Nico sat against a headstone in a graveyard in Brooklyn. Why Brooklyn? Nico didn't really know. He had been sitting in this same position staring at his mother's grave and then he must have fallen asleep and shadow-traveled that way because the next thing he knew he was in Brooklyn. A guy who looked like an older version of him knelt beside him.

"Someone you knew?" the stranger asked. Nico looked carefully at the headstone. It had the names of everyone who had died in the battle of the labyrinth and the battle of Manhattan on it.

"Most of them," Nico said. The stranger took a closer look at the headstone.

"That's a lot of names," he said horrified.

"War's a waist. They're not actually buried there though, they were cremated," Nico said.

"War?" the stranger asked. That's when Nico woke up enough to notice the stranger's aura.

"How do you have the same aura as me?" he asked. The guy looked confused for a moment and then his eyes widened, apparently having just sensed Nico's aura.

"But that would mean you're a god-ling!" the stranger said.

"Demigod, but how did you know?" Nico asked.

"I'm the god Anubis, god of funerals and such," the stranger said.

"I'm Nico Di Angelo, son of Hades god of the underworld. I'm often referred to as the King of the Ghosts and the Ambassador to Pluto," Nico introduced himself in turn.

"I think we're from different pantheons because my boss is the god of the underworld and his name is Osiris," Anubis said.

"That would make you...Egyptian, yes?" Nico said.

"Yes, and what pantheon are you from?" Anubis asked.

"My dad is from the Greek pantheon, but as the Ambassador from Pluto I also represent the underworld to the Romans," Nico said, "Actually I was just there a couple of hours ago. I went to a graveyard in California to visit my mother's grave, fell asleep and woke up here."

"Does that happen to you often?" Anubis asked.

"What, waking up on the other side of the country from where I fall asleep? No, not often, but it isn't unheard of. I can travel using shadows and occasionally I do so in my sleep. It's not usually this targeted though, I usually end up in the middle of the street in some city in China," Nico said gesturing at the gravestone in front of them.

"Well I think we probably shouldn't tell our respective pantheons about each other," Anubis said.

"You're probably right, but I can't say I like it. I'm already keeping the Greeks and the Romans secret from each other," Nico said grudgingly.