Nico Di Angelo Meets Tam Song

How is This Not Considered Torture?

There was seriously something wrong with people at this school.

"What are we doing now?" Nico asked Biana.

"I have no idea," she admitted with a shrug. "They'll tell us what they are testing us for in a little bit."

"There's different things to test for?" This world was getting more complicated.

"Yeah... empaths, telepaths, vanishers," Biana started to list them off, but Nico's mind snagged on one.

"Telepaths?" he asked, slightly panicked. "As in they read minds?"

"Yeah."

If there were telepaths just waltzing around who is to say they haven't already read his mind? He hated the idea of people poking around in there. And they could have already discovered his many secrets.

Sorry voice in his head, the promise might have already been broken.

Nico must have had a startled expression on his face, because Biana quickly reassured him.

"Don't worry." She placed a hand on his shoulder but withdrew it when he flinched. "We have laws in place so they can't just do whatever they like."

Nico severely doubted those laws were actually followed. How would someone catch or prove they were reading minds they weren't supposed to.

But he decided to roll with it. Who knew, maybe the elves had stupidly large consciences to stop them.

His thoughts were disrupted when a teacher walked in to the room.

They had been standing in a large empty room but when the teacher snapped his fingers a large oven looking thing popped out of nowhere.

Nico took a step back. "What?"

Biana groaned. "They're testing to see if we're Frosters."

"What?"

"If we can create ice," Biana explained, "but almost no one has it."

Nico stared at his hands and then at the oven. Well... this would be fun.

"And the oven?"

"He's a conjuror. That's a cooler ability. You snap your fingers and you get stuff."

That would be useful.

"Alright... in you go," the teacher called out and began shepherding people into the giant oven.

"We're getting in there?" he whispered to Biana.

"That's how they test if we're Frosters. Our abilities are only triggered in extreme conditions and this is... well..."

"It's pretty extreme," he finished.

"Yeah."

"Stop murmuring and get in!" the teacher yelled.

Inside was insufferable. They were packed together, shoulder to shoulder, and Nico hated being touched by this many people.

It was also really, really, really boring. Like mind boggling boring.

There wasn't anything to do or anything for him to focus on. They just sat there. Sweating.

So uncomfortable.

Slowly ever ten minutes or so, they would crank up the heat of this insufferable box.

Nico was reminded of being in Leo's workshop.

And he wasn't the biggest fan of Leo's workshop.

An itching sensation began to build up in his fingers, though Nico did his best to stuff it back down.

But it didn't seem to want to listen. Nico started scratching his hands and tried to distract himself from the blistering heat.

Despite his best efforts, ice spread out of his hands, covering the floor in front of him. Snowflakes drifted down and surrounded him, landing on his shoulders.

He cooled off instantly.

Biana gaped at him, and so did the other people sitting near him.

"Zeus's receding hairline," he cursed. Nico hadn't wanted people to know he could do this partly because of all of the 'keep your secrets' things the head voice had nagged him about and partly because he liked to keep a few tricks up his sleeve.

And if he needed to use his little ice powers, he was in very deep trouble.

The teacher had him step out of the box, for everyone to stare at him.

"Our first Froster!" he announced. Dull, bored clapping filled the room.

So much for keeping that quiet.

Fun fact. According to the Rick Riordan wiki, Nico has ice manipulation. I totally knew this prior to searching up nico's powers on the wiki yep.