HOW THE MIGHTY FALL (NICO)

[Briony Lewis]

The skinny girl let out a curse that wasn’t at all ladylike, grappling to keep her hold on the moving platform so that she wouldn’t be thrown onto the cold, winter ground. As she hung, suspended only by her left hand, she ventured a look downwards- and immediately wished she didn’t. The ground spun, and with a grunt, she swung her other arm up- lodging the kitchen knife into the wood of the moving obstacle course. She hung like that for a moment, beginning to swing, finally flipping herself up- and over- onto the platform. She didn’t have a moment to catch her breath, however- the swinging arms of the next obstacle swung at her, and she had to jump. Her foot caught on the bar and she landed on her face, the wind knocked out of her. The second bar cracked her in the forehead, and seeing nothing but stars, she rolled- and went over the edge. Quick reflexes allowed her hand to close around her knife, and she growled as sweat ran down her neck. It wasn’t like Brie to take part in the field days that the other campers did- her strengths weren’t her athletic ability, but her brains- and her disregard to morality. However, as the little brunette struggled to keep herself from tumbling twenty feet to the ground, there was only one thing on her mind: the ones who got to the top the fastest were considered the winners. And the winners were the ones that got to go on quests.



Brie pulled herself up again, perhaps not as gracefully, but she managed to not get knocked off her feet again. She pulled her knife out of the wood and jumped for the rope that would get her to the next platform. Placing her knife between her teeth, she began to shimmy upwards. If she had her winged sandals on, this would have been a breeze- but in the normal games, her sandals would have been cheating. If she wanted to be ready when the competitions started again in spring, she needed to figure out how to beat this thing now. When the next quest was handed out, Brie wanted to be the one that got to leave.



Reaching the top of the rope, she eyed the next platform. She knew if she missed the jump, it was quite possible she could get herself killed, but she set her jaw stubbornly. Taking a moment to swing the rope as far as she could, she clamped her teeth tightly on the knife blade and launched herself forward- surprisingly making it. She moved from the wide platform to the skinny plank that surrounded the top section, avoiding the pieces of wall that moved to knock her off. This was where she excelled, she thought with a smirk- she could climb like nobody’s business. What Brie didn’t anticipate, however, was the trapdoor under her feet releasing- sending her knife to the ground far below, and herself scrabbling to keep from falling on it.



“I. Am not. Fucking. Losing now,” Brie snarled, wincing at the splinters that dug into her hands as she pulled herself up. She ran up the rest of the planks, finally jumping to pull herself up onto to the top- and letting out a loud whoop as she collapsed, scratched, dirty, and bleeding, onto the wood.



She lay like that, panting for breath, for several long minutes before she sat up, running a hand through her long, tangled hair. Her dark eyes fell on a boy far below, and for the first time all day, Brie grinned. “Hey you,” she called to Nico, letting her legs dangle over the edge. “Want to join me?” 

[Nico di Angelo]

Nico didn't normally hang around the stadium unless there was something definitely in it for him. One, there were too many people around, two, he saw no point in the obstacle courses the camp provided, and three, the course only ran during the day. He was averse to sunlight -it made him ill. All of those things factored into Nico di Angelo lurking away in Hades cabin, attempting to avoid his siblings and hopefully not avoiding Brie. And all of that strongly disagreed with him lurking in the shadows around the obstacle course.

Something had drawn the brunet there and, being a child of an Olympian God, Nico wasn't about to ignore a gut feeling. (Sometimes Hermes sent Nico feelings and the demigod had an itching feeling this was one of those times.) So he'd actually walked for once, opting out of shadow traveling because that would keep him away longer. Nico's eyes were fixed on the ground as he slowly slunk across the brightly lit camp. He was glad, at least, that people knew to leave him alone. But that also meant there weren't things to distract him and make him take longer to get to the stadium. And when Nico got there, he was infinitely glad he'd taken as much time as he had.

Why, he asked himself as he stood, tense in the shadows, why did she have to be such an idiot? Had he really been sent to the stadium to watch Brie practice her obstacle course and almost kill herself a few times? Nico's hands clenched and unclenched and he had to restrain himself from running after her to knock some sense into the damn girl. He didn't relax but he did exhale in relief when the girl reached the top of the course. Bloody and probably in a bit of pain. Nico narrowed his eyes when Brie sat up.

"Hey you. Want to join me?"

Nico's eye twitched. "No," he said dryly. "I'm fine on the ground." As if to punctuate his words, he folded his arms across his chest and stared up at Brie, his face neutral but his aura challenging.

[Briony Lewis]

"No,"

Brie’s grin grew. She could see the disapproval on Nico’s face, but that only made her victory sweeter.

"I'm fine on the ground."

