"Good morning, Sunshine! Time to get up!" Will pulled the curtains back and let sunlight stream into the room. I took his pillow, muffling my groans and shielding my eyes. I turned onto my other side, snuggling into the blankets even more.

Every. Single. Morning.
"Whad do you wan me do do? Phodosynfesise?" He jumped on top of me, wrestling the pillow out of the way. I smiled. He was so cute. He smiled back, and I leaned in close, and kissed his cheek.
"Ugh, you still have morning breath." Fending off my disgusting breath, Will scrambled off of the bed. He poured some coffee into his cup and mine. I slowly sat up, stretching my spine before moving from the bed to the table, slurping from my cup.
"Have you made up your mind yet?" I hoped that he had; Chiron had shown me a photo of the little girl. She looked so much like Bianca that it wasn't funny.
"Yeah, I think that we should go check her out first. Make sure she's...I dunno...good?"

I smiled at Will. 'Check that she was good' was a big improvement from 'yeah, no'. This was going to work out just fine. We changed into some normal clothes and headed back up to the Big House. We opened the door, walking past Percy versing Annabeth and Nisha in a pingpong game, and headed towards the study. Will cleared his throat.
"Chiron, we've come to an agreement. We'd like to meet the little girl."
"Marvelous, I'll send word to Reyna. We'll just get you to sign these papers, just some legal issues we have to get out of the way. And how would you be getting there?" Chiron furrowed his brows, interested in our answer as we both signed.

"We were, uh-"
"- We're going to be shadow travelling there later this morning, and should be back in a couple of hours." I squeezed Will's hand, silently pleading with him not to say anything else. Chiron nodded and turned away. We were about to leave when someone grabbed my arm. It was Nisha. I told Will to go on and let Brandy kow that we'd be gone for a few days.

"Are you going somewhere?"
"Yeah, why? Noticed anything strange?"
"No, but what if something goes wrong when you're gone? What if we need you here?"
"It's only for the day, I'm sure everything will be fine." She nodded and headed back inside. For a twelve year old, she worried about everything. But it did make sense; Leo went missing and she and him used to be practically joined at the hip. She probably thought that we were going to leave too. I shook my head and joked, "You'll be fine. It's not like the world is going to end."

I walked back to the apartment and started packing a small bag. Only the necessities. Will opened the door and came inside, a wide grin on his face. Soon, we both had our bags packed.
"You ready for this?" I clasped his hand in mine. He nodded, and we slipped into the shadows of the underworld, quickly leaving it again.

The sun over San Francisco was blinding and I felt like I was burning just by standing outside. Holding hands, we walked through the centre of New Rome. We heard a shout behind us and turned towards it, seeing a blonde man with thin glasses, holding two ice creams.

"Will! Nico! Good to see you guys. I was just grabbing Pipes and I some ice cream. Did you want to join us back at our house?"

"Not just yet, Jason. We have to go do some things."

"Yeah, alright. Just swing by anytime, we're just going to be at home all day."

We nodded, leaving him to carry the icecreams back to his and Piper's house. Strolling down to the road from the fountain, we headed to where Reyna and Thalia lived. It was in a neat little cul-de-sac. It had a deceivingly quaint front door, just plain wood, but inside it had a sprawling layout that tended to confuse new visitors. These rooms were mostly weapons rooms; Thalia's archery equipment, a practise range in the basement, a whole collection of Reyna's swords and spears in another, and a large polishing and maintenance room out the back. Thankfully, it was the kitchen that you first walked into. On one of the island stools, a mop of curly black hair was sucking on a juice box. Will cleared his throat and looked at Reyna.

"So, is that her?"
"Yeah, her name's Katelyn."
"Does she go by Katie?"
"Yeah. Thanks for taking her. She's a bit of a trouble here. Thalia had to lock Ferrum and Osmium up. They were a tad too excited to meet a toddler." Katie put the juice box on the bench, and carefully climbed down from her stool. Racing over to us, she fell face first onto Will's feet, giggling. I grinned. She was too cute. Will's hand wrapped around mine. I could tell that he loved the idea of this little joy.
"Hey, Reyna? Did anyone know where she came from?"
"Nah, no one does. She just kind of showed up out of the blue."
"Well, can you give us a call if anyone finds her parents. We might take her back to camp."

