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"Thanks for helping me with this guys."
The gravel crunched under the three's feet as they carefully trekked up the small mountain. Hazel led the way in the front, following the natural path that had been made for hikes with Percy close behind. Every few moments the daughter of Pluto would pause and kick the dirt with her foot before she continued walking, taking in the area's nearby surroundings.
"Hey, no problem" Percy shrugged behind her, waiting patiently for her to finish examining the earth before they started walking again "I didn't have any classes this afternoon and Annabeth has a lecture to attend at Berkeley so I was free anyway. Besides, I needed a walk that wasn't just my campus, and this one can always use a little sun on him."
"Shut up." Nico huffed from the back
Hazel laughed, stopping again to swish her feet in the earth. The ground felt fertile and was newly saturated, the soft brown particles sticking to her shoes like glue. She hadn't made it a habit yet to clean her shoes frequently, so even before they had started the impromptu hike they had been quite dirty. Now, they were covered with a thick layer of dirt that rendered the purple sneakers completely unrecognisable.
"Really though, thanks. I've been wanting to check out this mountain for a while, even before I was appointed praetor."
"Why didn't you just hike anytime? Sure it's tall but it's no Olympus." Percy bent down and picked up a pebble, tossing it in the direction of the younger boy behind him.
"It's not that I wanted to hike it" Hazel deflected the small boulder that had been aimed at Percy's head, looking playfully behind at her brother who was conveniently looking innocently in the other direction, "This mountain is pretty close to camp, and every time I was near it I just got a strange feeling creeping up on me so I wanted to check it out just to see of everything was okay."
"Strange feeling as in 'some weird mortals are watching us through the bushes as we speak' or strange feeling like 'there is some new entity that's rising and we're all doomed strange feeling?"
"Neither. It's more with the actual mountain than anything else. Like how you feel near choppy water? Something like that"
The praetor bent down and placed her hand in the earth, fingers rubbing together to feel the dirt.
"I just wanted to check it out to make sure it isn't going to be a problem for anyone"
From her spot on the ground, she looked back at her brother, who was absentmindedly pulling leaves off of stray branches before letting them fall to the uneven dirt.
"You feel it too right?"
"Kind of?" Nico eyes scanned at the surrounding area, nothing seeming out of the ordinary other than bulging areas in some parts of the ground and a few slanted trees, "Enough to get what you're talking about, but not really. I keep hearing things though."
"Hearing things?" her eyebrows furrowed, trying to listen in to the surroundings.
"I don't hear anything" Percy leaned against a jilted tree, placing his foot at the back and crossing his arms "Are you sure? Is this some hades-pluto thing that I'm getting left out of?"
"Percy trust me, me of all people know the difference between things heard in my head and what's actually making sounds."
"I wonder if we should keep walking up. If you're hearing something that probably isn't a good thing-"
Hazel paused, listening to the rustling of the bushes behind them. Was that what Nico had been talking about? All three demigods froze, hands immediately darting to their respective weapons.
The sound seemed to be coming from a nearby bush closest to Percy. The Bush rustled again before it stilled, falling silent. Uncapping his sword, Percy hesitantly prodded the bush, blinking when it remained unmoving. Moving toward it slowly, he lowered his sword and kicked it.
That was enough to provoke the empousa that was hiding there to jump out. The bronze-legged girl lept out at Percy, letting out a shrill shriek as she bared her fangs to bite into him. Startled, he stumbled back and cut into her with riptide.
The weapon sliced the monster clean in half. Both parts of her dropped to the ground, and she wailed before finally exploding into a cloud of golden dust.
"Why," Nico stared at the older boy "Why did you think it was a good idea to kick the bush"
"Why not?"
Opening his mouth to counter, then closing it again when he realised that Percy's ridiculous answer made some sense to him and he would've probably done the same thing, Nico just sighed and sheathed his sword, letting the weapon reside in the scabbard that hung on his side.
Percy capped his sword and turned to Hazel, who also shook her head at the antics "So was that the thing you two were hearing then?"
Glancing at the pile of golden remains that once was the animal-legged monster, Hazel shook her head.
"No, I don't think so. The feeling is still there" Her nose scrunched as she tried to concentrate, attempting to figure out where it was coming from. Maybe they had to walk further up.
"Do you want to walk up further then?" Percy suggested, "We still have some time before we have to go back down, we can go a bit more."
Her brother nodded "I'd say we could just shadow travel to the top but that's probably missing the point"
Hazel sighed, looking up at the elevated landform she was on. She really just wanted to solve this so that she can stop worrying about it.
"Yeah sure, but we can't go too far though. I have to meet Frank for..."
Then she heard it.
It was soft, so faint at first it barely registered in her mind that she was hearing it. The sound resembled sounded like a soft crackling in the distance as if a candle was growing out of control after touching a piece of paper.
