November 2

Nico

The Feast was just under two weeks away and Nico was regretting accepting his independent study. Hazel's duties as centurion had picked up, so Nico was left with finalizing tour details and housing assignments. At this point he could care less if the Greek demigods got a full walk-through of the Senate House or if they were shown the best gelato shop or anything else on their itinerary, but he knew the visit was important to Hazel so he tried his best to be pleasant as he went over the schedule with Terminus for the fifth time.

Chiron had worked with Hermes to get the campers from New Jersey to San Francisco overnight the Saturday before the Feast. There would be a sort of welcoming 'mixer' between the Roman and Greek demigods on Sunday night, and they would stay until the following Friday to watch the parades, chariot races, and other events wrapping up the festival. Terminus demanded to be given a full background of each of the Greek campers, accompanied by photographs and lists of their divine parent, height, weight, and eye color. Nico was glad that he had found Roman demigods to act as group chaperones - he wasn't interested in trying to prove to Terminus that everyone actually was who they said they were once they arrived.

Nico was impressed with how many of the Camp Jupiter demigods had volunteered to help with the visit. He was able to hand off almost every job during the trip to various Roman campers. A few days ago, while he was detailing which jobs had been covered to Hazel and Reyna, he off-handedly mentioned that he was going to skip the mixer and the Feast. His excuse was that he'd need to be up early the following days to make sure breakfasts and tours were taken care of, but he also didn't want to run into Will with whoever his date was.

To his surprise, it was Reyna, rather than Hazel, who insisted he go. "You're helping organize this whole thing and if I have to be there, then you will be sitting next to me the whole time so I don't stab myself with a butterknife." Nico had gathered that she wasn't terribly excited about the date aspect of the evenings either.

Terminus was still describing the many dangers strangers could bring with them, especially Greeks, when Nico caught sight of Frank. "Frank! Um, sorry Terminus, I need to speak with the praetor. I promise to make sure none of the visitors are imposters or possessed or concealing some sort of poison, and you'll get the final list the Friday before. Thanks."

Nico jogged over to Frank. "I'm so glad you walked by. I meant to just drop off the itinerary and he was still lecturing me 45 minutes later."

"Yeah, no problem," Frank replied as they walked toward camp. "Hey, thanks for working on all of this. I know that it isn't really your thing, but if Hazel tried to do it all she'd never have time to sleep. You're a good brother."

Nico smiled. "Well, if I'm going to hide out here I might as well stay busy, right?"

"Right, about that … are you planning on staying longer? Like, after the Games? You're welcome to, but if you are we'll need to start treating you like a regular camper. We could probably manage to skip the probatio phase, but you'd need to take on legionnaire duties and everything. Reyna and I have been sort of letting it slide because you've been working on the Camp Half Blood visit, but some of the senators have started to ask so we can't put it off much longer. Sorry."

Frank looked a little guilty. Nico understood, though. He wasn't acting as an ambassador and he'd been staying at Camp Jupiter for nearly 2 months.

"No, I told Chiron I'd go back to the other camp with them when they leave." He had felt much more comfortable promising that a month ago, but now that the date was approaching he felt some anxiety start to build. He wasn't sure what to expect from life at Camp Half Blood without any of the Seven there. He should probably stock up on box DVD sets of very long-running tv shows to pass the time.

"Good," said Frank. "I mean, not good that you won't be here, but I'm glad you're going to try going back."

Nico just nodded. He wasn't sure how much Hazel had told Frank about what happened with him and Will, but he was glad that Frank didn't say anything about it.

They reached the barracks and parted ways. Nico sighed as he thought about everything he had to get done before the games started. He traded one notebook for another and left again for New Rome. He decided that next time he asked for an independent study, he'd go with underworld jobs from his dad rather than event planning.