Hi. This is the next chapter. I just want to thank Random fangirl0257 for your review. (I used my own spin on your idea. Hope you don't mind.) Y'know, it really helps an author to write better when we get reviews because it is just acknowledgement that our story is going in the right direction. (And if it's not, I love constructive criticism.) Seriously, how is it going? What should happen next? (I have some good ideas but I want to hear yours) and how long should I make this. I think more people should ship Tratie. They're so cute! (Unfortunately, I can't take credit for that. These characters belong to Uncle Rick. (I really don't want to say that, because admitting they're his will give him the license to throw them into hell or some messed up crud like that.)) (One day Karma will come back to bite that man on the butt)
Travis was lost. Figuratively of course because he knew Camp Halfblood like the back of his hand. It was necessary for him because he needed a lot of escape routes for some of the pranks he pulled. Especially the ones on Katie. She ran fast. The thought made him even more depressed. Why do you care?His brain asked him. Travis really wished he had an answer to that question. But he didn't, so he settled on giving the tetherball an extra hard wack. It swung round the pole, blurring as it flew… and nailed the kid walking by in the middle of the forehead. "Ow!" Leo complained. Will Solace stood up from where he had been sitting on a nearby bench with his so called best friend Nico di Angelo. "Leo are you okay?" Leo rubbed his head. "I'm fine." He glared at Travis. "What's up with you man?" Travis shrugged his shoulders and shoved his hands into his pockets moodily. Nico looked up from his book and smiled a wicked grin. "I think I know." Travis made a cutting gesture across his throat. "I swear di Angelo!" Nico laughed and held his hands up. "What?" Will and Leo looked between the two of them. "It's nothing." Travis said. Will shrugged and turned back to Leo. "You aren't responding properly." He said waving his hand back and forth in front of Leo's eyes. Travis muttered an apology and started to stalk off. "Where are you going?" Nico called after him, his voice practically sparkling with mischief. "For a nice walk in the strawberry fields maybe?" Will looked up from examining Leo in confusion. "But Travis is allergic to strawberries.?" Nico threw back his head and laughed. He did that a lot more these days, Travis noticed. His eyes were lighter and his face when he smiled was truly beautiful. He was, in every sense of the word an angel. At least, you would think that from the way Will looked at him when the other boy wasn't paying attention. Will was doing just that thing now, staring in awe at how the sun caught in Nico's black hair. In any other circumstance, Travis would have found it cute at this point though, he was too depressed to care. He managed a half smile and then walked away. He made his way over to the Hermes cabin. As he walked past he couldn't help but glance in the window of cabin four. It was empty of course. Most of the Demeter kids were probably out tending to the strawberry fields or taming the garden of wild roses that grew just inside the woods. Travis approached the Hermes cabin with slow steps. He was exhausted. He didn't think he had slept at all last night. There was a scuffling noise from inside the cabin and a muffled boy's voice said, "Quick, he's coming. Get under.. Yeah." There was a crash, the door opened and Conner tripped out. He slammed the door behind him and leaned on the knob. "H-hey Travis." Travis narrowed his eyes at his brother. "What are you hiding?"
"N-nothing." Conner said with an obviously faked air of nonchalance. Travis was too tired to even argue. "Just let me in, Conner" He said dejectedly. Conner turned a pale shade of green. "You can't go in there."
"Why not?" Travis asked. Annoyed.
"B-because the cabin is filled with dangerous chemicals." He looked pleased with himself. "Yeah! Yeah that's it. It was Cecil." For a son of Hermes, Conner was an awful liar. Too tired to even sigh, Travis turned around and made for the big house.
Conner:
Stepped back into the cabin and closed the door behind him. "That was a close one," He said. "You can come out now." Lacy crawled out from under Conner's bunk bed. "It smells." She scowled. "And I'm pretty sure there's something moving in the mold back there." Conner waved his hand dismissively. " No time for that! We have to figure this out now. He's getting worse." Lacy nodded vigorously. " Even I could sense that! I could practically smell the heartbreak. He reeks of it." Conner rolled his eyes. "Anyway. What should our first step be?" Lacey frowned in concentration. She pulled her legs underneath herself. "Usually, in this kind of situation the first step would be getting them to admit they like each other to a close friend or someone. But in this case, I think the first step would be getting them to admit it to themselves." Conner nodded. It sounded reasonable. "So, how are we going to do that?" Lacy scowled at him. "Honestly Stoll! You're so clueless!"
