Leo was awoken by a different man than the one he'd met at the ping-pong table the night before. For one thing, this guy wasn't a centaur. For another, he wasn't nearly as nice.

"What," the man started with a shout, making Leo sit up, his heart racing. "In Hades are you doing in here?"

Leo, in his half-asleep and sluggish state, replied something intelligent like: "Humub?"

The man sighed, seeming to take that for an answer. He opened the closet, rustling through on the lookout for something. "I swear, I feel like that woman in that movie Anna, with all these kids running around here. And I'm not even getting paid! Chiron is not about to let kids sleep in all the guest rooms, that is a very clear line I won't have crossed--"

"Oh, hey," Leo rubbed his eyes, taking in the man's appearance. He looked like one of those guys in an Ancient Greek painting, living lavishly with servants feeding him grapes. Only he wasn't wearing one of those over-the-shoulder thrifted window drapes. Instead, he had on one of those tiger-print shirts tourist dads wore, and when he emerged from the closet with a bottle of wine, it all pieced together. "You're the wine guy. From the video. Dino-something..."

The man just blinked, exasperated. "Dionysus, yes. God of wine, parties, insanity, you name it. I also have a tendency for turning campers who linger in the Big House into dolphins. Go...take care of the strawberry plants or something, make yourself useful."

"I haven't even seen the strawberry plants yet," Leo replied. "I just came in last night, when this massive hell-dog thing tried to bite my face off." Leo never tried to garner anyone's sympathy, as typically people didn't care what was happening to him, but he was hoping to get this guy off his back a little.

"Fascinating," Dionysus replied in a stage whisper, though a quick roll of his eyes told Leo he was anything but fascinated. "Would've paid to see it. Now if you'll excuse me, it won't be long before the big guy sees me with this." he gestured to his bottle of wine. Leo's eyes narrowed; he had quite a few foster parents like that before, the mothers with several children hailing a glass (or seven) of wine as a saving grace.

"Hopefully he's distracted enough..." Dionysus trailed off, walking out as he opened the bottle. "He's got bigger clouds in the sky to focus on..." he got about three steps down the hall before Leo heard him curse like he'd stubbed his toe. No surprise to anyone, the man knew his way around swear words. Leo didn't have a clue what he was talking about, but he guessed the wine wouldn't help.

Leo looked on the desk beside the bed to see a new change of clothes--a pair of shorts (thankfully down to his knees and not as short as Apollo's) and a bright orange tee-shirt. Printed on it were the words Camp Half-Blood, along with a pegasus mid-flight.

"This can't be real," Leo whispered, changing into the clothes. They couldn't have a pegasus here, like, as a mascot. He peeked through the blinds, taking in the camp now that it was bathed in daylight. He could see a volleyball court just outside, though no one was using it, assumedly due to the cold. He also spotted a pavilion of some kind, where some kids were working on sculptures and paintings. There was a glittering canoe lake, and a sprinkling of over a dozen cabins, one of which would be his.

Unless he didn't get claimed.

Unless he was just a mortal who catastrophically messed up, who deviously found a way in. When they found out what a fraud he was...well, they had plenty of weapons on the walls alone.

Leo thought of Nico's pure black sword. He'd never seen a weapon like that before, and he didn't even think to ask what it was made of. He loved the components and materials of things and, provided this wasn't all some sick joke (he's still not a hundred percent sold), he'd love to find out how this all worked.

Leo made his way downstairs in his new camp shirt, shorts, and the tennis shoes he'd worn yesterday. The Big House was empty, but there were voices and laughter coming from outside.

He walked through the field of cabins, trying not to get distracted by how distinctive each one was. There were larger ones--one that looked like an Olive Garden for all of its vines crawling over the walls. One that looked like a Barbie dream house--pink wasn't really Leo's color, but for all its pattern clashes, it somehow looked dreamy. There was one that looked as though it were made entirely out of gold--not that Leo could look for longer than half a second without his eyes stinging. Without a doubt, that was Apollo's--and for a god that liked to be looked at, his cabin's design was very much hard to look at.

