a/n: oh, finally, reputation is on spotify and i am living for it (delicate is my fave)
also don't mind all the spanish this is just me sort of trying to practice even though we're way ahead of all this stuff irl
. . .
Nico returns home with nothing conclusive but his resolve.
He tries to envision the grave in his mind, anything unusual about it, but all he can think of is the name and the tagline: QUEEN MARIE; Death does not stop the committed.
There's nothing but his mind's eye and there's nothing to do about that, either. So Nico goes to school the next day and the next and the next, and he sits through all his classes.
Spanish is at the really preliminary lesson-stage. They learn basic phrases like ¿Cόmo estás? and ¿Quién es? Gonzalez is very clear what she expects out of the class and very clear that her tests and curriculum will be challenging. Nico doesn't really like it, but is a little heartened by the idea of a challenge. He's looking forward to showing his teacher what he can do.
Math is just basic review of algebraic concepts. Y = mx + b, y = Ax + By, point-slope form, and in general, a whole lot of slope. The Agency had taught him American school curriculum at an accelerated pace — he'd done all of this in seventh grade. It's kind of annoying, and Mr. Matthews does not help matters.
His teacher is really boring. He's kind of a genius, but he has the most monotone voice and Nico just cannot listen to anything he says for more than two minutes. And the worst part of that is the fact that the teacher gives really good advice, no matter how cranky he is.
Then he has History. Nico really hates U.S. History. It's not about the teacher or anything. It's just that damn, the subject is boring. To Mrs. Johnson's credit, though, she makes the subject seem a little fun with her blunt nature and sarcastic commentary.
Then there's Biology. Nico is pretty good at the subject. He hates the teacher, though. She's vague, and she's mean and condescending. They go over a few classroom policies and they also start a few basic biology concepts: the different cells and their parts.
At lunch he meets Will and the gang of friends. He can connect with Hazel over their mutual dislike of the same things: the Biology teacher, the U.S. History subject, the hardships of being freshmen in a group of upperclassmen. It's not as if they treat them badly, it's more of a "You're younger and inexperienced" kind of thing.
Will doesn't do that, though. He's kind of cute, actually, with his nerdy comments and laid-back demeanor most of the time; Nico's discovered from their chats that when he stumbles onto something he's passionate about, he has no chill. Especially when it comes to music and the arts.
He goes on tirades, ranting about his nasty Music teacher: "Okay, so he doesn't even teach and when he does, it's in an extremely sexist and douchey way! Like, this is school, people can at least save their bigotry for their homes! And he can't even do the scales properly...how is he a teacher when his students have to constantly correct him! Mr. Wilkins is just — ugh!"
To be fair, they are valid reasons.
Nico returns to the grave for a few days; he finds nothing. Scowling, he returns home each day to the homework he's assigned, a hindrance to the mission but a necessary evil.
The next day — it's Wednesday — Bryce Lawrence finds him at his locker again, this time before school, accompanied by a scruffy blond who seems overly full of himself.
"This is the runt," he tells the blond. The blond boy smirks.
"So he's the little idiot…" he muses. "Well, what a shame. He's not bad-looking." The blond squints at Nico. "I'm Octavian. And you are — Nico di Angelo. And you are — a dead man." He smirks, and then lunges at Nico.
Nico sidesteps, narrowly missing Octavian's punch. His locker takes the brunt of it, denting slightly. Octavian scowls, hissing, but he doesn't flap his hand or screech. Nico can't honestly say he's surprised.
There are some onlookers, but there's no one actually doing anything. How disgusting is it that everyone would look but no one would talk?
It's nothing new, he tells himself. People aren't good. He knows this already — it's just the way people are. Everyone's in it for themselves, but for some reason it just hurts today — because how can a crowd of so many people just leave him like this, even if he can take care of himself?
Nico shakes his feelings away as Bryce comes for him. He again slides away to a side, as Bryce skids on his shoes and drives himself after Nico again, as Octavian joins in the fun.
"Come on, little runt. Can't keep hiding, can you?"
Nico shrugs. "Watch me."
And then there's the bell: it makes a trilling sound, and everyone seems to pause for a moment before the crowds disperse, making their way to their respective classes.
Bryce and Octavian throw matching sneers at Nico.
Octavian gesticulates between them. "We're not done, runt."
"I didn't expect you to be."
"Saved by the bell," comments Lawrence lightly, and he walks away with his blond companion, snickering.
Nico scowls after them, but then makes himself get to Spanish class.
He worries his lower lip in thought as he drifts through the hallway: neither Bryce nor Octavian had acted in the way typical high-school bullies did. The boys were way too controlled, too restrained.
There's something off about this whole situation.
And Nico's resolve to find out what's going on is only growing.
. . .
