Chapter Text
Cold wind drifted past as Nico walked the empty streets of Hurricane, Utah, the place Hades had told him to travel in order to find the new target. Nico didn't really know much about this target, Hades had been annoyingly vague when describing the man, but his father did seem quite irritated with the serial killer, that's for sure.
Puddles splashed and raindrops fell as he walked, path lit up by the street lights. The wind was getting heavier with each step and Nico pulled his newly patched up Avatior jacket tighter around himself. He really should've taken Will's advice to put on more clothes, because his ripped black jeans may not have been the most ideal choice of clothing for this mission.
Nico's walk fell short when his eyes caught sight of a building lit up by many bright neon lights and a huge sign in the middle. It stuck out like a pop concert would've in the Underworld. Cause it was definitely bright, alright.
Nico reached into his back pocket and pulled out the note he got from Hades with the address of the place.
Mega Pizzaplex του Freddy Fazbear, μην με απογοητεύσεις, γιε μου. (Freddy Fazbear's Mega Pizzaplex, don't fail me, Son.)
- Hades
Nico looked back up at the sign, the letters were a little blurry, but he could make out the same title as on the note.
‘Perfect,’ he thought sarcastically, ‘a bright and colorful building with neon lights, just the place I wanted to spend my Friday night.’
He put the folded paper back in his pocket with a tired sigh. The fates might as well be playing with his life's luck in a Casino.
He began to walk over to a nearby wall of the building, fully intent on using his usual shadows to travel with. What Will doesn't know doesn't hurt him.
He was already taking sprints towards what looked to be the only white wall of the colorful building, when he suddenly felt something heavy and wet hit him right on the cheek when the wind had picked up yet again. He flinched back instinctively, already pulling out his sword when he looked down at the object that had hit him on the cheek.
It turned out to just be a newspaper. Out of curiosity he picked it up, trying to hold it without breaking it. The newspaper felt a little gross to hold as it had still been on the wet and dirty ground. His face shifted into a frown as he scanned through the text. It took maybe a little longer than average, but he could make out the main title of the article.
Young child's frontal lobe severely damaged after prank pulled by his older brother.
It was a Monday afternoon when disaster struck on young Dave Afton's birthday party. The child's frontal lobe is said to have gotten severely damaged by one of the animatronic machines in Fredbear's Family Diner. Doctors say that the injury is most likely death causing and that the young child will sadly not make it.
According to witnesses of people who were there, it is said that Dave's older brother and his friends had been the ones to lift the crying child's head to the mouth of the animatronic bear.
"It was an accident, I never meant for any of this to happen," says a guilt-ridden Michael Afton.
Doctors continue... blah, blah, blah, Nico thought. An injury like that is death causing, that child was doomed from the beginning.
Nico scanned the other parts of the front page, there was a picture next to the article, which showed the robotic bear they talked about, the mouth area of the yellow bear was now covered in a pool of blood that dripped all the way down to the legs. Kinda gruesome to show on the front page, but okay.
Poor kid, though. That must've been a really painful way to die. Great, now he was in a even more bad mood. The picture of the bloody bear staring up at him wasn't exactly helping.
Nico put the paper down on top of a nearby trash can, his face now morphed into a mix of sadness and disgust. There was only so long even he could stare at the aftermath picture, and besides, he didn't have time to get distracted by other things right now, it was just a random newspaper tragedy from the 1980s, it wouldn't be important to his mission.
He walked back over to the poster lined wall and took a deep breath, wiping his now wet hands off on his jeans. He had shadow-traveled earlier today to get to Hurricane in the first place and that already took quite the toll on him. It was risky doing another jump this early after, but… he had his ambrosia squares. And a Kit Kat.
Ah, fuck it, he decided.
Nico's feet began to move into a sprint as he took off right into the wall. Shadows overtook his body and pulled him through the shadow realm to the other side of the wall. The shreiks of the damned seemed louder today than they usually were. Nico found it a little weird, but he didn't have time to pay it more mind as he got spit out on the inside of the Pizzaplex. Nico could immediately feel the exhaustion running through his body and his knees buckled.
He fell into a crouching position on the checkered flooring, his hands catching most of the fall.
“Dang, I probably should've brought that second Kit Kat,” Nico muttered to himself tiredly, but before he had time to dwell on his past mistakes he broke out in a coughing fit. That was normal after shadow-travel, especially after the war with Gaia, what wasn't normal after shadow-traveling though, was the metal taste of what he knew to be blood in his mouth.
“Vaffanculo,” he swore under his breath when he saw the dark red, more close to black, really, spot on the floor. That definitely wasn't normal. (Fuck)
The distraction of the blood on the floor and just the plain exhaustion of shadow travel kept him from noticing the faint sound of footsteps behind him and before he knew it, he was full force tackled to the ground, a knee dug hard into his back, and his cheek smashed right into the small puddle of blood on the floor.