a free day [private]

It was rare that Lucy ever had much free time what with her camp duties and all, but hey, she didn't question today's. Her guard duty had been cut a bit short because two newer campers had come in to be shown the ropes, so she was allowed to leave early as their superior lectured them on the finer points of not letting strangers in through the tunnel without good proof.

Heaving a sigh, she sat by the lake of New Rome picking at the grass by her feet. It was a beautiful day: sunny and cloudless, people were lurking about and swimming in the lake. She was alone as usualy, but she didn't care much for that. She liked to be alone and nap, because conversations were so hard to keep up with.

With a shrug, she laid back on the ground and shut her eyes, suppressing a yawn as she basked in the warm sunlight. She'd have to get back to the barracks in about an hour, but for now she could relax.

Things were turning out the same for long time, Deos was never given any responsibility due to the fact of his incompetence, for example he had snuck away from several of his guard duty's in the past week he was punished and lectured but no one ever got through to the young demigod. Just like he usually did Deos was avoiding the other romans skipping out on his guard duty by running off to one of his many hiding places. Taking in a long deep breath of the warm spring air, Deos stood on a slight hill in view of the lake he knew, it wouldn't be long til he was caught being in such an open area but he didn't care he liked to watch people examine them like a docter or an investigator.  

Sitting on the hill looking out at the sparkling lake, he watched the other demigods he thought about who they were, what jobs they did and who their parents we're, at times Deos even tried to guess even if he would never know the answer to any of the questions he thought about. With a groan of relief he stretched across the warm grass feeling the sun bathe him as he felt his back pop "it will take them at least half an hour or so to find me so... I might as well relax" Deos thought to himself with a smirk.

It had been maybe a minute before, suddenly, a sort of falling sensation came over her -- and then Lucy started before she fell asleep, sitting straight up as she blinked awkwardly and tried to still her accelerated heart rate. Taking a deep breath, she sighed again and rubbed her forehead with the palm of her hand to calm an itching sensation that had formed there. Was it itchy? She thought something had landed on it while she dozed-- perhaps a bug, like a fly or something, but she had heard no buzzing at all beforehand.

Taking a look around, the daughter of Somnus scanned the surrounding area again -- and noticed now a boy on one of the weird slopes around the lake -- a little hill only several yards away, stretching there like some sort of cat. He looked sort of familiar, but Lucy couldn't see his face very well. He probably wasn't in the same cohort as her, though, so he must have been somebody she'd seen lurking about during War Games or doing errands for the centurions. She glanced at her watch and frowned at the time, speaking aloud to herself: "2:30 pm? Pfft. I would've been done guard duty by now."

The sun was shining down on the roman camp, making Deos smile as he felt the sun, warm the grass around him. The demigod crossed his arms behind his head as his eye lids started to feel heavy. Deos let out a sigh of content as he felt the sun beat down on him and the surrounding camp the young demigod ran his arms and legs along the warm grass as his worry's started to melt away from his expectant lecture, to his punishment for leaving guard duty. As the young demigod ran his arms and legs along the warm grass the friction between his skin and the warm grass giving him a bit of satisfaction as he felt a sensation along his skin. The young man looked as if he was trying to make a snow angel in the grass as he squirmed in the grass. Deos's eyes lurched open as he felt a pair of eyes staring at him, he sat up looking around, the lake filled with groups of demigods no nothing was out of the ordinary there to deos, he then began to look around along the sweeping fields of grass looking for someone suspecting it was a search party to get him back to his duty. Then the demigod saw a girl laying in the grass several yards away ""how did I miss that chick!?!?!" Deos thought panicked as heat started to flush to his cheeks as he blushed as he thought about what he had been doing. ""how long has she been there!?"he asked himself, the boy looked at her he had pretty good eye sight but he couldn't see her face thanks to the angle but he was sure she wasn't,t in his cohort but then again he was never a people person.

Lazily, Lucy lifted her hand to her face to rub at an itchy spot on her forehead, taking another casual glance around her only for her gaze to fall on that boy on the hill again. Judging by the shifting sound close by her in the grass earlier, he must have been moving around quite a bit. Like an antsy puppy or the like.

She blinked at him as he stared back at her, looking slightly red in the face and shifty-eyed like she had just caught him red-handed doing... something. Probably one of those troublemaker legionnaires -- they seemed to increase in number as the days passed and as they all began to get claimed. What could this boy have done to warrant such a reaction? The only thing she could think of was skipping some sort of duty, like guard duty or kitchen duty or cleanup, but she really couldn't tell nor did she care. Lucy personally had no issue with such kids because it wasn't her job to keep them in line and they never really hurt her ayway; the poor centurions and their inferiors, though, probably were tearing fistfuls of their own hair out as these brats tried to keep causing trouble and were virtually handing their own heads over to them on golden platters. Camp Jupiter (and, to a degree, New Rome) was very disciplined and militaristic, she could admit, but they could certainly use a bit more freedom.

But they'd been doing this for hundreds to thousands of years, so it probably wasn't in her best interest for the daughter of Somnus to subtly suggest the centurions and praetors lay off a bit. She valued her head. It was a very beautiful head that would not look good at all on a spike. Her parents wouldn't be happy about her losing it for a stupid opinion at all.

