Waves (Percy Jackson & DC Crossover)

An Ally Crosses Over

Nico's POV
Surprise!

The air was hotter than Nico remembered. Red-tinted mist was slowly suffocating the demigod and he knew it, but he also knew the fiery water of the Phlegethon would keep him going even if drinking the scorching liquid was an unpleasant experience.

Nico didn't know how long he'd been in Tartarus, time felt like it moved differently down in the unventured depths of the Underworld. It had been a tough trip already. The Son of Hades had been forced to abandon some of his supplies due to sudden monster attacks and had used nearly all of the remaining supplies. Worst of all, he was no closer to finding his cousin, Percy Jackson.

He'd traveled high and low, interrogating monsters, and trying to retrace his friend's steps from his legendary first visit to the pit. He thought Percy would have tried to find something familiar in a space so void of normal life, but there wasn't any indication of Percy anywhere.

Now Nico hid between two large and jagged pillars of obsidian shards that would be considered abnormally sharp in the world above, but down in the pit, they were the norm. He was almost tempted to lean back against one of them and rest for just one minute, which made him realize he was probably losing his mind.

The only place he found to be anywhere safe enough to sleep was the fallen shrine of Hermes. The goldy aura was a bit unsettling but it kept most monsters away, and he'd summoned a skeleton soldier to wake him if anything more dangerous came prowling around. The demigod also preferred the occasional food drops over his burning water only diet he'd had going for the last few days. He was half expecting it to give him food poisoning, seeing as everything was trying to kill him down here.

A strange sound caught the demigod's attention and he clutched his Stygian Iron blade. Normally, the Son of Hades wouldn't be so anxious, but after what he'd already been through, he had every right to be.

Whatever the thing was, it was getting closer. Nico's hand reached for Diocletian's scepter even though he knew he didn't have enough strength to summon so many dead. In the end, it didn't matter. A shadow loomed over Nico as well as the glass-like spires he hid behind. Holding his breath, Nico focused on trying to melt into the darkness, but his time in Tartarus has eaten away at his strength for too long. A gutteral growl sounded above him, overlapped by several more identical snarls that seemed almost like an echo. Nico knew he'd been found.

Leaping forward, the demigod sprinted as fast as he could to the nearest cover, a small gap in the towering cliff line. The obsidian piller he'd just been hiding behind exploded, causing him to reflexively guard his head with his hands as glass-like shards shot past. Sparing a glance behind him, Nico found himself locking eyes with one of nine reptilian heads.

"Di Immortales!" Nico muttered, pushing himself to go even faster. One of the heads shot forward trying to swallow the smaller demigod whole, but its prey leapt to the side and jabbed it with his blade. The snake-like head drew back slightly hissing before spewing a dark substance that reeked of poison. Nico managed to avoid the attack by rolling underneath the monster's head.

The Son of Hades didn't know what to do. He knew cutting the monster's heads off would only make the matter worse. He only really had two options, try to fight the Hydra or use the gift his father had given him when he'd also received Diocletian's scepter. The stone from his father's throne that could transport him back to the Underworld.

I can't leave, not yet. Percy is still somewhere down here, Nico thought rolling out of the way of another scaly head and into the shadow of another one. He knew if he just had fire to cauterize the monster after chopping its heads off then he'd have a chance in winning, but he didn't.

As Nico moved slip into the shadow of another one of the monster's heads, a void opened up below both him and the Hydra. Its edges sparked a dull gray while the middle a complete blackness that terrified the Ghost King.

The the sudden disappearance of ground underneath their feet caused both the monster and immortalized demigod to plummet into nothingness.