As much as Nikolas had grown to love his new home in Camp Half-Blood, he couldn't stand how he was late to pretty much everything. No matter how early he left, be it minutes or even hours, something always managed to get in his way. A year ago he would have attributed it to bad luck or chance, but after learning the truth about his father and who he really was through his year at Camp Half-Blood, it was clear that the cards were constantly stacked against him just for bearing the blood of Hephaestus. It was fairly obvious that the gods were rather fickle and even petty beings, who did not hesitate to blame the son for the sins of the father. It wouldn't surprise him if the inconveniences and problems that constantly plagued him had been conjured by the gods themselves: just desserts, he supposed, for being the unwanted spawn of a hated, brilliant cripple.

But oh, no, Nick wasn't going to be late this time. He wouldn't let the gods bully him today. With a sly grin, he slammed a fist onto the button of the new elevator he had just installed and let out a hearty laugh when the gears began to spin and the pulleys and cranks began to do their magic. Building an elevator was a sorely needed necessity for the crippled son of Hephaestus, as it allowed him to access the main floor from the basement easily and effortlessly, and most importantly of all, allowed skip the exhausting and incredibly humiliating chore of scooting up an entire filthy metal spiral staircase on his ass. Nick watched as the elevator platform descended-- and jolted to a halt nearly three feet above the floor, much too high for him to climb up on from his wheelchair. Confused, Nick punched the button again, which only caused the elevator to start its ascent. Another push of the button caused it to stop three feet above the ground once more. Incredibly frustrated by the machine's malfunction, Nick rapidly rammed the side of his fist onto the button, as if pressing it harder and faster would result in it actually working. Instead, the elevator creaked and let out a low, ominous moan-- and then suddenly crashed to the ground with a deafening boom.

After the dust and debris had settled, Nick let out a sigh. The wrath of the gods still dogged him at every turn, it seemed. Well, looks like he wasn't going to taking his nifty new elevator today... or anytime soon, judging by the smoking pile of wreckage before his feet. And so, leaving that problem for another day, he wheeled himself over to the staircase and plopped out of his chair and spun himself about on the ground, letting his back face the stairs. He left his wheelchair and began scooting up the stairs with a painful slowness, pushing himself up backwards step by step by step until after what seemed like an eternity, he reached the top. Once there, another wheelchair waited with his trusty crossbow Loyalty strapped to the side. After taking a short breather he pulled himself into his low-backed wheelchair and unlocked the wheels. Giving the wheels an experimental turn, he thanked the gods no one had messed with his second wheelchair while he had been working in the basemnt for days straight on that blasted elevator.

"Well," he said to himself brightly as he steered his way through the veritable minefield that was the messy main floor of Cabin Nine, "Let's see how Erin's doing with the newbies, shall we?" He pulled open the door and after taking a moment to enjoy the sunlight, used all his upper body strength to shoot himself forward and fly over the steps leading into the cabin. He got a second or two of airtime before landing and skidding on the ground, the wheels beneath him creaking dangerously from the impact. Nick was suddenly grateful he had taken the time to reinforce the thing. using the built-up speed from exiting the cabin, he wheeled himself over to the crowd of newbies just in time to see the most bizarre display.

Apparently someone had trash-talked Cabin Thirteen or something of the like, as Erin seemed to be threatening to probably throw some loudmouth newblood into Tartarus while Thane was making a full display of his power to a group of gawking newbloods. He wasn't surprised by Erin's display of rage, but it was a rare thing to see Thane so peeved that he'd use that funky arm of his. Nick skidded to a stop a short distance off, not wanting to tangle himself in whatever awful mess that was. No one really liked the so-called 'Hephaestus hotheads', and he wasn't too eager to make anyone any angrier by reminding them of his existence. After Thane had stormed back inside and Erin finally released the newbie, Nick swallowed his growing nervousness and wheeled himself around the group of newbies-- and almost crashed straight into Syleste of Cabin Fifteen.

"Oh, jeez. Sorry Syleste. Didn't see you there." He carefully made his way around Syleste and approached Erin. "Hey, Erin, sorry I'm late to the party. We get any new Hephaestus kids?"