Nico

I came out of my shadow traveling a couple feet underwater right below where the mystery man was sitting.  I was mentally prepared for the shock of the water temperature, but not for actually being under water.  Any other time my head would go under water I would freak the fuck out.  Hopefully, this time I could keep my fears at bay so I wouldn't do something stupid like drown.  As I was trying my best to hold my breath, I looked up and saw the feet of the young man in the water above me.  Immediately, I knew that I only had one option from where I was at.  I swam toward the surface with my right arm stretched out in front of me.  Once I was close enough, I grabbed one of his ankles and pulled him into the water.  There was a splash above me before the water faded away.

The swirling mist around me slowly faded away revealing a clearing in the middle of a forest.  My clothes were dry and the air was actually cool for the first time in months.  Surprisingly, my sword was ready in my right hand with a shield in the other.  Looking across the clearing, I saw the guy that was sitting on the edge of the pool.  He was equipped with a sword and shield as well.  However, he had a perplexed look on his face almost like he was confused.

"What the fuck," he half asked, "another demigod?"

His accent was definitely British and sounded as hot as the rest of his body.  He wasn't huge by any means, but definitely well-toned.  It looked like he spent all of his free time swimming at the complex.

"Nico Solangelo, Son of Hades.  And who might you be?"

"I am Douglas, Son of Hecate.  And you were in my pool!"

Douglas came running toward me with his sword aiming right at my chest.  Somehow, I didn't think that he knew exactly who he was dealing with.  I parried his attack, but his sword still managed to nick the side of my bicep.  A trickle of blood started its way down my arm.  I turned and slashed at his chest with my sword.  I only managed to catch his shirt, splitting it half way down his chest to his waist.  Douglas took another stab at me which I easily deflected.  I didn't want to really hurt him, but he was starting to piss me off.  My next strike connected the tip of my sword with the side of his leg.  It cut him from just below his waist down the left side of his thigh.  His trunks were split open and blood stated running down his thin leg.  Douglas made the mistake of letting the wound distract him from the fight.  He reached down, putting his hand over the wound.  I took the opportunity to swing my sword broadside towards his chest.  It connected and Douglas fell landing flat on his back.  I walked up and stood over him, straddling my feet on each side of his stomach.  Just as I pointed the tip of my sword at him, the mist rushed in and swirled around us.

When the mist disappeared, I was standing in the middle of a colosseum.  There were spectators standing on the stone stands surrounding me wearing togas.  As they were cheering, I suddenly noticed my apparent lack of clothing.  There was a cloth wrapped around my mid-section and that was all that I was wearing.  Standing on the other side of the colosseum was Douglas.  He was also wearing just a loin cloth, only he had a sword in his hand.  I looked around desperately to find a weapon, but there was nothing to be found.  There was only one way that this was going to end in my favor, I had to get that sword from him.

Once again, he came charging toward me with his sword pointed at my chest.  I was able to mostly dodge his attack.  However, his sword managed to glance down my side.  It grazed my side, going down the side of my hip slicing right through the cloth wrapped around me.  The cloth that was barely covering me to begin with fell away, leaving my completely bare.  Strangely, I didn't even care that I was now fully naked standing in front of a large group of spectators.  The only thing that mattered was getting that sword out of his hands.

Douglas was now standing about ten feet from me, still holding the sword with my blood dripping off its tip.  I ran toward him and lowered my upper body before connecting.  My shoulder connected directly with stomach as his sword came down on my back.  I could feel it's blade cut me from my shoulder down to the top of my ass.  As his sword was slicing my backside open, I managed to knock Douglas over.  My shoulder was still pinned into his stomach as I struggled to get the sword out of his hand.  I pulled my knee up between his legs and connected with his junk.  He still had a death grip on the hilt of the sword even with the pain that I just inflicted.  Finally, I reached up to his face and pushed my fingers into his eyes.  It was a dirty move, but I was running out of options.  As his hand started to loosen its grip on the sword, the mist started swirling around us again.

This time I was standing in the middle of a boxing ring.  Thankfully, I was wearing a pair of shorts that went down to my knees.  As I looked around, I noticed that everyone that was watching was some sort of monster.  Any other time I would have been scared, but right now I could have given two fucks.  Douglas was standing in the opposite corner of the ring.  He was holding his hands up with the boxing gloves on them.  There was a dracnae slithering around holding up a sign with 'Round 3' written on it.

I wasn't sure if it was the heat from the lights or if it was just hot in the room.  I wasn't even moving yet and I was already sweating.  Douglas was also covered in a shiny sheen of sweat.  I hadn't really stopped to take a good look at him until now.  His frame wasn't much bigger than mine.  He definitely had a swimmer build though, with toned legs and a very well developed torso.  Plus, he was definitely pretty good looking, even though he was trying to kill me.  For some reason though, I thought that he looked kind of familiar.

I was struck out of my trance by the ringing of the bell.  Holding my gloves up in front of my face, I slowly headed toward the middle of the ring.  Douglas was bouncing around like he was an old pro as he approached me.  The closest that I've ever come to boxing was hand-to-hand combat training at camp.  Of course, I've seen enough movies and tv shows that I knew what to do.

