Nico's Tale: The End of the World.

Amarda of the Night

Thalia Grace felt blood coating her face as she dragged herself through the the Redwood forest in San Francisco. She pulled her arrow out of the side of a boar and lugged it onto her back, continuing as if the whole world was trying to kill her.

A spear sped past her head and she caught it in midair, spinning around and pinning it into the forehead of the emancipated form shuffling its way towards her. The world spinner around her and she kept moving, hazily aware of the cracking of lightning above her.

I thought... Zeus... Dead...

She coughed and kept advancing, crying out in pain as a branch fell forwards and hit her in the back.

Smoke rose from the distance but she had fallen to the ground, crawling towards a hope of salvation. A roar erupted from behind her and she tried to look backwards before she saw a giant that was even taller than the trees lumbering towards her.

A plane soared towards the behemoth over her head, blasting it in the eyes with bullets that seemed to annoy it. Thalia picked herself up, trying to increase her pace but stumbling. The smoke drew nearer and she begun to hear the crackling of a campfire.

"Hey! Hey over here, I've got one! There's a human here. Looks like a Hunter of Artemis! I thought we were all gone!"

Reyna Avila Ramirez-Arellano ran towards her, still dressed in her silver parka. Her spear was strapped to her back and she enveloped her girlfriend in an uncharacteristic hug.

"Reyna... I thought... Dead... I watched you..."

"Amici here saved me. She found me dying on the floor and got me to the nearest homeless shelter. Can you believe it?"

Her face was scarred though, and she had a weight to her voice that meant she was the only one that survived. Thalia gulped.

"It's a bloody miracle the attack didn't involve those dam zombies."

A small smile crossed her face before she remembered all the dead. She put her weight on Reyna and limped further towards the camp.

There was a wooden barrier surrounding it that Thalia was lifted over. Reyna vaulted it moments after and picked her up, Princess-style.

"I'm sorry about Annabeth, Thalia," she said.

The fifteen-year old looked up, confused.

"What do you mean, 'I'm sorry about Annabeth'? She's not... Oh my gods, Percy must be-!"

"She isn't the only one. We got word that Percy and Grover's death was what ended her in the end. That or Estelle's death."

Thalia's eyes widened in horror and she blinked a couple of tears out of her eyes. There was a group of people starting to gather around her and another thought came to mind.

"What is this place?"

"This is the Armada of the Night. We're a group of scattered demigods and the rare mortals that can see through the mist."

"Bit on the nose, isn't it. And it's quite cheesy. Why 'Night', too? Don't you hunt in the day?"

"Nah. It's not safe. The monsters started coming out in the day when we hunted them during the night, and we've never been able to change that. And the animals tend to be sleeping, too. Easier prey."

"How many of you are there? Armada suggests a large amount and this... this isn't that many people."

"We've got people all across the western seaboard. I think our furthest contacts are Portland. Las Vegas is overrun by monsters, and any desert has been turned into full hideouts for the dead."

Thalia looked around slowly. The camp stretched for acres in three directions but they were understaffed. They had maybe twenty or thirty people there, and at least half were in awful shape.

She breathed heavily and watched the world spinning around her. Reyna called out her name but she had already hit the ground, dirt flying up in the air. She felt a weight lifting from her back - the meat - and coughed violently as blackness descended upon her.

Brooklyn House

Nico spent the night thrashing around. He cried out for some help and Jack lay with him from that point onwards. He pictured Will Solace's rotting head rolling around on the floor below him and he screamed louder than he had his entire life. He watched all of his friends dying around him. Percy's, Annabeth's, Will's...

He jerked awake, sweating in fear. Pushing himself up, he felt his bones were even weaker than before.

He made his way out of the front door, trying to keep out the smoke clogging up his sinuses. Fire rose from the main city and he limped his way towards a Moped that lay, seemingly unscathed, on the side of the pavement.

He picked it up and hopped on it, strapping Jack onto the back with a piece of string that he soon wriggled free of.

They took off down the street, the magical sword acting as a defence system as monsters flung themselves at the pair. The Motorway was barren apart from the odd flaming car here and there and bodies scattered all of over the place.

They reached a stretch of clear land and Nico pushed it too it's limits, speeding towards what would hopefully be Boston. Death reeks from the shadows as he realised something.

How could I have missed that? He thought, Gods!

He jumped off the bike and grabbed Jack, vanishing into the shadow of the smoke clouds.

As a zombie jumped out at him and grabbed his leg.

The Chase Space

Nico appeared in the doorway, the decrepit figure clinging to his leg as tiredness overcame him. He coughed brutally and Jack was disorientated from the speed they'd been travelling.

"HELP!" Jack screamed, lying on the ground in agony as the thing clung to his hilt. Nico tried to reach out and bat it away but blackness was overwhelming him.

A door swung open and Magnus pierced the zombie with his dagger.

"Jack! Thank the gods you're alive!"

He threw Jack inside and hauled Nico onto his shoulders, carrying him through to a desk he hurriedly cleared. Sally knelt over him, feeding him a small chunk of blue cookie as Kayla brought some Ambrosia and Nectar.

A window smashed upstairs and there was a small scream and gurgling sound. Magnus sprinted up and watched as a young thirteen year old's head disappeared into the mouth of one of the zombies. He shouted for help and stabbed it in the head, watching it dissolve into gold dust. He held in a retch and keeled over backwards, missing the onslaught of them crawling in through the window.

As a blood-curdling war cry echoed from outside.

"PEANUT BUTTER!!!"