"I am not!" Conner protested. "No, but seriously. How are we going to do this?"
Lacy stared at him waiting for him to get it. When he didn't she sighed, as if he were a particularly dense schoolchild and she were the teacher waiting for him to realise that two plus two was not a trick question. "You and I are working together for a reason right?" She asked.
Realisation dawned upon Conner's face. "I like how you think bubblegum." Lacy fingered the ends of her hair and scowled. "I don't think this colour is working." Her face screwed up in concentration. Conner watched as her shock of pale pink hair began to lighten into a silver grey. Strands of pale ice blue began to chase the grey through her hair. When the transformation was complete, Lacy was sitting in the middle of the Hermes Cabin with pale blue and silver ombre hair. "Much better" She said in satisfaction. Connor gaped at her. "How did you do that?" Lacy glanced up at himself consciously. "It's a new Aphrodite power I discovered. It's pretty lame, I know." Connor took a strand of her hair and twirled it around his finger. "It's actually pretty cool." He disagreed. Lacy stared at him and when he noticed her he flushed deep red and quickly pulled away. He backed up until he had his back ramrod straight against the bedpost. "Anyway." Lacy said, her eyes twinkling behind her aviator glasses. "We are going to get them together with good old trickery and a little thing I like to call, Reverse Psychology." The two shared a grin that could only come from two very bad people doing a very good thing.
(Meanwhile)
Miranda:
Katie had her suitcase open on her bunk bed. Clothes and books and other assorted knicknacks spilling out of it. Her hair was unboud in a messy tangle around her face. Her clothes were crumpled and in disarray. Buttons done up into the wrong button holes and everything. "What's wrong?" Miranda Gardiner asked walking into the cabin. Katie glanced at her younger sibling. (A/N: I don't actually know who is the younger Gardiner sibling but this is how it's going to work.)" There's a lot of my stuff missing. It's all the stuff the Stolls have taken over the years." Miranda rolled her eyes. "Just go ask for it back." Katie snorted. " And risk seeing Travis again? No thanks." Miranda rolled her eyes. "You'll just have to deal with it then." Katie scowled fiercely. "They have my walkman. And my little Bonnie." Katie had a little bonsai tree that she kept on her bedside table and painstakingly tended to each day. So much so that she nicknamed it Bonnie. "I didn't even realise that it had gone missing. I swear I saw it just yesterday. But I must have been so tired I imagined it. Neither of the twins would have had the time to be in here yesterday." Miranda hid her grin behind a hand when Katie turned to her. "You'll just have to deal with it."
"I can't leave without it." Katie moaned.
"Then get it back." Miranda told her. Katie let out a frustrated groan and stormed into the bathroom to clean up. Miranda made her way out of the cabin and walked a few rows down until she got to the Hermes Cabin. She pushed open the door to find Conner Stoll and Lacy sitting on the floor across from each other. Grinning and laughing. Miranda hid a smile behind a hand again. "Here." Miranda walked over to Conner and placed a tiny ceramic pot down beside him. Conner to his credit simply said . "Thanks." He grinned. "Did she suspect it was you?"
"Nah." She smiled. "She suspected it was Travis or you. Just like you thought she would."
"No offence-" Conner said. "But this is special to her?!"
"Oh yes." Lacey said. "She treats that plant like her child."
"Well then," Conner stood up, taking the plant with him. He opened the lid to the trunk at the bottom of Travis' bed. He gingerly placed the plant in and closed it again. "Time to plant the evidence." The pun elicited such an impish grin from him that Lacy and Miranda couldn't help but laugh. Miranda turned to leave, but when she reached the door she turned to see Conner staring at Lacy as she cracked up. She was truly beautiful when she smiled. Miranda turned to go and hid a smile for the third time that day. Lacy was oblivious of course. In her mind, she was still Conner's dorky childhood friend who he had nicknamed 'Braces'. Then she had gone on to become the girl he teased. She was happy for her best friend all the same. After all, Lacy had, had a crush on Conner Stoll for years now. And it seemed that feelings were not as unrequited as they had first seemed.