Nico's Dark Task

"When shall I teach you death magic?"

In hindsight, telling Jason about the task Hades had given him, was probably not the best idea.

In Nico's defense, he felt the need to tell someone, and who better than one of his best friends. One that was hung up on doing what was right and keeping to 'the rules'.

The whole thing had started as a normal meeting.

Nico had told Jason in an Iris message that he wanted to talk to him about something, and Jason, being the loyal friend he was, immediately got slightly worried.

"Why? Did something happen? Are you hurt?" Jason spluttered, his eyebrows scrunching in worry.

Nico raised his hands, "No, no. I'm not hurt or anything. I just- wanted to talk, is all."

The son of Jupiter visibly relaxed, "Oh, okay."

"Where are you now? I can shadow travel there."

"I'm actually at Camp Half-Blood. Y'know, that huge oak tree in the forest?."

Nico nodded and swiped his hand through the mist. He went for the nearest shadow and melted into it.

As he stepped out into the open, he was greeted by the warm air of Camp Half-Blood. It was a nice change to the pungent air of the Underworld, and Nico felt a tiny smile graze his face.

The air was abruptly knocked out of him as he was pulled into a hug.

Jason's strong arms squeezed him tightly, a bit too tight.

"Jason- uh- you're kinda killing me here," he managed to utter.

The other demigod immediately let go and held him at an arm's length, allowing Nico to swallow huge gasps of air.

"Sorry. But you've been killing me with worry, man! I haven't heard from you in over a month, none of my iris messages have gotten though either."

Nico shrugged, "There's not really that good reception in the Underworld."

"You've been staying with Hades?"

"Something like that."

Jason let go of him to sit down by the tree-trunk. He patted the ground beside him, "You wanted to talk?"

Nico hesitated for a second before sitting down. He looked at the elder for a moment, opened his mouth and then closing it again. He bit his lip.

How was he supposed to start? 'Hey, Jason. You wanna know what I've been up to lately? I've been hunting down demigods, torturing them and then draining their soul to give to my father. And also, I've absorbed a soul and possibly started liking killing them. Oh, I almost forgot, there's this Egyptian god I've been hanging out with, he's really hot and I may or may not like him a teeny tiny bit. Okay, good talk. See ya' in a couple of months.' Yeah, right.

"Jason... I-" Nico started, gripping strands of grass, slowly pulling them out of the ground. "Have you ever felt pleasure from... hurting someone?"

Jason looked at him, his eyebrows twitching slightly in surprise before scrunching together, "I don't think so... But I some do." He went quiet for s few seconds. "...Do you feel like that?"

Nico licked his lips, "I guess... or something like that..." He plucked a tuft of grass from the ground and started picking them from his hand, letting them flutter to the ground.

"...Are these monsters, or...?"

"They're demigods, and-"

Jason interrupted him, "Demigods?!"

Nico winced, "Yes, demigods. Look, just let me tell you from the beginning."

Jason didn't utter a sound while Nico explained the situation, his eyebrows furrowing as the story progressed. His left eye twitched as Nico mentioned Saltus, and his hand had clenched hard when the smaller demigod told him about his meetings with Anubis.