"That is huge," Nico said. He stared up at the giant mansion in front of him. Jason stood next to him and stared as well. The two had been dropped off a few blocks away, but they could have been dropped off miles away. It was impossible to miss the mansion. The two of them were trying to find a way in, but there were so many options that there really were none at all.
A huge fence surrounded the entire complex. The barrier was about ten feet tall and made of steel bars. The bars looked to be electrified. There was no way they could climb the fence, and flying over it wasn't an option. Guards patrolled the perimeter closely.
Nico wanted to sneak in with the servers, but now, he didn't see any. He also didn't think that they could just walk up to the gate and claim to be part of the wait staff, so they were stuck outside. Jason spoke, "Flying over the fence and then to the roof isn't an option, is it?"
"Not with this many guards," Nico answered. He looked up and squinted at the roof. Jason did as well. "Are there any guards up there?"
"I doubt it," Jason said. He crossed his arms. "If there are, they're probably asleep. Shadow travel?"
"Onto the roof?" Nico asked. Jason nodded. "I don't know."
"You can do it, Nico. I trust you," Jason said. Nico sighed and nodded. He led Jason towards the shadows and focused on the building across from them. Nico closed his eyes and felt a tug in his gut. The world around him spun, and Nico felt his feet hit solid ground. Jason caught him.
"I'm okay," Nico said after a few moments. Jason handed him some nectar. Nico took it and then scanned the roof. He was surprised to see the roof was made of glass. Nico looked through the glass, and below him, he saw people milling around. They all looked like ants.
Jason looked down as well. There was at least a hundred people inside. Nico tried to focus on specific people, but he couldn't make anyone out. Jason spoke, "I hope Piper is okay."
"She'll be fine. Reyna will take care of her," Nico assured. Jason frowned and crossed his arms. "You don't trust her?"
"I do trust her, but I also think she's short sighted and rash sometimes. I don't want Reyna's actions to get Piper hurt," Jason said. He sighed and focused back on the glass.
"She'll be fine," Nico declared. "We need to focus on our job."
"Yeah," Jason agreed. Nico looked around the roof again. There was just the glass roof and nothing else on it. No helicopter pads or stairs leading downwards were in sight. Jason started to walk, and Nico followed. There came a point where the glass roof turned to concrete, and Nico guessed that this part was where the vault was.
"Any guesses on how to get inside?" Nico asked. Jason frowned and started to pace around. Nico was just as lost as him. Their planning stages involved outside pictures of the mansion, but no one had a picture of the inside or any real blueprints. The only blueprints they had were rough drafts and guesses.
"Let's look around," Jason suggested. Nico nodded and started to walk. The roof looked more like a parking lot than a roof. It was absolutely gigantic. A frown came to his face as he looked around. He continued to walk, but nothing on the roof changed. It was just concrete.
An angry sigh left Nico. Their only two jobs were to get inside and steal the wings, but they couldn't even manage the first part. Nico looked up at the sky and stepped down. His foot slipped on something, and he fell forward. Nico threw his arms out in front of him to keep his face from busting on concrete.
As he slammed into the roof, he heard a small crack. It wasn't from him though. Nico frowned as he realized that the concrete wasn't actually concrete. He heard running a moment later. Jason made it to his side and spoke, "What happened? Are you hurt?"
"I'm fine. I just tripped," Nico said. He stood and brushed himself off. "This is glass too. They painted it to look like concrete."
Jason knelt down and felt the roof. He spoke, "We can break into a part of it and see where we are."
"Agreed," Nico said. Jason took his sword and used the handle to bash into the glass. It only took a few strikes for the glass to crack, and he slammed his sword into it. Suddenly, the cracks shattered, and the ceiling fell out from underneath them.
As Nico fell towards the ground, he debated what he should do with his last moments. Curse Jason? Yell at him? Just scream in general? Before Nico could really decide on what those perfect words would be, he felt like something slam into him, even though he was still falling. A gasp escaped him as he slowed.
The air seemed to slow his fall, but it was still a rough landing. He hit the ground face first and broke his nose. A groan escaped him as blood rushed from the wound. Nico groaned as he slowly rolled onto his back and put both hands to his face. When he lowered his hands, he looked around their landing zone.
Nico's eyes widened as he realized they had fallen into a room full of clothes. There were racks all around the room, and numerous hangers that hung from rods on the ceiling and the wall. Nico blinked and sat up. Every type of clothing was in the room, some things he had never seen before. There was an entire wall dedicated to large hats he had seen in cowboy movies. A few racks had one piece suits that were all polka dotted but with different colors.
"One family does not need this much money," Jason muttered. He helped Nico stand. "You good?"
"I think." Nico said. He looked at the floor. Immaculately polished tile covered the floor underneath his feet. Nico could see the blood and his broken nose in the reflection. Nico looked at all of the clothes. Jason led Nico towards a door, and they stepped out into a long hallway.
Nico looked at both sides of the hallway, but it seemed endless. He saw doors every so often, but there was literally no end to the long corridor. There were paintings covering the walls, along with display cases that seemed to hold marble busts.
"This is crazy," Nico began. "How are we even going to find where the vault would be?"
"We start walking and looking," Jason answered. Nico sighed, and they took off down the hallway. They stopped at each door and found a large variety of different rooms. One was a gaming room that was full of working arcade machines that reminded Nico of the lotus casino. Another was a room full of mannequins. They left that one pretty quickly. Another room was just full of scarves. Literal scarves of many colors and materials.