“Then I’ll join you.” Before he had a chance to say anything else, she had slid off the edge, bending her knees when she hit the platform fifteen feet below, and launched herself off again. She flickered out of sight for a long moment, then reappeared, her feet planted firmly on the ground only an inch and a half in front of him, her face flushed as if she had run several miles. Though Nico had been trying to teach her how to shadow travel, something that should have been an easy gift to a daughter of the god of travel, Brie wasn’t very good at it. She could only go short distances, and even then, only half of the time. Though she would never admit it, she had been practicing without him- the only way she had been confident enough to throw herself off a fifty foot high tower without a second thought.

“No need to look so disapproving,” Brie chided him, still smirking. She leaned forward to press her lips to his before sauntering off to collect her dropped knife. It was unusual for Brie to show such casual affection, even to her boyfriend (a word she hated using, and hated in general,) and it was even more unusual for Brie to be in such a good mood- particularly after a mandatory detention with her father. To say that her relationship with Hermes was strained was the understatement of the year.

“What brings you out here, anyway?” She tucked her knife away, straightening as she looked at him over her shoulder. She pushed her long hair back, surveying his face as she tried to get a good read on him. Even after a year together, there were times she couldn’t quite read Nico- though there was little doubt that there was anyone who could do it better than her. There was something to be said about absolute trust and the bond it created, and Nico was, by far, the only one that Brie did indeed trust. “This isn’t exactly your scene, graveyard boy.”

[Nico di Angelo]

Nico's mouth twitched as he stood there defiantly. Part of him didn't want to go up because it would be tedious while the other part of him that he ignored thought he wouldn't make it. He frowned when Brie said she'd join him. "Wha-" he didn't get a chance to question her because she was in motion. His instincts told him to move, to catch her, to do something, while his logic told him to stay put. Even as she landed on the platform after a fifteen foot jump and seemed okay, Nico's instincts were screaming in the back of his head. And then she flickered out of place, causing Nico's lips to pull together in an irritated line.

"No need to look so disapproving."

Nico snorted in irritation. "You dropped fifteen feet and shadow traveled," he snapped. "I'm allowed to disapprove." However, his lips curled at the corners when she kissed him before walking away. So maybe he was mad at her but they were in a relationship and he was a guy and kisses, well... She didn't usually show affection, especially not publicly. (Nor did he, for that matter.) He might also not have been as mad at her as he claimed or acted like. Nico sighed and shook his head at the girl.

"... Graveyard boy?" Nico asked, raising his eyebrows. "Did you really just...?" He sighed and dropped his arms from his chest. He shoved one hand into his pocket and let the other one hang at his side. "I felt like coming out here," he stated dryly. While he trusted her explicitly, Nico didn't feel comfortable telling anyone that he had gut feelings and he most certainly wasn't going to tell Brie that her father had led him to the stadium. One, that just sounded idiotic. Hermes and Nico didn't have a relationship of any kind. And two, Brie and Hermes' relationship was on the shittier side of things. Nico didn't want to touch on that little wound. "Is it wrong to want sunlight now and then?" Nico had trouble not sneering at that question. He hated sun and it was definitely a well known fact.

[Briony Lewis]

So he wasn’t impressed- that just amused Brie even more than she already was. She was, at the end of the day, bolder than Nico- he liked to think things through, while Brie tore through everything without a moment’s hesitation. It had put her in some precarious situations over the last year, let alone before that- and lately, Nico had been the one who had to save her ass.

"You dropped fifteen feet and shadow traveled, I’m allowed to disapprove.”

Brie rolled her eyes at him. “Lighten up, wouldya? I’m not hurt, and hey- I set a new personal record. That should count for something, right?”

She couldn’t help but feel amused at Nico’s smile, and once she had pocketed her knife, she crept closer. Her grin grew as he stuck his hand in his pocket, wondering how long it would take him to catch on that she had stolen from him. It wasn’t unusual for Brie to raid Nico’s pockets (or anyone else around her, for that matter)- in fact, it was almost a game at this point. In Nico’s case, she always gave back what she took, a true sign of her affection.

"... Graveyard boy?Did you really just...?"

“I did,” she responded. “It didn’t work, did it?”

"I felt like coming out here,"

Brie raised her brows at him. “Why?” She asked bluntly. Brie had never had a problem asking the questions she wanted answers to, usually without regard to the feelings of the person she was interrogating. With Nico, while she was still blunt, there was a true concern behind the words. If Nico was up to something, Brie wanted to know what it was- and she wanted to participate.

"Is it wrong to want sunlight now and then?"

“Nico.” This time, Brie’s smirk faded as she stared long and hard at him. “What’s really going on?”

[Nico di Angelo]

Nico ran his unpocketed hand down his face in exasperation, his brief worry over Brie causing him to feel like he was an old man or something. (Time-wise he really was an old guy, but in physique and mentality he was not.) The brunet stared at Brie, his face blank. His eyes glittered in thinly veiled amusement, though, and he sighed.

