"Percy, I blame you for this."

Said son of Poseidon glared at the other boy. "Nico, you could've at least told me that even hellhounds get certain 'urges'! How is it my fault?"

"You just had to bring Mrs. O'Leary right when she had 'those' times too! The symptoms are very obvious, by the way."

"Well, excuse me for not knowing." He set down a puppy version of Cerberus and stuffed a red rubber ball into one of its mouths, then stood up. "But seriously, just what are you going to do with all of them? There's, like, twenty mini Cerberuses and twenty mini Mrs. O' Learys running around in this den!"

"Percy, there aren't that many," Nico mumbled offhandedly as he threw another chew toy into the large mass of hellhound puppies… hellpuppies?

He still didn't know what to do with them, however. Percy and Annabeth would take a mini-Cerberus (gods know how many spare red rubber balls she purchased for whenever she visited the Underworld), Camp might take in a few and so would a couple of other half-bloods, but Percy was right—there were a lot of them.

Half-bloods, half-bloods, gotta think of a few more capable owners—wait a minute. Half-Bloods. Didn't Lou Ellen mention something about that Salem Institute thingie she went to for witches? That a pen pal somewhere in the UK knew of a person who specialized in caring for especially dangerous creatures? Yup, he thought to himself. Got myself another owner to take another furball off of my hands.

"Hey, Percy," he called over to the other demigod.

"What?"

"Care for a trip to Europe?"

British people were crazy. That wasn't meant to be racist.

But Nico was very, very sure that cloaks weren't the newest fashion trend (No matter how much the ghosts tried to convince him). So, that meant one thing. Well, most likely one thing. Mortals were strange, so it really could be anything.

He decided to chance at it and dragged Percy along with him, following ("I think you mean 'politely stalking'." "Shut up.") a woman wearing a cloak and a pointy hat into a small pub called the Leaky Cauldron.

The Leaky Cauldron was packed with people. Packed as in almost every space was occupied, but you didn't have to stand in order to stay inside—not packed as in we're-stuck-in-the-fields-of-Asphodel-and-if-I-cou ld-actually-talk-I'd-tell-you-to-shove-over kind of packed.

He whispered to Percy, "Alright, we're looking for a man named 'Rubeus Hagrid'—half giant, should be easy to spot—a regular customer here. You got the dog?"

"Yeah," Percy replied, patted the inside of his backpack. Soft snoring (do puppies snore?) emanated from it. "Picked the easiest for him to handle, and he's the one of the uniheaded pups. Bit of a wimp, though—maybe it'll make him easier to raise, not sure about it. Hey, isn't that the Hagrid dude we needed to find?"

Nico suppressed the urge to slap himself on the head. Half a giant. That should have been a major physical clue, but no, he just had to ignore the guy that was double the height of most of the people in the room.

"Come on," he muttered, pushing his way through the crooked mass of chairs and table and people, Percy right behind. "Wonder if he's drunk. That'll make it easier to convince him."

"Nico, you're only 15."

"Yeah, well, you're 18, and these are wizards. Look at that kid over there, isn't he drinking beer?" Both glanced over long enough to see a boy take a swing of something (it was in a beer bottle) and almost immediately after gain red blotches on both his cheeks, staggering over to another table where a long-haired boy facepalmed and a brunette with her hair in two buns get up to help the other boy to his seat. Now that he though about it, they were one of the very few people with normal clothing (close to normal—that green spandex suit was going to get on his nerves very, very soon).

"What's with the eyebrows?"

"Dunno."

They finally made there way over to Hagrid, who did have a slightly red-looking complexion, hopefully from the alcohol. Nico turned to Percy.

"You're up. Don't make a mess of it." Percy rolled his eyes and slid into the seat at the bar next to Hagrid and calmly ordered a mug, while Nico tried his best to summon some of the metal currency from someone's pocket. To put it plainly, he sucked. He managed to get a fairly large gold coin though, and slipped it into Percy's hand as he walked past.

After some friendly small talk that soon got onto the track of magical creatures, Hagrid stated, yes, he'd like to have one as a pet, no, he didn't know someone who could supply him with one, yes, he'd take very good care of it, and so on. Percy and Nico shared a look, before Nico nodded. Percy turned back to Hagrid.

"Well, sir, looks like it's your lucky day. Got a nice hound here, not quite sure which breed (because no one at all would freak out if he said that he had a hellhound in his backpack), but still a puppy. Needs to be housebroken, but I'm sure you can manage that on your own?"

"I'll be fine, cared fer somma the creatures in the Forbidden Fores' a few times, I'd lover ter try it again," he replied, happiness shining through his eyes (the kid in the green spandex suit cried tears of joy in the background).

"Alright, but be warned, you need a lot of chew toys for this little guy," Percy cautioned, stroking the head of the hellhound a few more times before gently placing him into Hagrid's hands.