They made it to a door that had a large warning label on it. The door itself was completely metal. Nico grabbed the handle but winced as it was freezing cold. He opened the door, and inside, he found a ton of different ice sculptures. Most of the ice sculptures seemed to be of some woman, but Nico had no clue who she was. A few were of the woman and a man, and a couple others were with three others who looked like kids.
"This is weird," Jason said. Nico nodded his agreement and closed the door. Down the hall, they heard another door open. The two exchanged looks and threw themselves backwards into another room. Jason gently closed the door, keeping it open enough to peek out. Nico turned to look at the room.
"I think this is weirder," Nico muttered. He looked at the toilets on each side of the wall. Some were gold plated, one looked to be encrusted in diamonds, another was made of wood, some looked ancient, and all of it was weird. "What do you think, Jason?"
"Wait," Jason whispered. Nico turned and saw Jason motioning for him to come near. Nico slowly did. He peeked out through the crack in the door and stared. Two people were walking down the hallway. Well, one man was walking, and he was practically dragging Piper with him.
The man wore a suit and tie, and he had a predatory smile on his face. He pushed his glasses up, almost hiding his green eyes. It looked like his nose had been broken, but there was a dreamy look on his face: charmspeak.
"You're showing me to the vault, right?" Piper asked.
"I'm showing you to the vault," the man confirmed. His voice had no emotion to it. He led Piper past their room. Jason grabbed Nico's arm and pulled him out into the hallway. Nico stumbled behind. Piper glanced back at them, but she relaxed upon seeing it was only them.
The two of them slowly followed behind Piper and the man. They made their way down the large hallway, and it wasn't until minutes later that they stopped at a steel door. The man typed a code into a panel near the door, and the door popped open.
"Your family has a lot of security. Is there a way to turn it off?" Piper asked. The man turned to look at her, and he nodded. "Can you show me how?"
"Only my parents know," the man answered. Piper frowned but nodded. She took a step backwards.
"Alright, Trevor, thank you for the help. One more thing:" Piper said. Trevor looked at her, and Piper punched him hard in the face. He collapsed to the ground in a heap. "That was for Reyna."
Piper looked at them and smiled. She stepped into the vault. Jason quickly followed behind, and Nico took up the rear. Upon stepping into the vault, Nico's breath left him. All he could do was stare in wonder. The room wasn't as large as he suspected, but it was filled to the brim with all kinds of odd things.
The wall on their left had numerous sets of armor lined against it. Display cases a few feet from that wall had tons of different weapons inside. It didn't look like it was limited to Greek or Roman weapons either. Nico saw a samurai sword in one display case, and the case next to that had a large battle axe. Something told Nico that none of these were replicas.
"This is one of the vault rooms they have," Piper explained. "Trevor said the wings should be in here."
"What kind of traps are there? Hylla mentioned laser wires and silent alarms," Jason said. Piper looked at them and shrugged. Nico scanned the room again. He didn't see any red lasers or tripwires or anything like that. Each display case was made of glass and probably had an alarm attached to them.
"Let's find the wings and go from there," Nico stated. He turned and started to walk. Jason and Piper followed his example. The three of them split off and looked at each of the display cases. Nico didn't see anything that looked like wings. He knew that sometimes the Mist changed it to be different, but he didn't know what it would change the wings to be.
Nico continued to walk around. He found a couple of ancient tablets that had hieroglyphics on it. There were a few vases as well as cups. Nico felt like he was on a tour in a museum and not on some grand heist. He sighed and looked up. His eyes widened as he saw what was hanging above them.
A couple of those things were brooms, and he wasn't quite sure what those were supposed to represent. There were a few bicycles as well, but none of that was as important as the three different wings that hung up above.
One of the wings looked like an enlarged butterfly wing. It was orange with a large black dot in the middle. One of the other wings was pure white. The last pair of wings was patterned like a rainbow, but it had darker colors on it.
"I think I found them," Nico called out. He pointed up. Jason and Piper joined his side.
"Now, all we have to do is figure out how to get them," Jason said. "I can try to use the air to get up there."
"Just be careful," Piper warned. Jason nodded. Before he could even try, alarms sounded throughout the vault. Nico turned to check their entrance. He saw a large grate drop down on the door that they had entered from.
"I didn't do it." Nico said. He looked at his friends.
"Neither did I," Jason said quickly. He gave Nico a look. Nico returned the look and crossed his arms.
"I've been standing here. How could I have done anything?" Nico demanded. Jason opened his mouth, but Nico glared. "Don't. Just get the wings down. I'll shadow travel us out of here."
"I don't want to leave Reyna here," Piper began. "I already left her unconscious."
"Let's get the wings out of here and then worry about them," Jason recommended. "Reyna can defend herself. If we don't get the wings out of here, she will kick all of our asses."
"You're right," Piper said. "I just feel guilty."
"Trust me. We are not going to leave Reyna here," Nico said. "And, I'm sure Hylla won't as well. Let's just get the wings and get out of here."
Nico looked up and focused on the wings. He listened to the alarms that blared throughout the large building. Something told him that one of the pirates had set those alarms off, and he was worried to find out what they had done. Nico sighed and tried to focus his thoughts. First, they would get the wings. Then, they would get to safety. After that, the three of them would go back for the pirates.