Disclaimer: I don't own Nico, Percy, Thalia, or Annabeth. Nor do I own the board games mentioned.
Nico and Murder on the Train
Chapter 1- The Best Game Ever
Summer was coming to a close. The heroes had managed to defeat Kronos and save the world, which was totally awesome. Now there was a new, ominous, and downright dreadful prophecy looming on the horizon, so the only natural thing to do was play board games in the Poseidon cabin.
Tomorrow most of the heroes would be packing up and leaving Camp Half Blood to go home and do boring human things like go to school, clean their rooms, and go to bed at 8:00 sharp. Nico was actually glad he wasn't going to be forced to live that life.
Normally, Nico di Angelo became upset at this time of the year because he had no mortal parent like the rest of the half-bloods. He wasn't upset when it came to maintaining a boring life of 3 meals a day and a bedtime. Thankfully, when he went to the Underworld, Hades didn't make have a curfew.
Nico refused to go to the underworld this year though. No, he had no intention of a repeating the last time he went to visit his father. The entire time his forsaken step mother had made his life a living hell (which was ironic being that he was basically living in hell). So, Nico had volunteered his cousin Percy as his new roommate.
The conversation had played out like this:
"Hey Perce, are you leaving for home, as usual, at the end of summer," Nico asked.
Percy replied, "Yes."
"Awesome, I'm coming with you. Your mom won't mind right? She seems cool enough." Nico had answered and walked away with finality because there was only one outcome to this situation.
Percy was stumped after the conversation, but that wasn't really anything unusual really. Nico was very convincing though, so he was preparing to head home to the Jackson house. He really didn't know what that meant for his future, but he could tell you he wasn't going to be forced to eat cereal or be turned into a random flower.
The last night at camp started off very boring. Mr. D rambled on about useless information and pronounced everyone's names wrong. It was like any other day at camp, and he Nico, wasn't going to stand for that type of injustice. So, he decided to be rebellious and make sure this was a night to remember.
Okay, so Nico's idea of a rebellious night was getting Percy Jackson and Thalia Grace to sneak away from campfire, without Annabeth, and go play games in the Poseidon cabin. So, Percy and Thalia refused to come on his terms, so he was forced to shadow travel them both instead. Apparently, Thalia thought he was an idiot and Percy wasn't going anywhere without Annabeth, but Nico showed them, ha-ha.
So, currently the three cousins were sitting in the middle of the floor with a stack of board games Nico had smuggled from random houses. No, he didn't steal the games; he was simply borrowing them. Borrowing the games forever, but really who was looking at the technical details?
There weren't really any board games when Nico was a child, not any good ones anyway. So, he had decided to force his cousins to liven up his current childhood, or adolescent years, whatever you call it. First game: Candyland, which Nico despised as soon as he opened the box. It had way to much colors and apparent happiness and he wasn't having any of that.
The second game: Monopoly, which was only fun the first time they played. Thalia forced them to play a second game because Percy won the first, and she refused to lose to a barnacle head. Monopoly was an endless game and Nico wanted to shoot himself to escape the monotonous torture. Pounding on the wall halted the game temporarily. Annabeth couldn't knock on the door because he had stationed two skeletal guards to ensure no one was able to walk in and interrupt his game night.
The monopoly game ended after the board mysteriously was sucked into the floor. Thalia accused Nico of doing this horrible deed, but of course, he would never commit such a heinous act. Well the last board game sat to the side: Clue.
Unlike the other two board games, Nico loved Clue. He decided it was by far the best game ever, maybe better than Mythomagic. No not better, but it was close, for sure. Nico was playing as Professor Plum because professors were smart and he needed smarts to win.
Okay Nico could with certainty say that Ms. Scarlet was the killer and that she killed the mystery person with a rope (lame). Now, he just needed to know the room, it was either the kitchen or the lounge. Hmm, the kitchen, he was hungry. Dang, ADHD, he had to stay on topic and solve the murder.
Percy announced that he was guessing his next turn. Hades no! Nico was not going to lose to Percy freaking Jackson. "I'm guessing!" Nico yelled.
Percy smirked, "Don't mess up cuz."
Well no pressure there. Which one was the right choice, this was by far the toughest decision he had ever made. So he came to the most logical conclusion: the kitchen. Ms. Scarlet was a woman, so obviously the kitchen was the murder room of choice.
"It is Ms. Scarlet, in the Kitchen, with a rope," Nico declared proudly.
Thalia opened the envelope and showed him and Percy the cards. "NOOO!" Nico shrieked, "Ms. Scarlet why have you forsaken the woman code and killed outside of the kitchen?"
Thalia and Percy looked shocked and confused. "What the heck does that mean, Nico?" Thalia fumed, "what is this 'woman code' you speak of?"
Okay so maybe sexism wasn't Nico's smartest move. However, he still declared Clue to be the best board game ever. So, it was obvious there should be a rematch. His cousins adamantly refused however, something about it being late and needing sleep, blah blah blah.
"You guys are so uncool," Nico stated matter-of-factly.
So Nico slumped off to the Hades cabin, population one. Nico wanted to play Clue again and redeem himself, but had no one to play with. The people in this camp didn't know how to have fun. So, Nico decided to be a drone to and go to sleep as well.
The clock showed 3:45 when Nico sprang awake. It had only been an hour since he had fallen asleep, but he had thought of the most diabolical plan. "Percy," he shook his cousin awake, "you, me, and Thalia need to go on a murder train and solve mysteries."
Apparently, waking a son of Poseidon from his beauty sleep wasn't a wise decision. Now Nico sat on his bed with a Kleenex up his nose to stop the blood. Maybe Thalia would be more loving at 4:00 in the morning. He stopped as soon as the opened the door, "Ha Thalia, loving, man I'm funny. She isn't a loving person at any time of day."
Nico shadow traveled to the nearest bank. He hit up the ATM for $100 and decided all of these good ideas called for a treat. Thank goodness Mcdonalds is open at this time of night, or morning, it really didn't matter. A double cheeseburger and coke later brought Nico sitting in front of Annabeth's laptop. He didn't have a laptop so Annabeth was just going to have to share.
"I have us three tickets to the New York Murder Mystery Train this Friday night!" Nico yelled across the dining pavilion to Thalia and Percy.
Author's Note: This is going to be a rather short story, probably only 3 chapters. I am writing on this while I finish the next chapters of 'I Turn to You' and "Something Isn't Right Here."
So please continue to read and review my stories and I will be updating soon!
