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Nico, if he had to be honest with himself, loved the new version of the world devoid of the Mist.
Sure, he wouldn't say the last few months had been easy, especially with the increase of monster attacks on mortals and the new problem of mortals of various religions ending up confused in the Underworld after their deaths but, for the sake of living his life, he liked the Mist-free world a lot better.
The new influx of mortals in the Underworld, caused by the division that was previously created by the mist, was pretty problematic and Nico couldn't help but feel a bit of empathy for the poor confused souls who, after their deaths, ended up in a very Greco-roman Underworld when they had prayed to a different diety all their lives.
He was sorry to the poor people that were simply confused by the situation but that were nonetheless ready to embrace their afterlife but he was especially excited to be put on 'bigot watch' as his father had started to call it.
'Bigot watch' was, to Nico's pleasure, the act of giving bigots a hard time once they found out they ended up in an afterlife that wasn't the one they were expecting.
It was obviously a service strictly dedicated to people who were assholes during their lives but Nico still liked being in charge of that, especially since it didn't take much of his time and it really was liberatory to bash people who were likely to be the autors of his very own religious trauma.
He did feel sorry though for all those poor souls who struggled to cope with the knowledge of a Greco-roman Underworld instead of the one they had envisioned during their lives, he did, in a sense, really understand them.
The cultural gap from 1930s' Italy to modern day United States had really shook Nico to the core when he started remembering bits and pieces of his life before the Lotus Hotel, especially when it came to all things godly related.
Now though, the absence of the Mist made it possible for him to roam around freely without worrying about mortals seeing him bash the head of an innocent cheerleader or stab the heart on an innocuous old lady, they all saw Empousas, Harpies and the entire spectrum of mythological beings.
And, to add to it, demigods were free to dispose of monsters as they pleased.
So, thanks to his extensive experience and his very limited but effective training, he was deemed by Chiron strong enough to leave camp basically on a wim.
Sure, it could be considered just burocracy but it was still quite dangerous for young demigods outside of the two camps, they had to fend for themselves and their lives were constantly at risk so Chiron and Mr D created a system to evaluate demigods and, based on their skills, they could give them permission to leave camp's premises even without being assigned a quest.
And Nico was glad he finally had the chance so take advantage of this privilege and go on an actual date with Will without any sibling, cousin or friend meddling.
Their plan was simple, they left at around 10 a.m., took the Gray Sister's taxi to Manhattan and lazily strolled around enjoying each other's company during a relaxing sunny day.
Maybe a bit too sunny in Nico's opinion but he knew Will's dad always tried to take a peek at his kids' dating lives to decide whether to give their partners the shovel talk of the millennium or not.
They walked, hand in hand, for hours on end, entering shops, drinking milkshakes, snacking on candy they brought from camp and talked for as long as they physically could.
After a light picnic lunch in Central Park, they walked until they reached a jewelry store where Will stopped for a moment to see the windows and told Nico: "Ah, I gotta buy a gift for Kayla's birthday! Don't you think she'd like that necklace?"
Nico looked at the golden chain he was pointing at and nodded as he felt that the necklace was indeed quite her style.
The two entered the slightly dusty jewelry shop and Nico couldn't help but notice how many people were occupying the space.
Each wall had glass cabinets with jewelry exposed to be able to shop easily, the two main wooden counters that sat opposite to the entrance were currently occupied by other customers being helped by the store's workers in their choices.
As soon as they set foot in the shop, they were greeted by the clerk who said in a quite distinct british accent: "Good morning gentlemen, what were you searching for today? Could I be of any help?"
Will nodded, bringing his hand up to his face to bring a stray strand of golden hair behind his ear, a gesture that Nico followed with high attention, then he answered: "Ahem... Good morning to you too, I'm searching for a birthday gift for my younger sister and from the window I saw a golden chain that I liked, would you mind showing it to me?"
Nico noted that, although Will was using the same speech register as the jeweler, his heavy Texan accent made him sound way less polite than how the man sounded.
English was, sadly, Nico's most comfortable language as of today. He hadn't minded at first, too preoccupied with losing Bianca and the wars, but now after a few splotches of memories ha started to return, the loss of his mother tongue and of its connected cultural heritage weighted on him more than he ever expected it to.
It made sense, really, that it could have been considered quite an unfortunate situation but Nico was, for the lack of a better word, definitely furious at his father because of the memory loss.
He kept listening silently to the polite conversation Will was having with the store's clerk, butting in a handful of times just to comment on his boyfriend's opinions on the gift.
