Takes place just after The Last Olympian, and uses the mood of the end of that book, rather than the mood that was created for the end of that book in the second series. So it doesn't exactly ignore Heroes of Olympus, but it does take place securely in the universe of the first series.

My contribution to the 2018 Fandom Trumps Hate auction, for SoVeryAverageMe, who wanted Nico, platonic cuddling, and found families. This is a little more angsty and a little less fluffy than I planned, but it does have a happy ending.

Nico doesn't notice exactly what it is at first – what seems so wrong about coming to Camp Half-Blood.

Well, there are many things that seem wrong. People are friendly, suddenly, which they didn't seem to be before. He's building his own cabin (or, supervising the building of his own cabin) with an army of skeletons. (Which, he's able to dimly reflect, his past self would have thought was the coolest thing ever.) Also – he's pretty sure his dad is proud of him. Everything is too – too good, and he doesn't trust it.

But there's something more, too, something else that feels slightly off, and it takes him awhile before he realizes it, but once he does, he can't stop noticing it: everyone seems to want to touch him.

He isn't used to it, doesn't know how to handle it, doesn't think he likes it. Sure, he has his new cabin, and privacy when he's alone (which must be rare for the others, and that makes him cringe a little bit) – but whenever he's outside doing activities, or chores, or learning new things, it's hands on his shoulder, friendly punches to the arm, slaps on his back. Some of them – usually older, usually girls – even want to ruffle his hair. All. The. Time.

He can't remember the last time he was touched this much – or even at all – and he thinks he might hate it.

Bianca used to touch him.

She was the only one who did, mostly because she was the only one who was ever close enough. She'd put a hand on his arm when talking to him (usually to hold him back from getting into some new mischief, and he shakes his head when he remembers what a kid he used to be), hug him goodnight, rub his back when he woke from a nightmare.

He feels it in his dreams sometimes, just like he hears her voice: scolding him, usually, or grabbing his arm to stop him from running away. She was so annoying, really, so overbearing; sometimes he just wanted to scream –

He always wakes up with his face wet.

Annabeth, too, is reconciling herself to some new changes.

Relationships are weird, and for all she's been wanting this one for a couple of years now, that doesn't – she is surprised to find out – make it any easier to adjust to. She thinks Percy might be feeling weird about it, too.

The weirdness is, in some ways, in the absence of weirdness. Nothing has changed about the way they interact, and that's a relief. He's the first person she wants to go to to talk about things, still her favorite sparring partner, his company preferable to most anyone else's – but then, he always was that.

No, it's the touching that's weird. There's a world of difference between wanting and doing, she finds out, and now that she actually can reach out and hold his hand, put an arm around his waist, even kiss him on the cheek when he says something particularly clever or ridiculous, it's harder than she expected to make herself do so.

She hasn't been touch-averse in a long time, got over that quickly when she first came to camp, but it's been even longer since she touched any one person with such regularity. It hasn't been since –

Since them.

Thalia and Luke were the touchiest people Annabeth had ever met when she was seven, Thalia especially. They were always ruffling her hair and calling her kiddo, squirt – sometimes Thalia would even slip up and call her sweetie.

It had never been like this at home. She hadn't grown up being touched: the most she ever got from her dad was the occasional perfunctory hug, usually in company, or he would pick her up to carry her places when she really didn't want to go. Her stepmom never touched her at all.

From that to this – it was an overwhelming change, but one that Annabeth found herself taking to remarkably.

"Nico, you have to get off the game now."

Nico scowled at his sister. "I've only been playing for like an hour, Bianca, come on!"

"Yes, and an hour is plenty. The game will still be there in the morning."

She was wearing her stern-face, the one that Nico liked to think was the way their mother would have looked at him, if she were still alive. Of course, he couldn't remember their mother at all, but it helped to think that Bianca looked like her. It made him less angry at Bianca when she was being annoying and strict.

"But I just leveled up!"

"Nico. Come on." She tugged on his arm. "You never know when that lawyer is going to come get us. Do you want your brain to rot?"

"It's not going to" –

"Nico!"

Her mom-face got even sterner, and Nico realized this wasn't a battle he was going to win – but that didn't mean he had to lose gracefully. Sighing and scowling, he signed out of the game and let her lead him back to their room, grumbling all the while.

Once they got there, though, she sat down on the bed and put her head in her hands. His irritation dissipating, Nico climbed up onto the bed next to her.

"Bianca?"

