Disclaimer: PJO is the property of Rick Riordan. I own nothing beyond a weird and wild imagination.

AN: So sorry for the wait all! And thank you for your beautiful comments. I really appreciate them. And honestly I didn't mean to make everyone wait so long. I cuaght a stomach virus from work and spent more of this week being ill than I would have preferred. :( So apologies on waiting. But hopefully this chapter is worth it. You're all amazing and honestly I enjoyed writing this chapter so much it's beyond words.

Tempting the Fates

Chapter Twenty Eight

The Earth Trembles

Nico

"Is he okay? I mean… is he even breathing? Because I don't think he's breathing."

"He is breathing."

"Okay. Okay okay. But… he doesn't look so good, man. I mean he's burning up. His skin feels like fire but he's still trembling. Can you even get a temperature down here?"

"Nico is okay. Lots of energy to kill so many monsters like that. He is fine just very very tired. The heat is from working like when there is too much running or walking and it is warm. He will cool down in time."

"And if he doesn't?"

"Then I imagine he will die."

"Oh well that's great, Bob. Just great."

The voices swam around him like warm currents. They were there and he drifted along with them but he wasn't capable of changing the tide any more than the tide was capable of stopping an earthquake. Nico was carried along with them, listening but not truly aware of what was going on beyond some budding consciousness taking root in his stomach and growing outward as he became more cognisant of himself.

And the shittiest thing, Nico di Angelo decided, about perception is that with it comes pain.

Every beat of his heart was felt inside of his skull, the muscle attempting to shatter through the bone and free itself to pulse in peace without restriction. There were the wounds, so minor in comparison, where a hellhound had bit at his shoulder and another had grazed its nails across his stomach. They stung but were just tiny little bug bites compared to the real agony and that was every single electrical firing off in his brain. Each cell was feverish, the fire spreading from his brain to his eyes, consuming his lungs and his arms and his torso and down his legs to his toes. There was no smoke but just because the flames weren't visible didn't mean they weren't licking his skin, greedy in their consumption of himself.

Nico's insides were boiling, stomach roiling and clenching all at once. His temperature rose and it rose until he was convulsing (and he became faintly aware in that far off not-quite-dreaming or out-of-body-experience sort of way that he was actually convulsing) and in his minds eye all he could see was red. Red background, red setting, red red red.

The deep vermilion of Tartarus and the copper of blood pumping russet rage flaring through him— just as it had when the hellhounds were teeming around them and Percy had disappeared in their midst. It had spread and he'd felt it building, the choler and the passion tipping him over the edge. His vision had gone just like the ground beneath him and he was wading in it— in red. In the rubicund that made up the monsters insides, feeling the tug of the earth from within as he always did when he manipulated the terrestrial sphere tied to his godly parentage… except it was more intense.

More intense because the focus was precise in a way it rarely was (because even practicing had been so morally grey it had frightened him into compunction and questioning his own humanity that such a power existed let alone lay dormant in himself). And it built and the tug of the earth was no longer the earth but the dust, the particles that made up all of life and they came from the soil like all things did, and it was the dust scientific in its exercising and they responded, each and every perfect piece.

And the execution spread the fire like lightning striking the ground in the middle of a drought. He was kindling too long without water and quick to catch.

Nico pulled apart each one of those monsters with the shattering heave in his gut, holding himself together by strength of will and little else. When they'd all fallen— each and every hellhound— so had he because he could feel them, their deaths thick in the air, and his body was on fire. Everything on fire.

"Hold him down. Oh gods, hold him down! Careful. Don't hurt him."

"His tongue…"

"I know I know I know. I've got it…"

His body was seizing, he knew that. And someone was shoving something in his mouth so, what, he wouldn't choke? Bite off his own tongue? Maybe if he bit it off it wouldn't feel like it was turning into ash, used coals in his mouth. Something— or someone— strong was holding him down, he could feel the pressure and it was a welcome relief to the burning.

"His eyes. Bob saw his eyes!"

"Nico? Nico… can you hear me? We've got you, okay? I've got you. Just hold on and we'll ride this out together, okay? Stay with us…"

Stay with you?

Who was he meant to be staying with?

No one stays. Everyone always goes.

"Stay with us."

Stay with… Percy?

Brilliant green. The soft sound of waves whispering towards the shore. Wind tousling jet black hair. The scent of salt and sand. A smile like a sunrise when all you had was the hope of another day (after the dusk of each previous day had passed). Eyes kind and as forgiving as the moon, and just as willing to let you slip away unnoticed and without question. Strength like the currents hidden beneath the surface.

Percy.

