I get so excited when I find more reviews for this story:D They always make my day and I love seeing the same people review every or almost every chapter:) I really value y'alls opinion and try to always make sure not to confuse y'all too much and to make sure I'm keeping you all entertained:) And all the people who are just now finding this story: WELCOME I VALUE YOUR OPINIONS, TOO! Hope this chapter gets awesome reviews and critiques, as well:D
Warning: if gay people make you uncomfortable, stop reading. This chapter contains boyxboy love (nothing sexual, purely romantic) and a lot of chapters after this will mention Solangelo because they're my OTP. You've been warned ~(O.O~)
Enjoy!:D
When Nico di Angelo showed up to the Big House's infirmary looking like a zombie on crack, Will thought the son of Hades had been kept awake due to recurring nightmares again. His concern was quickly replaced with anger when Nico revealed that he had purposely decided to wander camp all night rather than sleep like a normal human being.
"You did what?" he asked with a strained smile that looked more like a grimace.
They were standing in the center of one of the rooms reserved for the more severely injured campers. Will had been making his rounds to check on patients, when Nico had literally stumbled in wearing an oversized orange Camp Half-Blood shirt with his usual black skinny jeans. The doctor's attention had immediately been drawn to the attractive Italian, only to notice the deep bags under two glazed obsidian eyes.
"I didn't wanna sleep," Nico shrugged. "Walking around camp sounded more relaxing, at the time."
Will ran a hand through his hair to keep himself from tying the gloomy camper to a hospital bed for three days of mandatory bedrest, again. Maybe he could even get Lou Ellen to put a sleeping spell on Nico that would lift only after the boy made up all those hours of lost sleep. Then again, that would probably mean that Nico wouldn't wake up for another three years and Will didn't think he could go that long without hearing his Death Breath's sassy retorts.
Finally deciding that a sleep spell wouldn't do, Will sighed in exasperation. "What am I going to do with you, Death Boy? Blatantly ignoring my orders for rest… Was it because I ordered you as a friend? Should I order you as a doctor?"
The light blush spreading across the smaller boy's cheeks told Will all he needed to know.
"Alrighty then. Nico di Angelo, son of Hades, you are to sleep every night and get plenty of rest, until further notice. Doctor's orders."
Nico seemed to be fighting a smile as his blush deepened and he refused to make eye contact. "Shut it, Solace."
He's so cute when he's flustered, Will thought cheerfully.
Just before he could give voice to how cute Nico was, Will's least favorite demigod came strolling through the infirmary like he owned the place.
The black haired son of Poseidon glanced around for a moment before spotting them. As he walked closer, Will hastily threw an arm over Nico's shoulders and forced his smile to be amiable and friendly.
He knew that Nico wasn't interested in Percy and that Percy was practically married to Annabeth, but he was still a little insecure when it came to Nico. Percy was a hero who had saved the world more times than Will could remember, whereas he was just a simple healer who had never done anything praise-worthy in his life. Even Nico was a legendary hero with amazing sword fighting skills and Hades only knows how many other superpowers.
His smile became more genuine as he remembered what Nico had said to him when he'd caught up to him in the infirmary during dinner the night before.
"Solace, you've saved more lives than anyone I know. Gods, you've saved me in more ways than one. As far as I'm concerned, you're more of a hero than Percy. That might not mean much coming from a son of Hades, but it should still count for something, right?"
Nico thought he was a hero, that's all that mattered he reminded himself as Percy came to stand before them.
"'Sup, Solace? Mind if I borrow Nico for a minute?" Percy asked with a dorky smile.
"Oh, gods," Nico muttered. "If you and Jason try to pull another prank on me, I will kill you both without hesitation."
Percy took a large step away from Nico in order to be out of reach.
"No, it's not a prank," Percy assured him. "We wanted to see if you wanted to train the two new guys. Dean's not bad, but he's mostly depending on Ares when it comes to fighting with a sword. And the hippie needs a lot of help. You in?"
Will subconsciously tightened his grip on Nico's shoulder. He was being selfish in wanting to keep Nico all to himself but Nico was the only person he truly felt comfortable around.
