The next morning, Nico woke up instinctually early, as if his mind were telling him off for last night. Really, dude? What were you thinking? Opening up, being vulnerable...

Luckily, he'd rolled over sometime in his sleep, his hand slipping out of Leo's. Unluckily, there was nothing he could do to avoid the awkwardness that would surely follow into this morning.

So, when Nico sat up-he looked over at Leo, who was still asleep, curls askew and cheek pressed against the pillow-he decided the best way forward was out. Out and on with the quest.

Piper was stirring, and she sat up and looked around, noticing Nico had gotten dressed in under a minute.

"Are you getting us breakfast?" She asked blearily. "I could go for some yogurt and fruit..."

"No room service," Nico replied. "I'm going downstairs to get us checked out. Make sure Leo doesn't forget anything, okay?"

Piper sighed but nodded, grabbing her hairbrush. She checked the time. "It's only 6:45, do we really need to check out this early? We should maybe try to see a sunrise before we go...you know, underground..."

Nico shook his head. "We need to get to Hedge as soon as possible. If you hurry, you can get the complimentary breakfast."

That seemed incentive enough. As Nico shrugged on his coat and turned to leave, he could hear Piper waking Leo up with promises of pancakes and bacon.

As Nico passed the Out Of Order sign hung on the elevator on the way to the stairs, he mulled over the events of last night. The dream-this one containing a darkened temple, beady yellow eyes, and strands of shadow strangling his friends. It was the first dream Nico had had that was so frantic, so unclear, and that scared him more than any kind of dream. Still, he couldn't help but focus on the irrelevant-the aftermath, his need to be comforted like a child.

'You are a child,' a voice spoke in his head, one that sounded eerily like Bianca. He heard her sometimes, but he knew it wasn't her spirit. No, this was his own imagination, talking back and forth to himself.

Why had Leo reached out like that, tracing nimble fingers so gently against Nico's hand as if it were crafted from porcelain? He didn't seem the type, but did Nico seem in that dire of a need after that desperate hug?

If it was a girl he wouldn't be acting like this. He'd be anxious and distant, sure, that was his bread and butter, but with a boy...

It was the whole business with Percy Jackson that made him so...strange about everything. And it was uncalled for to even think of Leo's gesture as anything but grossly platonic.

And Nico was only thinking of it because it was so extreme, and he hoped Leo never did anything like it again.

'Hey, you,' he remembered Leo's voice then, every decibel and hint of tone amplified in the darkness. Why did it have to sound like...that? Why was Nico even thinking about this irrelevant event when he had so many other things to worry-

He snapped himself back into reality as he slapped the key card onto the front counter. "We're checking out." he said to the woman at the front counter, realizing as soon as he'd said it that he sounded ruder than he'd meant to.

The woman looked up from her computer, and the first thing Nico noticed was that she was pretty. Like, dazzlingly pretty. Nico hardly paid attention to that sort of thing, especially not with women, but even so, he felt his face flush as he took a step back.

She swept back a lock of curly caramel-brown hair to reveal a name tag. Mina. She smiled, brown eyes sparkling, showing off dimples and straight white teeth. If anything, she should have been working for a modeling agency rather than some hotel in the middle of nowhere.

"Seems a bit early, don't you think?" Mina asked sweetly, though she took the card anyway.

"We want to get a head start on the day," Nico replied. "My...my friends will be down soon with the other key."

"Right," Mina stowed the key in a small box by her computer. "I was told by the guy on the night shift that you kids seemed awfully young to be getting a room here. You know that if we find out that you're runaways, we have to report it, right?"

"We're eighteen," Nico said stonily. "All of us. We aren't running from anything." The last thing Nico needed as they were trying to save the world was the cops on their tail-taking Percy's word for it from his first quest, it was not at all convenient. Not to mention, Nico was fifteen, but also ninety. That had to put his average chronological age, what, in his fifties? Nope, thinking about that made his head spin.

Mina hummed in a way that suggested she didn't believe him. "You should be running," she said serenely. "Yes, running to see what a beautiful sunrise is coming along today. You never know when it may be the last one."

"The last," Nico started, his heart starting to race as he backed up a step. His vision began to clear-Mina's brown eyes flashed in the light, and with a blink, they turned a deep blood red. Her hair appeared to be on fire--or the fire itself. Her lips curled, long fangs protruding from her mouth-fangs that were already covered in blood.

Nico grabbed for the hilt of his sword on his belt-only he'd left it upstairs. He'd been in such a rush to leave, he hadn't thought about it. He started for the spare knife in his pocket as he stumbled back further, only to find the pocket empty; that was the knife he'd given to Leo. Big help that would do him now.