Beside Apollo's cabin was one that looked a little smaller, almost unassuming until Leo got close. There were gears all along the side, as if the place were one giant machine. Rising out of the top was one large tube, emitting something like smoke, only it was a glittering gold. It didn't smell like smoke at all, in fact it smelled like...popcorn from movie nights with his mom, and the anise she used to bake with. Leo wondered for a brief, heart-shattering moment, if he could go in there and see her making a fresh batch of cookies. Maybe that's what they meant when they were talking about parents, maybe the flames didn't destroy everything. Maybe his mom was a demi-whatever here, too, and everyone was wrong about her passing away--

"Leo?"

Leo paused, blinking as reality hit him. His hand was on the door, partially twisted, not quite open. He looked over to see Nico, who was looking at him curiously. They stared each other down for a moment before Nico spoke again:

"It's okay, you can look, if you feel drawn to it," he said, walking up alongside him. "This is the cabin of Hephaestus, god of blacksmiths. His demigod children are really great at making things, like enchanted swords and animatronic--"

"Enchanted swords?" Leo asked, temporarily dazzled out of his train of thought on his mother. His hand slipped from the doorknob. "Like, if I were his--if he were my father, I could learn to make cool stuff like that?"

"You don't have to be in that cabin," Nico shrugged. "Here, demigods like to work on all sorts of different hobbies. I can show you later on the tour."

Leo nodded, focusing back on the cabin as he slowly opened the door. It was empty, and there were no beds. He stepped inside, taking notice of all the tools on the walls. Some were standard things you would see in a shop, others seemed more mystical, as if they'd been designed for magical purposes. One item had a twisted hook with a vein of purple liquid along the metal, as if it were meant to infuse hard-to-reach places in weapons.

"I thought they were baking something in here," Leo said absent-mindedly, fingers tracing along the tools, tempted to grab things that looked particularly fun; okay, best to step away from that son-of-Hermes mentality.

"Baking?" Nico asked, brows furrowed for a half a second before confusion dawned on him. "Oh, that. Shane Finley invented that smoke-stack thing. The cabin was letting out smoke, the Demeter cabin and the satyrs and nymphs didn't like it because they're all about the environment. There was a small machine versus plants war, and the Hephaestus cabin agreed to find a solution. Shane made a filter system, so the smoke gets filtered out with ambrosia, food of the gods. I don't know how he did it or if it's actually more or less environmentally friendly, but everyone can agree it smells good."

"Can't argue there, it smells like popcorn," Leo said, his stomach rumbling in agreement.

"Popcorn?" Nico mused, leading Leo back out to the circle of cabins. He started past them, to a pavilion in the distance. Leo half-wondered if he'd leave him in the dust; he never asked Leo to follow, but he had a sort of commanding energy about him. Leo then wondered if his creepy Hades powers included sucking people's souls out of their bodies or anything like that. Maybe he could turn people to dust like he did the hellhound.

Leo didn't want to find out. He bounded after him.

"Ambrosia, like I said, is food of the gods," Nico explained. "Demigods can eat it, but only in small amounts. It heals wounds and tastes like one of your favorite foods. I'm guessing popcorn is a favorite of yours?"

Leo frowned. Nico was probably just trying to make conversation--even if he didn't seem the social type--but there was something about the question that seemed off, like popcorn was a stupid favorite food. And Leo supposed it was. But he could remember when he was young, and his mom had gotten off work after a particularly grueling shift, she would take him to the video store and let him rent a movie. It had to be in the kid's section--no sneaking off to the gory horror or adult comedies. Once he got his movie, his mom would buy one of those jumbo buckets of popcorn with the bag attached. And when they watched the movie, she would hold him, not minding his squirming as they ate popcorn together. He never had to wait through the trailers to eat, as there was enough for the whole movie.