When Nico glanced at him with a raised eyebrow, Will smiled back. "You should go, I'm sure it'll be a lot of fun. I'll be fine without my assistant for a day," he lied to the stoic son of Hades.
Said son of Hades did not look like he believed a word that had come out of Will's mouth.
"I'm gonna help Solace in the infirmary for awhile," Nico said much to Will's surprise. "When we get done, I might come by the arena and help train the new guys."
Percy glanced between the two and then smiled knowingly. "Alright, you two lovebirds behave, understood?"
As the son of Poseidon walked out of the infirmary, Will briefly caught a glimpse of Nico's brilliant scarlet face before he hid it behind his hands. He would have joked about it or called it cute, if it hadn't been for the fact that Will was fairly certain his own face was the same shade of red.
Once Will was sure that his face was back to its usual tan color, he removed his arm from Nico's shoulders.
"I just have a few more patients to check on, then I need to redress a few bandages," Will explained casually. "After that, I will be personally looking after my favorite patient. That would be you, Angel. Because I say that you need more sun in your life and the best way to get that is to wander around camp during the day."
"Did you just call me 'Angel'?" Nico asked with a confused look on his face.
Will's only response was a wink.
Nico rolled his eyes before following Will on his rounds. A few campers gave the Ghost King wary glances and some flat out refused to even be within ten feet of the son of Hades. Whenever the campers didn't want to be near Nico, he would begin retreating to make the camper more comfortable but Will always managed to grab him before he could run far.
Will's excuse was always something along the lines of desperately needing Nico's assistance even on the simplest of injuries.
Some campers demanded another doctor to care for their wounds and Will was always happy to oblige. If they were going to judge Nico for his parentage instead of his personality, then Will really didn't want to bother with them anyways.
Once Will had finished, he left Nico for a second to change out of his scrubs. When he returned he found Nico still standing awkwardly outside the door. Even after almost a week of working at the infirmary, Nico had yet to become comfortable around so many people, although that was to be expected from years of being alone.
Will grabbed Nico's hand and led him out of the infirmary.
"Come on, Zombie Boy," Will ordered. "You need sunshine, Doctor's orders."
Nico dragged his feet the entire way out of the infirmary. "Solace, 'Doctor's orders' isn't a magical phrase that's gonna make me do whatever you tell me to."
Will gave one last tug on Nico's arm and the grumpy camper was standing in the warm sunlight. "Well, you could've easily broken free of my grip but you didn't. So, if it ain't broke, I ain't gonna fix it."
Reluctantly releasing Death Boy's hand, Will began to walk towards the beach. After about twenty feet, Nico finally stop sulking and appeared to be cheering up. Will was fairly certain that he saw Gloom And Doom crack a smile out of the corner of his eye; but he couldn't be completely sure, as the smile disappeared the moment he turned to look at him.
In the midst of telling Nico about how he and his half-siblings had once cursed Clarisse to only speak in couplets for a week after she started a fight in the infirmary, Nico quit walking. Will stopped mid-sentence to eye his friend anxiously.
The smaller camper's face was tilted downwards, so that his black hair created a thick curtain to hide behind. His arms hung limp by his side and Will was terrified Nico was about to have some sort of mental breakdown or the darkness was going to overtake him any second.
"Nico?" he asked tentatively.
"What am I to you, Solace?" Nico inquired.
Will let out a relieved sigh. His favorite assistant was just being insecure, he wasn't going to die or break. "Gods... You had me worried there for a second, Death Boy," Will laughed breathlessly.
Nico didn't look up as he repeated his question, "What am I to you, Solace? I mean, are we friends or am I just a charity case? Do you actually even care or do you just feel sorry for me? Am I just a patient you feel the need to fix or … or what?"
He finally met Will's eyes and Will could feel his heart break a little at how lost the son of Hades looked.
"Oh, Nico," Will muttered as he stepped forward to hug the shorter camper.
Nico flinched like he did whenever anyone tried to make physical contact with him, anyone but Will. He'd never flinched from Will before and the sudden distrust caused Will to freeze for a second.
Will's raised arms fell to his sides as he stared at the son of Hades. His hurt was quickly morphing into anger.
