![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
are you there, dad? it's me, nico
Who| Nico & you
What| Nico tries some unconventional methods to contact outside help, and meanwhile discovers his biography
Where| The new age store, the bookstore
When| Day 3
Warnings/Notes| Destruction of...property? Nico's bio is here. Feel free to have your character have read it already and drawn their own conclusions about this weird angry kid.
A. Nico is no stranger to being somebody's pawn; it's in the job description for demigods, right between "unasked for tribulations" and "probably won't live to see twenty." Just because he's acclimated to it better than most doesn't make it any easier to adjust to this. He hasn't been at the whims of mortals since he learned he was a half-blood. He can't even shadow travel out of here: the shadows that should jump to life and swallow him like skin instead settle over him dead and static as dry air.
But he's learned to survive on his own, with or without his powers. So when he's dumped in the arena in the midst of all that carnage, he doesn't stop to listen to strangers talking about defiance or hugging it out in the aftermath of the explosions. He gets out of there, he changes into the first black tshirt and jeans he can find, and he gets supplies. The knife is no Stygian iron sword, it's not even a celestial bronze knife, though it's better than nothing. But he can't say he feels comfortable carrying live steel on him. This is a weapon that can hurt mortals; this is a weapon that can kill them.
It doesn't matter; he's getting out of here as soon as he can, even if needing to call for help rankles. There are more important things to worry about right now, like getting the Athena Parthenos back to Camp Half-Blood.
Which is how he winds up in Experience: The Power of Crystals! hunting for something that can cast a rainbow. When he finds one, he holds it up to the light, and tosses a tiny bag of patchouli through in the absence of any drachmas or denarii. Iris was into the new age stuff, right?
"Oh Iris, goddess of the rainbow, accept my offering and show me..." For a moment he flounders, wondering who he should ask to see. Logically, Reyna, since he's supposed to be traveling with her. His dad comes to mind, but with the way the gods can't settle between Greek or Roman these days, that would be basically useless. Percy--no. Asking for Jason comes to mind, but he dismisses the thought. Finally he says, "Show me Hazel Levesque, please."
Nothing happens.
B. So he can't get word to Hazel. Or to Reyna, or to Percy, or to Jason, or to Chiron, or to anyone he knows. He's stuck here in a giant mall-shaped colosseum, probably with lions hidden in the basement waiting to eat him because that's what the Romans liked to do, and he can't so much as touch his powers. He should feel death everywhere here, if this is where people are dying, and instead there's--nothing. An empty void. Static.
He's not sure why he even bothers with the bookstore, except that it's a place he hasn't checked yet and finding Hazel there is still present in his mind. If she's here, he needs to protect her. He needs to keep her safe. This is the kind of place that would bring back all sorts of bad memories for her.
It is really, really unfortunate that those are his thoughts when he stumbles across a book with his picture on it. He picks it up, incredulous, then notices another copy beside it written in Greek. He knows it's Greek. He knows it the way he knows the sky is blue and up is the opposite of down, and he even thinks he can make out the four letters that spell out his name, but he can't read it. Horror-struck and sick to his stomach, he tries to leaf through it, and still--nothing. Finally he returns to the English copy--and he can read that alright, if you can call the letters getting all mixed up in his head before he can make sense of them reading. Whoever these people are, whoever their gods are, they took Greek from him and left him stuck with dyslexic English.
But his morbid curiosity is enough to get him to leaf through the book, struggle though it is. He only picks up bits here and pieces there, but the parts about him using Hazel--and what it says about Bianca--
He's so mad he starts ripping the pages out of the book.
What| Nico tries some unconventional methods to contact outside help, and meanwhile discovers his biography
Where| The new age store, the bookstore
When| Day 3
Warnings/Notes| Destruction of...property? Nico's bio is here. Feel free to have your character have read it already and drawn their own conclusions about this weird angry kid.
A. Nico is no stranger to being somebody's pawn; it's in the job description for demigods, right between "unasked for tribulations" and "probably won't live to see twenty." Just because he's acclimated to it better than most doesn't make it any easier to adjust to this. He hasn't been at the whims of mortals since he learned he was a half-blood. He can't even shadow travel out of here: the shadows that should jump to life and swallow him like skin instead settle over him dead and static as dry air.
