Chapter Text
"Slash"
A hellhound claw came right at Nico's face as it tried to rake its dark, menacing hooks into his face. He quickly blocked it with his sword that seemed to ooze a sinister purple light. Wherever he expected to come across when he shadow traveled was not this. Shadow traveling was a relatively new skill he had acquired once Bianca... he could not even bear to think about it, much less say it. Percy had swore, he had promised but still... Anyways that would not matter now, for he was more likely to die.
This was his first time coming across a hellhound, he had never seen one before and had only met Cerberus in the Underworld once when visiting his father. He had heard of them in camp and seen one from afar but never went close to the one that was at camp. He could not, for the life of his father, remember their weakness. The hellhound came close once more as it glared at Nico with its glowing red eyes, a stark contrast to its brown fur. Its menacing eyes creeped the living daylights out of Nico.
Nico was running out of energy rapidly and Nico could not shadow travel again, he was just in China and he definitely didn't want to go to Camp Halfblood and accidently see Percy, it was all still to fresh and there was also good enough chance that he would disappear into mist or turn into a ghost or disappear or something like that. At least that's what he thinks his father said. He wasn't paying attention. It's not his fault! Cerberus was playing with a red slobbery ball in a corner when his father had decided to educate him. He tried hitting the hellhound kind of crazily in a barbaric way in hopes to hit its weak spot. It's like he wasn't even trying to aim. The hellhound lunged forward as it raked its claws into Nico's stomach and he started to lose blood quickly. He decided he had no choice but to melt in the shadows and go wherever it decided to take him. He prayed that it wouldn't be China again.
---
"Hey Dickybird," Jason yelled in a high pitched voice, "Pass it to me!"
The batboys were doing something relatively mundane today, they were playing catch with a ball. Now, you may be asking yourself, why? Well, once Dick learned that Damian had never in his life played catch, he took it upon himself to plan a whole day of playing catch. It was a surprisingly hard thing to plan, in between Damian and Tim's school, Jason's... actually he didn't know what Jason did, all he knew was he was busy a lot and that Jason had given him a list of dates where he was free and of course his own detective job in Bludhaven and of course all their nightly activities. But today was dedicated to having fun. They found a rather old-looking abandoned park with no civilians or reporters to take pictures of the Wayne boys.
"OWWWW...," Jason yelled as the ball managed to hit him square in the forehead.
"And that is how you destroy the great Red Hood. With a game of catch," snickered Tim.
"Shut up replacement," Jason yelled whilst chasing Tim.
Jason passed the ball to Dick as he ran off and Dick threw the ball to Damian. Damian had accidently broken his shoulder in patrol yesterday so he was a tad bit off balance as the ball too hit him on the head.
"Tt, Grayson. Does no one in this family know how to throw a ball?" an angry little boy said in a high pitched squeaky voice. It was hard to take him seriously with a voice like that.
"Sorry Dami," Dick said, stifling his laugh.
Damian ran off to get the ball as Jason and Tim returned back, rather unscathed from the brawl. As Damian returned back with the ball something started to fall from the sky. A black thing, a black bat or bird or something else.
"What's that?" Jason asked no one in particular.
Damien caught the bird thing, something rather difficult with a broken shoulder, "Help me, you idiots," as the others surged forward at his remarks.
On second glance, it was not a bird thing, but rather a human being. He was a small, young man around Damian's age. He was wearing black ripped jeans, an aviator jacket and a small skull ring. The white fur on the aviator jacket was coated with fresh blood, not dried. He was still bleeding. Underneath the jacket he wore a skull shirt. Damian reached forward to check for a pulse, and he felt a weak and faint one.
"He's bleeding profusely. He's hurt badly. We need to get him checked," Damian said. They all ran to the car where Alfred Pennyworth was waiting.
"Back so quick, young masters?" Alfred said, "Is there something wrong?"
"We need to drive, quick", Dick said fast, "We found this boy, he's losing blood and quick."
