Death and Madness|| Nico di Angelo

What the hell? I'm in hell

I got a sudden dizzy feeling. We weren't going down anymore, but forward. The air turned misty. Spirits around me started changing shape. Their modern clothes flickered, turning into gray hooded robes. The floor of the elevator began swaying.

I blinked hard. When I opened my eyes, Charon's creamy Italian suit had been replaced by a long black robe. His tortoiseshell glasses were gone. Where his eyes should've been were empty sockets.

He saw me looking, and said, "Well?"

"Nothing," I managed.

I thought he was grinning, but that wasn't it. The flesh of his face was becoming transparent, letting me see straight through to his skull.

The floor kept swaying.

"I think I'm gonna be sick" I said, and Nico snorted.

When I blinked again, the elevator wasn't an elevator anymore. We were standing in a wooden barge. Charon was poling us across a dark, oily river, swirling with bones, dead fish, and other, stranger things—plastic dolls, crushed carnations, soggy diplomas with gilt edges.

"The river Styx" Nico said.

Mist curled off the filthy water. Above us, almost lost in the gloom, was a ceiling of stalactites. Ahead, the far shore glimmered with greenish light, the colour of poison.

Panic closed up my throat. What was I doing here? These people around me . . . they were dead. Nico was the son of Hades, he belonged here, not me. But in a way, even the Underworld was beautiful.

As if sensing my conflicting thoughts, Nico lay a hand on my shoulder. It wasn't for comfort, but as an assurance that he was there.

The shoreline of the Underworld came into view. Craggy rocks and black volcanic sand stretched inland about a hundred yards to the base of a high stone wall, which marched off in either direction as far as we could see. A sound came from somewhere nearby in the green gloom, echoing off the stones—the howl of a large animal.

"Is that Cerberus?" I asked, the excitement in my voice more than noticeable.

"Sounds like he's hungry" Charon said.

"Can we meet him? Can we? Can we?" I pestered Nico but he shook his head. 

"We're here on a different business" 

The bottom of our boat slid onto the black sand. The dead began to disembark. A woman holding a man's hand. An old man and an old woman hobbling along arm in arm. A boy about five years old, shuffling silently along in his gray robe.

One day that would be me. It could be me tomorrow or the day after that.

We followed the spirits up a well-worn path.

I'm not sure what I was expecting—Pearly Gates, or a big black portcullis, or something. But the entrance to the Underworld looked like a cross between airport security and the Jersey Turnpike.

There were three separate entrances under one huge black archway that said YOU ARE NOW ENTERING EREBUS. Each entrance had a pass-through metal detector with security cameras mounted on top. Beyond this were tollbooths manned by black-robed ghouls like Charon.

The howling of the hungry animal was really loud now, but I couldn't see where it was coming from. The three-headed dog, Cerberus, who was supposed to guard Hades' door, was nowhere to be seen.

The dead queued up in the three lines, two marked ATTENDANT ON DUTY, and one marked EZ DEATH. The EZ DEATH line was moving right along. The other two were crawling.

Instead of going through the lines, Nico went to the edge of Styx where he began constructing a campfire. What the hell? 

This boy was crazy. 

"So we come all the way into the Underworld for you to build a campfire?" I asked. 

"We need to wait for the spirit I need" Nico rolled his eyes. I sat down next to him, watching him feed the fire. 

For a while we sat in the silence, but then Nico began throwing trading cards into the fire. I tried to stop him, but he insisted-

"I'm not a kid anymore... I can't believe I really thought the world was a game"

Nico tossed another trading card into the blue flames. "Useless," he muttered. "I can't believe I ever liked this stuff. "

"A childish game, master,"

I almost jumped in surprise at the voice. I was certain there hadn't been anyone near the fire a second ago, but now something shimmered. I thought it was just firelight. Then I realised it was the form of a man—a wisp of blue smoke, a shadow. If you looked at him head-on, he wasn't there. But if you looked out of the corner of your eye, you could make out his shape. A ghost.

Nico didn't look rattled. In fact he looked as if he expected the ghost. 

"I've failed," he muttered. "There's no way to get her back. I had almost given up when I found you Vi"

Okay... I didn't really know how to respond to that so I kept quiet. 

The other voice kept silent too.

Nico turned toward it doubtfully. "Is there another way? Speak. "

"It has never been done," the ghost said. "But there may be a way. "

"Tell me," Nico commanded. His eyes shined with a fierce light.

"An exchange," the ghost said. "A soul for a soul. "

"I've offered!"

"Not yours," the ghost said. "You cannot offer your father a soul he will eventually collect anyway. Nor will he be anxious for the death of his son. I mean a soul that should have died already. Someone who has cheated death. "

Nico's face darkened. "Not that again. You're talking about murder."

My eyes widened in surprise but Nico was quick to respond. "I don't commit murder Vi" He assured me. And something about his panicked look made me think he wanted this friendship as much as I did.

"I'm talking about justice," the ghost said. "Vengeance. "

"Those are not the same thing. "

The ghost laughed dryly. "You will learn differently as you get older. "

Nico stared at the flames. "Why can't I at least summon her? I want to talk to her. She would...she would help me. "

"I will help you," the ghost promised. "Have I not saved you many times? Did I not lead you through the maze and teach you to use your powers? Do you want revenge for your sister or not?"

I didn't like the tone of the ghost. To me he sounded like a bad influence who was pushing Nico to do something the boy didn't want. But I figured it wasn't my place. 

Nico turned from the fire and from me. I'm not sure but he seemed to wipe a tear. 

"Very well. You have a plan?"

"Oh, yes," the ghost said, sounding quite pleased. "We have many dark roads to travel. We must start in the maze"

"What maze?" I spoke up. 

"The one that kept the Minotaur in the old days" Nico answered. I'm not sure if I heard it correctly but the ghost seemed to hiss at me or the mention of the Minotaur. 

"Wasn't that under the king's palace in Crete?" 

"Yeah, but it moves... like Olympus" 

"So the labyrinth is under some building in America" I felt quite pleased that I hadn't been a part of this world for more than a day and yet I figured it out. 

"Under a building?" The ghost scoffed. Okay, he really didn't like me. "The Labyrinth is huge. It wouldn't fit under a single city, much less a single building."

"But you're going to help me to Camp and then go into the labyrinth right?" I asked. 

"Of course, it's just that I thought- never mind" Nico stuttered. The truth was that I didn't want to go to camp anymore. The way Nico had spoken about them, they didn't seem the best demigods, especially the Percy guy.

The more I thought of it, the more it seemed wrong to let Nico wander with that ghost. I had made up my mind. The only problem was how I was going to tell him. I didn't want to seem clingy or needy, but I wanted him to know that I wanted to stay.

Before I could say anything more, Nico stood up. "You'll be needing a weapon, come on"

He offered me his hand and this time I didn't hesitate.