Just then, the door from the stairwell opened, and Piper and Leo came out. They both seemed pretty tired and inattentive-that is, until Mina shoved aside the desk monitor, which fell to the floor with an explosive crash. She then stepped up over the desk-one bronze leg, then one goat leg-each with the agility of a demon from a horror movie.

"The mortal receptionist I had to eat this morning was utter filth," Mina drawled, flames dancing around her head. "The blood of a demigod, however...so rich, running with traces of divinity and ambrosia-"

"Nico!" Piper yelled, unsheathing her knife and running forward. She only slowed down for a moment when the empousa met her eyes with a snarl. "Leo, the sword!" She called, charging forward with her knife. Mina slashed at her, but Piper ducked, in turn slashing her shoulder. If the slash was deeper, and a few inches to the left, it would have sent her in a dust heap right back to Tartarus.

Leo tossed Nico his sword in its sheath before lighting up his hands. He looked conflicted-like he wanted to chuck fireballs at Mina, but with Piper fighting so close with her knife, he couldn't risk it.

Nico thought briefly about summoning some of the dead-something he would have had to do if Piper and Leo hadn't arrived on time-but no. One good slash with his sword, and she would be out for the count.

But just as Nico unsheathed his sword, the front door opened. The mostly-empty rundown hotel had one more occupant: Percy Jackson.

Nico's eyes widened, and he almost dropped his sword. "Percy!" he called, kicking Mina away from Piper so hard the empousa slammed against the desk and crumpled to the floor. That would be temporary, though, with the strength of most monsters. The more important matter-what in Hades was Percy Jackson doing here in Canada? Did Chiron send him because he knew Nico's quest would fail?

Leo made a confused, choked-off sound. "That's Percy?"

Percy started towards the empousa, and admittedly, he did have a bit more...swagger than Nico had seen previously. He smiled at Nico in an almost flashy way-Nico felt his face flush; Percy could kill the worst of monsters, but he never made a show of it unless he had to. This was just...bizarre.

"Don't worry about this one, sweetheart," Percy called loftily, unsheathing his sword. His voice--it sounded like him at first, then it morphed into something different, like...a woman's voice. "I'll take care of it." Just as Mina lunged, Percy stabbed her clean through the chest, reducing her to a pile of golden dust.

The only thing left was a Celestial Bronze leg. Percy frowned and poked at it with his foot. "Does anyone want this? I imagine my husband might like some for his forges..."

Nico's heart simultaneously dropped and felt like it was crawling up his throat. This was not Percy at all-first the Mist had tricked his vision, then the magic of a goddess.

Yep. This was Aphrodite, the goddess of love. Interfering on a quest where three demigods were trying to save the god of the sun from the goddess of night. And Nico had just foolishly confessed to his quest mates that the goddess of love had taken the form of Percy Jackson in his eyes.

"Teresa Palmer?" Leo demanded, starring gob-smacked at the goddess. "I mean-" he squinted as the goddess must have continued to change forms in his eyes. "I think you're Teresa Palmer, and then you keep changing...dude, I can't believe we just got saved by Teresa-freaking-Palmer!"

"Leo, no one knows what you're talking about," Piper snapped. She was frowning at Aphrodite, arms crossed-that's when Nico noticed she was sporting a nasty cut on her arm from the fight. "Hello, mother."

Aprhodite began to change forms in Nico's eyes-a handsome actor he'd seen on TV back at the Lotus Hotel so many years ago. Then Will Solace, who he crushed on for about a month when getting over Percy, though Nico quickly lost interest and retreated to the safety of not crushing on anyone. Then, of course, Aphrodite's form changed back to Percy, with his charming crooked smile, as if she were mocking him.

"Hello, dear," Aphrodite cooed. "Oh, I'm so excited to meet your adorable little friends! Come, let's have some coffee and chat."

---

"Hm," Aphrodite frowned from her spot at the table, arms crossed-Nico could now easily tell this wasn't Percy, as she wasn't anything like him. "What's taking the coffee so long, honey?"

Leo, who had been up and tinkering with the machine, jolted slightly, his face flushing. "The coffee maker's broken, but I'm working on it! Should just be a second..." he pulled out a screwdriver from his magic toolbelt, cursing when the wrong one seemed to come out.

Leo was on edge. Aphrodite was making him on edge, and he wasn't the only one that seemed to be effected. Between Piper's suddenly cloudy disposition and Nico feeling as if his bones were melting from anxiety, no one seemed to want the goddess of love here. Not that they could tell her that, though.

