Annabeth had been sitting at the Athena table in the dinning pavilion, working on a blueprint sketch. Due to the Greek-Roman summer exchange program, more of her portable cabins were required to house the prospective campers. And some existing cabins had requested customized upgrades. Her brow was furrowed, and her lips pressed together in concentration. The expression was affectionately dubbed, her I’m-planning-something look by Percy.

The blonde had been so absorbed in her work, she hadn’t noticed Nico until he had spoken. Annabeth looked up from the blueprints, gray eyes regarded him quizzically. She had assumed that he was referring to her project, until she followed his line of sight. He was looking at her sword, that was attached to her side. The demigod was mildly surprised by his question, surely he had seen her sword at some point? But she couldn’t blame him if he hadn’t noticed, Nico had seemed distracted in his own thoughts, before leaving on his mission with Reyna, and coach Hedge. 

“Sort of? I’ve had it since Tartarus. It was created for me by the giant, Damasen.  He made it from the bone of the Maeonian drakon,’ she explained. The blonde tried to swallow the lump that had formed in her throat at the mention of the giant.

Nico concealed his flinch at the mention of Tartarus. He had wished that the horrors would fade in time, that his mind would shield him and blur his memory if only a little bit. His wishes went unanswered, the nightmares still plaguing him from time to time, every second he had spent in the depths one he could be dragged through at the mention of it. 

Her eyes shot up, glaring at him as he laughed. “Not funny,” she chided, shaking her head. “You tell any of my siblings that I was wearing this and you’ll wake up with a drakon head in your cabin, Godfather-style,” she threatened, half-joking— but also half-completely-serious.

“Please tell me you’re planning on wearing a sweater vest, pleeeeeeaaaaaase,” she exaggerated the plea, smiling then. “Do I get to be in your class? I’m going to be so annoying. Man, you know, this is going to be a little fun. It’s kind of like playing shitty dress up,” she said, pulling at her tie again, “And make-believe. Public high school was kind of fun, I wonder what these private school preps get up to when mommy and daddy aren’t around.”

Nico began to walk towards the school, as Veronica expounded relentlessly on plans of making going back to school even more of a daunting task. "No sweater vests-- well maybe sweater vest if it’s in the code of conduct. And don’t make me assign extra homework.” He groaned and tried to keep away the memories of the last time he was at a boarding school in Maine. He glanced at Veronica and he relaxed a little bit more. At least he wasn’t alone. 

“Seems like you’re gonna find out. You’ll make friends here pretty easily.”

“You is kind, you is smart, you is important,” they said with a smile, accent exaggeratedly thick, dripping like molasses off a spoon. Rowan knew everyone in camp, there was never a face or a name they couldn’t place. And they held firmly in their belief that the camp– and the strange half-mortal, half-godly realm they inhabited– operated smoothly and perfectly for the most part, because everyone played a part and was important in some way, whether big or small. To them, Nico was a big part of that. “Trust me,” they said simply, nodding their head. “Oh, yeah of course. I need to fix my baby first,” Rowan replies with a chuckle.

“Thanks, Rowan.” Their accent was bemusing but their words felt good to hear and he accompanied them all the way to the Hephaestus kids’ forges. He began to take the armor off piece by piece, wincing every now and again. Beneath he wore a simple shirt, though it was ripped and stained with blood and ichor. He scrunched his nose up. “Sorry. I can wash the armor off...”

Nico noticed the blonde at a distance, but it was too late to change his trajectory without making it obvious so he continued on his path. A path that lead straight to Annabeth Chase. He tried to compose himself, so much had changed but his reaction to seeing any of them was a hard habit to break. Then he noticed the sword at her side and curiosity won over his natural aversion to all things awkward. “Is that... new?”

She smiled and gave him a cheeky wink, jingling her keys again and the bike silently evaporated into a thick black smoke before appearing as the small charm on her chain again. She stowed them back in her pocket, out of sight to anyone who might question it. “It gets the job done,” she replied with a shrug. “Gift from dear old dad on my seventeenth,” she added, a ghost of a tiny frown on her lips that disappeared in a second.

“They decided on student— said something about my ‘youthful exuberance’ and my ‘proclivity for catching gossip’,” she explained. She shrugged off her backpack, setting in in the grass as she took off her jacket, revealing the button-down shirt and tie underneath. She yanked at it a little impatiently, feeling like it was suffocating her. “Ugh, this thing is going to cut off my air supply,” she whined. “Why couldn’t I have been like a super hot, super cool guidance counselor or something?”

“Yeah, I can see that.” He nodded, studying the blonde closely. There was a youthful quality about her. He didn’t think about what that meant about him. As she revealed her new school uniform, Nico held back a laugh.

“I guess they thought I’d have more on me. They took my whole wallet…” she pressed the ice pack against her nose and hissed, pulling up her shirt some. “Is it bad?” She felt like hell. She was going to sleep for days after this.

“Hmm, interesting…” she mused. “Remind me to pester you with questions about your powers later, I’m fascinated.”

