"What? Has anyone ever seen this man before? Other than here? Anyone know his backstory?" "Nope," Leo said. "Gee, thanks Leo, that's super helpful," I said sarcastically. Even after that, I heard several 'no's, 'nop,"'s, or some mix I between. Then, Nico murmered, "Maybe..." 'Maybe' that's just the kind of hope that I need, I thought. "Bianca and I saw him in the casino. He was a complainer of some kind," Nico sugested. "Well,that's a start..." Leo began. "Anything else? No one knows him from anywhere else," Percy asked inquisitively. "We could split up, in a set of two, search for more clues," I sugested. "At first, I thought you were going to sugest the no partner - thing," Nico answered. "Are you kidding, we've already lost two from our group," I exclaimed. "Yeah, I know, I was just saying, ya' know, I would have protested..." "Yeah, well I guess we should get into groups..," "Ok, Percy and Annabeth, Frank, and I, Nico, Leo, and Xena, ok?" Jason sugested, and everyone agreed. As we each headed out to look for clues, I turned around to look at Annabeth with a discouraged look, and she mouthed to me, "It's ok, we'll meet bckpack here with everyone else. Don't worry," After she did this, she smiled, giving me some courage. As Nico, Leo and I headed into the street of Italy, we talked about where we've been to in the world, "so, Leo, Nico, where ' ve you guys been?" Both of the boys started talking, "Blah, blah, blah," I mimiced, "one at a time, Leo, you first." Leo gave Nico a smug face, "well, I've been to Mexico, California, New Orleans, New York, but those are just some off the top of my head..." "And you, Nico," I asked inquisitively. "Well, New Orleans, New York, Rome, Leo's been there too, um... I can't think of anything else," Nico chuckled nervously. "And what about you?" "Well," I started slowly, "I've been to every state in the US, Italy,as you can see," I said as I gestured around, "Mexico, for a mission trip, England, North and South America, and most of that stuff ' s because my dad, with his job, and all, he moves around a lot..." "Well, that's cool... But, I'm just wondering, how did your dad land a spot in Hawaii?" "His manager wanted him to take photos of the surfers, oh, I forgot to tell you, he's a photographer. Anyway, he usually takes pictures of nature, still life, that's why this was such a hard job-" "How is taking pictures of surfers hard," Leo retorted. "As I was saying, before someone, that I won't bother to mention, so rudely interrupted, he usually takes stationary pics, not moving, he's done this for his whole life and changing to something in FAST movement, " as I said the last part of my sentence, I glared at him, like this 😑 "Well, let's just keep- Woah," I said this and just stopped in my tracks. I walked over to a large caravan that had a poster, like this:
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"Oh, g'day, mate!" As he said this, an Australian man walked over and slapped me on the back, a lot gentler than I expected. "Um, hi," I answered after I cringed from the light slap - tap on my back. "Were you lookn' at the poster of that beautiful woman?" "Yeah, actually. I got to meet someone who had a samurai job but wore a black and white dress exactly like that." "Well, that was actually a default, she actually does wear a black n' white dress."