"Yeah?" She peeked at him through her fingers.

"Do you really think the lawyer is going to find Dad, like he said? Do you think we're going to live with him?"

She hesitated. "I don't know, Nico. But we have to hope, don't we?"

He didn't know, so he just leaned against her. She pulled one hand away from her face and put her arm around his shoulders, and they just sat there in silence for a long time.

"Hair like yours, and you didn't even think to bring a comb when you ran away from home?"

Annabeth gritted her teeth at a particularly hard yank. "I had more important things to worry about," she retorted. "Besides, it's easier when you don't comb it."

"Hair care is always important." Thalia was being gentler now, holding onto the ends of the hair as she worked the comb through the knots. "You've gotta do it sometime, kiddo, or else it gets like this."

Luke laughed. "We can't all be vain like you, Thalia," he said, shifting out of the way as she aimed a kick at him. "I'm with you, Annabeth."

"Then how come you didn't protect me when she came after me?" She could feel her hair growing huge as the strands separated – huge and staticky. It felt worse than usual, and she wondered if it was a Thalia thing. Most people didn't have a daughter of Zeus comb their hair, she supposed.

Luke shrugged. "Hey, if there's one thing you learn around here pretty quick, it's that Thalia's in charge. Best to just go with it."

"Da – darn right," said Thalia, and Annabeth rolled her eyes. They kept doing that – as though she hadn't heard swear words before. She was seven years old, not a toddler! But then Thalia patted her shoulder. "Done. And don't ever let it get this bad again."

"Like you'd let me," grumbled Annabeth, but she didn't slap Thalia's hand away.

He stopped touching people after Bianca's death.

He supposes he might have gone a little overboard, what with summoning Minos and trying to exchange the spirit of Daedalus for Bianca's. But at the time, he just needed to run away, to flee to darkness and shadows, to be away from anything real, from anyone who would offer him "help" that wouldn't be helpful at all. He had no patience for empty comfort and justifications and stupid promises that people wouldn't keep. He just needed to get away. One nice thing about the dead is that they don't try to get close to you – and couldn't even if they tried.

Shades, after all, don't have bodies that can touch. Not even for the son of Hades.

When Thalia died, the only person Annabeth wanted to talk to was Luke. Unfortunately, it seemed he was the only person who did not want to talk to her.

Everyone else was interested: she was the girl who had shown up with the daughter of Zeus, after all, and watched her turn into a pine tree – the most dramatic god-related event most of them had encountered. They wanted to ask her questions about their journey, or offer empty comfort, like: she's not really dead and she wouldn't want you to withdraw like this.

She tried to go to Luke, but he had turned sullen and distant: alternating between long spells of silence in which he did not even seem to recognize her and sudden bursts of explosive anger: at the world, at the gods, at Thalia – everything.

The only place Annabeth felt comfortable was next to the pine tree, putting a hand on its root as though it were really Thalia's leg, talking to it as though it could hear her.

It was there that Chiron found her one night, whispering to someone who had lost the ability to listen, and trying hard not to cry. He didn't speak, just lowered himself to the ground near her and listened until she wasn't talking to Thalia anymore, but to him. When she finally started crying, he let her hug him and bury her face in his neck, and when she was so exhausted that she couldn't keep her eyes open any longer, he lifted her onto his back and carried her back to her cabin.

It wasn't the one moment that changed everything, but it did let her start healing.

Nico's eyes fly open; gasping for air, he's already bolt upright by the time he realizes that he's awake.

The dreams aren't prophetic – not now, at least (which is a relief, because it's only been a couple of weeks since the last great catastrophe) – but that doesn't make them any better. It's not like he wants to relive all those memories: those first days in the Underworld, before he learned the places he was welcome; the dark, looming atmosphere of Mount Othrys; the moment when one of the Titans almost caught him –

He shudders, and his face drops into his hands. He's glad now, to be alone: no fellow campers to see him so weak, his hands shaking. No one to try to make it all better.

But he can't help remembering when he was younger. He's always had nightmares, since he was little, and he would always crawl out of his bed and into Bianca's. Sometimes she'd wake up and ask him about his dream and tell him it was all going to be okay, but even when she was still asleep she'd curl into him, and one of her arms would drape over his shoulders and he'd feel okay, even if just for a minute.

Now –

He doesn't know why, but suddenly the bed feels too close and confining. Even the cabin is too much right now. Maybe he'll go for a walk – a little fresh air, to shake away the thoughts.

