Nico was just chilling alone in the Hades cabin at Camp Half-blood, the same way he had been doing whenever he could catch a break from Jason and Piper (and, up until a few days ago, Leo). The past three months following the Giant War had been slightly overwhelming for Nico. Reyna, Coach Hedge, and he somehow had managed to arrive at Half-blood hill just in time to stop an imminent attack from the Roman's, much to Octavian's chagrin. The Roman augur had still tried to rally the troops for an attack, but the sight of the Praetor and a giant gold and ivory statue calmed both sides enough to end the tension. The son of Hades remembered leaning heavily on Reyna and hearing the clatter of swords, shields, spears, bows, and arrows drop to the ground and a loud cheer rising from both sides at the sight of the three of them. Even the memory of hearing the cheers surprised Nico, even after three months he wasn't used to people actually being happy to see him. They were now though, people stopped flinching when he walked into a room and actually started to smile at him. People even started to walk up and talk to him, though it was only a few of the very brave campers, and after a time some of the campers started to realize that Nico was actually a very sweet person once they took the time to get to know him (though that number was still very small). The camp still found him intimidating, but the subtle changes showed that there was no animosity towards him. It made it incredibly easy for Jason to convince him to stay at camp (that and the fact that two heroes who shall remain unnamed moved to Camp Jupiter almost immediately).

A knock on his cabin door brought him out of his reverie. It's probably Jason, I told him to go enjoy his date, Nico thought. Even if the campers weren't afraid of him anymore, only Jason, Hazel, Piper, and sometimes Leo were brave enough to approach the door of the obsidian stone cabin. "Jason, I told you I had stuff to do, go spend time with Piper. If it is absolutely necessary, you can come back late—" He stopped abruptly, the whole time he had been speaking, he had also been walking towards that door and had swung it open. "…Er" he finished weakly. It definitely wasn't Jason outside. "Percy." For a second, he just stands there, one hand still on the door handle, one hanging at his side.

"Uh, hi," Percy shuffled his feet, " I'm just stopping by to say hi…" he paused slightly and looked Nico over, "You look surprised, I take it Jason didn't tell you that I'm moving back to New York?"

Nico, still stuck in place, squeezed the door knob and stared blankly. "No, he didn't." He'd have a word with Jason later.

Percy rubbed the back of his neck with an amused smile, "So… Can I come in?" he asked.

That snapped Nico's attention and he stepped back with the door and gestured into his cabin with his free arm so Percy could walk right in front of him. Nico was already starting to feel awkward.

"You listen to The Downtown Fiction?" Nico had forgotten that his music was still playing on his Super-Special-Demigod laptop (Leo had named it, it was similar to Daedalus' laptop that Annabeth had, with a few add-ons from Leo) at a low volume on the desk next to his bed.

"Yeah, Thalia downloaded a bunch of these rock bands on my laptop when she came to visit last week. It was right before Leo left, actually." Coincidentally, Leo was the one who gave Nico the laptop after making it from scratch, along with the ones he gave to Jason and Piper. "She said something about making sure that I knew what good modern music, I kind of like them."

Percy nodded, slipping his hands into his pockets. It was a little unusual to be standing in the Hades cabin; he had never been in there before. He let his eyes wonder around and take in the room. For how foreboding the exterior was designed to be, the interior was quite cozy. The walls were paneled in a dark wood, and a large red and black striped rug was spread on the floor. It almost looked like a regular cabin one would find in the mountains or anywhere else one might build a cabin, though it was a bit darker from heavy curtains hanging in front of the windows and it was a little weird to see so many jewels sitting around (probably from Hazel). His wandering eyes finally landed on the resident of the cabin who was leaning against a dresser and fiddling in a drawer. Percy inspected Nico closely and was slightly surprised by how much healthier Nico looked after only three months, "Did you get taller?" Percy stepped closer and realized that the height difference him and Nico used to have was roughly cut in half, and now the top of the younger boy's head reached the bottom of his chin.

Nico felt really uncomfortable with Percy there, and dammit he really shouldn't because it was his own cabin, but the awkwardness only grew at the older boy's closeness. He cleared his throat, "Yeah, I hit a growth spurt last month."

It was kind of impressive how well Nico was growing up, at least to Percy. He got taller, he was less scrawny and more lean (you could tell in the thin dark purple and gray striped sweater that he was wearing, along with the black skinny jeans and converse. Some things will never change.), and his skin was still pale, but it wasn't translucent anymore and looked more like polished ivory. Percy quickly realized he was staring. "Oh cool, well, I just wanted to come and say hi to you and check in with Chiron before I headed over to my mom's place. It was nice to see that you're doing well, hopefully we can hang out soon, maybe before Christmas?"

Nico just shrugged and Percy turned to walk towards the door. "Say hi to your mom from me," Nico called with a small smile as Percy turned to wave as he walked out the door. Nico sank back into his bed in relief after the door clicked shut. He would be giving Jason a stern talking to tomorrow morning. Only twenty minutes of breathing the same air as Percy Jackson and his mind was already a jumbled mess.