"New personal record, right," he stated. "It counts for something considering you didn't die." But Nico knew his worry had been sort of stupid. He'd have felt it if she was in any immediate, life threatening danger. But he couldn't help it. The gut feeling, her shadow traveling... Everything kind of piled against her in his mind. He had reason to worry even if secretly he'd admit he was being an idiot.

Nico raised an eyebrow when the brunette girl came closer to him after getting her knife, his small smile still vaguely playing about his lips. She did have that sort of affect on him, the affect that he wanted to smile even though he never wanted to smile, that he wouldn't mind the sun if she was next to him. Nico looked away from her to draw himself out of his thoughts. Affection was a dangerous thing for him. And even though he'd pretty much dove headfirst into the rabbit hole, at times Nico still liked to resist it's gravity for his own sanity.

With a scoff, Nico said dryly while not looking at the girl, "Don't call me Graveyard Boy again." He was close to smiling at her again but then she question why he was out there, why he was getting a little sunlight. Nico looked at her, but the smile he'd felt blooming was gone, the affection that always welled up inside of his heart when he saw her was dampened by the need to keep his communication with Hermes private, and his lips formed a grim line, almost a chiding pursing of the lips but not quite. "I felt like coming out here," he repeated, his tone less than pleasant but not yet a snap. "Hades might be my dad but I'm half human. I can't always be deprived of sunlight." And while he knew his excuse was stupid, Nico was bound and determined to keep to it and not let anything slip about his gut feeling. "Why are you out here?" he shot back. "You're not feeling suicidal, that I know."

[Briony Lewis]

"New personal record, right. It counts for something considering you didn't die."

“Please,” Brie rolled her eyes. “My life is not nearly awesome enough for it to be ended right here and now- and besides, we both know you’d go rescue me anyway.” Brie knew that was beyond Nico’s powers, but she knew he would do his damnedest. Brie wasn’t stupid, and she could see the effect she had on him- probably because it was the same he had on her. “So no harm, no foul.”

"Don't call me Graveyard Boy again."

Brie smirked, catching the hidden smile. “Once more, with feeling- I might actually believe you mean that.” She pocketed the drachma she had “borrowed” from him, careful not to mix it with her own so that it could be easily returned. “If you don’t like that one, I’ll have to come up with a different nickname for you.”

At his change of expression, Brie narrowed her eyes. If she hadn’t been certain before that he was up to something, it was undeniable now- but his stony silence on the matter, when they usually shared such things, was alarming. Brie wasn’t insecure enough to think it had to do with another girl, but she knew without a fact that Nico’s silence had everything to do with something she would not like.

"I felt like coming out here. Hades might be my dad but I'm half human. I can't always be deprived of sunlight."

“You’re being stupid.” Brie folded her arms, her gaze stormy. “You wanting to willingly come out and enjoy the sunshine is like me saying I love my daily detentions- it’s pure bullshit and we both know it.”

"Why are you out here? You're not feeling suicidal, that I know."

“Oh wow,” she replied snarkily, “You’ve learned to read minds. Good for you. If you must know, I’m practicing so that I might get out of this place sometime within the next century. I want to be assigned a quest.”

[Nico di Angelo]

Nico sighed loudly and shook his head at the girl in front of him. She was one of the most stubborn girls in his whole freaking life. "Of course. Because you can't die until you save the world from certain death and destruction," he retorted playfully. His eyes flashed in irritation for a few seconds at the mention of him going to rescue her if she died. It irritated him because he knew it was true. He'd fight his father tooth and nail to get Brie back.

He sniffed indignantly at Brie. "I don't need a nickname," he argued with a put out frown on his face. "Nico is just fine." He wrinkled his nose, wondering what else Briony could come up with in terms of nicknames for him. "Bianca never gave me a nickname." His voice went low and became almost a whine. And while it hurt to actually say her name still, it was true. But Brie wasn't his sister and saying Bianca wouldn't do something was really stupid on his part. But that never stopped him from saying stupid things around Brie before.

Case in point of said stupidity, his faux defense about wanting sunlight. She was right -Nico really did detest the sun. He was outside when he needed to be outside and he fought in the sunlight a number of times. And he hated it with a passion. It tired him out, almost as quickly as shadow traveling did. His father was a god of darkness and his mother hadn't been much different. (At least, he didn't think so or he'd like the sun more.)

"You don't like spending time with Lord Hermes?" Nico wondered, his face the picture of innocence. "I suppose every single day is excessive but maybe once every other day you'd think would be nice." He cocked his head to the side and looked at Brie, his face carefully innocent but otherwise blank.

"Oh wow, you’ve learned to read minds. Good for you. If you must know, I’m practicing so that I might get out of this place sometime within the next century. I want to be assigned a quest."

Nico sobered up rather quickly at that, bringing his head so it wasn't cocked to the side. Only a quest would cause Brie to get the tar beat out of her by a stupid obstacle course. Only a quest would cause Brie to even waste her time in the stadium. "Ask Lord Hermes to take you to Mount Olympus," he snapped. "That'll get you out of here and not risk your life."