"Alrigh', and thank yeh!" he cried as Percy got up from his seat, having already paid for his drink, and made his way back to Nico. He paused for a second, then fished out a golden drachma and tossed it to Hagrid.

"Hey, if you ever need some help, throw this into a rainbow, ask for—" Here he paused. What name should he give? Making up his mind, he continued, "Ask for Peter Johnson at Number 3. It'll signal me to come here." Then he made his ever so dramatic exit into the shadows (who cared that it was Nico's job to do that).

"Peter Johnson? Really?" questioned Nico as they walked out of the pub past the long-haired guy holding down Green Spandex Suit, whose cheeks had reddened another shade and had already punched the table to splinters. No, that position was not awkward at all.

"I didn't want to give out my real name," protested Percy. "Besides, it was the first thing I could come up with."

"… I will refrain from calling you Peter for the rest of your life out of the kindness of my heart."

"First time."

"I was joking."

Hagrid looked at the coin that Peter Johnson (that was probably his name—wasn't it what he was supposed to ask for to contact him?) gave him—gold, similar to a Galleon. It gave off a strange feeling, however. He pushed it aside as paranoia from the First Wizarding War. Everyone was still on edge from that.

But… the writing. Hagrid was not an idiot as everyone else thought him to be—his brain just worked differently. The giant blood within him automatically recognized it as Greek and warned him to stay away.

He turned his gaze back to the cute puppy sleeping on his lap. Peter couldn't be bad, right? No evil person could have that kind of heart.

Shrugging, he pocketed the coin, finished off his drink, and headed back to Hogwarts. The puppy—Fang, that was its name, right?—needed to get used to where he'd be living.

Hagrid frowned when he heard of all the guarding needed for the Sorcerer's Stone.

He couldn't let Fang do it—that dog was too cowardly, and Hagrid wasn't gonna sign him up for something that could potentially be dangerous. Neither could the creatures he found in the Forbidden Forest—too wild to be placed inside a school.

But he really wanted to repay for what Dumbledore did for him, so he said that he'd provided one of the layers of protection for the Stone.

Back in his hut, he opened the cupboard that held the strange coin in it. But after a few years, would Peter really still come? He sighed—it was worth a try.

Nico flopped down on Percy's couch and started to doze off, shoving the older demigod off in the process. He was tired from the newest quest (rescuing an unfortunate demigod that almost got strangled to death with some weird necklace—he killed the part of a soul that was possessing it and solved the problem easy-peasy) and wanted some sleep.

But no, the Fates wouldn't let him have that either, huh?

A rainbow shimmered into existence in front of where Percy currently sat on the floor. A female voice said, "Rubeus Hagrid requires assistance. He requests something that can guard a very important object." Then the rainbow disappeared and the line went dead. Nico glared at Percy.

"I needed sleep, you know," he growled, and turned over, clamping a cushion over his head. Percy looked at him in amusement—ah, good old days when sleep was the most important thing in life—before kicking the son of Hades off his couch and sitting right smack in the middle of it.

"Do that after you get Fluffy. Hagrid needs a guard; I'll give him one just for the heck of it. Oh, and by the way," he smirked, "Sleep later. Blackjack is one of the best pegasi we have, but not even he can carry a three-headed dog the size of my room. You're shadow traveling."

Nico's muffled reply came through the cushion still pressed over his head. "You're evil."

"Why, thank you."

A moment passed before Nico bolted upright. "Wait, I'm shadow traveling?"

"I got the honors last time. Besides, I can't shadow travel. Son of Poseidon here? And right now, you're the one that's 18; I have to go back to college tomorrow."

"Damn."

A few hours later, Nico came falling from the sky.

Well, not the sky really, more like the shadow on the ceiling caused by Percy messing around with his mini LED flashlight. Those things were fun…

But back to the present. Nico fell from the ceiling and landed on top of Percy, who was on his bed with the flashlight, which was kind of just sitting there.

After a small argument ("Get off me! Gods!" "Shut up! My ears have been abused enough!"), the two finally settled into a far less awkward positioning.

"So, how did it go?" Percy asked, noting the small scratches and scuff marks that littered Nico's face and arms.

"… He saw the sword…"

"…"

"Well, it worked out fine in the end, and that's what matters, right?"

"He insisted on naming it Fluffy."

"What."

Cute little oneshot depicting the origins of Fang and Fluffy.

How'd you like it? Now I know the pain of writing Hagrid's speech. I may be considered Level 2 now.

Oh, and a bit more I couldn't manage to fit in:

"Well, he did pay you, right?" Percy asked. "Since that didn't go without effort, I'd guess."

"He payed me in wizard money. So, no, you're not getting that Coke until I find a way to inconspicuously exchange this for American without going to the bank."

"So you mean that was all for nothing?"

"...You really love Coke, don't you?"