Hey guys, I'm back with Chapter 16 of Nico's story. Hope you enjoy. Please review, also. So far, I'm glad you're enjoying it.

Disclaimer: same as before

Chapter 16

Nico's POV

When I first began my afternoon project of calling up my mother's spirit (or attempting to, at least) it had been in the actual afternoon and I was determined. I left the house with Percy near three o'clock and together, we made our way to a remote location in the park. In my hands, I clutched a bag of mini lemon meringue pies, grape juice, and some left over spaghetti and salad. I started out my chant strong and bold. But that was over four hours ago.

By now, the sun was long gone and the sky was dark. A chilly wind blew and carried my whispered chants away with it. My voice was low and blending into the background noise of police sirens and Christmas carols. If you weren't standing within five feet of me, you probably wouldn't even have known I was speaking. The eerie red glow still hovered over ditch Percy and I had dug and dumped the food into. Percy kept other souls other than my mother from eating or drinking from it. But it was useless; all our efforts were to no avail.

Percy sat on a boulder a few feet away with his sword stuck into the ground. He rested his head in his hands, supported by his elbows. He looked tired and bored but I tried not to feel too sorry for him; I was on a mission. Percy looked at the watch on his wrist and grabbed his sword.

"Let's go, Nico," he said. "She's not showing up. I'm sorry, man."

I dropped my chant and the glow died down gradually. I let out a sigh and stared at the vomit-colored substance in the pit before moving around it and pushing the dirt back into the hole with my foot. Percy joined me.

"You ok?" he asked, noticing how silent I was. How could I answer that? I wanted to say I was fine but that was a lie. I felt miserable, like I'd just gotten robbed after winning the lottery or kicked in the gut. Was it wrong that I just wanted to see her? I'd grown up without my mother. Do you have any idea how hard that is? Sure, having a god as my father deemed me special and having special powers was certainly a plus, but sometimes…a boy really needs his mom.

"I just had to try," I answered. Percy nodded, understanding my motives.

"That's alright," Percy said. "I get it."

"I just want more memories of her," I said, kicking the last mound of soil into the ditch, covering up the meringue pies and spaghetti bits. "Is that so wrong?"

"It's perfectly normal, Nico," Percy pat my back. I sighed again, staring at the dirt ground where the pit used to be and for a moment, I even considered digging it up and starting the chant all over again, just to give it another try.

"Ready to head home?" Percy asked. I shook my head.

"I think I'll stay out here for a little bit. I'll meet you back at the house later." Percy stared at me and after a few seconds he shrugged and nodded and agreed. We said our goodbyes, and soon I was alone in the park.

I sat on the rock where Percy sat and stuck my own sword into the ground. The wind was blowing lightly and I popped the collar of my leather jacket so that it covered the back of my neck. Aviator jackets aren't exactly the perfect type of outerwear for the winter, but I didn't want to leave without it. It made me feel closer to my family; the mortal side of my family at least, the side that fought and died in WWII.

I wanted more memories of them, too. As a half-blood, there's a lot of emphasis placed on training and beating monsters and going on quests and just surviving in general. Sometimes, too much emphasis, and I forget that I'm half-mortal, too. I forget that the mortal world is out there, and there's more to life than being a demigod. Maybe that was why I kept this aviator jacket all the time; I didn't want to forget the mortal side of me. Because only focusing on my godly half is only focusing on half of myself.

That's all I wanted; I wanted memories of my mother. I wanted to know her. At school and on the street, I see little kids with their mothers, buying them pizza and ice cream, scolding them at church. Even older kids; teenagers obligated to buy flowers on mother's day and adults walking hand-in-hand with grandmas.

And Percy. Percy and Sally had a great relationship. Sally always told me stories from Percy's baby years; his first basketball game, the radio she bought him when he came home with a grade other than D, his first words. They were best friends, inseparable they were.

I never felt jealous of him before, but now I did.

I may as well have no mother. I may as well have been hatched from a chicken egg and raised on my own. My mother was a woman named Maria di Angelo, but I don't even know who this woman is, who she was, what her life was like, and whether I really loved her or not. How could you love someone you don't even remember?

That's why I was obsessed with finding answers; I wanted to have memories of my family and my mother. I wanted to know if I ever got in trouble for drawing on the walls, what my first words were. Hell, I wanted to know what the potty-training days were like!

Because without all that, I'm just Nico; the demigod with no past and no future and doesn't belong to any family.

