Ghost King Meets Batman

I Wish I Knew

[Edited April 17, 2023]

Nico carefully climbed down off of his desk and sat gently in his chair. He sat there, staring at the new blank page sitting there before him. He wanted to draw something else. He wanted to see if his new talent was a fluke or something. He still had motivation, but he no longer had any inspiration. He sat there for several minutes just trying to come up with things that he could draw but nothing sounded all that appealing to him at the moment. He eyed the rest of the room for inspiration but nothing immediately came to him.

That's when his mind started to wander. His thoughts strayed to Camp Halfblood and what they were probably doing right about then. Maybe they were having a game of Capture the Flag. Maybe Annabeth was leading a charge against the Ares cabin. Maybe Percy was bending the creek to his will. The possibilities were endless. Nico absently wished he'd been around for more of the events at camp. Now that the prophecy was over and more and more demigods were showing up at the borders, the place had become too crowded for him.

With other demigods on his mind, it wasn't too long before an idea for another picture came to him. He was going to draw Percy and Annabeth. It seemed fitting since they were his only real friends at camp. Maybe his only real friend at all. It was only right that they were the next people he drew after Bianca.

He wanted to portray them as the happy, carefree people that he had always known them to be. He decided on drawing them at the very moment that the war ended. Both were in battle armor, their helmets long since discarded, holding each other as if nothing else mattered. Nico started with the form of Annabeth, her hands in Percy's hair. The curves, shading, and depth came naturally to him. He automatically knew what to do to get the picture how he wanted. When he was satisfied with her figure, he moved on to draw Percy.

The picture took him several hours to complete, which he did all in one sitting. He didn't stop working until it was complete and even then he couldn't stop moving. After he had tacked up the piece he cleaned up all his art supplies, made his bed, and put away the rest of the clothes that Chiron had sent him from Camp. There wasn't much, but it was better than nothing. Even after had finished all the little tasks he could think of, he could still feel himself tingling with nervous energy but he wasn't sure why. Sometimes he would just get these sudden waves of productivity where he felt like he could take on the world, but usually, they dissipated fairly quickly. This time the feeling wasn't going away.

He felt that if he didn't work through the energy it would well back up into whatever panic had overtaken him a few hours prior and he didn't want that. Nico paced in circles rapidly for a few minutes, trying to expel some of the energy. Every time he paused for more than a few moments he could feel the pressure start to build up in his muscles and his chest so he had to move again. He could feel the panic coming up despite his efforts and it made him want to growl in frustration.

 Why couldn't he calm down? What was happening to him? After a while of just pacing and looking for little tasks to do like picking up paper scraps or organizing his dressers, Nico could feel himself coming back down from the wave of anxiety. It hadn't reached a peak like it had earlier and he had managed to keep from having a full-blown meltdown. However, the demigod still felt drained. How could he go from having so much energy to being so empty?

Nico glanced at his drawings numbly. It was like he was inside a fishbowl. Everything was softer and slightly distorted. The thoughts were there, they just weren't as loud as they usually were and they were a lot slower than normal. Was this what it was like to think like a normal person? His eyes started to process his art. Drawing reminded him of Rachel, and how Percy told him that she drew Luke from her dreams. What if he could draw out the people he sees in his demigod dreams? He can make sure that he can recognize them. He told himself that he would do that the next time that he saw someone new in his dreams. After this fog went away.