"Quite a few of you seem not to be grasping the pronunciation rules," Gonzalez tells the class. "So we'll be going over it. Again. Until you get it." Everyone in the classroom lets out a deep, collective sigh. She's always insistent on making sure the class gets the concepts. "Repitan, por favor — the vowels each have one sound — a like aah, e like eh, i like eeh, o like oh, and u like ooh."
"The vowels each have one sound — a like ahh, e like eh, i like eeh, o like oh, and u like ooh," everyone recites dispassionately. Miss Gonzalez narrows her eyes at them, but continues.
"There are certain combining sounds as well — ch like che, ll like ehye, and rr like errre. Roll the tongue."
"There are certain combining sounds as well…" mutters the class.
"H is a silent letter and j is pronounced like heh…"
. . .
Lunch rolls around and Will's outside his Bio class, bouncing on his heels.
When Nico finds his way out of the door, Will kind-of-sort-of-completely explodes.
"What the hell? You're here a week and already you're fighting with Bryce Lawrence and Octavian? How are you not dead? And relatively unscathed at that?"
"Chill, Will." Nico scowls at his own slang. "They just tried to get me, bully the 'little freshie runt' or whatever. Doesn't matter anyway, I kept dodging them while they just kind of barrelled after me." Will frowns.
"You're not hurt, are you?"
"The only punch was taken by my poor locker."
Will still narrows his eyes at Nico. "I'll hold you to that. Wait up." He steers Nico toward the front of the boys' bathrooms. Then he looks at Nico with his ever-narrowed eyes, inspecting his pale skin for injuries.
Nico finds it a little bit cute, and that scrunched-up look Will's got going on there is pretty adorable as well.
No, he tells himself firmly. It's not cute — just attra — no. It's just normal. I'm not attracted to Will, not in the least, not at all, what do you mean, inner voice, I am not attracted to him at all —
"Nico, you alright?" asks Will, looking worriedly at him, and interrupting his train of thought.
"Hmm? Oh, fine," Nico mutters, "just thinking."
"Well, stop thinking. We need to eat."
"Yeah, yeah."
Nico makes his way with Will to the lunch table, where everyone simultaneously erupts as they walk up.
"Okay, so word on the street is you survived Octavian and Bryce this morning and actually taunted them and everything, spill it, spill it, spill it," commands Lou Ellen authoritatively.
"So basically," explains Nico, "they kind of ambushed — well, not really — but they found me at my locker and tried to beat me up but I kept dodging them and they kind of got really mad that they weren't able to beat up the 'little freshie runt.'"
"Are you alright?" asks Hazel. There's something like — is that guilt? — shining in her worried eyes.
"Yeah, I'm fine — my locker is not, however. That's what I'm really pissed about." A half-truth. He's actually pissed that he can't figure out the QUEEN MARIE mystery and then there's the oddness of Bryce and Octavian, how clearly their professionalism was masked behind their angry high-schooler façades. There is something going on in this school, and Nico needs to find out what, except there is no proof. Not even a smidgen of evidence. And that is what really pisses him off.
"No," Hazel insists. "But really. You're fine, right?" She seems as if she's trying to convince herself of something, as if she needs to make sure that Nico's alright. And why even is that? She's barely known Nico for a week.
In fact, everyone here's known Nico for a week. And they're so caring for him — somehow, that warms his heart more than he'd care to admit. This group of people barely even knows him, and yet they stand by his side even if it'd mean going across Bryce Lawrence and his compatriot Octavian.
You don't know that, whispers a niggling little sense of doubt in his head. They make you think they're concerned, but when the time comes, they'll gang up on you...you're going soft, Nico...
Shut up, Nico tells it, trying, trying to deny. But the voice has a point.
Frank thankfully adds to Hazel's point and stacks up Nico's internal argument in — his? — favor. "No, really, she has a point," he tells Nico. "You seem so cool about this whole thing, I mean, really. You're alright —"
"— Right?" Hazel cuts in.
"Yes, guys. "I'm fine. They didn't land a scratch on me. And Will can testify to that, right?" Nico looks pointedly at the aforementioned Will.
"Well, nothing that I know of," replies Will. "I mean, he could be hiding something...just kidding," he jokes. "Hopefully," he adds after a moment.
Everyone laughs at that, Nico included. It's refreshing, this moment, one of happiness and lightness even in the face of a bully's attack.
They're buttering you up...they'll feed you and fatten you and slow you and then kill you, that little voice hisses.
You don't know that, Nico tells it back.
. . .
The next day, before school right outside the hallway (which is in an inconspicuous niche, to Nico's luck), they're back. Unfortunately, they bring more people. Nico thinks one of their names is Dakota, who looks extremely dispassionate about the whole thing, and rather reluctant, too.
"Thought you got away, did you?" Bryce asks him, phrased as a question but really a statement.
Octavian sneers, but then nods, a minute thing. The group of about 5 people, excluding Bryce and Octavian, begins, then, lunging at him.