The candle grew louder and louder until it resembled more of a fireplace, then a raging wildfire. The quiet rumbling shifted into a deafening roar in only a matter of moments. The silence of the mountain was instead replaced with ear-splitting sounds that closely resembled cracking wood and tumbling boulders.
Hazel looked up in the direction it was coming from, and from where she stood she saw the exceedingly large mass barreling towards them. Her golden eyes couldn't make out anything through the cloud of thick dust and dirt, but even if she couldn't quite see it, the sound and the movement were enough to put two and two together. The more she realised it, the more she felt the feeling that had been bothering her for months, until it grew into a terrified pit.
No wonder she felt it so familiar, she should've known that it had something to do with the natural aspects of the earth. Hazel was a child of Pluto, she should've known that.
The landslide was massive, and it was tumbling right toward them.
Remembering who she was with, Hazel whipped around to look at her friends. Nico heard it too, his eyes wide as he looked up at it. Percy followed their line of sight, standing up straight when he realised what was happening.
The praetor's mind reeled, frozen in her place. The three of them wouldn't get away from that in time even if they started running. Nico could probably grab Percy and shadow-travel them both away, but from where they were standing he might not be able to do it fast enough. They needed to be further away.
Fear spiked through Hazel's chest, her heart hammering against her ribs. The whole scene felt familiar, she couldn't do it again. She didn't want to.
I can't think like that she tried to reason with herself, even if she just wanted to curl into herself and run I'm a praetor now, what would a praetor do?
In a moment of quick thinking, without even thinking of what she was doing, she acted. Throwing out her arms, two large rocks were thrown out of the ground in the direction of her brother and Percy. The mineral made contact, throwing the two back. The steepness of the mountain combined with the force caused them to tumble further down, away from the trajectory of the landslide and out of harm's way.
Hazel let out a sigh of relief before her mouth was filled with dirt as she was buried under the earth.
Nico groaned, sitting up as he tentatively touched where his head had made contact with the ground. Lucky for him, it had been softer than the base of the mountain or else his head may have cracked against the ground like an egg.
Everything had happened so fast that Nico wasn't even fully sure what happened. The sound he had heard earlier had gotten louder, and a weirdly ominous cloud of dust had appeared out of nowhere. Next thing you know, he and Percy are tumbling down the mountain as if they came straight out of a nursery rhyme.
He groaned, still trying to focus after falling. Looking forward from where he and Percy had fallen, instead of the path that had been there previously, it was blocked by a dirt mountain: dirt, leaves, and even parts of trees made up the mass that was accumulated before them. Just by looking at it Nico knew that there was no walking through that anymore. Then, slowly like a soil creep, he realised something that made his stomach sink faster than the landslide.
He didn't see Hazel anywhere.
Before Nico could Fully process what had even happened, Percy was already screaming.
That made him focus quickly. Pushing himself up to a standing position, Nico stumbled before running towards Percy, who stood at the base of the mound of dirt and debris. Onyx eyes scanned the area to see what he could've been possibly looking at to scream that way because Nico almost never heard him sound like that. But he couldn't see anything, everywhere he looked was just piles and piles of earth. And that was the problem, he couldn't see his sister.
Fear immediately spiked through him, and he himself almost started screaming before he remembered something that made him relax a bit. He didn't feel her die, she was still alive. The problem was how long it would stay that way.
putting a hand on the older boy's shoulder, Nico shadow-travelled them both close to where Hazel had pushed them off. The area was unrecognisable now, everything looking somewhat the same. Everywhere Nico looked all he saw was brown, and it made him ache to think that Hazel was under there somewhere.
Nico remembered the first time he'd been around to see her have a panic attack. He forgot what exactly had happened, but he remembered that it was how he had found out that she was claustrophobic. Hazel had drowned in oil the last time she was alive, she barely tolerated water, much less small spaces where she couldn't breathe. It would be hard to breathe under the weight of something as large as this, much less when you're having a panic attack from it. If they didn't find her fast, she may actually die this time.
Percy jerked away from his hold so suddenly it almost made Nico jump back in surprise. The son of Posideon dashed towards the nearest pile and started digging wildly with his bare hands. He was yelling something that Nico couldn't make out, and almost didn't want to with how loud he was doing it. Running to where the boy was digging on his knees, Nico called out to him.
"Percy."
Either Percy didn't hear him or ignored his voice. Looking at his eyes, the younger boy nearly took a step back. They were wild as if he wasn't even aware of his surroundings. Or maybe he was and that was the problem. either way, it was clear Percy wasn't all that there, and even though Nico was also panicked at the state of his friend and wasn't sure why he was acting like this, it wasn't helping any of them if he was in that state.
Stepping in front of him where he could clearly see him, Nico crouched down and put his hands over his to stop it from digging.
"Percy, Percy!"
