...

I understand now, alone and afraid, that all of my life will stay this way.

    He landed in a tree.

In another situation, this could have been a great opportunity to laugh at his random destination. He could huff lightly and carefully climb down, usually accompanied by the comments of some surprised camper nearby or the chuckles of a friend. Now, burned skin shoved harshly against tree bark and a pit of nausea curling in his stomach, anything pleasant was the furthest from his mind. 

    Nico propped himself against the trunk, biting back a wince as he moved his injured arm with him. It stung, the angry burns painfully throbbing every other second. The chips of wood lodged in his arm definitely didn't help things, but that was something to deal with later.

    Slowly, he shifted his legs to gain some more balance, and stopped movement there. Getting down seemed too harsh of a feat. He didn't want to go out and find someone. Dealing with any of the drama left behind was exhausting him just thinking about it. The only thing appealing to him right now was being alone and unbothered, with wounds or not. 

    Nico huffed. Call him selfish, but he really couldn't give a damn about any of the responsibilities shoved onto him at the moment. It seemed like a never-ending cycle of quests and tasks and favors that give him nothing in return. Near death experience after near death expierence, and people expect him to bounce back? His father expects him to bounce back? To accept everything asked of him with no hesitation? 

    Honestly, sometimes, he wished he was dead. A ghost, a forgotten soul, with no burdens to bear. How easy it'd be, to slip by and fade. Back to being alone, sure, but at peace. A sickly sort of calm that, the more he dwells on it, seems increasingly attractive with time.

    Nico leaned his head against the wood, a pathetic, shaky sigh ripped from his throat. He knows, rationally, that he shouldn't be thinking about that. Suicidal thoughts and reckless tendencies were giant red flags. Feelings come and go, his mental state rises and falls, but it's times like this where any hope for recovery shrivels and dies. He's back in that tiny jar, surviving on a few measly seeds that grow smaller and smaller each time he reaches. Loneliness is one thing; it's a slow, quiet feeling that tears you apart gradually. Softly. The realization that you're not lonely, but purely alone, is another thing entirely. It resurfaces at the worst possible times, and leaves you breathless. Choking on the wave of emotions that comes to remind you of your insignificance. That nobody cares, and nobody will care, because you're so far gone. So buried that it's too much work to even try and resurface. 

    At times, it's comforting, in a way. Now, it only serves to push him over the edge.

    Nico sucked in a breath, doubled over, and broke. Tears that seemed to scorch his skin trailed down his face, and ugly, wrecked sobs ripped from his lungs. He was alone and left for dead, in a foreign place with weak hopes of getting back. He didn't want this, any of this.  

    Nico would come back to camp as a forgotten name. Just another story of a demigod who died 'fighting', another face that'd wash away. "It's better this way," they'd whisper among themselves. "He was more trouble then he was worth."

    Maybe something would be held, a formality to please his father, the god that didn't care. No one would mourn the death of someone who was so invisible. 

He screamed.

    Loud enough that it hurt. Loud enough to shake the birds from the trees. Loud enough to drown out the ringing and stupid, stupid, thoughts in his head. 

    'I hate you,' was the one sentence he could make out, pointed at his father, dressed with bloody stains and a hellish cloak. But the image turned to one of himself, merging Hades and him as one and the same, and the waves of pure, unfiltered disgust refused to stop.  

    Everything piled up, the pressure settling on his chest and pressing down on his lungs. Panic was the one emotion he could identify, from this painful mess boiling underneath his skin, and it flooded every sense.  His hands clawed at his neck, at his sternum, at his head, a poor, desperate attempt to get some air in his lungs. 

    Eyes screwed shut, he hit the rough bark over and over again. Nico needed to ground himself, stay aware of the burn of his knuckles, and the feeling of warm liquid spilling from his hands. He grit his teeth against the screaming from his injured arm, and continued. He wouldn't let himself lose control. He couldn't. 

    He wanted to breathe, to soothe the ache in his chest and the clamp around his throat, but he couldn't. He couldn't, he couldn't, he couldn't, he-

"KID."

    Nico's head snapped up, and he froze. Aizawa was standing there, with one hand gripped tightly around his scarf. He looked conflicted, torn, like he was forcibly holding himself back.  It was almost ridiculous, to see this man in such a tense state, refusing to move from his spot. Nico couldn't understand why the adult in this situation was staying away from him (a pathetic, sniveling child), until he looked down at his feet and saw the pile of dead leaves.

    Inky, black shadows were growing and growing, spilling from the tree and dripping down the side. Leaves were wilting, grass was dying, branches were weakening, and the teacher stood right outside Nico's self-made area of death. 

    He cursed shakily, violently wiping the remains of his tears off his face. No, no, he was causing more destruction, the type he's never dealt with before. Powers go off emotions, he reminded himself, and willed himself to breathe. To suck it up. To get out of this fog.

    Nico shook his head, squeezing his eyes shut and forcing himself to move. Even if he still felt like there was concrete on his chest, and nausea spinning in his head, he was still going to fix this. 

    "I'm sorry," he forced out, muffling a cry as he slowly climbed down from the branch he was sitting on. His shoe slipped, causing more rough scrapes as he fell the rest of the way down, but he pushed himself to get up right after. Standing in the dying patch of weeds and grass, the pit of black, he ground his teeth and focused all the spiraling energy on stopping the flow of decay. It was a bumpy start, but soon enough, the felt the darkness recede into the normal, harmless shadows.

    Nico opened his eyes to see Aizawa cautiously but quickly approach him, hands off his weapon. Maybe as a way of saying Nico wouldn't be attacked? He didn't know; exhaustion slurred his mind. 

    "Can you walk? Are you able to hold yourself upright for the walk back inside?"

    Nico nodded slowly, already making a move to go back in and pass the teacher, but made no more than three steps before his stomach tightened and he leaned over, vomiting on the ground. With his head pounding and acidic taste in his mouth, he promptly gave up on moving any longer.

    Aizawa's hand was on his back as Nico grabbed his stomach, emptying whatever he could onto the grass. He continued until it wasn't possible, still painfully dizzy and dry-heaving until he knew for sure nothing would come up and surprise him along the way. Grimacing, Nico used the back of his hand to wipe off vomit from the corners of his mouth. "Sorry," he muttered. "I'm not usually so...messy."

    "It's alright," the older man responded, slipping a hesitant arm around Nico's shoulders. "Lean on me. We're going inside to see Recovery Girl, the nurse. She'll help you."

    Despite his usual complaint he would have given for being touched and handled, like a helpless child, he couldn't find the energy to do so.

    Instead, he walked along with this new stranger, resigned to his fate with each and every step.