Douglas took the first swing at my head, which I quickly dodged.  I was so proud of myself that I didn't even notice even notice his other fist coming at my stomach.  The impact of the glove with my abs caught me completely off guard.  It knocked the wind out of me and hurt like hell.  Trying not to let the pain distract me, I swung back at his side.  He deflected my glove and landed another strike on the side of my head.  This time I stumbled to the side and almost fell over.  Catching myself with my other hand, I stopped myself from falling on the mat.  Luckily, I looked up just in time to see his glove coming at my head once again.  I dropped down and rolled off to the side before jumping back up on my feet.  I swung my gloved fist with all I had and connected directly with Douglas' jaw.  Spit flew from his mouth as his face twisted to the side.

I took this as the perfect opportunity to get another swing in.  I tried for an upper cut and landed dead square with the bottom of his jaw.  The cute swimmer dude flew backwards and landed flat on his ass.  He laid there on the mat rolling his head from shoulder to shoulder.  I walked over him and dropped to my knees straddling him.  I had a knee on each side of his arms just in case he tried to swing at me.  Since my last hit didn't do the job, I pulled my arm back and drove my glove directly into the side of his head.  It took two more hits like that before he finally stopped moving.  The now all too familiar black haze came out of his nose and mouth before the mist swirled around us once again.

...

The next think I knew, I was laying on concrete with someone pushing on my chest.  I coughed up the fluid that seemed to be in my lungs and took a deep breath.  The eyes of my guardian angel appeared over mine.  I was never so happy to see my baby in my life.

"Baby, you scared the shit out of me," Will said.

Groggily, I replied, "good, you'll be ready for me then."

Will started laughing as he got up, sitting me upright with him.  He sat across from me, with his hands on my back holding me up.  I looked beside me and found Douglas laying on floor beside me.  It looked like he was just starting to come around.  His hands slowly went up from his sides and held his head.  As he was laying there with his hairless armpits exposed and his eyes closed, I really had to admit that he was pretty hot.

"What happened to me," Douglas asked?

Jason gave him the whole spiel about Chaos as Douglas laid there holding his head.

"Bloody hell," Douglas said still holding his head.  "I really have fucked up, haven't I?"

Douglas' eyes slowly started to open and he looked around at the three of us.  "Is that you Will, and Nico?"

Fuck, I remembered him now.  Skinny kid, always kept to himself at camp.  I had always thought that he was cute, but that was when Will and I were still in our honeymoon stage.  He pretty much kept to himself during the summer and only participated with the other campers when he had to.  Come to think of it, I only really saw him around the sound in our free time, unless he was in my class.  He was usually sitting on the end of the dock with his feet dangling in the water just like he was today.

"Yeah, it's us buddy.  Never expected to meet you here like this."

Douglas replied, "my family moved here for work in the spring, so I just ended up coming with them.  I got a part time job here on the maintenance staff just so I could get free access to the pool.  Just sitting with my feet in the water always seemed to calm my thoughts."

Jason asked, "so how was a skinny guy like you causing so much rioting?"

Douglas sighed, "I was using the mist to manipulate what people were seeing.  I still can't believe that I was causing so much disaster."

Will said, "it's alright, Chaos was causing you to do it.  You must be a pretty powerful demigod to have that much control over the mist."

Just as Douglas was about to respond, the whole room darkened and a mist appeared over the pool.  A woman appeared, apparently hovering over the middle of the pool on the mist.  She was wearing dark robes and had blonde hair that was pinned up in and up-do.  There was a torch with green Greek fire in each hand.  A polecat was sitting on her shoulder whispering into her ear, while a black Labrador retriever sat beside her.

"My son," Hecate said, "it is good to see you.  Sadly, this meeting must be kept extremely short.  Heroes of Olympus, the Council has been extremely pleased with your progress.  There are only two stops left for the three of you to stop Chaos' plans.  It is now time to return to the other side of the pond and protect the home of the Gods.  May the Gods protect you all on your journey.  My son, hopefully time...."

Just as she was mid-sentence, a black cloud appeared above the pool.  The swirling black smoke formed into the shape of a face.  It had to be the God Chaos.

"Infidels, if you think that you can stop me, you are mistaken.  My minions have already done enough damage to this pitiful planet.  It will only be a matter of time before I regain enough power to overthrow the Gods.  If you value your lives, you'll stop this futile quest to stop me."

And with that, both Gods disappeared.  Chaos had to be worried at this point that we were so close to our goal.  As the light returned to the room, the four of us just stood and looked at each other.

Douglas finally broke the silence.  "You guys better get going if you're going to stop that fucker."

"Are you going to be alright?"

"Yeah, I'll be fine," Douglas replied.  "I need to get the mess that I caused fixed.  You guys need to head to your next stop."

We all said our goodbyes to our friend.  I made sure to exchange phone numbers with Douglas and made him promise to call if he ever came back to the States.  Will, Jason, and I left Douglas behind and headed back up the stairs toward the roof.  Once we opened the roof door, the heat hit us like a tidal wave.  Jason didn't even hesitate pushing the button that called the ship back to us.  I was already soaked in the few minutes that it took the ship to reach us.  The mix of sweat and chlorine was almost nauseating.  Leo dropped the ship as close to the roof as he could so we wouldn't have to climb that far.  Once we were all back onboard the Argo III, we told Leo and the girls where our next stop was.  Leo punched some buttons on the controls and we were on our way back to the United States.