So, here is the second part!
I hope you all enjoy this and leave a review to tell me how you liked it!
Have a nice day!
The demigods had calmed down a lot when Will re-entered the living room. They were all seated around the table and calmly eating their dinner. Okay, maybe calmly was a bit of an overstatement. Everyone was talking, a bit of food was flying and Chuck was crying loudly. But it was calmer than before.
Will sat down in his earlier seat, thankfully not next to Leo. Instead the beautiful girl was sitting there.
"Hi, I'm Piper!", she introduced herself. "I'm sorry about Leo, he takes some time getting used to"
Will nodded slowly. He doubted he would ever get used to someone randomly bursting into flames. After a short awkward silence between Piper and him, Will coughed and looked away. Across from him, little Chuck was mashing his potatoes and Sally tried to help him with it.
The longer Will watched the little boy, the more he noticed about him. For example the laugh that sounded like some sort of goat and the small horns sticking out of Chuck's curls. It made Will wonder what exactly Chuck was.
Finally Will could tear his gaze away from the horns and focused on the food. Half of it was gone already, so the choice wasn't that big. He took some potatoes, vegetables and cornbread and started eating.
"No meat?", Piper asked him.
Will looked up and from his plate to Piper's, which was sporting the same food as his.
"Uh, no. I'm a vegetarian"
Piper's eyes began to shine.
"You too?", she asked. "Finally someone who understands that it is possible to live without meat"
Will smiled slightly. Maybe they had a topic they could talk about so that he stopped feeling so out of place.
"I know and people think it is so hard but it isn't really. And you live healthier, which is always important."
Piper nodded, smiling brightly. She told Will all about her experiences and how she wanted to become vegan, but her trainer advised her to wait with that because it would be hard for her body to handle with all the fighting and exercise. It lead to Will explaining to her how he had researched this topic and offered to Piper to give her some of the info he found.
Before Piper could agree, the boy next to her, a tall blonde with a small scar on his lip and some impressive built leaned over the table to look at him.
"Are you trying to steal my girlfriend?", he asked, but didn't sound angry.
Nonetheless, Will paled and shook his head wildly. The boy started laughing and Piper rolled her eyes.
"Just kidding, I'm Jason", he held out his hand for Will to shake.
"N-Nice to meet you", Will said, stumbling over his own words.
The change in personality had taken him by surprise and he wasn't sure what to make of it.
"Stop being an idiot, Jason", Nico said, sounding a bit annoyed. At what, Will wasn't sure.
"Jason will never stop being an idiot", Percy said and started laughing.
"That's rich, coming from you, Jackson", Jason retorted.
Most of the people in the room started laughing at this. Sally was trading an amused look with her husband.
Jason and Percy began to banter back and forth and sometimes others would join in.
"Is this normal?", Will asked, turning towards Nico and Reyna.
"Sadly yes. I swear they act younger than Chuck", Reyna said.
Leo had started to chant "Fight! Fight! Fight!" and Nico shook his head at the boy.
"If they start a fight now, I'm going to punch them both in the face", Annabeth said, turning up next to Reyna. Piper nodded in agreement.
"What is wrong with boys that they always act like they're five", she questioned.
"Hey!", Nico and Will said simultaneously, but the three girls ignored them.
"To the roof!", a girl Will hadn't noticed before yelled.
This was met with enthusiastic cheers and suddenly everybody stood up and stormed towards the door. Well, not everybody, but some.
Leo was the first at the door, followed by Jason and Percy who were laughing at each other. A boy trailed behind them, holding the door open for another girl. The boy had curly brown hair and a goatee. He was wearing one of the bright orange t-shirts a lot of demigods seemed to wear. The girl was … strange. She had green skin for starters and her brown dress looked like it was made from trees. She also had a branch in her brown hair. Then came the girl who yelled before, she had short black hair and was wearing punk clothes. Following her was a girl with cinnamon brown hair, who looked fed up and Hazel and Frank.
"I'm going to make sure they don't get into any trouble", Piper announced and then hurried out of the room.
"Same", Annabeth muttered and followed her.
This left Nico, Will, Reyna and Chuck. Sally and Paul had retreated to the kitchen.
"Fit! Fit!", Chuck was saying, slamming his fork into his plate.
"I'm getting him to the roof, don't do anything stupid", Reyna said and then the two of them left too.
"Do I want to know what they are doing on the roof?", Will asked.
"Some sort of sparring match to test who is more powerful", Nico said. "You can expect everything to get wet and electrocuted."
"Isn't that dangerous?", Will asked, a frown on his face.
"No, it's just a friendly match", Nico said and then he stood up.
"Are you going upstairs, too?", Will asked him.
"If you want to"
Will smiled slightly at that answer. "Good, then lets do something fun. How good are you at video games?"
Explaining to Nico how to move your character in Mario Kart was a slow and tiring process. But as soon as the son of Hades found out how it worked, Will was left in the dust. After the fifth time, Will was fed up. He always considered himself good at video games, especially Mario Kart, so being beaten by a boy who never played that game before in his life, and acted as if he didn't even know who Mario was (which was scandalous), was frustrating.
"Can we play something else?", he grit out through his teeth.
Nico glanced over at him and then shrugged. "Sure"
He sounded a bit confused, but Will wasn't going to explain about his problem.
Before he could ask after other games, the others came back in.
"Oh, you're playing! Can we join?", Percy asked.
"If you want to", Will said, a bit uncertain.
How were they supposed to play a four player game with thirteen people? And why would they want to play with Will? From what he gathered they probably thought he was stupid.
The teenagers piled around the couch and started to talk about who was going first.
"What exactly is that?", Hazel asked and pointed at the controller Will was holding.
