Team Percy makes a play

A few days later, the fight between Jason and Percy had spread everywhere, even to Camp Jupiter. Chiron had assured the gods that no one was seriously hurt.

Chiron had also made sure to issue out punishments to Percy and Jason. Jason easily got the better punishment. While Jason was relaxing in his air-conditioned cabin with his video games and television, Percy had stable cleaning duty AKA one of the most despised chores at camp.

Percy didn't mind these stables, at least the horses weren't carnivores this time. No, instead he had to deal with the heat, smell, and noise that was associated with horses. Then there was Blackjack constantly nagging him for sugar cubes. Percy should've known that Blackjack was not going to make his chore any easier.

After hours of work, Percy had went into his cabin and showered, planning to take a nap. He pulled his shirt down and heard the sound of someone knocking on his door. He wondered if it was Jason and if he finally came to his senses.

When Percy opened the door, he was greeted to Annabeth. She'd been coming over to his cabin more often, mainly to help him find Jason's bolt or just to hang out. Annabeth was holding a piece of paper in her hands while she had that same look that told Percy that she had a plan.

"Hi." Percy said.

"Hi." Annabeth said, "Listen, can I come in? I think I might be able to help you out with this whole bolt thing."

"Sure, come in." Percy said. He turned and walked in as Annabeth followed him.

Annabeth closed the door and turned around, "Okay, so we both know that we don't have anything to do with stealing the bolt."

"Yeah," Percy agreed as he sat down in his desk, "So what's the plan?"

"Well, I have this list of people who I think stole the bolt, or might've had something to do with it." Annabeth said as she set a piece of notebook paper down right in front of him.

Percy picked the paper and read all the names on it. The list had everyone from new campers in the Hermes cabin all the way to Nico. As much as Percy hated to admit it, he did have a few thought about Nico possibly being the one to steal the lightning bolt.

"So, why are like half of these new kids?" Percy asked.

"Well, they might not know who Jason is, you know, since he's pretty new too, so they might steal stuff from him." Annabeth said, "It's not the best theory I have but it's something."

"Right, then what's with Nico being on here?"

Annabeth bit her lip and sat on Percy's desk, "Yeah about that. I kind of pulled the Hades card when I thought that one up. I mean think about it, Nico knew you and Jason got gifts, so maybe he got jealous and decided to have you two fight, or he just might be pranking you both."

Percy highly doubted that Nico was pranking him. Nico had seen the fight and he knew what was going on because of the missing bolt. If he was pranking Jason, then he was taking things way too far. Not to mention that Percy never asked to be involved.

"So what do we do then?" Percy asked.

"Well, we should start with Nico first. He's the strongest on that list." Annabeth said, "Plus, Jason's bolt went missing at night. Nico's always been the strongest at night. What stopped him from just shadow traveling into Jason's cabin and stealing the bolt?"

"Now that you mention that, he did seem a bit too calm at the meeting too." Percy said.

"So here's what you're going to do. You're going to go sneak into Nico's cabin and look for the bolt. He has sword fighting classes tomorrow so you have a good few hours to look around." Annabeth said.

"Why don't you do it?"

"I came up with the plan, so you have to do it."

"Fine." Percy said. Of course along with possibly having to skip stable cleaning, he was also going to have to break into a cabin. Was Annabeth trying to get him in more trouble?