Leo couldn't even remember if the popcorn was really that good. Shortly after his mother died, the video place shut down. Not that Leo was around long enough to see it.

"Leo?" Nico asked.

Leo shook his head, focusing back in on the world around him. "Huh? Oh, yeah. I'm a movie buff, and I can't properly critique a movie without some popcorn! Either way, not complaining about the magical godly popcorn smell coming out of that cabin, as long as I get to try some! Anyways, what's your ambrosia-stuff taste like?"

Nico frowned, slipping his hands into the pockets of his ripped skinny jeans. He had a small frame, but when he glanced back, his eyes were haunting. Leo once again tried to will his soul to stay in his body.

"Up ahead is the dining pavilion," Nico continued as if Leo hadn't asked his question. That was for the best, for all soul-and-life related reasons. "I imagine everyone is finishing up breakfast. Afterwards, I can give you the tour, you can return your car to the mortal world, and...who knows, maybe you'll get claimed."

Nico looked over at Leo and must have noticed the expression on his face--the one of worry and total doubt, that is. Before he could speak again, Leo piped up:

"Is getting claimed painful?"

That was not the question he'd meant to ask, but it was enough to throw Nico off, which was good enough for Leo.

"It depends," Nico said. "Your godly parent--probably your dad, in your case--he already knows you're around. You just haven't done anything to get his attention. Getting claimed doesn't hurt that I know of--it's catching their eye that might."

Nico turned on his heel and moved forward towards the pavilion, Leo speeding after him.

What a reassuring guy, Leo thought. And an absolute Mad Hatter.

---

The pavilion, which Nico had mentioned was mostly called the mess hall, had no ceiling. This didn't seem to be an issue, as Leo had noticed earlier not a speck of rain or snow seemed to be getting in. Rows and rows of tables were set up, but one thing that caught Leo's eye was the ground; there was a crack in the marble floor spanning about thirty feet, carved so deep the ground had lifted around it. Everyone seemed to be ignoring it, though; Leo wasn't sure how, but he supposed it was a question for later.

The campers all went to sit at designated tables, and Nico lead him to a table with so many kids, they had to split between two tables; this must have been the Hermes cabin.

"Hey, it's Leo!" the kid from last night, the one that ordered pizza, said, clapping him on the back. "Very good pizza, very good craftsmanship, I must say. If you can sneak back into the mortal world and get us more pizza, you should have a nice bunk all to yourself in the Hermes cabin!"

(Great, these kids were fighting over beds? Wouldn't be a first for Leo, but he hadn't quite expected this whole experience to be like his foster homes.)

"Thanks, um...Connor, right?" Leo asked, to which the guy nodded. "I'll look into it for sure."

Connor seemed satisfied with that answer and continued to eat. Leo looked down at his empty plate. It had neat, intricate designs, along with some Ancient Greek letters, but that didn't help his hunger.

Leo looked around for Nico, but he'd already gone--he was sitting alone at a table, the lone sone of Hades. He almost felt bad for him--or, he would if half his butt wasn't sliding off the end of the seat.

"Just think about what you want for breakfast," Connor explained. "Like, you summon it. See?" he closed his eyes, and another pancake appeared on his plate.

Leo couldn't quite believe what he was seeing, but he closed his eyes and followed suit. A waffle, nice. With maple syrup and butter and cut up strawberries in the boxes. It was like the breakfast set out for Disney channel kids before they grabbed an apple and ran off to school.

The Hermes cabin seemed like pretty good company; they came from different backgrounds and seemed to excel in all sorts of things. None of them seemed to like it when Leo asked if they wanted to work for UPS, though.

Even though they were more sociable and far less brooding, Leo found himself missing Nico a bit. The Hermes kids hadn't fended off a hellhound for him, after all. And they seemed more interested in the mortal world than how he was adjusting to demigodhood.

After breakfast, Leo tried not to seem too eager to catch up with the moody son of Hades. He appeared to only eat a few grapes, but tossed the rest into the campfire when he saw Leo was done.