She frowned at him for a second before asking, suppressing a yawn to keep herself from sounding rude: "You okay there, buddy?"

After a minute or so, Deos looked down at the dark green grass he heard the girl say something, but the demigod was trying to focus on something else besides the girl and her beady eyes. He looked back up at the girl, he was now calm instead of flushed and embarrassed like he was moments ago. What the girl had said registered to him after a minute, "Yes, I'm fine i was just..." The boy said trying to think up a believable explanation " I was.." he repeated, a thousand awful explanations went through his head but after a minute, he was flustered " I was just messing around that's all i do strange things sometimes... i guess or at least I've been told" Deos said finally telling the girl the truth.

The demigod stood up taking a long stretch which, in turn made him sigh in relief, he looked at the lake "It's a beautiful day isn't it.. definitely not a day to be spending doing guard duty wouldn't you say?" he asked the girl calmly, he could now clearly see her face " No she certainly isn't in my cohort " he thought to himself as the wind started to get stronger blowing across the camp, pushing the demigods hair to the side which made him grumble in annoyance "Hey girl or whatever your name is, i haven't seen you around the entire time I've been here which cohort are you in?" he asked looking back at her instead of the lake. Deos wondered, if a search party came around the lake, would this girl point them to him because of his suspicious behavior?, deos certainly was a very... distinct demigod to miss so it would probably be better if he left this girl by the lake. But he liked taking chance's so he would risk talking with this girl for the time being.

Lucy frowned at the boy, shifting around on the grass to find a better position instead of slouching. What a perfectly suspicious person he was, definitely hiding something. Alarm bells were going up in her head: troublemaker perhaps, avoiding guard duty since he had so obviously name-dropped it. He could have said it was a beautiful day to be at the lake or just that it was nice today in general, but Lucy could smell a big fat liar all the same. She decided to play along, however. "Yessir, it is a beautiful day. I'm just here wiling away my free time -- I got off guard duty because some other kids were getting the run down on Stranger Danger."

Crossing her legs to lean her arms on her knees, she continued with another yawn: "I'm in the First Cohort, have been for quite some time. What about you? I've never seen you much before, either. Can I hazard a guess of Fifth or Fourth? My cohort doesn't interact much with those two." Allegedly First Cohort was high and mighty compared to the others; there were certainly quite a few powerful people in there, with whom Lucy definitely didn't fit in with. She had been surprised at all to get someone to stick up for her; perhaps it was her radiant beauty or the fact that she was obviously making the people around her fall asleep. By accident, they assume.

[ooc: Sorry for the late post. Have been busy.]

"Yeah i just got off guard duty myself thanks to the rotation" Deo lied to the young girl, he stretched his right arm pushing it out before running his hands through his hair. "Yes I'm in the fourth cohort but I'm not surprised that you haven't seen me before. Hell i would doubt it if even some of the people in my own cohort knew who i was" he said seriously as he looked back down at the lake the day was getting hotter, he wished their could have been a few trees planted around here it would have been nice to lay in the shade away from the heat.

"i'm Deo Zavin by the way" he said telling the girl his name he thought that he might as well tell the girl who he was it wasn't like their were Legionnaires asking around for him and he was fairly sure this girl wouldn't point him out for the demigods looking for him but then again what did he know about this girl?

Did he now? Maybe he hadn't been guarding the same places as Lucy was normally assigned to. Such was the life of the cohort system, always so weird and confusing. She'd been here for several years now but still could only barely fathom the intricacies of the Roman military hierarchy, but if she ever bothered to stay awake maybe she'd know more.

"Lucy Smith," she replied languidly, extending her arms forward to stretch out her shoulders. Maybe she'd been sleeping weird last night in the barracks, which certainly wouldn't have been the first time within the last week -- or the last. "Daughter of Somnus. Where do you guard? I'm normally at the Tunnel myself with another girl from my cohort. Not very fun business, I'm always too tired to fight. Would be pretty useless there, too." Read: lazy.

"This isn't good, this girl better not ask too many questions" The white haired legionnaire thought quickly while looking over the Daughter of Somnus "I usually guard around the roads and sometimes by the aqueduct, but i get assigned too a lot of places. It does get tiresome to get assigned to different places all the time" he stated giving her a few partial truths. kicking at the ground lazily, sticking his hands into his front pockets. "I'm the Son of Chione by the way" he looked down at Lucy's feet he didn't meet too many people and not too many people meet him, or remember him at least but he would remember this encounter with the drowsy looking Daughter of Somnus

"Son of Chione? That's cool. They're rare." Roads and aqueduct. She'd need to check those out sometime, maybe see what was up -- Lucy had a small inkling of what this kid was really like. Not trustworthy, a bit lazier than any centurion would like, but probably not someone who'd bother her too much in the long run. She'd barely see him anyway what with their cohorts rarely having their schedules coincide. The daughter of Somnus scratched her chin as she squinted into the distance, watching the footpath for anybody else coming along -- but no, nobody and definitely not people she knew to get her out of this weird conversation or confirm her suspicions. "Any interesting things at the aqueduct happen to you? Sudden floods?"