Disclaimer: I do not own the Percy Jackson series, all rights belong to Rick Riordan

Chapter 2 – Nico's Suspicion

2 Months Later

3rd Person POV

It had now been 3 months since Percy had disappeared to go on his quest for Athena's permission to marry Annabeth and 2 months since Aiden had been claimed by Poseidon and come to camp half-blood. In these two months, he had gained a following of campers who believed that he was some sort of all-powerful demigod because of the countless lies that they were being told, most of these campers were from the Ares cabin who thought that Aiden was better than Percy already. They appear to quickly forget everything what Percy had done for the camp and Olympus and how it was much more difficult and dangerous than anything Aiden has said that he had done.

For the rest of the campers, it was becoming very tiring listening to Aiden's bragging about how he was the best demigod to have ever lived. All of them knew that this statement was wrong and were waiting for Percy to come back and put him in his place, but they also knew that Percy would never do any such thing. That's what they all liked about him, even though he was much more powerful than any of them, he was incredibly humble and never went out of his way to make others feel bad.

Two campers that were arguably the most frustrated about the constant bragging were Thalia and Nico. They knew that Aiden would never be as powerful and loved as Percy, but they couldn't get that into his head. Each time that they would say this to him when they heard him bragging, he would only get angry and swear that he would challenge and beat Percy when that coward showed his face.

No one knew the details about Percy's quest except for Athena (obviously), Chiron and both of them (none of them know that Zeus found out) because he had asked them to make sure that Annabeth was alright when he couldn't. Little did he know that this request was difficult for Thalia, she had formed a crush on the hero during the war and the thought of him being married to someone else hurt, even if it was Annabeth. It was because of this that she didn't notice how friendly Annabeth had become with Aiden, she spent nearly every bit of time that she could with the guy and would always be laughing and touching his arm or hugging him. The only person to notice this and find it suspicious was Nico but he didn't say anything to anyone because everyone knew Annabeth and thought that she would never cheat on Percy, he instead resorted to mentioning Percy whenever he saw the two together in an effort to get Aiden to back off, but he never did.

It was just another day at camp, everyone was completing their daily chores and responsibilities, Chiron was training some campers, Will Solace (who happens to be Nico's boyfriend) was healing some campers who were injured due to a prank by the Stoll brothers, Thalia was in the woods practising her powers over lightning (she did this often after she left the hunters, you can probably guess why she left) and Nico was lounging about the Hades cabin waiting for her to be done.

Nico was getting bored and was about to go find Thalia when he heard a girl laugh and giggle from the direction of Athena cabin. Any other day he would have ignored it thinking that an Aphrodite girl was making out with another camper but he was already on edge after seeing Annabeth with Aiden earlier in the day so he decided that he would go find out what the girl was doing. As he went to turn the corner to where he thought the giggle came from, he heard another laugh, but he now recognised this laugh and hoped that he wasn't about to see something that he would regret.

Instead of walking around the corner, he decided to travel through the shadows using his powers, who new that the children of Hades had the powers to be so sneaky… ok… everyone knew but it didn't mean that they could stop them. Nico stayed in the shadows so that he was hidden and could get away fast if he needed to but what he saw left him frozen in place. He was right about his assumption that the laugh belonged to Annabeth but was stunned to see her arm locked around Aiden's. He couldn't hear what the two were talking about from where he was forced to hide but he managed to hear the tail end of their meeting.

They had both gotten up and Annabeth was complaining about how she had to go check up on the Athena cabin, "I wish I didn't have to babysit my silly siblings, they are supposed to be smart for Zeus sake".

They both laughed at this statement, a bit more than they should have considering that it wasn't funny at all then they both stopped as she spoke again, "Well I guess I'll come see you later, where we usually meet? By the beach?".

Aiden nodded to this and Annabeth gave him a lingering kiss on his cheek. Nico almost jumped out right there and then to confront her but decided against it thinking that there was an explanation to what she was doing. He then left to go find Thalia, just like he had previously planned so that he could tell her what he saw and decide what they should do.

Nico's POV

I raced back towards my cabin and saw that Thalia was now outside waiting for me, I guess she finished her training and she did not look happy in the slightest. I debated turning around and going somewhere else but then I remembered what I needed to tell her about. As I approached her, she was sending sparks out of her hand and I winced having remembered how painful her shocks were but continued hoping that she wasn't mad because of me, but my luck isn't that good.

"Where have you been death breath?! I thought you said you were going to wait for me in your cabin because you didn't want to be electrocuted when I trained", small arcs of electricity shot towards me as she spoke.

"Yeh about that, I was in my cabin but got bored so was actually going to come find you". I nervously ran my hand through the back of my hair, knowing that the excuse would not spare me a few shocks.