Will, after seeing a few options, picked one that he liked best for Kayla and the clerk accompanied them towards the cash register where they could pay.
"Do you want a gift package?" Asked the clerk, showing Will the packaging options.
As the son of Apollo chose how to decorate the package, Nico's attention got captured by the bell at the entrance chiming repeatedly for a few times.
He looked towards the glass door where four tall men with their faces slightly covered by hats and sunglasses were currently entering, looking as suspicious as a Minotaur in a toy store.
Nico kept glancing towards them, keeping an eye at their actions and trying to decide whether they were actually worth keeping an eye on or not.
The answer to his question came faster than he expected when one of them suddenly put himself in front of a door while the other three each took a gun out of their jackets.
Nico fully turned, putting himself right in front of Will to protect him from eventual stray bullets and Nico couldn't help but quickly think about how much it sucked being a demigod in these cases, not only you could be hurt by godly weapons but you were also actually incredibly vulnerable to mortal ones.
Nico thought, for a second, that the four malevolent mortals weren't actually going to shoot as it was probably the worst way to begin a robbery since it completely panicked all the hostages, but he had to give it to them, they were dumber than he thought.
One of them shot.
The bullet, which for Nico's misfortune his demigodly senses were able to follow for its entire flight path, found its final moment of inertia in the shoulder of the man who was directly next to the clerk Will was talking to.
Nico felt Will quickly move behind him, predicting as well as he did where the bullet would embed itself, and jumping behind the counter, lowering himself next to the man whose legs were currently giving up on him because of the pain he was experiencing.
"Hands up and sit on the floor!" Ordered the man who just shot before pointing the gun to a girl who was trying to close with a key the big glass cabinet that contained some valuable jewelry and exclaiming: "You! Don't close that and open all the cabinets or you'll end up like your colleague."
She trembled, nodding in fear and gulping, quickly moving around the counters to open the rest of the glass cabinets for the thieves.
Nico glanced at Will who, with his quick paced precision he had developed during the wars, was disinfecting a pair of tweezers and, lighting up his left index slightly to use as a torch, he was scanning the wound to find the bullet.
Unfortunately, one of the thieves noticed where Nico was glancing and quickly walked up to him to check the man who was shot and Nico had approximate five seconds to decide whether to fight the guy.
On one hand, these were mortals and he had no business playing law enforcement in the middle of a hostage situation with active shooters, he wasn't a cop.
On the other hand, he knew he had the chance to defuse the situation quickly and precisely, avoiding any unnecessary casualty.
Four seconds.
Sure Nico could quickly do something but he couldn't attack the four of them together and one of them was clearly trigger happy, he wasn't sure that he wouldn't shoot while Nico disposed of one of the other three.
Three seconds.
The rest of the people were defenseless though and, if the police didn't arrive quickly, it could really get ugly.
Two seconds.
Mortals though, really? Was he really debating whether attacking mortals was okay? Nico had an upper hand on them whether they were as armed as they were or not, he was just quicker, more durable and, all in all, more suited for war than they were.
One second.
He couldn't hesitate, these people needed to be protected.
He was putting himself right in front of the thug when one of the others attracted the attention of all the presents by screaming: "Hey you, throw that phone away now! And don't move."
Everyone in the room turned around to look at the person the thug was screaming to and Nico noted it was the clerk Will was previously talking to.
The clerk let the phone fall which hit slightly Will's foot, distracting him slightly.
The thug that Nico was closest to sprinted behind the counter before the son of Hades could get out of his own head to stop him and then he froze, eyes locked on where Will and the wounded were.
"Y-you!" He shouted, clearly referring to Will "H-how... you're..."
He breathed.
"A demigod."
Sure, Will's singing was making him and the wound he was curing glow slightly with divine energy and the wound was clearly closing by itself as the thug was watching but Nico was almost shocked it took him so little time to understand his boyfriend's nature.
The other thugs now looked more and more alarmed, clearly aware that a demigod being present at the scene would ruin their plans quickly.
Now Nico knew he had to intervene during the moment of uncertainty and distraction.
He took a step back and melted himself slightly in the shadows to make himself look almost invisible, especially to a distracted eye, then he moved, fast and precise, brandishing his Stygian Iron as an extention of his arm.
The first thug he hit was the one at the door, hoping that the sound of the collusion would distract the other three and make them turn towards him.
