Disclaimer: Don't own PJO.

Note: Lots of swearing in this chapter.

~The Death March~

000 Nico 000

Waking up unnaturally is not fun.

Waking up unnaturally and finding yourself hungry and tired beyond belief is even less fun.

Waking up with all of that plus the fact that the love you finally, finally got a day ago is gone is just the fucking icing on top of a shit cake of not fucking fun.

Which simply means I woke up feeling like a shitty piece of an even shittier cake.

I find myself lying down, somebody's calling my name and I'm just about to start getting u- Fuck. I guess I shouldn't start moving anytime soon. I think to myself as a sharp pain shoots up my spine when I attempt to move my arms.

I feel like I haven't slept in weeks even though I just woke up. I've got this throbbing headache you get when you lack sleep. Plus I'm fucking starving.

"Nico! Get up! Alisa's disappeared!" that girl, Jiana, says as she starts hysterically shaking me and I feel my throat vibrate in a pained groan.

"I. Can't. Motherfucking. Move." I say each word slowly and clearly since my mouth is slightly muffled by the couch cushions. "No... Energy..."

"What are you talking about?" she asks, still hysterical, "Get up!"

She pulls my limp body and I moan. She manages to keep my body in a sort-of sitting position and when I open my eyes (which I can't even fully open because, gods, I'm. Seriously. Fucking. T-I-R-E-D.) I feel sudden and immediate exhaustion. Jiana grunts, "What the fuck happened to you, di Angelo?"

"More importantly," Amante, the little shit, grabs my shoulders and proceeds to yell, amplifying the already fucking painful headache, "What happened to Alisa?!"

I don't respond other than to shut my eyes because, shit, the light from the fireplace burned like the sun. I don't respond mostly because I'm slowly suspecting Alisa's disappearance and my lack of energy are connected somehow.

"Di Angelo!" Amante continues yelling and the sound is just painful for me, "Do you even care?"

"Fuck. You." I wheeze out, trying to think through the headache and the largely tempting part of my brain telling me to shut up and fall asleep.

"What?" Amante yells, "Get up you insufferable asshole!"

"Fuckass. Get Percy." I wheeze calmly, not listening to him.

"Get up!" he shakes me harder, which aggravates me more, "Get up!"

"Get Percy, you Fuckass!" I manage to open my eyes a little more and glare at him.

He growls, "Fine. Watch him, Jiana."

A few minutes after, Percy and Annabeth come in, Amante right behind them.

"What happened to you, Nico? You look like death... or at least, more so than usual." Percy says, crouching in front of me.

"Completely... fucking... drained." I croak out in a raspy voice. "Think... might be... Ali's doing..."

Annabeth pulls out a small can of nectar and slowly let it slide down my throat.

It gives me enough energy to manage choking down two small bars of ambrosia.

As soon as I swallow the second bar, Annabeth gets me to stand up and asks, "Why do you think the girl has anything to do with it?"

I shake my head to keep me more alert and answer, "I feel drained of power, somebody meant to drain my energy and they used a power I'm familiar with, so I didn't wake up. And the only magic I'd not expect to go against me is shadow-magic."

"Can't it be a shadow-using wizard?" Jiana asks.

I shake my head, "Wand-shadow-magic feels different, off somehow. I'd definitely notice that, the thing that drained me, it was true shadow-magic, and I've only seen one person other than me use it. Alisa."

"What has that got to do with her disappearance?" Kale asks slightly more calmly than before.

"Give me a second, fucktard." I say, "You remember that weirdo blonde kid that put her in a coma?"

He nods, "Yeah, come to think of it, I haven't seen him since."

I look at him grimly, "That's 'cause the kid's dead. His body was possessed and when he hit Alisa with that spell, the soul possessing his came into Ali, but his own soul was too connected with the possessor, his soul was literally ripped out of his fucking body and his physical body disintegrated. He's essentially a ghost now, probably a pretty weak one since I haven't seen him either. That's what the visible ghosts are, souls ripped out before their time. Souls ripped out, usually by magic."

"Thanks for the necromancy lesson, but Alisa, remember?" Jiana says.

"I was getting to that." I say irritably, "I think whatever possessed Alisa hasn't taken control of her body 'cause she's too connected to both the Underworld and the Living one. He needs his entire soul to control such a strong demigod. He somehow got her to go to the Underworld."

"A soul that isn't complete?" Jiana stares at me unbelieving, simply because of the implications.