Thalia was now calmer than she was but was still shooting electricity towards me until she suddenly stopped and stared at me, she must know that something is wrong. I guess that's what you get when you share everything with each other.

She started to look worried and dragged me into the dark Hades cabin by my arm, closing the doors behind us so that no one could hear us talk, it was a good thing that Hades didn't care about other demigod children entering his cabin. She sat us both down on my bed before waiting for me to confess what was wrong, it was pointless denying anything because she would just electrocute me every time I tried so I decided to tell her the truth.

"You know its quite scary that you are able to know when something is wrong or troubling me"

This statement was accompanied with the most nervous laughter that I could possibly imagine which only caused her to look more worried, she continued to stare into my eyes with her electric blue ones until I told her what was wrong.

"There's something that I have to tell you, but you cannot tell anyone, not yet, not until we are sure about what is going on"

She nodded, probably afraid to talk thinking that I would find some way out of this. She still stared straight into my eyes, it was unnerving but also quite comforting.

"I've been suspicious of Annabeth for a while now, even before Percy left and I can't shake this feeling that something bad is happening, she has been distant for a while"

Now she looked confused and after a little while, she finally said something to me.

"What do you mean, Annabeth hasn't done anything wrong, especially to Percy. Have you forgotten that he has gone to… to get permission to marry her?", I could see how challenging it was for her to say that, she really likes Percy.

"I think you might be worrying about nothing Nico, I've known her for years, she wouldn't do anything to hurt Percy, why would she, he treats her like a queen...", she trailed off towards the end of her sentence, I knew that she wanted Percy to treat her like that but she would never say it.

I admit that I was now slightly frustrated, this was why I never told anyone, I knew that they wouldn't believe me because they all saw Annabeth as this perfect girl, but I knew that something was going on.

"You don't understand Thals, I've seen the way she has been acting towards other guys for months, now she won't leave that idiot Aiden alone then I saw her and him…" I trailed off, worried that she would think I was lying but she caught me.

"You caught them doing what Nico? Tell me or I will shock you so hard that your soul will leave your body"

Now Thalia looked scary, like, I will kill you scary. Her eyes lost all comforting feelings which were replaced by an intense fire and her whole body was starting to emit a small but increasing number of sparks. She also moved closer, almost pinning me against my headboard so that I couldn't escape, not even into the shadows.

"I will ask you one more time before I start shocking it out of you death breath, what did you catch them doing?"

I sighed, knowing that I would have to tell her or risk her doing something far worse than killing me.

"When I came out of the cabin to come find you, I heard a girl laugh and giggle, so I decided to go find out who it was. When I got closer, I heard the girl laugh again and this time I knew that it was Annabeth so I went into the shadows so that I could see what she was doing without her seeing me…"

I had now paused so that I could see whether Thalia was ok, I could see that she was starting to think of all the possible endings to the story and making herself angry, but she just took in a deep breath and spoke. "Continue Nico, I will be fine, I need to know what happened"

I hesitantly finished the story, being careful to recall everything exactly as I saw it so that she wouldn't get too angry.

"When I got to a place where I could see her, I saw that she was sat with her arm locked around Aiden's, talking and laughing too much than she should have been. Then when she got up to leave, she told him that she would meet him where they usually meet… by the beach and she left after kissing him on the cheek"

Thalia was now red with anger, she no longer questioned whether or not Annabeth would do this, she knew that I could never lie to her. She began to get up and stomp towards the door of the cabin, but I grabbed her arm and was sent flying towards the wall by a powerful shock of electricity. Wow… I forgot how much that hurt.

She instantly turned around and ran towards me, desperately exclaiming how sorry she was and how she didn't mean to do it which I of course already knew so I wasn't angry with her at all. I pulled myself up so that I was resting on my elbows and she sat on the floor next to me, still red with anger but calmer than she was a minute ago, I guess electrocuting me allowed her to let out some of her anger, I just wish that it didn't have to be so painful.

"We can't do anything about it yet Thals, we don't know what is actually happening so we can't storm up to her and make a massive deal out of this"

Thalia nodded, fully understanding why we couldn't walk up to her and accuse her of something that we had no proof about, so we figured that we had to go find some.

"We need to find some proof that will tell us what she is doing, and I think I know where we can find it. We need to go to the beach when they meet up to see what they are doing but we can't let them see us or they might act differently"

Thalia instantly agreed, I could see in her eyes that she wouldn't rest until she found out what was going on and I knew that I wouldn't either.

"You're right Nico, we need a plan to find out what is happening, a smart one"

We both then spent the next few hours coming up with a strategic plan to spy on Annabeth and Aiden without them finding us. The time flew by and we finally decided what we should do to catch her in the act if anything was going on. We both got up and left the cabin, it was almost time for dinner and soon after that, we would need to keep a close eye on Annabeth to follow her and start the plan.