He raised his arm swiftly and, with the pomel at the end of the hilt of his sword, he hit a specific point of the cervical bone of the thug, making him pass out and crumble on the floor.
As Nico hoped, the other thieves, alarmed by their companion falling, looked towards him but they really couldn't see much except the unusual dimming of the artificial lighting in the room.
Nico then moved towards thug number two, the one who was way too trigger happy for his liking, he entered his specific shadow and slashing the barrel of the gun clean in half before kicking him in the balls for good measure and lastly hitting him in the head with the flat of his sword.
The thug folded on himself in pain before passing out on the floor. Nico felt weird about using too much force on a mortal but he definetely deserved it for shooting a man in cold blood like he did.
Two down, two more to go.
Thug number three was the one who was still frozen, looking at Will in shock and terror, now aware that the rest of his mates were being taken out by a seemingly invisible force.
Nico got closed to him, kicked him in his shins and, without too much force, hit him on the back of his neck making him lose consciousness quickly.
Thug number four was he one who hadn't done anything yet, who currently was looking around the others and trembling in fear at the situation.
He dropped the gun and raised his hands, murmuring low and breathy prayers to some god whose name Nico couldn't hear.
This halted the son of Hades furious spree.
Nico was aware that, even for demigod standards, the children of the Big Three were outscaled, too strong to even fight their peers in practice spars and too godly to adapt in the mortal world.
The son of Hades had come to term with his own streght, had acknowledged his force wasn't to be used against mortals and that, although sometimes control was hard, especially in the midst of intense battle, he had to keep a lock on his most powerful abilities, in particular when being brutal wasn't needed.
Still, every thought he had about his own powers, especially when talking about the use of streght against mortals, was based on the idea that, before the Mist's disappearance, he had never even interacted with mortals for long enough to warrant the use of force.
The man praying to an entity he didn't know and that could, for what he knew, potentially be the parent of the one attacking him and his group really made Nico rethink about his position in the situation.
Nico made the Stygian Iron disappear and, still hidden by the shadows, he grabbed Will's backpack where he knew his boyfriend always kept ducktape - he said it was handy sometimes - and tied the thug's wrist together behind his back, the man still crying on the floor while praying desperately.
Nico let go of the shadows, reappearing fully corporeal and letting the hostages out of the door where the police car's lights were now stationed in front of the jewelery shop.
Nico went behind the counter where Will was fully chanting a healing ritual that made the wounded man's skin glow in a light green hue and told him: "You can take your time now, I... the rest of the thieves are incapacitated."
Will nodded, chanting louder and letting his body glow freely, the shine starting to intensify even on the man's wound that was now almost fully healed.
Once the ritual ended, Will gave the man a tablet of pain reducing medicine and instructed: "In a few hours the pain should be completely gone but if it's still there in a week either go to the hospital or harass Apollo in a prayer asking for Will Solace, he'll call me for you."
"I can't thank you enough!" Answered the man whose wound had now completely disappeared "I will pray to you!"
Will sputtered a bit, a red blush now covering his warm cheeks as he answered: "No no! No praying to the demigods, pray to my father or... my brother! Asclepius! He's the god of medicine and he doesn't receive many prayers these days so he'd be glad to hear from you. Please. Thank you."
"But he didn't cure me you..."
"Hands up, no one moves from their places!"
Announced a police officer who, with the rest of his squad, was now entering cautiously the building to capture the gang of thieves that had attempted the robbery but they couldn't help but be taken aback by the sight in front of them.
Three thugs were sprawled on the floor in different compromising positions, clearly passed out and the fourth man was kneeling on the floor with his hands tied by ductape behind his back while he murmured a rhythmic mantra-like prayer.
Then, behind them, a kid in his mid teens wearing a black fluffy cardigan and sporting the most menacing expression known to man was standing protectively in front of the counter.
"Kid..."
"Nico." Said the teenager back.
"Nico, could you tell us what happened?" Asked a police officer, getting closer to the demigod.
Nico didn't really want to have trouble with mortal police and if he had to be honest it wasn't like he needed to lie anymore, he was a demigod and he could actually say so.
It was a terrible chore right now and he wanted to go back to his date but he did develop a quite keen sense of justice after spending a lot of time with Jason Grace.
"Those four entered here hoping to be able to rob the store, they shot a man that my boyfriend just finished patching up and I decided that we needed to all get out of here safely so I made them lose consciousness so that, once you got here, everything would be fine." Okay, Nico never said he was going to be good at explaining what had happened.
