Unexpected valentine

Will had officially been searching for his boyfriend, Nico, for 70 hours, 36 minutes and 54 seconds... 55... 56...moving on swiftly. The point is, is that Will had been scouring Camp half-blood non-stop (with the exceptions of sleep and food, plus keeping hydrated. Above nearly all else, Will Solace is a doctor.) for his missing boyfriend for a long time and today was valentines day. Will knew that Nico wasn't one for openly showing his affections, especially in public, but it would have been nice to spend the day together, regardless of the expected lack of grand, romantic gestures. It had barely been three days and Will already missed his little cinnamon roll of darkness.

It wasn't like Nico was missing, either, he was just seemed to be avoiding Will at all costs. Everyone he asked had seen Nico and told him not to worry so much. That only had the opposite affect though, since they all tried to help take his mind off of it with varying success and reactions. For instance, when Will asked Percy if he had seen Nico yesterday, Percy just said "Yeah, of course I have, and I'd love to help track him down, but I need to go help Annabeth with one of her speeches for the younger campers. You know how she gets, it all has to be perfect."

"Well, I hope you have fun. If you could point me in the direction he was off to, that would be a great help and I'll be on my way." If only it had been that simple...

Percy looked like he had just been struck with what Annabeth would probably call a 'rare moment of genius'. "You know," Percy started in a way in which made Will not want to know. "I think Annabeth would appreciate another person's input, that isn't me. She tends to end up shouting the meanings of lots of long, complicated words at me and you know her, it nearly always ends up with violence."

"Yeah, I know that." Will chuckled. "Last time you were cooped up in the infirmary for a week thanks to the broken ankle she gave you."

"Well, this time it would be quicker if we already had a doctor on hand, prepared to give medical attention where needed."

"I guess that makes sense-" Before Will could even begin to protest about continuing his search, Percy had grabbed his arm and started dragging him off to the Poseidon cabin.

"I knew I could count on you to understand!" Percy exclaimed cheerily.

Once at the Poseidon cabin, Will knew that he couldn't back out, what with the delighted look on Annabeth's face at the prospect of having some help that wasn't 'seaweed brain'. Long story short, both Will and Percy had ended up being rudely awakened by an angry daughter of Athena chucking a bucket of freezing water over them, and although Percy didn't actually get wet, the effect was there, after they had both fallen asleep during her fifth run through. After Percy dried Will off, handy son of Poseidon trick, Will went on his way. Once again trying to find his boyfriend.

Will searched high and low. He searched every MacDonald's in the area, climbed the lava climbing wall, checked the infirmary and the Hades cabin. He even checked with Percy that Nico wasn't hiding with his mum (everyone liked Sally's blue chocolate chip cookies). Nico was nowhere. It was hopeless. He was just going to have to face facts and spend valentines day hiding up a tree, away from everyone else, like every year. He only hid in the tree though because he always had Aphrodite girls trying to get him with someone and the Stolls' pranks weren't only for unsuspecting lovers. No one was safe from the Stoll brothers. The blonde shuddered at the memory of what had happened when he had asked Travis and Connor for the whereabouts of his boyfriend. They had shared a single, mischievous look that easily subsidised a conversation. It was creepy how in sync they are sometimes. They grabbed, gagged and bagged him, quite literally too. The Stolls caught his arms, put a gag around his head and hung from (ironically) a tree after he was shoved in a net... with a snake...

Turns out, he was being used as bait for their latest prank. Will spent a good two hours and a bit in the net until one of the younger campers wandered into the area in which Will was suspended. The child, a daughter of Demeter Will was pretty sure, noticed the trapped son of Apollo and walked towards him, intent on helping the captured camper. Will tried his best to warm her that it was a prank, but he couldn't speak around the stupid gag that covered his mouth. So instead, he settled for frantically shaking his head about like a lunatic. If the Stolls were filming it, they were going to regret it if they show anyone else or refuse to give him all copies of the tape...

