The worst thing about whatever was on the dart Nico had been shot with was that it didn't knock him out. It only paralyzed him. He tried to fight against it, but all his limbs suddenly felt like they were made out of lead.

He fought back his panic as he heard Landin radio someone to come collect him, then used all the control he had over the muscles in his face to narrow his eyes at the bastard when Landin knelt down in front of him.

"That was a nice trick you did. That little disappearing act of yours. I have to admit, I was beginning to worry that you'd actually slipped away."

If Nico could have talked he would have spat out a few curses in the bastard's face. Hades, he would have spat in his face literally.

But paralyzed, he was helpless to do anything as those two people he'd heard go into the creepy eye room came and lifted him off the ground.

You have no idea who you're messing with . . . what your messing with, Nico tried to tell them with his eyes. Even without my demigod powers I'm far from helpless.

"Take him to optics," said Landin to his lackeys, and they both draped one of Nico's arms over their shoulders and started carrying him out.

Optics? Is that where they do their freaky laser eye-surgery thing? Nico felt panic well up. A-Anubis? You there?

He didn't feel any sort of response from the god. That could only mean that Sadie and the others still required his full attention, and Nico would be damned if he took that away from them. If they required all of Anubis's attention that meant at least one of them, probably Sadie, was most likely in mortal danger. Nico wasn't. He would deal with this himself. He wasn't sure how yet, but he'd manage somehow.

Think. There's got to be a way out of this. Nico took a mental inventory of what he had at his disposal. His black blood seemed to be his best weapon now. It would burn through anything. And he had a limited amount of Egyptian magic at his disposal. Now he wished that he'd paid more attention in the classes at Brooklyn House. He'd been a fool to think he'd always be able to call on Anubis to do his spells for him.

I can get into my Duat locker on my own. I have stuff in there I can use. Firecrackers. My staff. More Stygian iron weapons, and some celestial bronze stuff too. But if I can't move, I can't use them. Or can I?

A plan began to form in Nico's mind. It was devious. A little dangerous. Okay, more than a little dangerous. But it was necessary. He couldn't come up with anything else on such short notice. He tried, but couldn't. And screaming in his own mind for Anubis to help him wasn't a real plan. It might work, but Nico would not resort to that. He would stand on his own two feet this time. Metaphorically. Paralyzed as he was, he couldn't stand at all, but that didn't matter. He didn't need to move a single muscle to make his plan work. This would be all about getting the magic right.

He wished that he could have sneered at Landin's lackeys as they drug him into the creepy eye room and strapped him into an examination chair. They were right to take precautions with a son of Hades . . . but those precautions wouldn't be enough. Not for a host of Anubis. Not by a long shot.

You fools are going to regret this.

Even with a plan, it was difficult to fight off his fear as they clamped these . . . things over his eyelids. Things that held his eyes open and made it so that he couldn't blink. Then they brought this big machine forward with these two scope looking things . . . or maybe they actually looked more like twin muzzles of some sort of gun. Nico was willing to bet his Mythomagic collection that those were where the laser would be coming out of. They moved it right up so that it was directly in front of him and adjusted the laser nozzles so that they were right in front of his eyes, and Nico felt unbridled panic start to rise up in him because if they kept the machine right there his plan wouldn't work . . . or maybe it could, but it would have some really horrible consequences for him.

Don't be a wuss, he told himself. If it's a choice between a few scars or going completely off the wall insane, I'll take the scars.

But then it turned out that his worries were for naught, and they moved the machine back, several feet away.

"You're probably confused right now, Mr. di Angelo . . . if that really is your name," said Landin. "It seems to me like you haven't been completely truthful with me."

And it seems to me that it would be fun to watch your face rot off, Nico thought at him.

"Or perhaps not. Perhaps you are ignorant as to why you have these strange abilities that you exhibited. Either way, I shall make some explanations -"

Please tell me he's not going to do a big super-villain reveal right now, Nico mentally groaned.

"- later."

Thank Hades.

"We shall have that conversation when you are capable of speaking. But now we will begin the process which will cure you of your affliction."

Affliction? How can you think being a demigod is an affliction when you yourself are a demigod, you freaking hypocrite?

"Minnie. Pietro. Please begin."

And you please stand right next to the machine, you freak, thought Nico. I want you close for this, you bastard.

His anger made it easier for him to concentrate. Usually that was not the case, but in this situation he could either feel smoldering anger or blinding panic. He chose anger. And as the lasers turned on and began burning away whatever it was in his eyes that was vital to him retaining his power, his sanity, and his dashingly dark eye color, he had to use every bit of his concentrating ability to put his plan into action.

Thirty seconds was all the time he knew he'd have to pull it off, but realistically, even taking that long would be a very bad thing. Humans lost all their melanin (whatever that was, Nico still wasn't sure) in one thirty second exposure to these lasers. The notes Nico read said that demigods took multiple sessions, but that didn't mean thirty seconds wouldn't steal away a significant amount of his melanin.