My thoughts were interrupted by something white and cold landing on my eyelash. I blinked my eyes really quick to get it off and then rubbed my eye. When I looked up, I realized that it had started snowing again. With nothing else to do and not wanting to get caught in the weather, I picked up my sword and started heading back to town.

It had taken me fifteen minutes to finally hit a paved street. I had traveled even deeper into the forest than I had thought and I was glad to see all the neon signs when I finally made it back to the city. I looked around for some kind of sign to tell me exactly where I was, and when I found one I started walking toward Percy's apartment. On the way there, I unknowingly walked past Posy's school, Knox Preparatory Academy, and I was reminded again how much I really liked her.

I walked past the spot on the wall where I sat and waited for Robbie and ran into Posy instead. I wasn't excited about it then, but I felt an almsot sentimental attachment to it now and I mentally slapped myself for being gushy again. My first crush, can you believe it?

After walking some more, I found myself in a crowded street. There were people everywhere! And each of them held at least two bags of Christmas gifts. I looked around and realized that I was in an open-air market. I tried my best to push past the crowd of moms buying toys and girlfriends buying whatever for their significant others and the whiny little kids who want stuff for themselves, but it was no use. I kept getting pushed around like driftwood in a stormy sea.

I finally found an empty alley on the side and I made a break for it, accidentally pushing a girl aside more violently than I intended. She pushed me back after that, but thankfully I was pushed into the empty alley that I wanted to end up in. I stood up and brushed the snow from my back end and started walking away from the crowded street. It got surprinsingly quieter as I continued walking, and you expect it to because of the distance between me and the crowded market, but it should never be this silent in Manhattan. There's always a noise or two, even just a cat meowing or a chihuahua howling at the moon.

The tall buildings and fire escapes helped alleviate the amount of snow falling on me, which helped a bit. But without the snow falling to the ground, the ground was wetter and more slippery than before. I walked slowly and had to watch my step; I didn't want to slip on the ice. It was starting to get foggy and when I looked up at the sky, there were no stars to give off light. I had to rely on the flickering street lights, but they're far away and the space in between is as dark as that cave.

The hairs on the back of my head started to stand on end as the silence only grew the more I walked and when I couldn't stand it any longer, I stopped. I purposely exhaled loudly to add a bit of sound to the quiet because it disturbed me. But at the same time, it didn't feel right to be the only thing capable of making a sound. It made me feel like an intruder, disturbing the constance of silence.

I looked around me. I was caught between two brick wall at least three stories high. The nearest light was a street lamp some ten feet away, but it wasn't bright enough. There was something about my surroundings that bothered me. I felt like I'd been here before even though the surroundings didn't seem familiar, I felt like I had been in this very situation before.

The wind died down and street lamp flickered and finally died and I followed my first instinct, which was to whip out my sword and get into battle stance. I scanned the darkness. Everything seemed calm but I knew better; someone was stirring around here and they were trying to get me.

"Who's there?" I yelled into the pitch blackness. No answer. "Who's there!" I yelled again. "I know you're here, so show yourself." I said in a normal voice. I held my ground for another minute or two, but when nothing happened, I did the only manly thing I could do then; I ran. I took off down the alley, faster than I had ever run before. I slipped a few times and the cold air whipped my face raw, but I still kept running.

I had almost reached the end of the labyrinthine alleyways when I heard a faint scream. It wasn't nearly loud enough to call any attention but I heard. I know because I'd heard it before...a month ago in a dream. I heard my heart beating in my chest, louder than any other sound. It was pounding my brain and I was rooted to that spot. I couldn't move.

Silence ensued and I stood there waiting for another sound. I didn't want to just go in running after a scream that may have only been in my head. It could have been a trap. But right in the nick of time, I heard it again. That petrifying scream that made my blood run cold and I flinched when the sound reached my ears.

"Posy!" I yelled. I gulped. Please don't let it be her. Please don't let it be her I chanted in my head. Oh gods, please not her.

I waited. And sooner or later, my patience was rewarded. Posy yelled my name. "Nico!" her voice was loud, desperate, and distressed. She was in trouble. My Posy was in trouble. Faster than a jet, I took off toward the sound, dodging trash cans and rounding sharp corners. I don't know what emotions were more powerful in me right; desperation to reach Posy in time, hope that maybe it wasn't her, anger at Landon or whoever had captured her, and fear that it was all just a trap and I had just fallen victim to it.

I slipped again but I bolted right up as soon as I did, not even taking notice of the pain in my hip and my side where I had gotten cut.