Anyway, despite Will's attempts at stopping her falling into the trap, the daughter of Demeter soon found herself in a similar situation to Will, except with treacle, wasps, only being suspended by her ankles and a lot more screaming.

Back to the present though, Will was about to give up on his search when Mrs O'Leary bounded over to him, wagging her tail back and forth excitedly. She was the one person... er, hell hound that Will had not asked. Guess giving up and wallowing in misery alone would have to wait for after one last attempt.

"Hey, Mrs O'Leary, have you seen Nico anywhere? It seems like he's been avoiding me for three days now." Mrs O'Leary just barked loudly and licked Will's face. "Is that a yes, then?" He laughed at the excited over grown puppy. Mrs O'Leary barked again and signalled for Will to follow. So Will did.

They kept going, until it was nearly dark and Will was getting very suspicious over the hell-hound's behaviour. He was thinking that following her was a lost cause, but every time he tried to go away, Mrs O'Leary stopped him. In spite of Will's deteriorating faith in his fluffy guide, for the last few minutes she appeared to be leading with a lot more confidence, as if she knew exactly where she was going with the magical mystery tour she had been taking Will on. The duo ended up in the woods. The further in they got, the more Will was certain that a monster would leap out at them from nowhere. But it was actually quite a nice and peaceful walk in the forest, with a hell hound. As you do. Except it was too quiet and peaceful, almost as if someone had come along and killed a path of monsters. That was completely ridiculous though. No one would ever do something like that.

Eventually, Will could see a glow coming through the trees. "What's that?" He asked his canine companion, as if she could straight out give him an answer. They got closer to the glowing. It quickly became apparent to Will that the glow was coming from a clearing in the woods that was being lit up by a ton of candles. There was a table in the centre with a bunch of roses in a vase and meals for two already set out. The thing that caught most of Will's attention, however, was the short, black haired, Italian boy who was looking so very handsome in his black suit. In short, Will was speechless and flabbergasted.

"What is all this?" He managed to ask eventually. Further observation of the clearing showed that there was a wooden frame, with the gaps filled in with intricately woven twigs and fairy lights, that was acting as a cover over their heads. It appeared to be supported by nothing.

"Umm, happy valentine's day?" Nico said sheepishly. "I'm sorry that I've been avoiding you, it's just there was so much to do in order to prepare for this and I was afraid that if I spoke to you I would ruin the surprise."

"How did you manage to pull all this off in like three days?" Will asked.

"Well, I spent a while collecting favours off everyone to keep you busy. It took a day and a bit to make the roof. I took quite a while going back and forth with the tables, candles, food and drink, which took extra time because I also had to avoid you." He then looked at Will expectantly, "Do you like it?"

Will was taken aback by Nico. He would have never have guessed that the boy had a romantic streak, but then again, he was Italian. "Like it? I love it! I was scared for a while there that you were going to leave me to fend off the other campers all alone."

"Well, here, we don't have to worry about the others. I put Mrs O'Leary and a few other people who owe me favours on look out."

"Just how many people owe you some sort of favour?" Will asked.

"Ha ha. A lot. But they don't matter right now." Nico said as he leaned in to kiss his boyfriend. "All that matters tonight is that we are together and you enjoy the rest of the evening that I have planned."

They shared a smile until Will frowned slightly, "Wait, do you mean there's more?"

Nico rubbed his neck, looking slightly guilty, "I may or may not have gone a little bit over board." Will chuckled and kissed Nico again,

"Doesn't matter that much. All that I care about is that we spend valentine's day together. And so together they enjoyed the rest of valentine's day, laughing, talking and kissing. It was quite safe to say that it was unexpectedly the best valentine's ever.

(A/N, Yay, happy valentine's day! I know I'm a day late, technically two, but still! It's the thought that counts. This is my first Solangelo fic so I hope you liked it.

Did you know, you can open your mouth to fit a lightbulb in, but you can't get it open enough to take it back out. The useless stuff I know, but hey, at least I won't try to eat a lightbulb...