"Yeah. Your idiotic Lord Voldemort is leading Alisa in a death march." I grin humorlessly, "Ironically it's my job to get him back to the Underworld. Now, he's doing it himself."

000 Alisa 000

"We're here." I say to no-one in particular, except Voldemort, but he's in my head so that doesn't really matter.

Good, good, follow the path I'm sending you.

I walk forward, letting his thought-map guide me to what will most likely end in my death.

As I go on, I think to how, at the beginning of my year at Hogwarts, I was sent to do some important mission.

I felt sorry, and sent an apology to Hecate in my head. She was, after all, the one that got me out of that god-awful place my mother called her home.

I also felt a slightly bitter sadness at the thought of my mother. I wonder how she's doing. Is she thinking of me? I feel bad that after she took me in, I'd been sort of a bitch to her. Mostly because she fucking broke my dad, something she could only be half-blamed for since it was an all-encompassing rule that the divine side of my parentage couldn't take care of me. But then, she could have been nicer about it and not show off her relationship with her immortal lover. I tell her that I'm sorry in my head, sorry that we couldn't build a relationship. I think of my step-father, he's pretty nice. I tell him that I don't hate him in my head and that in different circumstances, I might have actually accepted him. I don't send my father any thoughts because I think of him every day and I have nothing more to say really, I'll see him soon, I guess. Unless I end up in the Fields of Punishment for resurrecting a manic asshole.

Lastly, I think of Nico. I run through my memories of him and contemplate the irony of my once-enemy turned love-of-my-life. I kind of wish my mom hadn't met me in the forest four years ago. Maybe I could've had Nico for a much longer time. But then, I might've gone suicidal without my mom teaching me how to fight.

Soon, I arrive at my destination. It's a small, barren and grey patch of land with a large square-shaped building rising up from it. Skeleton guards, very large, probably from a half-giant skeleton guards are beside the iron gate. I cover myself in shadows and walk past the unsuspecting guards.

How nostalgic, Voldemort's voice hisses venomously, I wonder if my guards miss me yet? Did you know this place was built especially for me?

I shrug and keep walking, arriving at a circular room with eight prison cells. Each cell had a man in chains, all the men seemed to be the same person, except each was older than the last with the last being a grotesquely mutated baby version, it didn't hang in chains. It floated in a strange tank in the middle of it's cell. Only one was empty. The second-to-the-last one.

They all hung in a defeated position as large black birds pecked at their ever-regenerating skin except for the baby one which seemed to be torturing itself based on it's soft mewls. Unless the tank water was some kind of poison.

Open them all.

I make quick work of the skeletons around me, certain death seemed to motivate me to just get the fucking job done.

I twist shadow-tentacles at the bars of the cells and the chains of each as well as the tank of the last. They squeeze and squeeze and squeeze until all breaks and the partial soul in each slumps down.

I take up the grotesque mewling baby first, mostly because this seemed the easiest to deal with.

Accept the soul into your body.

I give the strange thing permission to enter and a pair of slender fingers erupt from my stomach and pull it in. A wave of nausea hits me and I stumble to the first cell.

I take the young man's head in my hands when, suddenly, he speaks, "Why are you doing this?"

Surprise leads me to let go of him, "Why do you care?"

He shrugs, "I don't know. Maybe because I have some form of humanity in this form of my soul?"

My fingers shake, "Then can I ask you give me an Unbreakable Vow? Your other self promised he wouldn't do it, but, as you said, only this form of your soul has the humanity. Promises are easy to break."

He raises an eyebrow. "I don't mind. I'll be you soon enough."

"Your more negotiable than I thought you'd be." I say.

He just laughs, "I guess there's something of myself in you that doesn't happen to be two-eights of my soul that I see."

I grab my wand, "I guess we can't exactly do this properly since we don't have a third wizard."

He looks at me strangely, "A third wizard isn't exactly needed if a member of the party is of Hecate's original blessing."

"Heh, I guess I shouldn't be surprised you know of Lady Hecate." I shake my head. "Come on, then."

I grab his arm and he grabs mine, "You, Tom Marvolo Riddle and any of your other selves will never let Nico di Angelo suffer. Do you accept this Unbreakable Vow on threat to your entire being?"

Threads of gold curl around our connected arms as he speaks to seal the binding permanently.

"I do."

A/N: You essentially got two chapters here since I was about to cut it off like 900 words ago. It's also essentially my "Gaaah, I'm tired of saying sorry but I'm just really sorry!" For slight relief at my chapter updates, you probably only have to wait for one or two more. Review, please!