"Where are you?" I yelled, not knowing if I was asking Posy or her captor. "Hello?" I yelled again when I had no answer. By now, I was frantic. If I didn't find her in the next few minutes, I felt like I would explode from anxiety. "Posy!" I yelled again. I started looking around the darkness in the panic, not sure whether to attempt just swinging my sword around and hoping to hit something, but then I heard her again?

"Nico?" her voice was a normal volume now but I heard her perfectly. I turned around and there she was, backed up against a brick wall. Her hair was dissheveled and messy but I didn't care. Her eyes were wild and I knew she was terrified. I ran up to her and grabbed her by the shoulders.

"Are you alright?" I said a bit more forecfully than I had intended. "Are you alright!" I shook her this time. She looked back at me as if she couldn't tell if I was real or not.

"Posy, it's me! Nico!"

"You can't be here!" she said suddenly.

"What? How'd you get here? What's wrong?"

"You have to leave, like, now!" she said, trying to push me away but I swatted her away and grabbed her arm.

"What are you talking about!"

We stood there arguing for about another twenty seconds and I honestly don't remember most of what she said because we were both bickering so loudly that we couldn't understand what the other was saying. But one thing I did catch from her frantic yelled arguments was the name Landon. I stopped talking and stared at her.

"Where is he?" my voice was low. The mere mention of Landon's name had ignited a small fire inside me and I never felt like I hated anyone with such intensity ever before. I turned around and scanned the darkness again looking for him, but when I turned back to face her she looked like she was about to cry.

"I'm sorry," she whispered. I was just about the ask her what she meant, but just then, a pair of hands came out of the wall behind her and wrapped around her mouth. Another pair of strong arms bound me from behind, someone kicked my sword out of my hand and I got punched in the gut.

"Don't!" I heard Posy say.

I let out a yell and legs buckled. I fell down to my knees and someone strong held my arms behind the back and I couldn't get free. I looked up, my mind was a blur, but I could clearly make out the faces of the two thugs who held me in the cave, a girl with red hair who was holding a sharp knife to Posy's throat and holding her arms back, and the one boy who haunted my dreams for months.

"I warned you not to force me, Son of Hades." Landon said. When he stepped into the light, I saw that his hand was burned. The skin around his knuckles was the color of rust and seemed almost mutilated. His knuckles felt like rough sandpaper or a sharp rock. How do I know? Because he punched me right in the face, practically blinding me.

"You've brought this on yourself. Did you honestly think you'd get away so easily? One way or another, we were going to find you." I spat out blood.

Landon came up to my face and held the tip of a knife between my eyes and he didn't mean to do so gently; I felt the blade on my face starting to penetrate my skin. I winced, but that only made it worse. Landon spoke in simple words, but the sheer emphasis of it is what really got me honestly scared. He was practically hurling his insults and hate at me. I was trapped. I tried struggling but that did no good; the more I struggled, the more they kicked and punched me.

"I'll offer again. But this time if you refuse, so help me, I will kill her," he said, pointing the knife at Posy. "I swear I will! I'll kill her first so you can watch and then you're next. Do you hear me?"

I looked over at Posy. She was crying now and the girl was telling her to shut up and threatening to kill her. And in that one moment I regretted befriending Posy, regretted ever involving her in demigod business. Look what it brought her to. Standing there, terrified with a knife pressed against her throat being threatened with death and used as bait. And I had no one to blame but myself.

"You will be our guide into the Underworld," Landon said again. For a moment time stood still and I felt claustrophobic. For the first time, I felt completely defeated. I looked up at Posy and she looked at me, choking back tears. Then, she turned away from me and I knew that she was thinking the same thing. I thought about how my father had said that I was weak, that I was a failure compared to Bianca. For the first time, I knew he was probably right. I chose one mortal girl over my immortal family. Landon slapped me again.

"Answer me!" he yelled into my ear. I spat out more blood and then looked up and glared at him. Landon wasn't intimdated but I didn't care. I would stare him down the entire time. I had to think of a plan.

"The Doors of Orpheus," I spat out. "You'll need music."

TBC

Thanks for reading! Please review. I'm glad I got this chapter up before the weekend was over. This one took a while to write, sorry for the delay. Happy MLK day, everyone. Also, how do you guys feel about a title change? I was thinking of changing the title because it doesn't really have anything to do with the story as a whole. But if you guys are too used to it already, I'll keep. But first lemme hear what you think.