He takes his sword with him, in case one of the harpies decides it wants a snack.

Annabeth, meanwhile, is on a walk of her own.

Well, not quite her own.

"And she wants statues of herself at every corner of the temple," she says, rolling her eyes, "just in case something happens to one of them – though I suppose it isn't too much of a long shot to think Olympus will be destroyed again" –

"What will they look like?" Percy interrupts her. "I mean – will each of the statues look different, or does she have one form that she likes?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well – Aphrodite." It's dark, so she can't quite tell, but she thinks he might be blushing. "She – you know, she shifts form depending on who's looking at her. Depending on what you think is beautiful." He glances at her, and then quickly away, his face almost shy.

She can't stop the delighted smile from spreading over her face. "Percy Jackson," she teases him. "Is there something you wanted to tell me?"

"I didn't start out wanting to," he grumbles. "It just kind of happened."

"So when you saw Aphrodite . . ."

"You," he says. "She looked like you."

She doesn't always know the right time to do things like this, but now is definitely a moment. Still grinning like a fool, she takes both of his hands into hers and leans forward to kiss him.

They're still working on this kissing thing, but they've definitely gotten better at it than they used to be. After a moment, they separate, and the smile on his face is pretty much exactly the way she imagines hers looks.

"And we're at your cabin," she says, when she's gotten her bearings again. She squeezes his hands. "See you in the morning?"

"Absolutely." He leans in to give her one last peck, and it's just as sweet and soft as the last. "Good night."

"Good night, Seaweed Brain."

She turns away from his cabin once he disappears inside, still smiling helplessly. Maybe another round of the cabins before she goes back to her own, so she can calm down before her siblings see her and tease.

But she's only made it a few steps when a noise behind her makes her start and tense. She whirls, whips out her knife – and comes face to face with an equally-startled Nico di Angelo, hand on his sword.

He wasn't expecting to see other campers out this late. Sure, in light of what happened a few weeks ago, most rules have been relaxed at least a little bit – but habits are habits, and people don't usually sneak out. Besides, the harpies are still active, if less so.

Annabeth looks as startled as he is at first, but she calms down pretty quickly. "Nico," she says. "I – wasn't expecting to see you here."

"I wasn't expecting you, either."

Nico doesn't know how to feel about Annabeth, honestly. He doesn't dislike her, for sure. The first thing he ever saw her do was jump on the back of a manticore in an attempt to save his and his sister's life, and a sight like that doesn't really leave a person. But she's not the easiest person to get to know – well, he supposes he isn't either – and there are other things. Things he doesn't know if he's ready to admit to even himself just yet, that make it hard to try to open up to her.

But, looking back, he realizes that he's almost more disposed to think well of her because she has not, unlike most other campers here, attempted to force kindness on him. Maybe she's just been busy – that's probably it, the cynical side of him says – with her new designing project, with her new boyfriend – don't think about that – but at the same time –

"Nighttime is the best for a walk," she says. "So much less likelihood of being disturbed – except maybe by harpies."

- it seems like she might kind of understand.

"Yeah," is all he says.

"Mind if I walk with you?"

Yes, is what he wants to say. He doesn't want company. He hasn't wanted company in about two years, but people keep forcing it on him anyway. But then abruptly his nightmare flashes back into his mind, his memory of when Bianca used to comfort him, and suddenly – it doesn't seem like the worst thing. Not being alone.

"Sure," he responds at last. "I wasn't going anywhere in particular."

She shrugs. "Neither was I. I just didn't want to go back to my cabin just yet." She glances at him sideways. "I love my siblings, but it gets tiring sometimes, living in such a crowded cabin."

"Yeah," he says. "I can imagine."

She falls silent for a long time, and it's nice, the quiet, the darkness of the night. Not so bad to have a companion, not really.

"When I first came to camp, I was so overwhelmed," she says after a long while. "All these people, so little space, so much structure. It's weird, especially at first."

"But you stayed." He's not stupid; he knows they're talking about him. But at least she's doing it subtly.

"Yeah," she says softly. "Camp is my home. The best home I've ever had."

He doesn't know what to say to that, but she says it for him, eventually. "I don't want to push you, but – it can be a home for you, too, Nico. If you let it. We'd love to have you."

He looks up at her, not sure what to say, not sure what to feel. Not sure if he's ready for that, not now, not yet.

"Think about it," she says, and with a tentativeness that he doesn't usually see from her, she reaches out and puts a hand on his shoulder.

He lets her.