---
Wherever Nico had planned to wake up was not this. He was laying in some hospital bed, all of his wounds and injuries had been tended to. A teenager with black rimmed glasses had been sitting on a chair next to him, sleeping, as Nico was scared to even breathe loudly to wake him up.
"DON'T TAKE AWAY MY NOVEL," a loud, gruff voice yelled.
The boy sleeping suddenly shot up at the voice as he trudged sleepily to the direction of the voice.
"Tt, Todd. I wish to spar with you. Grayson is busy and Drake is sleeping and I am terribly bored," said a small kid.
" You wish to spar with me, huh," the gruff voice countered while punching the little kid who blocked his shots.
They looked like a normal, happy family if a tad too violent. Anyways, didn't all siblings fight? Nico could not stay here. Monsters would be attracted to him and they would try to kill him. Nico thought of shadow traveling but decided against it. He had already shadow-traveled twice in the past few hours and could not risk turning into whatever he would turn into if he took advantage of his powers. Nico tried to sneak away into the main hall, the shadows warping and hiding him as he went.
"Would you both shut up? I was trying to sleep. I was awake all night and then I had to go to that stupid park," Tim yelled at the two as the three continued to bicker.
Perfect. Now it would be easy to sneak away. Nico lunged for the front door, slamming it open as the three boys stared at him as if he was a reindeer in headlights.
"Hey don't run away. We are good people," Jason said enunciating the good, "Well most of us." Then he started flailing his hands yelling "WAITTTT!!!"
Then Nico bolted. They seemed like a nice enough family. He ran faster than he ever had as he went past the road and fence of the huge mansion that had just opened as a blue car went by a 20-something year old driving it. They both stared at each other wide eyed until he ran. He would not endanger them than he already had.
After some time, Nico decided he was hungry and searched his pockets for anything that even resembled money as he took out a crumpled up 10 dollars and 2 drachmas and some gum. He had spotted a McDonalds as he limped towards it. He went and purchased two happy meals, before sitting in some graveyard. He would eat one of the happy meals, and offer the other one to whoever would help bring his sister back. He had heard from the other ghosts of a certain king Minos.
---
"I just saw the new kid, running outside. What was that about?" Dick asked in an accusatory tone.
"He just ran," Jason said, stating the obvious.
"Did you at least put a tracker on him? He was hurt. There are probably bad people searching for him," Dick said as the others looked away from their brothers eyes, "None of you?"
"Well, Tim was guarding him and then..." Jason said, trying to pin the blame on his least favorite brother.
"It was only because you and Damian were fighting," Tim said with his eyes on his phone.
Then the three continued bickering as Dick sighed dejectedly.
"Wait, I think I found him," Tim said, hacking into Gotham's cameras through his phone," He's at... McDonalds, I think? Wait he just got out and he's walking to the cemetery. I think it's him, at least that's where a boy of his description just entered alone with his clothes."
"Great. Something useful," Dick said, " We'll go there in civilian clothing and try to talk to him. Just ask him if he's ok, or if he needs help."
---
They all piled into a car and Dick drove everyone to said cemetery where they saw the boy, chanting in some other language that none of them knew. It looked like it was part of some weird satanic ritual. Suddenly something appeared, a wisp of something inhumane, a ghost of the past. It seemed to talk to the boy but no one but Jason for some reason could see it. Jason ignored it. It was probably just a hallucination, most of it had started after the pit, he began seeing weird things, people with one eye, weird looking cheerleaders and a scary chihuahua. It was honestly kinda weird but Jason had just learned to ignore it. No one else could see it so it must be nothing.
"Hey are you ok?" Dick yelled at the boy, ruining his concentration causing the wisp in Jason's imagination to dissipate.
"It's you, again," the young boy rolled his eyes.
"What's your name? How old are you?" Dick asked.
"Nico, Nico di Angelo and I'm 10. Now it's my turn to ask questions. Who are you and how did you find me?"