The memory imbued his insides, light chasing shadows. It was a crusade against the cerise contagion of Tartarus, offering a salve to suffocate the inferno permeating each cell.

"I have you, Nico. I promise I have you."

Little by little his limbs became his own once more, his body no longer alien to himself. Inch my inch his muscles stilled, but still he wasn't able to bring himself to move. He was so tired. Exhaustion made him want to close those eyes and drift back off once more but apparently that wasn't in the cards because Percy started screaming and shouting at him straight away.

"Don't you dare! You wake back up. Wake back up right now!"

Waking is so hard, he wanted to say but he couldn't.

He was impossibly thirsty, lips dry and chap. What he wouldn't give for an ice cold glass of Sicilian lemonade or something equally crisp and cool.

Just a few more moments and I promise that's it. A few more moments just to catch my breath.

"Nico, wake up. Come on, buddy, wake back up. I've got you. I'm right here. I promise I'm right here."

Arms slipped under his shoulders and hooked around his back, one hand supporting his head. They pulled Nico upwards until he was half sitting and the warmth that budded in his stomach sprung to life in the rest of him. His eyes were still far away, not fully focusing on what was in front of him when something tickled the demigod's cheek.

Nico inhaled and the scent of the sea filled his nose and his heart. "I've got you," breath tickled the top of his ear. "I'm not leaving you. I won't let you go." The arms around him tightened, lifting Nico a little higher and supporting him against the other boy's chest.

Percy?

Breath rushed into his lungs, filling all the empty spaces in a loud gasp. Nico's hand shot upwards grappling at the other demigod's arm and sleeve until he found his hold and it anchored him there. With what strength he had, he reeled himself in and up, a boat mooring itself to the shore. The intake of air made his head spin, dizzy from the oxygen replacing the deficiency. Or maybe it was the warmth of the body he was pressed up against as he threw his arms blindly, a ballast.

"Gods, Nico!"

"Percy," he whispered, the name catching in his throat.

A hellhound hadn't made him a sea-flavoured snack, ripping into his flesh and tearing him apart but most importantly— most importantly he wasn't dead. Relief swept through him and Nico surged forward, arms clasping around the other boy tighter. With relief. With anger. With regret.

The weight of losing the Sea Prince off his shoulders was replaced with the gravity of what he'd done. The earth reached for the sea, tears pricking the backs of his eyes, words not finding their way past his lips in anything more than a snivel.

"Nico? Ni— shhh… it's okay. You're okay."

"I-i… b-but… I thought you were—"

The son of Poseidon enveloped him closer and rocked the Italian boy where he kneeled, fingers combing through the younger half blood's hair. He smoothed at the curls that wouldn't be tamed but didn't mind being caressed. A shiver ran up the Ghost King's spine.

"Please. A couple of hellhounds?" The words were whispered, just between the two of them. "Takes more than that to get to me, Neeks. Hell, Tartarus hasn't killed us yet. A few fucking hellhounds aren't going to do the trick, now are they?"

A few hellhounds nearly did, he thought but his voice was tucked away snug inside himself somewhere waiting to be found.

This is a trick, another part of him whispered. He might be real but you're not. Remember what she said? Just one of you. Maybe you've already done your part. Maybe you've helped him all that you can. The darkness seeped into the corners of his mind and repose grew in his stomach— the kind that anchors when you're waiting for the inevitable "finally" to be said and then that's it.

But breath tickled the top of his ear and he felt the warmth of a mouth accidentally— inadvertently?— brush the top of his ear.

For the first time since Tartarus, no, since before Tartarus, before Bianca, he felt something inside of him waking up.

Life.

The tremors began again, shooting through his body once more but this time, not from the exertion with the ire and the grief. His body quaked at the relief and the passion pouring out. Nico had to be sure it was real so he inhaled again. What he had done… to each of them… it had taken a toll that taxed his body and his mind. How he'd killed them. All of them. How he'd felt them: the before, the during, and their death hanging over him after. The sounds they made.

"I c-couldn't do it… not again. N-not alone, Per—" But his throat closed before he could finish the name.

"Shhh… I know. You don't have to, Nico. I'm here, okay? I've got you. We're going to do all of this together and we're going to make it out together. You and me." Nico turned his head into the touch of fingers still brushing through his hair and down the back of his neck trying to calm him. But he clung to the other boy just the same, his tears dampening the drakon hyde shirt that Percy was wearing.

Percy didn't say anything about it and the son of the Earthshaker was the rock that steadied the quaking earth.

Nico pulled away, rubbing the tears from his brown eyes with the back of his hand (as it turned out, drakon hyde wasn't very moisture absorbent but rather quite the opposite). "Sorry. I think I snotted on you a little bit."

