Chapter V — I Meet My Girlfriend’s Little Brother (Written by Brian Mun)
You see, my mom was a heavy drinker, a habit I resented deeply. She must’ve adopted it from my so-called dad, Zeus cause I heard he liked wine, that’s why he made Dionysus god. On her good days, she was like any other regular mom, doing stuff any other regular moms would do. But on her bad days, she cried and wept for no apparent reason and starts drinking heavily. Whenever I asked her to stop drinking or why she did it, she’d just beat me up.
When I slept, I dreamt I was 5 years old, looking at my mom who was driving the car very fast. I remember that night pretty vaguely, she said she wanted to go to her friend’s house for a visit, but I knew she was lying, so I followed her. I sneaked into the trunk of her car, and she drove to a nearby bar. When she went into the bar to get herself a few drinks, I stood beside the car, crying. Then a stranger came up to me, he had a bright aura surrounding him, which seemed to lift my spirits. He just smiled and walked away. Then I felt as if somebody whispered in my head. Dear child, you must stay strong, even if something bad happens, you must stay strong, the voice spoke.
The dream faded and I woke up in the infirmary, Claire right beside me.
“Thalia found you laying motionless near the campfire. Chiron said you were lucky she saw you before the cleaning harpies.” she said.
I wanted to lay up but as soon as I did, my whole head felt burning.
“Dont move, you’re feverish.” She fed me some ambrosia,” You passed out for like, 2 days.”
I felt better instantly after eating that ambrosia. “How are you Claire? I thought you were still out from that bonk in the head the hunters gave you.”
She smiled. And I realised it was the first time I’d seen her smile since arriving in this camp.
“Listen, I have archery practice. I’ll stop by later to check up on you, deal?” Claire said.
“Yea, sure. Hey uh, try not to shoot the other campers will ya?” I joked.
She punched me in my shoulder, which seriously hurt me considering I was sick. “Ow…” I muttered.
She just smiled at me and left the infirmary. When she left, I could’ve sworn I’d seen a tears in her eyes, as if she’s about to break down in tears.
The night passed without any dreams, so I was pretty glad since the last dream I had took me 2 days to wake up from. Over the week, I learned alot of stuff. The hunters and the Apollo cabin were taking turns teaching us archery, Annabeth taught us more about Greek myth and Percy taught us swordplay. There were some campers that really got on my nerves. Clarisse from Ares cabin tried drowning me in toilet water once, but I zapped her with a static shock instead and she passed out for a whole day. When she woke up, she swore she would pulverize me. Percy told me not to worry cause Clarisse is all talk. Then there were the Stoll brothers, Connor and Travis Stoll, stealing everything and pranking everyone in camp. Dont get me wrong, their pranks are funny, when you’re not on the receiving end of it. But I’m really starting to feel like I belong here, like I have a family here. Its also pretty cool that I had a sister. I could talk to her about stuff, and she’d listen, even though she tried to kill me.
We had a campout one night. Just a few of us — Percy, Annabeth, Thalia, Claire, Grover and me. We all talked about stuff that happened in our lives. It was pretty fun. Just then, the shadows seemed to darken around us, making everything seem gloomy and creepy, then a kid about 15 years old popped out of the shadows. He had shaggy black hair and semi-pale skin. He was wearing an aviator jacket and he had on a ring shaped like a skull.
We all stood up, surprised. Grover was so scared he hid behind Percy while claire almost passed out..again.
“Nico?” Percy said, astonished. “Nice of you to uh, drop in.”
“Bianca’s little brother?” Thalia regained her composure. “Man I really hate it when he does that.”
But the kid wasnt responding, he had scratch marks and bruises all over his body. We took him to the infirmary and fed him some nectar and ambrosia.
“Umm, Percy. You’re telling me that this is the guy you talked about? Nico, a son of Hades?” I asked.
“Yep.”
“Wait wait wait, hold on!” Claire said. “You mean this guy right here is my little brother?”
“Uh-huh” Percy and I said in unision.
Claire fainted…again. I caught her before her head could hit the edge of the bed.
“Seriously,”Thalia said. “That girl needs to learn how to stop fainting.”
Nico woke up before Claire did. “Yo, guys.” He coughed.
“Lie down Nico, you’re in no condition to-”
“Whose the new guy?” Nico pointed at me.
“Hiya. I’m Bryan, son of Zeus.” I said.
He held out his hand and I shook it. “Nico di Angelo, son of Hades.”
His smile faded just as soon as he turned and looked at Claire.
“Bi..Bianca?”
“Uh, no. She’s Claire, or you could call her big sis.” I said
Nico looked disappointed.”Oh.” He let out a big sigh.
I kinda wanted to ask who Bianca was until Percy mouthed,”Tell you later”
“Where’d you been to these days, Nico? Havent seen you in a long time.” Percy said. “And whats up with all those injuries?”
“I have good news, and bad news.” He said. “The good news is, I made it back here in one piece. The bad news is, we need to go on a quest. Artemis and Apollo are in danger and they need our help.