He learned justice from Jason but he did pick up his poor situational awareness from Percy and guess who he had known for a longer time? He hated the anwer to this question a lot.
One of the police officers seemed a bit weirded out by his story and another asked in a voice charged with irony: "And pray tell, how did a fifteen years old kid get rid of a group of thieves we've been trying to stop for months?"
Oh, that wasn't a good look on the police. These were the thugs they took months to stop? Funny, they looked pretty lame to Nico.
But well, Nico still had absolutely no reason to lie so he shrugged and answered: "Well, I am a demigod and, although we usually fight monsters, I can stop a petty thief if needed."
The police officers looked at the kid, then at each other, and a chorus of laughter erupted from them.
"You're not a demigod kid, c'mon, who helped you?" Asked an officer, still not convinced by Nico's version of the story.
The son of Hades let a disappointed breath go and, taking out a trusty Celestial Bronze dagger he had strapped around his right boot, asked: "You're mortal, right officer?"
The police nodded and Nico handed him the dagger which, since even its hilt was completely made out of Celestial Bronze, completely passed through the police officer's hand as if he was a ghost.
Nico picked the dagger up and, carefully showing every police officer in front of him, he cut his left index drawing just a speck of blood, enough to show that the Celestial Bronze actually hurt him.
"This is a godly metal." He explained then "It hurts any mythological creature, demigods included, and it spares mortals."
Will, since he had eaten an Ambrosia square and was therefore recharged a bit, easily helped the man up and, as they appeared from behind the counter, the police squad raised their guns towards them instinctually.
"The blond one is my boyfriend and the other is the man that got shot." Said Nico so that the squad would lower the guns "So anyways, me and Will are demigods, we took care of the thieves treated the wounded and safely got everyone out.
Will got right next to Nico and nodded as he added: "You could ask anyone who was present to corroborate our story, they would tell you the same version we told you. Also, I'm sure there's cameras everywhere."
The police officers looked completely lost which, in Nico's opinion, was completely understandable since it was probably the first time they had consciously been working on a case that included a demigod or two.
Sure, it was now almost normal to have creatures running around the streets, praying to the gods or seeing Hermes take part of a special episode on a random Home and Garden TV show but it still had been less than six months since the Mist had fallen and, after the two wars, there weren't a lot of demigods around anymore.
"I... I suppose you can go?" Said one of the police officers, probably the one who was in charge.
Will helped the man who had been shot to get out and told the police to bring him right home or at a hospital to give him a further check up since he saw signs of diabetes he hadn't been diagnosed yet then he fetched Nico's hand and accompanied him outside as the son of Hades' adrenaline fueled strenght was starting to slip from him.
They got out of the shop and, trying to go unnoticed, moved away from the crime scene to resume their date.
Will handed Nico a sip of honey mixed with Nectar and asked: "How are you doing? Are you hurt?"
"I hesitated." Answered Nico almost shell-shocked "I could have protected you better and I hesitated."
Will squeezed his hand, harder, as he asked softly and innocently, knowing well what Nico's answer was going to be: "Why did you?"
"They were mortals, Will." He almost sobbed "Their souls are held together with a thead that's barely there and my power is so... much."
Will nodded, perfectly understanding what Nico was trying to say. Of course he understood when the man he has cured that night was also slipping away from him when he couldn't find the bullet fast enough even though he was currently the most powerful healer at both camps.
"I get it, Nico." He said, a sad tone overtaking his voice "We hold so much power and these people feel so frail. I thought the guy I was taking care of was going to die and I hesitated to perform a suture ritual because I thought it was going to be too harsh on him. And I could feel his blood pressure rising trying to channel as many platelets on the wound as possible, I could feel his accelerated and panicked breathing and I could feel his nerves firing up in pain."
It was Nico's time to squeeze his boyfriend's hand back and Will kept talking by saying: "I would never blame you for hesitating if that's what bothers you because I understand the struggle."
Nico turned around to now to face him completely, a small smile provoked by the sight of his boyfriend slightly glowing cheeks overtaking his features.
"We're a mess." Chuckled Nico, never letting go of the eye contact between his black eyes and the light blue ones he so desperately adored.
Will hummed as melodiously as only a child of Apollo could and he answered: "At least we're a mess together, it could be worse."
Nico was definetely inclined to agree.
If Kayla received a huge batch of chocolate chip cookies and a pretty sunset painting for her birthday from her brother and his boyfriend though, was only thanks to the favors Percy and Rachel owed the couple.