Chapter 4 - Feelings are for wimps

Nico's Pov

Bright yellow blazed in front of Nico's eyes, almost blinding him. It took him a full minute to realise that the yellow was in fact blonde hair over his face.

"What the Hades." Nico grunted and he heard a feminine squeak as the hair darted away from his eyes. He looked into the reddening face of Will Solace.

"Solace? What in -"

"Hey! Don't get like that with me Death breath, I'm only trying to save your life." Will muttered something about doing his job and how CPR may have been a drastic action anyway, whilst pottering around the room searching for some unknown medical object. Nico was still half submerged in his weird dream world, trying to organise his thoughts and trying to bury thoughts of Tartarus. To his dismay he realised he was trembling slightly, hopefully Will wouldn't notice. Nico didn't need Will thinking he was weak.

"Wait Will, what do you mean? I was just asleep. Is that not allowed? I thought I was in here to recover -"

Will whirled around, brandishing what looked like a torch in a menacing way, his eyebrows raised high so that they hid behind his golden hair.

"Nico di Angelo! Of course you're allowed to sleep don't be so moronic. The fact is, I came in and you looked dead. You wouldn't respond to anything, and I couldn't see you breathing. So I panicked! I thought you'd gone into Cardiac arrest, so I bent over to check if I could see your chest rising and to listen to your breathing. Then you mutter in my ear and scare me to death!" Nico breifly wondered if Will had meant that pun before realising that he had tuned out halfway through Will's rant, watching as he waved his hands around in annoyance and how his blue eyes had seemed to darken to a cobalt colour. He looked hot when he was mad.

"Will ok, I'm sorry. I get like that sometimes when I have dreams. I just kind of go dead to the world." There was a brief pause in which Nico considered bolting out of the room, but quickly gave up on that idea when he realised his legs felt like overcooked spaghetti.

"You had a dream?" Will enquired with what might have been sympathy, Nico wasn't sure. He wasn't used to reading emotions. One of the benefits of hanging around the Lord of the underworld and his minions.

"Um, yeah. Nothing important." Nico had to force the lie out, keeping a neutral expression and attempting to calm his tremors by fiddling with his skull ring instead.

Will had rather rudely plonked himself on the edge of Nico's bed. Nico had half a mind to shove him off so he landed on his Podex. Will ignored the glare Nico was giving him and reached out a hand, as if to grasp Nico's. Nico sucked in a breath in shock and his eyes widened, causing Will to hastily retreat his hand, holding it awkwardly as if questioning why it had just moved of it's own volition. Will started to lean forward, staring into Nico's eyes and his heart felt as though he had just had 10 italian espressos, what was happening? Was Will about to?-

A bright light startled Nico and he almost smacked his forehead against Will's outstretched hand welding the torch.

"Pupil contraction slightly delayed, but that's to be expected with the severe state of exhaustion. Nico can you look to the left for me?" Nico stared at Will mouth agape as he tried to calm his racing heart.

"Solace! A little warning next time! Zeus almighty." Nico looked to left whilst continuing to fire Italian curses, as if he had said them in English Will would probably wash his mouth with bleach despite the 'severe health implications'.

Will finally finished his eye inspection or whatever the hell was going on, he leant back so that he was sitting at a more respectable distance.

"Are you sure it was nothing?" Will gazed at Nico, his blue eyes sparkling, sucking his bottom lip into his mouth and his brow crinkling slightly into a frown. Nico's dream came back to him in a flash, seeing Will's face crumpled in rage as he shouted at an unknown enemy. Surely that couldn't be the same guy? Was Nico's dream purely made up or was there an element of truth to it? Probably the latter considering that he was a demigod, but still Nico puzzled over the scene. Was that Will actually running towards him?

The look Will was giving him almost made Nico crumble, what was this guy doing to him? Nico steeled himself and put up his normal façade, undeterred by the son of Apollo.

"I've had worse dreams. I'll live." He muttered coldly dropping eye contact from Will, unable to watch his reaction. Nico saw Will shift out the corner of his eye and he knew that he was far from done with this conversation, but just as Will opened his mouth to say something, two guys popped their heads in the doorway. It was Percy and Jason and Nico had never been happier to see them in his life.

"Hey Nico, my man. How you doing? We missed you yesterday at sparring."

"Yeah well, I would have been there if not for this guy." Nico gestured at Will, throwing his arm in the son of Apollo's direction and giving his signature 'Fear me, I am the Ghost king!' glare. Again much to Nico's annoyance and begrudging respect, Will was unaffected and simply raised an eyebrow in response.

