

Malcolm sighed and walked toward his door to leave his room. But when he opened it, he was met with a panting Chris. He frowned. "What's wrong?"

"The radars have… picked up… planes coming our way. Not friendly."

"Here it is", Nico said, pointing to an apartment. Reyna raised an eyebrow. "Okay, this isn't it. The real entrance is the house behind this one. We can dig our way to the tunnel, so we can enter without any people noticing."

The daughter of Bellona frowned, but nodded. "But I'm not going to dig all the way over there."

Nico let out a low chuckle, which sounded more dark than joyful. "Don't worry, you don't have to do a thing." Reyna frowned confused, but Nico ignored it and kicked the door. It opened with a slam. "Ladies first."

Reyna raised an eyebrow, but decided not to question it. When she entered the apartment, she noticed that it was just like any other. Instead of looking around like Reyna was doing, Nico walked straight toward one of the doors. She followed him inside and noticed that it was the basement.

What confused her though, was the enormous hole that was revealed when Nico shoved the boxes that concealed it away. "What in Pluto's name is that?"

"I don't know, I just sensed it back there. I think that someone must have noticed the construction of that underground center, so maybe they tried to dig their way in, just like we want to", Reyna nodded, but something inside of her told her that Nico was the one who had dug this. After all, without earth powers it must have taken ages to dig a hole of this size. Without any wooden splints to take the weight of the earth, it would've collapsed for sure.

She knew that there were so many things that she still didn't know about Nico. Maybe he even knew something like this would happen. She sighed. If there was one thing that Reyna knew about Nico, was that you shouldn't demand reasons for his actions. He was a son of Pluto/Hades, after all.

The daughter of Bellona walked into the dark after the son of Hades.

[A/N]: Chapter 8, at your service *bows*... Okay, so no Percy today. I thought I would give you some foreplay of the approaching chaos xD No really, I'm already pitying [...]. Not going to spoil what's going to happen. :)

A little resume of the chapter: introduction of some OC's (Megan and Brandon are Awesome01's btw) that are searching for Frank. Nico and Reyna are going underground and Nico is showing his "son of Hades"-side for a bit. The camp is vulnerable to attacks, Malcolm is annoyed and the airplanes are approaching New York. I hope you liked it ;) Tell me what you thought of it!

I am sorry for the extremely late chapter... again... Sorry, but school's really pushing me with all those projects and exams. Plus sickness. Plus laziness. Plus writer's block (which I hope is over now)... I love you all for reviewing though! It helped me to get over my laziness ;)

To Lmb111514: That was the same reason why I was doubting if Percy should train them or not. But I liked the idea of Percy training the 'enemies' ;)

To 8EternallyMortal8: Oh, he's going to kick some mortal's asses, that's for sure xD I love his badassness (if that's a word) too much for that ;D Sure, no pressure... *me sweating behind my laptop, hoping that the chapter was okay* Nico & Reyna action and Percy's teaching next chapter!

'Till next time ^^

Xx Anny