"You really think I'd go through this much trouble to get someone out in the sunshine if they were just a patient?" Will responded with quiet anger. "You think I'd stay up at night trying to come up with new nicknames for a charity case? Do you honestly think I'd tell just anyone about my depression, fears, or self doubts? And I suppose you think I'd ditch my post at the infirmary to take someone I feel sorry for on a walk along the beach? If you really believe that then you're a bigger idiot than Percy and Jason combined. I mean, for the love of Apollo, do you really think that little of me?"
Those lost obsidian eyes widened in surprise. For a brief second, the light hit those eyes just enough to show a deep brown color that reminded Will of dark chocolate.
"You mean… you really like me? I'm not just imagining this and... you're not going to get tired of me in a week?" Nico stammered.
Will raised an eyebrow. "Well, you see… I have a very specific type, which includes: attractive, sassy, and grumpy Italian boys with bad attitudes who are in desperate need of sunshine and haircuts. You see anyone else at camp that fits those requirements? Me neither."
The grumpy Italian in question blushed a deep shade of red that would put a tomato to shame and that only added to his cuteness, in Will's opinion. He opened and closed his mouth like a fish for a couple seconds, unable to find anything to say.
"Now, here's what we're gonna do about this," Will informed him. "I'm gonna ask you out, to which you'll answer yes. And then, you're gonna go on a romantic walk along the beach with me, getting as much sun as you can. Seriously, Death Boy, would it have killed you to get a little sun while you were off saving the world from primordial goddesses?"
The speechless boy in front of him gave him a glare for the last comment which was matched by Will's serious doctor face. "I'm serious. You're unhealthily pale, you need sleep, and, I swear to the gods, if I see you skip another meal I'm going to shove the food down your throat myself."
Nico scoffed as he looked away with a confident smile, like he thought Will couldn't or wouldn't do it.
"I swear on the River…" Will started to promise.
"Okay!" Nico interrupted, a look of pure terror etched onto his face. "Okay. I promise not to skip anymore meals. Just don't swear on the Styx, please?"
"Fine," Will relented. "Now then, Nico di Angelo, would you like to be my boyfriend?"
His confident seriousness dissolved into a self-conscious anxiety as he awaited Nico's response.
The look on Will's face seriously reminded Nico of a kicked puppy.
"Yeah, Idiot," answered Nico, his sassiness replacing his insecurities from earlier.
Will's face lit up so brightly that it rivaled the sun's for a moment and it took Nico a second to blink away the spots that suddenly hindered his vision.
"Tone down the brightness, Sunshine," Nico said as his eyes adjusted.
In response, Will grabbed his hand and they continued towards the beach while Will began his story about cursing Clarisse again. About halfway to the beach, however, Nico felt a vague demonic presence coming from the woods. It was the same presence he had felt the night before, but when he'd gone out to investigate it had suddenly disappeared. Or maybe that angel with the digestive problems was messing with his abilities.
He stopped walking again, this time Will looked at him with confusion rather than concern.
"What's wrong, Death Breath?"
Nico knew that if he just ran off to search for a demonic presence Will would think he was ditching him, he was so easily hurt. Instead, Nico decided to see how Will would react to a spur-of-the-moment change of plans.
"Why don't we take a walk in the woods, instead?" Nico suggested, attempting to sound casual and not at all suspicious. If the look Will gave him was anything to go by, he'd failed.
"Are you trying to get out of the sun?"
"No?"
"Right… Then why the sudden desire to run into the forest?"
"I, um… There is a, uh… There's a demon in the woods?"
Will blinked. "You want to take me to fight a demon on our first date?"
Nico cursed himself for blushing at the word 'date'. "Uh, yes?"
He was rewarded with a brilliant smile from the son of Apollo for his answer. "Sounds awesome. Let's go!"
As Will began to practically skip towards the woods, Nico stared after him in bewilderment. I'm dating a dork, he thought before racing after the blonde.
"You know you're completely unarmed right?" Nico stated as the two stood at the edge of the woods. He had retrieved his sword from the Hades cabin and had briefly thought about getting Will a weapon. After a brief flashback to the bow and arrow incident, he'd decided against it.