The other demigod glanced down and laughed softly, shrugging his shoulders. "There's a first time for everything." And then he ruffled Nico's hair, his hand pausing a moment as he wiped a stray tear from the other boy's cheek.

"We're going to be okay somehow."

Smiling, the younger halfblood nodded. There was no point in thanking him because words wouldn't mean anything not in the way that could convey anything meaningful enough. Inside of his chest, his heart wrenched and he was briefly aware that maybe he should be more expiatory or ashamed but at that moment? He was just too tired to give a fuck about any of that.

The gods were asking enough of him without piling on his own self-reproach.

"I'm glad you're okay," Bob piped up from the side. The Titan had kept watch over the boys with Small Bob tucked safely (once more) inside of the bib of his coveralls.

"But we must hurry. The giants are coming. They will be here, soon."

Nico shot a frail smile at his friend, thankful that Bob had helped to keep them safe. And moreso still that he hadn't told Percy exactly what had happened— he expected a little bit more distance if that had been the case. Taking Percy's hand when it was offered, he pulled himself to his feet and brushed himself off. Not that there was much to brush off besides the settling dust of monsters waiting to reform but even that was enough. He didn't want any of the hellhounds on himself. Not even their ashes.

Standing, he wasn't steady on his feet and misstepped but Percy caught him snatching him up and settling him back once more offering a smile. Brown eyes locked with green ones for a long second before he broke away and fumbled with the Stygian sword reattaching it at his side.

"We need to go."

They left, Nico ignoring the pulsing in his head, moving as quickly as they could towards Bob's bright idea which, to be honest, sounded better than what they'd just been through regardless of results.

Jogging over the terrain (there wasn't any time to waste now and the Feast of Spes was breathing down their necks like the giants on their heels), he ignored the heaviness in his heart or the tension with each beat and each step. Something inside of him was unsound but he pushed the thought aside.

And briefly let himself get lost in thought about a certain demigod.

"What happened back there?"

"What?" Nico sputtered a little, turning to face the other as they ran. He knew full well the question was coming. Bob was just ahead of them and he looked behind, eyes silver and soft— but more than anything, knowing.

"The hellhounds. The way that they… you know…"

Percy's voice felt flat in the air but the important thing was that he wasn't accusing or angry. Just curious.

Part of him wanted to ask when the other demigod realised that he could shake the earth or become a tropical storm or a hurricane? Tap into powers so naturally rooted within himself. Because all of those things were so immensely powerful, heart stoppingly beautiful and there was no questioning as Nico had stood there observing Percy Jackson a true life hero that these things were verging on the divine. Having witness that, Percy at home in his element, there was a vitality there in mastering his godly parentage's element. And a sense of belonging so completely exactly where he was and who he was.

Instead of any of that, he wiped the sweat from his forehead and looked forward refusing to meet the inquiring emerald of the Sea Prince's eyes. "Dunno, Barnacle Brain," he mumbled but the words lacked any spine.

"Nico." He said.

"It's not like it is for you," Hades' son replied quietly.

"Bob said you'd practiced before."

"When I found out… what I could do. I had to. To make sure that I could control it and everyone would be safe." Pushing himself, Nico ran a little bit faster, his lengthening legs allowing him to carry more speed. Not that he was running away from Percy or anything because he knew the older halfblood would be able to keep up without any trouble.

"And what is it you can do?"

The look he shot him was dark but Percy was unflinching, remaining at his side.

You knew this was coming, he chastised himself.

"The water is your element. Mine is the earth. I can feel death all of the time. Even here. But I can't control it, just sense it. But the earth… I can control the earth and we're all made of the same things, Percy. Just dust and ash before we're born and dust and ash when we die. Just like the earth."

"So you ca—"

"Yes." The word was hoarse, his heart breaking a little. Nico had always wanted to be special (and boy, being a real life hero was a sure way to be special, according to the wide eyed child with the Mythomagic cards) but he'd never wanted to be different.

"And back there?"

"I thought you were dead. I couldn't…" What Nico couldn't say was how he felt, exactly, or why it'd happened. It'd hit him like a landslide and he'd been buried deep in the emotions unable to breathe. And it had just happened. "I couldn't stop it from happening. I didn't want to stop it from happening but I can't do," he waved his hand and he knew that Percy would misinterpret 'this' for Tartarus rather than anything more meaningful, "without you."

"I'd be lost without you."

And maybe he just meant in Tartarus but his green eyes were kind, he smiled again, and Nico's heart felt a little more calm. But when Percy took his hand and squeezed it, his heart nearly burst out of his chest. Nico turned away to hide the flush to his cheeks and did something he never did: smiled.