She followed his gaze to the grounds they were standing just on the edge of. A low whistled passed her lips, eyes going a little wide. “Well damn,” she said. “These people got money, I guess. My mom used to threaten to send me to a school like this, and I always thought it would be a terrible thing, but now I’m kinda wishing she had,” Veronica thought aloud. She was generally a talkative person, no matter who she was around. “Bike sounds good to me, I take it with me everywhere I go,” she told him, fishing her keys from her pocket and showing him the little motorcycle-shaped charm on them. A flick of her wrist and her bike would appear before them, ready for any destination. “You think we’ll blend in?” she asked, nodding towards the pristine buildings.

Nico recalled his own experience with boarding school and swiftly blocked it off. No time for a walk down that path. “Wow...” Nico gratefully clung to the distraction of Veronica’s bike appearing seemingly out of nowhere, eyes widening, “that is really convenient.” He didn’t mind the daughter of Ares’ talkative nature, he wasn’t good at keeping up a conversation himself but listening had always been something he’d excelled at-- that and glowering. 

“Well, nothing interesting could ever happen without you important kids around,” they said with a small shrug and a laugh, knocking their knuckles lightly against the chest plate of Nico’s armor. “Knock on bronze, amiright?”

“You should see an Apollo kid about that soreness,” they added, giving a glance over their shoulder as he followed behind. “A little nectar or something should set you right in a jiffy,” they stated, matter-of-factly, a little Southern drawl peppering their voice on the last word. “Man, I sound like my mom.”

A huff of a laugh heaved its way out of his chest right as they knocked against the armor, the bruise that had been forming from a hefty kick during the manticore encounter hidden beneath the plate. “Do I count?” he wheezed, “I mean...as important? Naw, nevermind.” He didn’t feel that way, but perhaps it was different. He thought of Percy and Annabeth and the way people seemed to gravitate towards them and then of himself. He let the topic drop, though, rubbing the space on his chest where he was bruised. Another grin at their word choice. “A jiffy.” He echoed, shaking his head. “I’ll take care of that after the armor. Priorities n’all.”

“I guess your right.” She sat on the edge of the bed, tilting her head back to lessen the bleeding. “Nico don’t. Revenge isn’t needed. They got twenty bucks off me- fuck-” she swore as she shifted her weight to her left side, where they’d held the knife against her hip and she sprained her ankle on the run away. “I sprained my ankle and they might have cut my hip.”

“Maybe blue or red, I dunno I can get some swatches and we can see. We should definitely get an accent wall maybe hang a picture or two.” Drew began walking around the area pointing as she spoke “Throws thick ones since winter is pretty cold and some light ones for summer, pillows and yeah no plants I have a whatever thumb it is that makes them die.” She said with a little grin “Do you like your room? Big enough?”

“People I knew. Some jack asses from that record store I like. They knew I’d be walking alone. Mother fuckers.” she groaned as he touched her nose, noticing just how much blood was there. She just hoped it wasn’t broken. “I couldn’t get to the shadows before they grabbed me. I’m sorry. I really tried to get away.”

“You don’t have to apologize to me. They shouldn’t have attacked you.” Once they were in the restroom he gently brought her hand up to grab the handkerchief in his stead while he fished around for a first aid kit in his cabinets. He was pretty certain he had one. Unfortunately they weren’t at camp or the kids of apollo would make quick work of healing Morgan up. “I’ll find them.” He said and it was every bit a threat and promise. He found the first aid kit and came back to her. “Let me see. Is there any other injuries?”

       “   This   is    my    first     time    skipping    and   I    feel    horrible    about   it.   ”      @diangelo-nico​

Veronica’s brow furrowed but she held on tight to him nonetheless. She didn’t know what this was about to feel like, but she could imagine it was another new sensation to log away as part of her weird life as a demigod. As shadow consumed them more, her vision disappeared and she felt like she was being pulled apart and mashed back together, her joints moving and popping– head feeling like she was on a merry-go-round. 

“Woah,” she muttered as they seemingly re-materialized, or at least that’s what it felt like to her. Her knees wobbled, like they weren’t used to holding up the weight of her body. “That is not a sensation that I want to get used to. No offense, but next time we should just take my bike,” she said, looking over at him. “I’m okay. You good? You look a little pale— well, paler.”

“Yeah, I just...won’t be able to do that again for awhile.”

“Oh, and he bites!” they exclaimed, giving a laugh then. They took a look at the armor as they helped him shrugs it off, clicking their tongue a little. It was going to be a small project to fix it, but Rowan looked forward to giving Nico’s armor a little spruce and improvement. “Oh, nothing major,” they said with a shrug. Luckily with their skill set, they were not to be missed from camp, so quests were a rarity for Rowan and their siblings. “Bonfires, mess hall duty, training. One could almost imagine we were a normal summer camp were it not for that last part.

“Well that’s a relief.” He didn’t hesitate to follow them, wincing a little as his muscles protested against any further movement. He had survived more than a walk across the camp, he was certain he could handle this. 

“I’m okay. I’m okay.” she was more reasoning to herself than anything else. She wiped some of the blood off from under her nose. “I got jumped on the way home. They stole my wallet.”