"It's the controller", he said confused. Had she never seen one before?
"You control the game with it", Frank explained.
Hazel looked baffled. "With that thing? But it's not connected to the TV in any way. And how is it that the TV knows what you want to do. Your decisions change and so does the game, right?" Frank nodded. "But how can it do that?"
Hazel sounded so confused.
Will was frowning. It was a game, it was programmed to change with your decisions.
"I'll explain it later. Do you want to play?", Leo asked.
"No, thank you"
"Means I can play!"
"You can't just decide you can play, when there are others who want to play, too", Piper scolded.
"I'm fine with sitting it out. This is new to me and I'm just getting used to electricity", Calypso announced.
"What?", Will asked. These people were confusing him. What was up with Hazel and Calypso that they didn't know about video games or even electricity.
All eyes turned to him again and Will became tomato red. He probably offended them and now they were mad.
"Oh right, you don't know. Sorry", Percy said and then turned to the others. "Stop confusing him, he's new"
Some of the girls gave him pitying looks, while Leo snickered.
"Why don't we explain it to him then?", the punk girl asked.
"Because we're having a fun time right now and don't want to ruin it by talking about Leo's death", Annabeth explained. "Now, I think it's best to make teams of three"
Everyone went back to talking and shouting over each other, while Will turned to look at his boyfriend with wide eyes.
"Leo's death?", he whispered.
Nico had a sort of guilty look on his face. "It's a long and complicated story I will tell you later"
Will narrowed his eyes. He wasn't going to get away with this again. "Promise?"
"Yeah, promise"
"Good, do you want to be in my team? We could be the two players team"
"Okay"
Nico gave his controller to Percy, who was sitting on the floor in front of the couch and therefore also in front of them.
"Okay, does everybody have team?", Annabeth yelled, so that she was heard over the others.
"Yes!", was heard, as well as a single "No!"
"You are in our team, G-man!", Percy said. "I thought you knew that"
"If I were you, Grover, I wouldn't go on a team with Kelp Head", the punk girl said.
Will really wanted to know her name, it was the only one he didn't know.
"Shut it, Pinecone Face!", Percy yelled back. "I'll wreck you!"
"How? With your boring water powers?", 'Pinecone Face' laughed.
"Gods, shut it, Thalia! Can we just play now, without you getting into one of your annoying arguments about your powers?", Nico snapped at the girl.
It was silent for a moment, then the others voiced their agreement.
Will noticed that the tree girl, Juniper was her name he believed, had joined Calypso and Hazel in their 'no-video games/electricity'-corner.
"Can you start the game, Will?", Reyna asked.
Will did as he was told and selected the four player modus. After every team had selected a character, the race started.
The following hours were two of the strangest (but also funniest) Will ever had. The demigods got really competitive about the game (especially Percy and Thalia) and whenever someone fired an item at another team, the person was bombarded with a variety of powers and weapons. They spared Will, thankfully, but it might have been because of Nico's death glare the first time Will had been hit with some water and not because he was a mortal. At the end it was a fun experience and Will was a happy vice-champion.
"I actually expected Annabeth to win", Percy said, after the final results were shown on the screen.
Will nodded in agreement. Annabeth and Reyna had practically won every race they played, but Thalia, who was the third member of their team, had finished last more often than not because she had gotten too competitive. And once she was hit with five items just inches from the finishing line, so that was bad luck. They still managed to finish third.
Instead Percy's team, consisting of Percy, Grover and Jason, had won the trophy. Their character, Peach, was happily dancing on top of the winner's podium. The choice of character was something Will couldn't really understand, but Nico had said that it was normal for Jercy, as he called it.
The worst team was Leo's, who had lost nearly every race and came in eight. Will didn't know why, because Frank was quite good at the game, but the rest of the team either didn't take the game seriously enough or just wasn't that good at it. Leo constantly drove in the wrong direction for 'fun', which annoyed all the others to no end. Piper had definitely tried but failed, but later told them she had never played the game before.
Will cast a glance at the clock and noticed that it was past nine already.
"I have to go home now", he told Nico, who was slowly falling asleep next to him, quietly. Nico lifted his head from Will's shoulder and nodded. He pushed Percy, who was leaning against his legs, away and then stood up. Will followed him, wishing the others a good night as he left the room.
"That was fun", Will said. He grabbed his jacket and pulled it on.
Nico smiled slightly. "That's good."
"They're nice people. They require some getting used to, but overall they're nice", Will said. "I just hope I they don't hate me"
Nico frowned. "Why would they hate you?"
He sounded like that was impossible and that made Will smile a bit.
"They probably think I'm stupid", he muttered. "But that doesn't matter right now." A bit louder he said. "I guess I'll see you on Saturday?"
Nico blinked and frowned. "Saturday...?"
"Lou Ellen invited us to her party, remember? It's this Saturday", Will said, shaking his head slightly. He poked Nico against the head. "You really need to start remembering these things"
"Yes, fine", Nico said and swatted Will's hand away.
"Good", Will gave him a bright smile and then turned to walk out of the door.
He got to the end of the hallway, when Nico caught up to him.
"Are you really going to go without saying good-bye?", he asked.
Will blushed slightly.
"Bye", he said and waved.
Nico rolled his eyes and came a bit closer, so that he was standing right in front of him. He reached up to pull Will towards him and their lips met in a short but sweet kiss.
"Bye", Nico said and turned around to walk back to his apartment.
Will smiled after him and then decided that it was time for him to go.
Waiting for the elevator to come was boring and so he found himself thinking about the evening again. It had gotten better after the initial problems and even turned out to be a fun evening. So maybe all these demigods had some weird habits and were overall very strange people, but they were also nice and fun to be around.