Mostly Normal: Magic Cannot Cure Sickness

Chapter Three: Epidemic!

"Nia?" a calm voice asked as they knocked on the door. The daughter of Hecate took a deep breath and tried to make her voice sound lively.

"Come in," she said, standing off of her bed and waiting for the child of Apollo to enter the cabin.

Will opened the door and came inside.

"How've you been feeling Nia?" he asked, getting straight to work. She shook her head and placed her hand on her throat, in which something was slowly eating her vocal cords, "Not so good then?"

Nia tried to say something but a hollow, rasping cough escaped her pale, orange tinted lips instead. Will's eyebrows shot up. "Oh dear," he said, "Looks like Orange Cough. You'd better come to the infirmary," he said, taking her hand and gently guiding her to the door.

Nia followed the son of Apollo patiently as they walked to the infirmary. The oldest child of Hecate was overjoyed that all of her siblings were either sent to the Roman camp on probation (Natalie) or at classes (Jeremy and Jackie), which meant that none of them had to see her in this state.

Will guided Nia into the infirmary tent and sat her down on a bed next to one occupied by Nico di Angelo.

"Stardust?" Will called into the room next to them. A young looking girl with long blond locks looked into the cabin with a questioning look on her face.

"Can I help you Will?" she asked, her Utah accent was evident in her voice.

"Yeah, Nia here has Orange Cough. Can you take care of her while I check Nico?" said Will. Stardust smiled.

"No problem," she said, "Nia, come here, sweetheart."

The tent flap opened and another child of Apollo came in, it was Hanna and she was leading a dark-haired girl in. This girl's lips also had an orange-ish tinge.

"Lora has it too?" Will groaned. "Take her to a bed, Hanna, and take care of her. I gotta check Nico now."

"On it, Will," Hanna said, leading the sickly looking daughter of Athena to another bed, next to Nia's.

Nia groaned and placed her hand over her throat, trying to soothe it as the Orange Cough ate her vocal cords. Lora sat up in bed and tried to speak, though her words came out as a croaking unhappy noise.

"Will!" shouted a young girl, who was also a child of Apollo, "I have two kids with Orange Cough here!"

"Bring them in, Cassia!" Will called back, and the girl came inside, bringing the two sons of Janus inside. Rio's lips almost matched his hair, and Elliot's pale face blended with his platinum-blond locks.

"Stardust, can you do me a huge favor?" Will asked after situating the two boys into beds, Stardust nodded and looked at her half brother, "Go around camp and find everyone who has Orange Cough, bring them back here and make everyone else wear masks. You know what? Just perform the standard epidemic procedure, and make more beds, we're gonna need them."

"Got it," said Stardust, running out of the infirmary. On the way out she nearly bumped into one of the newer daughters of Apollo, who was towing Robin from the Demeter cabin. The red haired girl looked a lot worse than the other campers with Orange Cough, which probably meant she'd had it longer than most of them. Maybe she'd given the sickness to a lot of these campers? Nia couldn't tell.

Nia lay back on the bed that she had been placed in, her throat bothering her too much for her to stand. If Robin had had the sickness for longer than the rest of them now did, it would explain why the small child of Demeter had never spoken to anyone. The doctors had disappeared from the tent and were slowly coming back in, removing the clothes that separated campers with illness from the campers with injuries. All the Apollo campers had masks over their mouths and gloves on, as to make sure that they did not catch Orange Cough as well.

Soon, the infirmary was full of sick campers, thanks to Stardust's hard work, and the air was full of coughing and retching. Will hastily checked on Nico and then moved on to Nia, giving her a tall glass of nectar for her throat.

That night, Nia lay awake, listening to the sounds of discomfort coming from the campers in the tent with her. She heard sounds of voices outside, as she listened in to the conversation, she could hear three voices, two of them female and one of them male.

"This is the most amount of cases of Orange Cough throughout history Will, what are we going to do?"

"Well first we need to alert the other camp, a few of their campers are sick here and we just sent Natalie and Bea over on probation."

"I put the remaining campers in the Hephaestus cabin, they're in one of the unused rooms," the third voice said, sounding rather startled.

"That's good," said the second voice, "Well done Stardust. You followed all requirements for an epidemic like this."

"Well," said the third voice again, sounding annoyed, "It's not the first time that happened, according to Stardust anyway."

"I had hoped that last time would be the last time that we had to deal with somethin' like this," Stardust said, knowing that doing basic things like changing out sheets and tending patients in the most Mortal way possible was all she could do.

"Looks like it's not," said the third voice sadly, "Sorry, Stardust. Will, can I go check on Robin again? She has a bad fever. I wanted to get her some ambrosia tonight."

"Yeah, just be sure to wear your mask and not to give her too much," Will said, before sighing and walking back into the tent to tend to more sick campers.