Practically the only thing he could hear was the soft sound of water lapping against the hull of the SS Awesome. Nico rolled his eyes even now at the name. It had started as a casual nickname. The paintjob was purely a surprise. Yay him. The moon was surprisingly clear tonight, not that there were many clouds in the middle of the ocean. Was that even possible? It was surprisingly warm, actually. Not that he usually got cold, but it was nice enough to lie on deck. He wondered where they were.

"37 13 49 North, 13 42 39 West," Percy whispered into his ear, reading his mind.

"I don't speak ship," Nico retorted.

Percy had the gall to laugh. "Well, we're near Portugal, or we could turn and go to Africa."

"Africa?" Nico raised an eyebrow. "Never been there..."

"Africa it is," Percy decided and the ship turned all of a sudden.

"Was that necessary?"

"Completely."

It wasn't, but Nico didn't care after the minutes of sickness were done. In fact, he nearly fell asleep. He had learnt over the past weeks that the soft movement of the waves were almost therapeutic. That, and lying with his head on Percy's chest, made his eyelids increasingly heavy.

Percy kissed his forehead and muttered something about the sails. Nico lay now with his head flat against the wooden boards. He often had to remind himself exactly how this happened. After Gaia, this seemed to right thing to do. Take a time out, travel the globe, exploit their new found freedom. He hadn't actually meant to be doing this with Percy, of all people, but it just kind of turned out like that.

Okay, so maybe it was slightly his fault. After he, Coach Hedge and Reyna had presented the Athena statue to the two camps, things had died down for, like, a day. He had only gone back because Hazel was in trouble. His shadow travel which he'd come to hate had saved her life. It was after that that Percy had called him out, saying that he'd only wanted to apologise. He still didn't get it. Aphrodite must have compelled him or something, because next thing he knew he was kissing Percy Jackson. Full on the mouth. It was safe to say he had jumped back into the shadows after that.

It was a couple weeks later when Nico had been packing quietly in his cabin. He had promised, to himself mostly, that he would leave. He had wanted to leave. It was the best. For everyone. Why for all the gods' sakes had he come into Nico's cabin?

"What are you doing?" he had said.

"Packing," Nico had replied shortly.

"Why?"

"Because I'm leaving. Forever." Nico had certainly not been expecting for Percy to slam him up against the wall and shove his tongue down his throat. That was a rather big improvement from the last time.

They had never had an official title. Still didn't. They just took a break, from the world, from life, from everything. What was Percy? His boyfriend? Maybe. Friend with benefits? Nah, way too mainstream. Soul mate? Too cheesy.

So he used to have a crush on Percy Jackson, prince of the sea. He never expected to fall in love, not as intensely as he was now. He certainly didn't imagine that Percy would fall for him as well. Said guy had returned now from doing Poseidon knows what with the sails.

"What'cha thinking about?"

"Death, misery, demise," Nico replied, though he blushed. Just a little bit.

"Well aren't you Mr Cheery?"

"That's my middle name," he said.

Percy rolled his eyes and they resumed their previous position, but not without a rather unfortunate nose pocking incident.

"So, we're really going to Africa?"

"Babe, we can go anywhere."

Nico pulled a face. "Perseus Jackson, don't you ever call me babe."

"What should I call you then? Sweetheart? Darling? Sugar pie?"

"Nico's fine. It's my name, after all."

"Whatever you say, Ghost King." Percy flipped them over, so he was lying on top of him. "I mean it, though. Anywhere." He kissed him then, which in Nico's opinion was like living Elysium.

"I hate to interrupt this and all, but you know we'll have to go back sometime, right?"

"Always a killjoy, weren't you? Yeah, sometime. Not yet. After, what? Five years of stupid prophecies and imminent death I think we deserve to be free. Just for a bit."

"And how do you know that you won't have to go save the world again?"

"Oh, I know."

"Yu-huh"

"Shut up," his sparkling green eyes trained on his deep brown, "babe."

"I hate you."

"You love me really," he said. He just didn't know to the extent of which that was completely true. Nico smiled against Percy's lips. Percy was his, maybe for a few more weeks of maybe forever... but Percy belonged to him.