Registering his voice, Percy's hands slowed, still shaking. His eyes softened, but they still remained in a state of terror. Breathes ragged, he looked up at Nico, and Nico swore his eyes broke even more looking at him.
"Hey, breathe,"
"No! We have to find her!"
"Percy," Nico tried to reason, holding himself back from crying and rushing to look for Hazel too "Calm down, she isn't-"
"Stop it!" Percy pulled his hands back, one moving to pull at his hair while the other clenched the dirt, "We have to- i have to get Bianca out before it's too late"
Hearing his dead sister's name was enough to make Nico stop breathing for a moment. He hadn't expected Percy to say that, much less in the situation they were currently in.
Then Nico remembered, he remembered how his sister had died. When he was first told, he hadn't fully processed any of the details. Only one fact ran through his mind between his ten-year-old self and now: his sister was dead, that was the only fact that mattered to him. It was only then did he remembered exactly what happened.
Bianca had died in a junkyard picking up something for him. She hadn't died in any painless way either. No, she had been crushed to death under the foot of a mechanical statue trying to turn it off to save everyone else.
Percy had seen the whole thing happen when he was thirteen. Percy was the one who had told him.
Here he was in front of him, shaking like a thirteen-year-old kid, right now he probably felt like he was. Nico wasn't thirteen anymore, but he recognised that fear anywhere, he'd felt it many times.
Shaken himself, Nico swallowed thickly and reached to touch the older boy's hands again. The sooner they both calmed down, the sooner they could find Hazel.
"Hey Percy," he managed to catch his attention, holding eye contact no matter how uncomfortable he felt "You're okay, she's okay. We'll find her. We're looking for Hazel, not Bianca. remember?"
Percy stayed silent for a few moments, before nodding, pulling his hands away from the hole he had dug. Nico took another breath, trying to quiet his own crushing anxiety and looked around.
They were in the same spot that they were at before they had been thrown off. Hazel had pushed them away before they could get buried too. Nothing looked familiar anymore, but she had been standing closer to Percy when it had happened and Percy had been standing near a tree.
Under a particularly large mound of dirt, he spotted it. Dashing toward it with Percy trudging behind him, Nico looked around nearby for any sign of his sister. Finding nothing, Nico felt crushed again. An overwhelming sense of fear filled his senses, and he wanted to cry. Yet he was still standing, his heart was beating at a normal pace, he felt fine. The fear he was feeling wasn't his.
As hazel had done before, Nico copied her movements of tentatively tapping on the ground, trying to sense where the feeling got stronger. Behind him, Percy would kick aside the dirt, like he hoped that if he kicked strong enough she'd be found underneath.
Nico took another step and stumbled. Looking behind him, he realised nothing was on the ground to trip on. His heart was pounding against his chest, and he felt as if his ribcage was about to explode.
Nico dropped to his knees and started digging, Percy immediately stopping to help him. With the use of his powers and the extra help, it didn't take them that long to find her.
Hazel had been lying on her back with both arms crossed over her chest, the hands curled protectively over her side. She reminded Nico of a broken bird like this, and if she hadn't been shaking he may have thought she was dead.
The girl's amber eyes flew open as she sat straight and began coughing violently. Nico rushed over and patted her back, waiting for her to stop coughing. Hazel grabbed one of his hands and tried to stand, stumbling on her feet when Percy caught her before she hit the ground.
"Are you okay?" The ex-practitioner held her up, tired green eyes scanning for any injuries.
"Yeah," Hazel answered weakly, though the strength with which her shaking hands held onto him said otherwise "I'm fine,"
"You have to stop doing that Hazel" Nico spoke up, watching his sister slightly tilt to head to look at him "You can't keep saving people at the expense of your life, you only have one."
A playful smile played on her lips "Do I now? I didn't notice."
A laugh was heard near her, and Hazel looked up to see her friend laughing at what she had said. It was a sort of broken laugh, the kind that was sad if you listened too closely, she hated hearing that kind of sound come from her friend.
"I blame Leo for your self-sacrificing behaviour, he's rubbing off on you."
At the mention of her friend, Hazel laughed too "Probably, what can I say, he gets it."
"What I'm hearing is that he has another punch due the next time I see him" Nico scoffed "Come on haze, Percy can carry you. We're shadow travelling out of here, I'm not walking."
Still feeling the aftereffects of the piercing fear hammering in her chest, Hazel gave in dropped her head against her friend and nodded.
She forgot that she wasn't alone anymore. Hazel didn't have to be afraid of drowning, not when she had them to pull her out.
Nico didn't have to be afraid of another sister getting crushed either, not when Percy was around. As he watched as the other boy held on to her tightly just to make sure she was okay, he knew how much he cared, and how much he tried. Maybe trying wasn't enough last time, but just like his sister's life, there were always second chances.