"So," Leo asked, cursing under his breath as one of the parts he was working with seemed to come undone as he was holding it. This place was worth what they paid for it, that was for sure, though Nico was used to much worse accommodations. "Aphrodite...Miss Aphrodite, Goddess Aphrodite," he juggled the titles. "Why is it that I see you as Teresa Palmer? At least, most of the time..."

Nico clenched his fists in his lap so hard, his knuckles went white. Of course, once Leo and Piper found out-

Aphrodite smiled-Percy's smile, a hand holding up her chin casually. "That's because you see me as what you think of when you think of true love and beauty. Sometimes it's who you've loved in the past, who you love currently, or just whoever you think is the most beautiful. It's so much fun hearing about who people see when they look at me!"

Piper's brows furrowed. "So, Leo, who is Teresa Palmer?"

"Oh," Leo's face flushed as he put the finishing touches on the coffee maker and started a pot. "Just this actress...I took one of my foster siblings to the movies this past summer to see Sorcerer's Apprentice, and I thought the lady playing the love interest, Becky, was really cute. But, Lady Aphrodite, your form changes...like, I've seen girls I crushed on in school and stuff, too. And I don't know who Piper saw, but I guess Nico saw-" Nico met his eyes, then, and Leo stopped short. He avoided his eyes, and when Nico looked at Piper, all he saw reflected in her eyes was pity.

"Yes, Nico's story is particularly special," Aphrodite mused. "In love with Percy Jackson, the striking young man who saved the world just last August. Meanwhile, he's in love with the-not-so-fashionable, but still smart, which I'm told means something-Annabeth Chase. So tragic, so different from your typical hero-maiden cliché! But it's a lot more accurate to real Ancient Greece. I mean just look at my half brother you're on a mission to save! His love life is chock full of beautiful women and handsome men, but he can never seem to keep them, can he? Meanwhile, my love-life calendar is booked into the next millennia, believe me."

Nico blinked frequently, eyes watering, every inch of his body stiff as he felt the impulse to heave into the nearby trashcan. Here Aphrodite was, flaunting around his love life-or the lack thereof-to the two people he was supposed to lead on this dangerous quest, and she was treating it like gossip.

"Mother," Piper started. "Leave him alone. He clearly doesn't want you talking about it."

"Okay, okay, I guess I'll leave it alone," Aphrodite rolled her eyes-for a moment Will Solace's blue eyes, then Percy's green ones again. "It's so fun to watch, though." She reached across the table, as if expecting to hold Nico's hands. "Don't worry, sweetheart, you'll get your happy ending."

Nico could almost taste iron on his tongue. He let out a breath, each one a struggle. "I don't need one." he said softly. He wanted more than anything to look down at his lap, to knock this chair down and run away, to shadow travel to China (again), though he held firm. He locked his eyes on hers-on Percy's.

Aphrodite blinked at him, as if she couldn't possibly process what she'd done to upset him. "Sorry, dear?"

Nico folded his hands together, ignoring the sweat. "I don't need a happy ending to my love life, or a love life in general. Respectfully, My Lady, I'm opting out."

The tension in the room seemed to increase tenfold, so much so that Leo's hand accidentally caught fire, melting part of the countertop. He grabbed a towel, attempting to fan it out.

Aphrodite threw back her head and laughed. "Oh, please, Nico, you're too cute. Listen, sweetheart...I know of people that have opted out of my little game. People born liking no one, never pursuing romance. I don't understand them, frankly, and I think they're kinda boring, but I know they're out there."

She took out a compact, as if checking some makeup she could only see on herself. She then closed it, eyes boring into Nico's. "A little fun fact: you are not one of those people. You can mourn over lost loves for years, pretending your heart has gone cold and dead, but I know better. I see your heart, and I know its silent yearning. My dear, that yearning will never leave you. So, you can be nice and follow the plan-maybe there's a nice boy waiting at that little camp for you." She blinked, eyes reflecting the beautiful sky blue of Will Solace's once more. "Or, you can continue to disrespect me, and you'll find-oh no!-you'll end up sad and alone for the rest of your days. We don't want that, now, do we?"

"He-He won't be alone." Leo spoke up. "He has us-Piper and I, we're here for him."

Aphrodite, Piper, and Nico all looked towards Leo. Leo met Nico's eyes, and an unidentifiable emotion sparked within Leo's eyes. Nico glanced down; Leo was always full of pent-up energy, but never had he trembled so much. He took the coffee pot and filled the goddess a cup-a to-go cup. Nico felt a small smile tugging at his lips.

"Here," Leo handed her the cup, along with the accompanying bowls of cream and sugar. "Please don't curse my love life for eternity."

Aphrodite frowned, materializing a purse in midair and producing a small bottle of golden liquid--nectar, the drink of the gods. She poured a little into her coffee and stirred it with the little coffee stirrer.