"No need to throw those out on my account," Leo said, before the breeze blew back just a bit, and he was hit with the smell of berries in the sun, of the white grape juice his mom used to get him. It smelled...absolutely amazing. Leo stepped tentatively closer, but Nico put a hand on his arm.

"We usually do sacrifices at dinnertime for the gods," Nico explained. "Scrape off part of the meal in offering, because they like the smell. They definitely wouldn't complain about adding breakfast to the menu, though."

"Hm," Leo nodded, frowning as the smell faded. "I see what you're saying there." He trailed off, gazing once more at that crack in the floor everyone had been ignoring earlier. "Hey," he started. "What do you know about that crack in the floor? Was there some kind of, like, godly battle or something?"

Nico looked down at the crack snaking along the floor, then back at Leo. The silence was so tense, someone could take a knife to it...like someone had taken to the floor, apparently.

"What do I know about it?" Nico asked, his voice low, almost hazy, like how fading voices would sound to someone dying. "Nothing. Not a thing..."

Leo had a tiny feeling he wasn't exactly swearing under oath, but with the chills running down his spine at the tone, Leo decided to solider on.

---

The first thing Nico showed him was the woods, which were right next to the mess hall. According to Nico, these woods were stocked full of bloodthirsty monsters, which Leo did not want to check firsthand. Apparently, demigods went out there to train against "the real thing". Why, Leo didn't know. He only hoped the other campers wouldn't send him out there for some sick initiation.

Then, there was a colossal circular colosseum where campers were hacking at straw training dummies with bronze swords and axes.

"I guess it wouldn't be too bad, getting a sword. It'd be kinda cool," Leo muttered. "But, I mean, does everything have to be about fighting? Isn't there, like, I love goddess? Maybe I could just hang out with the love-goddess demigods, get a couple of bow-and-arrows, and play Cupid?"

Nico raised an eyebrow, unimpressed by the idea. "Children of Aphrodite are not as fickle as you seem to think. Trust me. I can literally raise the dead, and they still freak me out. Besides, you haven't met their head counselor yet."

"Their head counselor?" Leo asked as they headed out to what looked like horse stables. He wondered, briefly, if Chiron slept in there, considering his lower half. But then he thought that wouldn't be right, and he probably shouldn't ask.

"Piper McLean," Nico answered. "She got here about three months ago, all the way from Texas. Oh--there she is now. She's good with the pegasi."

Leo watched as a girl his age lead a horse--no, a horse wouldn't have a thirty-foot wingspan--a pegasus out of the stables. The animal was a dark chocolate brown color, its wings feathery despite its otherwise horse-hair covered body. The girl had choppy brown hair, as if she'd cut it in about five minutes with a pair of those zig-zag safety scissors, but it still looked cute rather than wild. She smiled at Nico and walked closer, the sound of the horse's clomping muffled by the louder sound in Leo's head; it was sort of like one of those old-fashioned sirens, only mixed with the sound of a stadium of screaming baseball fans.

And yes, he heard that sound every time a cute girl walked his way.

"Hey," she greeted Nico, "Have I finally convinced you to hop on for a ride with Hershey? He does like you, you know." she patted his mane. Hershey knickered, seeming skittish; Leo was no horse expert, but he could tell Hershey was not a fan of Nico.

"Definitely not," Nico shook his head. "I was showing our newest camper around. Piper, this is Leo. Leo, Piper."

Piper smiled at Leo and shook his hand, which was a perfectly normal gesture, but Leo worried about the flaming potential despite the cold winter air. Her eyes were the prettiest shade of brown, and when the sun hit them just right, they practically glowed. She was wearing eyeshadow that seemed to change colors every few seconds--gold, pink, purple.

"So," She started, "How about you? You wanna let Hershey take you around for a lap? I promise there's been limited casualties."

From her, limited casualties sounded about as appealing as a day at the arcade complete with pizza and ice cream. He wondered if she was pulling some sort of love-goddess magic on him, if that was what Nico was talking about when he warned about children of Aphrodite.

