Nico di Angelo.
He remembered the first time he had seen him, in all his splendid glory. Will was hearing Percy and Annabeth arguing about how she shouldn't fight when he locked his eyes on him. His jet black hair contrasted against his olive pale skin complexion and his eyes were a brown so cold they could have freezed hell. He tried smiling at him, only to not get a response, just the boy's eyes locked with his sky blue ones. They faced each other for a while, and if they had been a little bit closer and if they had been seen, people would have probably frown because of the unusual couple they would make.
It was only about a year later that he heard about the boy's disappearence and even later on about his role to play in the war. Shadow travelling with the Athena Parthenos across the Atlantic. Will had followed doing what he did, helping the injured, training, doing the best he could to cheer people up and make them forget about the ancient monsters that were haunting them because of what their ancestors had done ages ago. But the boy never faded away from Will's mind. The Italian haunted him; in his sleep and even when he was awake.
Mellie's son was delivhawaiian ered safely, thought Will's head was scattered all over the place after that event. It wasn't until he crossed paths with a brown-eyed boy in a hawaiian shirt that he focused back.
At first, Will didn't recognized him. His hair was longer, framing his face with waves of infinite darkness. His eyes were darker and colder than before, as if he had aged ten years in the course of only one, and the shadows underneath his eyes didn't help the cause. He was deadly skinny, every bone was visible in his transparent skin. Scratch his once olive Italian skin, his complexion was white, almost greenish. Not only that, he was fading away quite literally, about to collapse and be swallowed by the shadows. People who might have looked at them,if they weren't in a life-or-death situation, might have thought they were a bizarre couple. The sun and The Dark. Complete opposites. Yet the opposites atract.
No more underworld powers, no more fighting, no more shadows. Not until Nico di Angelo could stand on his own bare feet. The recovery was slow, more than just the promised three days in the infimary. It went on for days and weeks of Will taking care of Nico, popping up in the middle of the night on Cabin 13 after hours to watch over Nico because he had realized Nico could go to the point of involuntarily hurting himself during nightmares. Chiron, at the start, had wanted to oppose; yet after hearing the boys' story he seemed to have forgotten everything about them from one night to another. He might have even told the harpies to ignore the fact that there were two boys in Cabin 13 when there should have been only one.
It had been over two months and all Camp Half-Blood wondered where the two of them were heading. Friends? Scratch that, they looked like a young married couple taking care of each other. But it wasn't until one night when the clock marked two AM that Nico was in his bed, and Will was lying on a bed next to Nico's. There were only four beds in the Cabin after Nico remodeled it. One for Hazel when she visited, one for himself, and two for other children that might eventually pop up. Thought Will had made one of them his. "Doctor's orders." Will had just woken up from a dream, not one of those that demigods had, not a premonition. He looked over Nico's bed, only to see the boy breathing fast and knotted between the sheets.
Will calmly shook him awake, to what he responded with a cry of help, his eyes teary. "Tartarus?" Will asked. Nico nodded. Will held him tight while the boy tried to recover his breath. When he did, five minutes later, Will stood up and was about to make his way to his bed when Nico grabbed his hand.
"Stay with me."
Will didn't speak. He just nodded shortly with a sweet small smile.
Thing went easily from there. They were just meant to be.