"I think melting into a pile of shadows counts as a valid reason to have you under observation and close to medical professionals at all times. If I ignored a case like this then I don't have any right to even consider becoming a doctor when I'm older." A shadow seemed to settle on Will's face, drawing the light from his eyes. What was he thinking about? Nico opened his mouth to quiz him, but Will spoke first and the comment died in his throat.

"Anyway, I better go and check on the other patients. I still have to check the whole ward, check the supplies, perform surgery (pretty sure there's an amputation at some point), speak to the nurses..." Will carries on muttering his list of the day's events as he exited the room. Percy and Jason, both shared a confused look before turning to Nico. Before they could say anything, Will reversed and popped his head into the doorway, not unlike Percy and Jason earlier.

"Hey Perce, haven't seen you in while. Quick question, are you guys ok to sit with Nico for a bit and keep him company while I do my rounds? We're really short staffed at the moment and Death boy here just gave me a bit of a scare so I don't really want him unaccompanied at the moment." Nico rolled his eyes at Will's statement.

"Will I was fine. Plus don't call me Death boy." Nico muttered the last part glaring at Jason as he snorted in amusement. Will fixed Nico with a stern look, as if daring him to argue with him again, Nico quietly decided to leave this arguement for now.

"Good to see you Will. Yeah that's fine, we wanted to chat with Nico anyway, catch him up on the camp gossip." Percy wiggled his eyebrows at Nico, as if expecting excitement, Nico rolled his eyes and sighed in what might have been disgust.

"Goodie." Nico muttered. Although appearing mad, Nico was secretly glad for the company and felt grateful that his friends had thought of him. Will gave double thumbs up before leaving for good.

"So... You and Will then?" Jason starts, rasing one eyebrow above the rim of his glasses.

"What?! No! Of course not, he's just committed to his job and very stubborn." And very hot ,Nico added mentally, causing him to blush. Jason deadpanned at him, looking severely unimpressed. Percy shifted awkwardly before changing the conversation onto the promised camp gossip, saying how Lacey was getting with Dakota and how baby chuck was already taking after his dad, kicking a camper in the face when they got too close to him. Nico soon grew bored of the camp's gossip, feigning interest up until Percy begun to discuss how the Romans were still at camp, helping to rebuild after the war and how they were quite disgusted by the informality of the Greeks, calling the daily cabin feuds childish.

"How are Hazel and Reyna?" Nico interrupted, deciding that he had lost interest on how the Hephaestus cabin had detonated a new invention over the Ares cabin to see if the roof was fortified as well.

"They're good, yeah. Reyna's been busy making sure all the Romans stay peaceful and Hazel, well... I think she's taking it quite hard at the moment. But she's been spending time with Frank and Arion so she's doing ok." Jason looked down, looking as though the weight of the sky had suddenly crushed upon him.

"I know man, I know." Percy said reaching out, placing his hand on Jason's shoulder and giving it a squeeze. They both looked so glum, Nico wished he could boost their spirits, but he had no idea how. He can't say about how Leo's death felt weird, what if it turned out to be nothing? No, he couldn't do that to them. He was about to change the subject when a huge flash of light suddenly filled the room followed shortly by a a deafening crash of thunder.

"Was that-?" Nico started, Jason cut in.

"Thunder? But that's impossible, no storm can get inside the camp borders." Jason glanced to Percy in confusion as if asking if he was responsible.

"Hey! Lightning isn't my thing, I'm the hurricane guy!" Percy defended whilst peering outside the window. The sky had darkened until it almost felt like night, with the occasional burst of lightning overhead.

"Oh man, this brings back déjà vu. Only time I've seen a storm like this in camp is when the master bolt went missing." Percy shuddered at the memory. Jason started incredulously at him.

"Went missing?!"

"Yeah long story. Anyway we better go check out and see if anyone knows what's going on. You stay here and wait for Will." Nico had started to get out of bed to help the boys, but a wave of vertigo sent him back onto his bed.

"Yeah I think I will. Thanks for coming guys, it was nice to see you." Nico said, Percy and Jason responded in kind before leaving. Nico felt his eyes start to drift shut when Jason suddenly ran back into the room.

"Assuming we don't die from whatever's causing this storm, are you up for capture the flag? It's on Friday night so you've got some time to decide. Let me know if you are and you can go on my team." Jason flashed a grin at Nico. A warm feeling run through Nico, he had never been invited by another camper to do capture the flag before.

"Yeah sounds good. Although I might need an all clear from 'the Doc' first." Nico said, sarcasm lacing his voice as he referred to Solace. Jason flashed a thumbs up before leaving again.

Finally, some peace and quiet. Nico thought before drifting off to sleep.