Or maybe Leo was just stupid around cute girls. Probably that.

"Yeah, okay," Leo nodded.

"Leo," Nico grabbed his arm gently, though his touch was as cold as ice. "You sure? You don't have to do anything here that you aren't comfortable with."

"I have to fight monsters, don't I?" Leo countered, amused, but frowned after seeing the look on Nico's face. He looked...guilty and sad somehow, like he was at fault. "Hey, I didn't mean...I mean, I wanna try it out. It'll be fun, promise. I've wanted to fly ever since I was a kid..."

With Piper's help, he got on Hershey's back. "So, any instructions?" Leo asked, trying to sit comfortably. He took it that comfort wasn't an option with this sort of thing; he wondered if demigods had ever tried to design a saddle out of luxury-mattress material.

"Um, hold on?" Piper said, but there wasn't much confidence there. "And don't pull on his mane, he hates that. Other than that, you're good to go. Trust your instincts, Hershey can handle the rest!" With that, Piper lightly smacked Hershey's back.

The horse--pegasus, as if that'd be hard to remember--neighed and started to gallop. He didn't lack speed, that was for sure--in fact, he started racing at speeds Leo wasn't even sure were legal. The strawberry fields beside him started to blur into a red-and-green haze, and Leo had no choice but to yelp and grab the pegasus's neck for his life.

"Are there horse speed limits?" Leo yelled, several octaves higher than he would have liked.

"What?" One of them, Piper or Nico, Leo wasn't sure, called back.

Then the pegasus lifted into the air.

Leo screamed, merely grateful he'd used the restroom before this experience. He shut his eyes tight, heart thudding in his chest. This couldn't be real, none of this could possibly be real. He was almost killed by a dog the size of a school bus last night, and now he was a hundred feet in the air on the back of a unicorn--minus the horn.

Hershey neighed as if he'd read Leo's mind--he probably didn't like being called a unicorn. Then again, when Leo opened his eyes, he noticed he was gripping the pegasus's mane.

"Sorry!" He yelled, letting go and wrapping his arms around Hershey's neck once more.

Leo's breath caught in his throat as he took in the sight of the camp--it was vast, but small from such a height, and beautiful. The rolling hills were just as bright green as they would be on a summer's day. The Big House still looked big and inviting, the cabins gleaming with unique colors. There was some kind of towering fortress in the distance--wait, was that lava? Awesome! And the beach, with the gleaming water of Long Island sound.

His eyes stung, his heart slowing down to a dull thump in his chest. Could this really be a home for him? He couldn't be special enough to be here. Leo's dad...his mom always waxed poetic about him, but was he really some sort of Greek god? Leo hardly knew anything about Greek gods, and what he did know didn't come from her. What if his dad was a nobody? Well, like father, like son. At least his father didn't hurt his mother the way Leo did. He wanted nothing more than for her to be here, watching him--maybe freaking out a little--when really...he was the reason she wasn't.

Leo blinked, tears slipping down his cheeks. Yep, leave it to him to bum himself out when he didn't have anyone to joke around with. He was riding on a freaking pegasus, something none of those rich kids at his old school could brag about, and here he was ruining it for himself.

Emotions coiled and burned within him, like they always did when he was on his own. Hershey suddenly neighed loudly, something of a horse-scream--could horses scream?--as his legs flailed through the air.

"I'm not touching your mane!" Leo argued. Only then he stopped short, pulling his smoldering hand away.

He had burned the hair off the back of the pegasus's neck.

He could only stare in horror as Hershey dove into an emergency landing, his anxiety barely registering the deadly dive. The pegasus clomped to the ground, the earth digging beneath his hooves. The land was so jarring, Leo was tossed off, rolling hard against the dirt.

"Leo!"

"Hey, you okay, man?"

"Gods, that looked rough!"

"Someone get an Apollo camper!"