"That's alright," Will reassured him. He didn't seem even the slightest bit worried about going into monster-infested woods. "I've got you to protect me."
The faith the blonde had in Nico took him by surprise, no one had ever been so trusting of him before. Most people would've trusted him to stab them in the back or kill their puppy, never to keep them safe. Nico swore to himself that he would never let anyone or anything harm Will.
With that, Nico stepped into the woods with Will only a couple steps behind him.
Nico honestly had no idea where the demon was in the woods, just that the demonic creature was in the general area. He could have easily shadow traveled to the place where the presence was strongest, it would've been faster, but Will would've murdered him before the darkness inside him could.
So, without his shadow travel, the couple slowly made their way through the forest. By the time they reached the creek that divided the forest into two, it was well past noon and Will was still excited about 'ghost hunting' with Nico. The son of Hades wasn't as thrilled, but seeing the son of Apollo literally bouncing through the creek did cause him to crack a smile.
Once across, Will asked in a silly voice, "Who you gonna call?"
Nico's baffled expression led to Will giving him a similar look.
"Ghostbusters? Famous movie from the… OH!" His face lit up with understanding. "Forgot you skipped over half of the 1900s. I'm dating an uncultured swine. As your personal doctor, I cannot allow this. I prescribe a movie night. I'm catching you up on every important thing you missed out on while locked away from society."
"I wasn't locked away…" Nico started to defend himself before Will unceremoniously hugged him close to his chest.
He started shushing and cooing at Nico like he was a child in need of soothing. "Shshsh… It's alright my little Angel, I'll make it all better."
"Solace, I'm gonna shove this sword down your throat if you don't let me go, now."
The son of Apollo didn't take the threat too seriously since Nico had started laughing halfway through making it. He did, however, take the drooling hellhound very seriously.
Neither of them was sure where it had come from or when it had entered the clearing on their side of the creek, they just knew that it looked angry. The hellhound was huge (not quite Mrs. O'Leary huge, but huge nonetheless) with glowing red eyes and a body that shifted like smoke.
It wasn't like any hellhound Nico had ever seen before, but the demon standing behind it he had definitely seen before.
"Crowley."
The demon stepped into the clearing to pat the hellhound on the head. "Ah, hello again, Nicky."
Nico scowled at the self-proclaimed ruler of Hell while Will positioned himself a few feet behind the grumpy camper.
"Don't call me that."
"How's Hades? How was Tartarus?" He was met with silence. Crowley continued on goodnaturedly, "Well, this has been fun, nice catching up to you, ya' little brat. But I have more important things to deal with right now, so be a dear and keep my little hellhound company while I'm gone."
Before Nico or Will could move or say anything, the King of Hell disappeared into the woods, leaving his rather hungry looking hellhound behind.
Nico raised his sword to defend himself and protect Will, while said blonde scooped up a couple rocks. The hellhound snarled at them before dissolving into nothing. The two campers stared in shock at the now empty clearing for a few seconds but just as they let their guards down, something sharp latched onto Nico's leg and pulled.
Searing pain flared up inside him as the invisible thing thrashed his leg around like a chew toy. He vaguely remembered screaming before what felt like claws ripped into his chest.
He thought he heard Will calling his name but the pain was so intense it was drowning out everything else.
A blinding light flooded the son of Hades's vision and the daggers in his leg and chest disappeared. Just before he blacked out, he caught a glimpse of Will's concerned face.
This was my longest chapter, yet! Aren't y'all proud of me?:D
Anyways, as promised, a Solangelo chapter with plot! Oh, how I love these two… hope this was a good chapter for y'all and sorry I injured our poor little Nico, but it's all for the good of the story!
In the next chapter, Crowley's little plan will be revealed. Also to be revealed in the next chapter: a new villain!:D This bad guy will be sort of familiar but completely new, as well... I really hope that made no sense to any of you whatsoever. It's gonna be a big surprise and I did a whole lot of research for this just for you guys:D
The next chapter should be as long as, if not longer than, this chapter so it should take me about as long as it took me to write this one.
Anywho, tell me what you think of this chapter and if it was any good or complete crap or in need of a good edit:) I'll get to work on the next chapter tomorrow morning before work:D