But he's learned to survive on his own, with or without his powers. So when he's dumped in the arena in the midst of all that carnage, he doesn't stop to listen to strangers talking about defiance or hugging it out in the aftermath of the explosions. He gets out of there, he changes into the first black tshirt and jeans he can find, and he gets supplies. The knife is no Stygian iron sword, it's not even a celestial bronze knife, though it's better than nothing. But he can't say he feels comfortable carrying live steel on him. This is a weapon that can hurt mortals; this is a weapon that can kill them.
It doesn't matter; he's getting out of here as soon as he can, even if needing to call for help rankles. There are more important things to worry about right now, like getting the Athena Parthenos back to Camp Half-Blood.
Which is how he winds up in Experience: The Power of Crystals! hunting for something that can cast a rainbow. When he finds one, he holds it up to the light, and tosses a tiny bag of patchouli through in the absence of any drachmas or denarii. Iris was into the new age stuff, right?
"Oh Iris, goddess of the rainbow, accept my offering and show me..." For a moment he flounders, wondering who he should ask to see. Logically, Reyna, since he's supposed to be traveling with her. His dad comes to mind, but with the way the gods can't settle between Greek or Roman these days, that would be basically useless. Percy--no. Asking for Jason comes to mind, but he dismisses the thought. Finally he says, "Show me Hazel Levesque, please."
Nothing happens.
B. So he can't get word to Hazel. Or to Reyna, or to Percy, or to Jason, or to Chiron, or to anyone he knows. He's stuck here in a giant mall-shaped colosseum, probably with lions hidden in the basement waiting to eat him because that's what the Romans liked to do, and he can't so much as touch his powers. He should feel death everywhere here, if this is where people are dying, and instead there's--nothing. An empty void. Static.
He's not sure why he even bothers with the bookstore, except that it's a place he hasn't checked yet and finding Hazel there is still present in his mind. If she's here, he needs to protect her. He needs to keep her safe. This is the kind of place that would bring back all sorts of bad memories for her.
It is really, really unfortunate that those are his thoughts when he stumbles across a book with his picture on it. He picks it up, incredulous, then notices another copy beside it written in Greek. He knows it's Greek. He knows it the way he knows the sky is blue and up is the opposite of down, and he even thinks he can make out the four letters that spell out his name, but he can't read it. Horror-struck and sick to his stomach, he tries to leaf through it, and still--nothing. Finally he returns to the English copy--and he can read that alright, if you can call the letters getting all mixed up in his head before he can make sense of them reading. Whoever these people are, whoever their gods are, they took Greek from him and left him stuck with dyslexic English.
But his morbid curiosity is enough to get him to leaf through the book, struggle though it is. He only picks up bits here and pieces there, but the parts about him using Hazel--and what it says about Bianca--
He's so mad he starts ripping the pages out of the book.
covered in Bs!!!
He'd been venturing out of his safe spot to fetch a few other books he hadn't touched yet when he noticed Nico, and the book he was vandalizing. Having read through his, and having noticed a reoccurring theme of stories so outlandish it was hard to tell what was and was not fabricated by the capitol, his curiosity is piqued. Also considering that those who do have powers have them stripped away or nullified here gives a small sense of security, or at least a smaller sense of risk engaging someone who might have close ties to death.
"I would have sooner thought yours was fiction than a biography. I guess I could say that about a lot of them though." He speaks so casually about it before getting to the meat of his interaction. "How much of it is false?"
no subject
It makes him feel...exposed and vulnerable, and he doesn't like that. Worse is the notion that it's giving complete strangers misleading ideas about Bianca and Hazel. He'd be able to stomach it better, if it weren't for what it says about them.
no subject
"Whatever it was that upset you, I'm sure you don't want people believing it's the truth." Trust him or don't, but there's at least a window to disprove whatever is a lie in there. Now's your chance, says the expression on his face.
no subject
"You've already said yourself the whole thing reads like fiction," he counters, his voice tight with annoyance.
Trust? He's not playing that game, either.
no subject
"So you're just a vandal then, taking out your teen angst on a book. Good to know." There's so much confidence as he taunts Nico that he doesn't even keep his eyes on the young man, browsing through for books he hasn't read yet to take down.
no subject
"Vandalism implies I'm destroying something of value." And there's nothing valuable about this garbage. "This is just waste disposal."