Leo sat up, rubbing his head with a groan. The first person he saw was Nico, kneeling down with concern in his eyes. Other campers had gathered around--they must have seen the dive. Some were coming near him, some were checking on Hershey.

"No," Leo started meekly. It sounded as if his throat had been the thing to get burned. "No, no, please, I'm sorry..."

"You're just in shock," Nico replied. "We're going to get you to the infirmary and you'll be fine, I promise."

"No," Leo protested. "I hurt him. I deserved it."

"You--" Nico started. His form was blurry--Leo's eyes were watery--from the fall or everything else, Leo didn't know. He could still feel his own skin, hot and invasive, blood boiling and itching to break free.

"Hershey's burned," Leo heard one of the campers say.

"How'd he get burned?"

"Did the new kid burn him? Damn--"

"Alright," Nico stood, stepping towards the campers. "That's enough. We don't need a crowd to figure this out--"

Leo's breathing quickened, and he was reminded of one of his foster homes. His foster "dad", if one could call him that, would come home in a rage after work. Leo would hide in the closet, trying to calm his panic attacks. He'd memorized that old floral pattern, even in the darkness. He had left scorch marks there, some flowers of his own.

Leo let out a sob, erupting into flames.

Several campers screamed, some rushing back in fear from what Leo could see. Layers of orange, blue, and red licked his skin, flicked around at the outside audience. It never felt bad for him. No, it was just warm. And still new, after all this time.

He hadn't caused a fire this big in maybe...eight years? But he felt more home in this than he possibly could anywhere else.

His Aunt Rosa always said he was destined for the fires of hell.

"Leo," Nico said, situating himself in front of Leo, an appropriate few feet back. Still, he was closer than anyone else would be comfortable. "I'm going to sit right here with you until..."

"Until I calm down?" Leo challenged, unsure why there was malice in his voice, or was that amusement. He was a real sick person, that was for sure.

"Until the flames go out," Nico replied. "Everything will be fine."

He didn't sound convinced. In fact, that didn't even sound like something he'd usually say. Leo laughed. He wasn't sure why, but he did. He rested his head on his hand and smiled.

Yeah, he had to be having some sort of breakdown.

"You asked me earlier why there was a crack in the floor at the mess hall?" Nico continued. "I don't like sharing this, but...I raised the dead for the first time, then. A couple years ago, my...my friend, Percy Jackson. He told me that...my sister had passed away on a quest."

His voice faltered, dying off in his throat, a flicker to match the flames.

"I was...so angry," Nico continued shakily. "So upset, so...overwhelmed that it felt like this...darkness was exploding out of me. But then the skeletons went to attack Percy, and I stopped them. The ground swallowed them whole. I never wanted to hurt anyone. And I'm sure you don't either. I know it was an accident. The others...they'll get it, eventually. We've all had our moments..."

Leo felt the flickering fire start to die down, filled instead with a red-hot sense of shame. Nico's sister had died, probably at the hands of some vicious beast, and Leo had been upset over nothing. He could feel his own tears sizzling, evaporating off his cheeks.

"I'm sorry," Leo managed, the words lone and stupid. The flames had mostly died down at that point, thankfully leaving Leo's clothes intact. He took a deep breath of fresh air, grounding him to this reality, as strange as it was. "I want to learn to control this...I want to learn to use this for good, if I can..."

He heard the sound of galloping, but instead of Hershey, he saw Chrion in what looked like leather armor.

"I heard there was an accident. Leo, are you--oh," Chrion stopped short, looking at something behind Leo. Only there was nothing behind Leo except the stables, and Piper had taken Hershey away. He was looking at something above Leo's head.

There, emblazoned in gold, was the emblem of a flaming hammer.

Leo tried to reach out and touch it, but as soon as it had appeared, it was gone.

"Hephaestus," Chiron announced to the remaining campers, most of which began to kneel. "God of blacksmiths, fire, and the forges. Leo Valdez, you are a son of Hephaestus."