"I didn't come here to make threats," She said. "I came here with a key reminder. My loves, you're going to Tartarus. That is a big deal. Not only Tartarus, but directly into Hypnos's tomb of sleep. While the sword may protect you from monsters, it will not protect you from the temptations of the tomb. Do you know what will protect you? Love. Love has acted as a guiding beacon for heroes for millennia. Honesty is one of the strong pillars that holds and honors love. The moment you all are honest with each other, the moment your love can guide you through. There..." Aphrodite seemed to grow wistful. "There has never been a demigod to make it through Hypnos's tomb and live to tell the tale. I just wanted to try to help you where I can, so that the worst doesn't happen to my daughter..."

Nico glanced over at Piper, and his heart sunk as he saw she was trying to keep tears at bay.

"Mom," Piper said. "I appreciate you coming to talk to us...and when you guided me with those doves to camp, but...you can't just fan out my friend's love lives out in the open. Not everyone is open about that kind of stuff, especially if they're-if they're-"

"Gay?" Nico tried, his head woozy from just saying the word, his nausea like an endless pit in his stomach.

Piper looked at him, her lips quirked to the side in that contemplative way of hers. "Exactly."

Aphrodite sighed. "Alright, fine. I've clearly overstayed my welcome. Excuse me for trying to protect you, and maybe getting a little carried away with it...just please try to remember my words, alright? I promise you that I'm right. Love solves everything, even if it's not in ways you'd expect." She took a sip of coffee and made a face. "Ugh, that was not worth the wait. One star. Now, dears, if you would look away, please."

Nico, Leo, and Piper all closed their eyes and instinctively looked down as the goddess revealed her true form, the brightness of it reflecting off every surface for just a moment. Then, she was gone, though the thick, uneasy tension she'd left in the room remained-as it would for the foreseeable future of the quest.

---

"I'm really sorry, Nico," Piper said, shouldering her bag as they made their way out to the car. On their way out, they had all noticed the bloodied handprint on the clear door of the break room, but had chosen not to say anything. Selfishly, Nico felt worse about what Aphrodite had said than about Mina snacking on a mortal.

"Forget about it," Nico replied. "Just...do me a favor and don't talk about things that don't matter, okay?"

"But it does matter," Leo interjected. "It's not just-"

"Look, I'm sorry, okay?" Nico demanded. "I'm sorry we had to sleep in the same bed, I promise it wasn't anything-"

Leo's brows furrowed. "No, dude, I don't care about that! What I mean is, like..." he sighed. "We don't care if you're gay-"

"Great!" Nico clapped his hands together, and in his rush of anxiety, a small crack opened in the floor. "It's great that you stood up to Aphrodite for me, even if you might've not meant it...so just stop talking about things you don't understand, alright?"

Leo's expression morphed from one of confusion to anger. He reached for his wrist-for a moment, Nico thought he was going to set his hand ablaze. Now more than ever, his fight or flight was up and running. Instead, Leo undid his wristwatch, handing it over to Nico. He also passed over Nico's knife. He then huffed, his eyes dark and unreadable as he turned and marched off to the car, slamming the door to the backseat.

"I knew this would ruin everything," Nico managed, clutching the wristwatch, running a thumb over the smooth glass face. "I knew coming forward like this would have consequences for the quest..."

"It won't," Piper insisted. "I mean, I told you about me, and how I'm...not really that into guys, and you took it well. I'm kinda surprised you didn't tell me about yourself, but I get it. What happened in there with mom wasn't cool, but Leo was just trying to be supportive. Maybe..."

As she trailed off hopelessly, Nico's brows furrowed at the watch. Why had Leo given it to him? Was it a symbol of last night, and how it meant nothing to their new friendship now? Nico pressed the Light button as Leo did last night, that small blue light bringing Nico back down to the mortal world as it did last night. Only in his nerves, he tapped it twice, and he found the watch open up around the middle. Neatly, impossibly stored in a compartment among the gears, was a tiny folded note. Nico took hold of it with trembling with fingers and opened it up:

we could be Maia & Katana. promise.

"Maia and Katana..." Nico whispered. He glanced up at Piper. Over the years, he hadn't exactly had the chance to study extensively on Greek myths outside of his old obsession with Mythomagic. "Who's Maia and Katana?"

Piper looked down at the note and shrugged. She glanced back at the car, probably mulling over how Leo was feeling and trying to piece it together with this mysterious note. "I don't know," Piper said, hands on her hips. "But as much as I hate to admit it, I think my mom is right. We hardly know each other, and if we're going to go through hell and back...maybe a little honesty is the right place to start."