Nico tries to dodge, to sidestep them, but to no avail. There are so many. He gets around Bryce and Octavian, but there's a burly boy with a gap between his teeth and an ugly, long nose with a scowl to boot, and he gets the first punch.
Nico is pushed backward from the force, and there's someone at his back, kicking him, hurtling him forward again.
Octavian pushes the rest over and struts toward Nico, smirking.
"Let's go, little runt."
Then he descends upon Nico, punching with his fists in that calm, clear way, not getting carried away like only the trained can do, and Nico can feel the pain, feel that feeling of crap, and then it's just —
What are you doing?
Why isn't he fighting back?
Nico kicks a leg in the air, hoping to get Octavian or Bryce or someone, but instead he finds himself flailing simply, as the punches land upon him and land and land and oh, look, there's another —
He throws up a hand this time, praying to anyone that he gets a clear shot, but to nothing but a waste of energy.
There are some kicks from others thrown in the mix again, and more sharp throbbing blooms all over Nico's body, and he's probably bruised all over with a black eye.
He can't see anything but that smug, smug smirk on Octavian's face and it's driving him nuts —
But then it registers: there's something that he can see, and that's the smug smirk of Octavian's face.
With steely resolve Nico lifts his fist and throws his force behind it in the way that the Agency taught him to, and he punches.
"Get off me, you creep."
Octavian rears, scowling and hissing due to the pain. Nico hoists himself up with a hiss of his own.
"'Wanna go again?" he's slurring a little bit, belatedly realizing there's some kind of liquid sloshing in his mouth — blood.
He has gone soft. He's allowed himself to take this hit.
But there is that black eye on Octavian, and maybe that makes it a little bit better.
(Not that much, though. Nico still hates himself for that blood in his mouth.)
. . .
So Nico stumbles to his locker way later than the bell, having limped all the way and scowling when he needed to stop.
Surprisingly, Will's waiting there, standing with a worried look on his face.
"Nico!" he cries when he sees him. "I thought you took the day off, but then I thought they'd gotten to you and I didn't know where you were so I decided here was the safest bet, and that I'd just be late — and oh, you're bleeding!"
"Will — oh, it hurts —"
"We need to get you to the nurse, oh my gosh, did they do this to you?"
"I got Octavian in the eye," Nico placates him. "I decked the smug little bastard right in the face."
Will whistles appreciatively, but there's something in its baritones, an uneasiness. "Nice. But — really, you need medical attention — I mean, I kind of know about medical attention, seeing as how I want to be a surgeon, but this is nurse-grade stuff."
"Yeah, yeah, Solace. Just help me get there. And make sure you get a late pass. You took too much trouble for me."
"Anything for a friend," he replies sincerely. "And I would've paid good money to see that punch."
Anything for a friend...so they're friends now?
Nico doesn't think he minds that, actually.
. . .
They end up at the nurses' and she asks them what happened — Will tells her about Octavian and Bryce and then she just shakes her head, sadly.
"There's not much I can do about them. They have money, see. They get off scot-free, all the time...you know how many students I get in here because of them?"
Will swallows, and Nico scowls at the ground.
"What a bunch of —" Nico's about to start using some very colorful expletives, but then Will cuts him off, asking the nurse, "Is he going to be all right?"
"Yes," she answers. Then she turns to Nico. "You're just a bit bruised, and you'll have that limp for a while, but otherwise you'll be fine."
"Thank you," Nico says gratefully.
"Just doing my job," replies the nurse. "You should go home, and your good friend here needs a late pass."
Nico is mad at himself for getting into this situation in the first place, for getting so roughed up.
He tries to tell himself he got upped because of the numbers — one against seven was hardly fair — that it was beneficial for him so he looks more helpless and less spy-like and suspicious, but that doesn't make it any less shameful.
. . .
The next day Nico limps with some Agency-courtesy crutches all throughout school (he'd called Chiron for them, and he could practically see his endearing shake of the head and worry at Trouble already?), and he can see Octavian and Bryce smirking at him in the halls; they don't make a move, but Nico gestures to his left eye — Octavian's blackened one — and smiles thinly, telling him, Remember that?
The smirks turn into scowls after that, but none of them try to hurt Nico or even taunt him. The gang seems satisfied, so Nico will leave it at that.
At lunch everyone tries to ensure he's okay and Nico thinks he can sometimes spot Hazel staring guiltily at him, as if the fact that he's hurt is her fault, which is absolutely ridiculous.
Cecil even brings him some burnt lasagna with a Heal soon, this recipe is from Culinary Arts class note. It tastes terrible, but Nico loves the gesture.
So, yeah — it gets worse before it gets better, but that grave mystery isn't going to solve itself, so Nico will limp over to Queen Marie's grave and find out what's going on here — whatever it takes.