I picked her up, and she started blowing raspberries on my sleeve. It was gross, but I forgave it because of the cuteness. She waved bye to Reyna and Thalia as we left, Ferrum and Osmium yipping from inside the house. It was maybe a 15 minute walk to get some ice cream, and go see Jason and Piper.

Oh, how wrong we were.

"What's your names? Are you my new daddies? Where are we going?"
"Uh-" Will glanced at me, not sure what to say.

"I'm Nico, and that's Will. We're going to be your new dads. That is, if you'd like us to? We're going for ice cream, would you like some?"
She nodded, "Bubblegum, pwease. Can I call you Dadda," she pointed to Will, "and Papa?" She pointed to me. Tears were welling in my eyes as I nodded, unchecked and unintentional. Today was the happiest I'd ever felt. We stopped at the ice cream shop, and I held her up to the glass to pick which cone she wanted. Chocolate and sprinkles.

"Miss Katie, whatever happened to wanting bubblegum?"

"I, I, I changed my mind." She threw her hands up in a shrug. I handed her the ice cream, which looked huge in her tiny hands. As for Will and I, we got something called a 'Hokey Pokey' (it had honeycomb in it, which Will adores) and another that tasted like salted caramel. We went and sat in the nearby park, eating our ice creams and basking in the sun. Katie sat in between Will and I, stealing licks from our ice creams and offering hers in return.

"Finished!" Katie cried, turning around, face smeared with ice cream.

"No, you're not," Will grappled her into a bear hug and wiped her face clean with a napkin, "Okay. Now you are. Are we ready to go to Jason and Piper's?"

"Who are they?"

"They're our really, really good friends. Come on, let's get going." And with that, we walked slowly to Jason and Piper's house. It was clear which one was theirs. It had a definite 'Jason and Piper' look to it, with the large open windows and the uncovered columns. I wondered if Annie had designed it.

"Hey, we're glad to see you two." Piper opened the door to welcome us in. She then realised that I had a kid in my arms. "I mean, you three. Who might this be?"

"I-I'm Katie," she giggled, pointing at herself. We stepped inside, closing the door behind us. Poor Piper looked better than she did during Lycaon's attack, but still had angry scarring across her face. Her left eye was milky white, the Lycanthrope himself leaving her blinded. I set Katie down on the ground and she raced around, stumbling and laughing. We sat down in their living room; the house was open plan, so it was the living room, dining room, and kitchen all in one space. Jason watched Katie as she ran, chuckling merrily about how happy she was.
"So was this the thing that you had to do first?"
"Uh, yeah. We went and picked her up from Reyna and Thalia's."
"She's cute, what's her name?" Katie tripped, falling onto her knees on the wooden floor. Picking herself up, she exclaimed, "I'm Katie! Remember?"
"That's right. Hi, Katie. I'm Jason and that's Piper. Where do you live, Katie?"
"Daddy? Where do I live?" She looked up at Will, and she started to toddle towards him.
"You live at camp with us, sweetheart. We'll head back there later this afternoon, how's that sound?"
"Okay, Daddy," she nodded at Will and turned back to Piper, "I live at camp!"
"I used to live at camp, I used to be a head councillor like both of your daddies."

I remembered Piper leaving. She thought that it would be easier for her and Jason to live in New Rome; she didn't want to be a burden on the Aphrodite cabin. Drew had taken back her place as head councillor.

My brain started to shift into a panicked overdrive as I realised that we'd forgotten to set up a room for Katie. I looked at Will, trying to remember if we actually had a nursery at camp or not. I didn't think so. I could hear my heartbeat in my chest, and my hands had started to freeze. What were we going to do?