Do this! Nico ordered himself as his vision filled with light. NOW!

His Duat storage locker opened. Several feet away from him. Right above the laser surgery machine. And his firecrackers and fireworks, sparklers, smoke-bombs, and Roman-candles all came pouring out. They momentarily blocked the lasers from reaching Nico's eyes, and the lasers burned into them instead.

And ignited them.

It was an impressive explosion. Nico could tell even though he was blinded by the light. He heard the whooshing song of a booming so loud that it left all other sounds muffled, and he saw bright colors, and blazes, and sparks. And smoke. Lots and lots of smoke. He could smell burning. And best of all, the lasers were no longer cutting into his eyeballs.

YES! Booyah!

Suddenly the sprinkler system activated, dousing Nico, and the other poor fools in the optics room with water. It was something of a relief to Nico. His eyes had been starting to burn since he couldn't blink to rehydrate them.

Then something else happened that took Nico by surprise. Without warning, strength flooded into him. His demigod strength.

Nico was confused but relieved beyond all measure. His connection to his father hadn't been severed. All of his melanin (whatever the heck melanin was) had not been stolen. He felt just as strong as ever.

The red flashing lights that began pulsing through the star-bursts covering his vision helped him realize what most likely was happening. Those had to be emergency lights. The fire had probably triggered them. And at the same time, the power dampener had been shut off. Nico didn't know if it was some sort of system failure, or because power was being diverted from whatever powered their dampener thing to fuel the emergency lights, or if it was a deliberate precaution that the bastard demigods running this place had put in, so that they too would have their powers if some sort of disaster happened. Nico didn't really care why either. Finding this out was a very good thing. Now he had a way to get his powers back the very next time he needed them! Zia had made damn sure that Nico knew how to throw a halfway decent fireball on his own, without relying on Anubis to do it for him. When the time came for him to make his escape, all he'd have to do would be to throw some fire at the nearest sprinkler and set the system off. Then he could either fight his way free or find some darkness and shadow travel out.

Score!

Nico suddenly became aware of something else. A spiritual presence.

Nico! screamed a familiar voice.

Percy?

His cousin was dream-walking again. He could see Percy's ghostly outline through the flashes of the emergency lights and the blind spots still obscuring his vision. But he didn't have to be able to see clearly to know there was a horrified look on Percy's face. Because when Nico thought about it objectively, he knew that his situation had to look pretty bad.

Hey, don't worry Percy, Nico tried to reassure his cousin. I've got the situation entirely under control.

What in Hades are you talking about? You call this under control? Apparently Percy didn't believe him.

I know it looks bad, admitted Nico, but I just averted a disaster and now I've got these guys exactly where I want them.

ARE YOU COMPLETELY INSANE!?

Trust me, Percy, I've got this. You don't have to come charging here to rescue me.

Nico never got to hear Percy's reply because suddenly the emergency lights switched off, and the dampener switched back on. Damn it. Now he's definitely going to come try to save me.

"What in Hades, I mean hell, just happened?"

"I don't know!"

"The laser cutter just exploded -"

"Thank you Captain Obvious! What I want to know is why!"

"I don't know! Mechanical error, maybe? A glitch, a power surge . . ."

"Could it have been the boy?"

"I don't - no, it couldn't have been. He was under the effects of the dampener too."

"He was under them when he turned invisible and snuck out of his room too, you might remember!"

"That was clearly some illusion. A trick of the Mist. His ability to do that wouldn't necessarily have been completely shut off by our reflectors. Even certain humans can affect it and bend it to their wills. This was an explosion. A real explosion, not an illusion of one. All the Mist in the world can't blow up a high tech machine!"

No, but apparently some drugstore fireworks can, Nico thought with a smirk. And he was able to smirk now, he realized. Even having his demigod powers back for a couple seconds had helped flush the drugs from his system. Or maybe his black blood had broken the drugs down faster than it should have. He could move his fingers too now, he found. But when he tried to wiggle his toes, he couldn't tell if he was doing anything or not.

When Landin's lackeys unstrapped him from the examination chair, unclamped his eyelids, and lifted him to carry him back to his room, he let them. He was still too drugged to make a break for it he knew. As soon as the drugs wore off completely, escape would be easy. He wasn't sure how long that would take, but Nico didn't think it would be before the morning.

Unless Anubis came back and told him that Sadie and the others were okay, Nico's new plan was to escape as soon as possible, and regroup with the Kanes. He kind of wanted to know why Landin and the others had such a blue eye fetish, but compared with Sadie's safety, or Carter's, or any of his other friends at Brooklyn House, he serious didn't give a damn about why Landin and his cronies were doing what they were doing. He had enough on those guys for Camp Half-Blood to take some sort of action now. And if Camp Half-Blood wouldn't, Nico would do something on his own. If Jason's camp didn't do something first. It didn't matter who did it, as long as this place went down.