vatheon | (no subject)

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(no subject)

Who: Leo Valdez, and anyone coming to his birthday party!
When: July 4th
Where: Coral Corral 8, Demigod house
Style: Pick what you'd like.
Status: Open like Leo's presents will be

Today is the kind of day for a party. A birthday party. But not the birthday of a country, or anything, that would just be stupid, especially when there's no USA in Vatheon (The only country is Italy). No, today is Leo's birthday, and this is a surprise party for him.

There's a lot of planning and preparation that's gone into this. The inside of the house is covered in decorations, all thankfully not fish themed. There's a table for presents, and a table with food, including an enormous cake. There's even a birthday playlist in the background, though "You're A Grand Old Flag" seems to have gotten mixed in here and there.

A surprise party isn't complete without a surprise at the beginning, so when Leo gets into the house, everyone had better be ready to shout "surprise!" Other than that, though, there isn't much structure to the party. People are free to mingle, get food, give Leo presents in person, or get angry at him for all those pranks he pulled.

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As one of the people in charge of organizing the party, Dirk has been around since long before the party started, to get everything set up. For that reason, once the party's begun, he doesn't do much actual partying. Mostly, he's off to the side, drinking soda. The only strange thing is that there is a premade bow stuck in his hair, that he either doesn't notice, or isn't paying attention to.

After a while, Leo spots Dirk off to the side and heads over to talk to him.

"You behind putting this whole thing together?" He noticed something in his hair as he approached, but it's only evident what it is when he gets up close enough to be heard. For now, he's just going to leave the bow sitting there.

"Somewhat. It was a collaborative Strider effort," he tells Leo, waving to him as he approaches. "So, was it worth the effort?" Something about the look on his face probably says that he's confident about that, but there's no harm in asking, as far as he's concerned.

"Yeah, it was worth it, but you guys really didn't have to go to all this trouble." Leo shrugs. "I woulda been fine just chilling here with a couple of friends. But thanks."

"You're still chilling with friends. We didn't invite just anyone off the street to this thing, you know." He's hoping that doesn't just mean that Leo would have preferred not to have the party, but unwilling to ask outright and put Leo on the spot.

"I know. And I'm not complaining." He grins just to make sure that's obvious. "Just saying that hanging out with only my closest friends woulda been fine."

"Sure, but I had to make sure I was invited." Dirk keeps a perfectly blank face as he nudges Leo in the side with an elbow. "Unless, of course, you want to feed my ego and tell me that I would have been invited anyway. It's only been a few short months but I already mean the world and the stars to you, right. It's okay, you don't have to say a word. I understand."

Does he mean it sincerely, or sarcastically? Who knows? But it's Dirk, so it's pretty much a certainty that he means it ironically.

"You would have been invited. I don't know about you meaning the world and the stars to me, but you're my closest friend that I've made while here." Leo's being honest. He's got no reason to be glib about this. Or sarcastic. Or ironic. Or any of the other things Dirk thinks he's being.

"Could say the same for you, dude," Dirk says, offering a fist bump. It's pretty much true. He's made a few friends, and a number of accquaintences, since arriving in the bubble, but with them there's almost always a qualifier attached. With Equius, it's sometimes but he's a troll and, more recently, but he hangs with that creepy clown and but he was my sprite. With most of the others interested in robotics, it was but they're way older than me. And with Kid, well, there's no qualifier. It's just I hate that guy.

"Really? But you've been here so long. Not that I'm complaining." Leo grinned and completed the fist bump.

"Doesn't mean I like everyone I've met," Dirk countered. "Sure, I've got guys like Eqiuis who's my bro. But him and people like Ro-Lal are technically from around the same neck of the universes as me."

"Makes sense. I wasn't counting AB and Pipes since they're from back home." They'd probably both kill him if they heard him tossing around those nicknames. Piper cause she hated it when he called her Pipes... and well, Annabeth hasn't had the chance to hear him call her that, so who knows how she'd take it.

"You said friend that you made here, I assumed as much. Technically I met Equius when I came here, which is why I mentioned him. You fun into the guy at all? Big blue troll with one broken horn."

"Yeah, I've run into him. Back during the truth curse. He introduced me to RoboEquius." And Leo just leaves it at that.

Nothing more needs to be said about that. RoboEquius explains himself, even when Equius doesn't. Instead of continuing to contemplate that, Dirk decides to switch the topics. "so about those other presents I have," he says.

"Yeah, been wondering what they are all day. You really know how to keep me in suspense." He tries not to look too eager, but come on, this is Leo. He looks as excited about whatever the gifts might be as a kid on Christmas morning.

After a few quick rapped lines, a metal box drops out of Dirk's sylladex. The lock comes in the form of a puzzle. Dirk hands it over to Leo. "Here you go. Shouldn't take too long for you to figure this out." And it shouldn't. It just involves a little math.

It's a good thing that Leo's great at math and enjoys a good puzzle. It doesn't take him very long at all to unlock the box. But he doesn't open it just yet.

"Nothing's gonna jump out and bite me when I open it, is it?"

"Of course not." The way he says it might not inspire confidence, but there's nothing like airholes in the box to make Leo nervous.

Once Leo opens it, he'll find a very hipsterish hat as the first thing inside.

It could have been something mechanical that jumped out and bitten him. But maybe that's something only Leo would think of doing.

"You trying to tell me something, dude?" He asked, eying the hat.

"That's for you to decide. I'm not about to decode it for you." He does, however, take it out and drop it on Leo's head.

The part under the hat is a package wrapped in fish-themed Christmas wrapping paper.

"I'm thinking you're trying to tease me about that stupid curse." Thankfully, it didn't affect him like the one he'd worn during the hat curse. He was the same old Leo.

Leo pulls the wrapped gift out of the box. "Nice gift wrap." He grins as he carefully opens it. That wrapping paper is a gift in and of itself.

It's a very good thing, though it brings a question to mind. "What happened to that outfit of yours, anyway?" He hasn't seen Leo in it ever since. It's really too bad.

The box, once unwrapped, has a number of items in it. There's a copy of "Robots for dummies," that a post-it note on the front identifies is "as edited by Dirk Strider." There's a custom-made pocket knife, with lots of weird tools on it and the symbol of Hephaestus emblazoned on it in bronze. Each of the parts of it have been made whole, but have possible spaces for celestial bronze add-ons.

And at the very bottom is a bottle of lemon pledge.

"I still have it in my closet," he say with a shrug. "Not really the best thing to wear while messing around with tools." Which is something he does pretty much all the time. Even though the clothes didn't cost him anything, he doesn't want to ruin them with grease and oil.

Leo takes out the book and briefly flips through it. He's gonna have to give that a better look later, but it looks amusing to say the least. He notices the Lemon pledge lurking under the pocket knife and laughs. Then he inspects the pocket knife very carefully, checking out everything on it.

"This is really sweet. You made it, right? I'm impressed."

The intent behind it, that it's meant for him to add onto with the celestial bronze weapons doesn't go unnoticed. And it's probably the most thoughtful gift he's ever received.

He waffles for a moment on whether or not a fist bump is the appropriate response and decides it isn't enough. Not for gifts this well thought out. He moves in for a hug (a manly bro hug, of course) and says "Thanks, man."

"Course I made it." Making gifts is one of the things he always does for birthdays. It's easy to find something that sort of fits, but he's always figured that if you want to make a gift that actually works for a person, you make it yourself.

He doesn't get the chance to say anything else before Leo moves in to hug him, and for a few moments after that, he's too surprised to say anything. It's not that he doesn't want the hug. It's more that he's not sure what he wants to do with it. "It's what I do," he says finally.