Disclaimer; Rights belong to Rick Riordan

Beta'ed by Primie

19 Scars

Tani knew Will Solace was one of the blessed.

Almost everyone in Camp did. It was just, well, when their minds turned to the blessed, their first thoughts were the Seven, the Children of the Big Three, countless other legends… the list went on and on.

Supposedly, Blessed Children were rare. For so many to pop up within mere months of each other ... in short, the rumor mill took in the news like fish to water. The Blessed Children were nothing short of legends.

But not many's first thoughts of the Blessed go to Will Solace.

And they had a good reason not to, Tani supposed.

Unlike Piper McLean's Charmspeak or Grover Underwood's Cry of Pan, where the two respectively could use the abilities and still stay on their feet, Will Solace's Healing was a completely different ball game.

Will's blessing was never used flauntingly, never taken as a simple trump card, something to pull out in the midst of battle. It was more like a last resort card.

Of course, Tani had never seen him use the Healing directly, but she had seen the aftermath. Will Solace, lying on an infirmary cot completely exhausted and passed out, while the patient on the other hand, was completely healed. Not a single scratch remained.

Needless to say, not many had seen Will Solace in action and were lucid enough to tell the tale. In fact, Tani could probably count the people who had ever seen it, not subjected to, but rather seen from the sidelines, on one hand.

Will never used it unless there really wasn't any other choice.

(No other choice, they had told her—)

And right now, there really wasn't any other choice.

The patient had lost a lot of blood. Normally this wouldn't be the problem, unless the patient had a really rare blood type or was a demigod.

In this case, the patient was both.

Only demigods could give demigods blood. Well, technically, demigods could receive blood from mortals, but the results weren't exactly pretty. AKA, the godly blood would burn out the mortal blood, and it would leave the demigod with even less blood. Which was the opposite of what everyone wanted. Foreign substances and all, Tani didn't really understand it.

Rare blood types, that one was self explanatory. The patient had O negative type blood. While Os are the universal donor, not the same can be said for receiver. The problem was, O's only can receive from other O types, and less than 7% of the entire US population were O negatives. Coupled with the fact the Camp was currently out of O negative blood… In short, things weren't looking good.

Despite all of that, Tani could not push aside the fact that she was about to witness the Blessed Children of Apollo's famously rumored Healings.

Tani was in awe.

She could feel, from where she was standing, her brother pull at the sun's energy, filling the room with the unmistakable feeling of safesafesafe. His eyes were closed, and the almost unnoticeable golden glow from his palms was directed at the patient's body, and—

Tani shut her eyes, squeezed her fits, trying to burn the feeling into her memory.

It was amazing.

It was warm, it was comforting, it was everything and more Tani had ever even dared to imagine what safe would be like.

Of course, it ended all too soon.

No more than four minutes into Will working his magic and Tani silently fangirling, the warm feeling disappeared rather unexpectedly.

And ever so conveniently, right at that moment, Will drew his hands back from the patient and promptly crumpled to the floor.

(His eyes were closed, his body was cold, lifeless—)

For a long moment, nothing could be heard except for Tani's slightly panicked breathing.

Only uncorhentent noises could be made as she hurried over to the patient and brother.

Crouching down, she laid her elder brother into a much more comfortable position, and began the normal check up routine.

Pulse, breath, color… all good, if a little on the way-too-pale-but-he's-alive-so-I'm-not-going-to-dwell-on-that side. Just exhausted.

Now, the patient.

Hesitant, Tani's hands gently inspected the patient's once damaged body.

Professionalism kept her form squealing like a little girl (the girl she was supposed to be, but oh well. She was a demigod, what did she expect?) and self control kept her from laughing hysterically.

Once again. Pulse, breath, color...

When Tani finished, she stepped back in shock. Breathing out, she slowly wrapped her mind around the clearly displayed results.

Despite logic, despite laws, despite everything, really, Will had done the so-called impossible.

Tani wouldn't have believed it if she hadn't seen it for herself.

Nothing.

Not even a single scratch.

As Tani moved her brother's limp body over to a cot, and drew the curtain around the patient's cot closed, she made a promise.

Tani Maple vowed to work harder, to never give in, to save more lives.

Because results were right in front of her, and the patient would have no doubt died if Will Solace hadn't been there.

If there was a way to save them, she would take it.

She vowed to be a healer worthy of being Head.

(Because they were doctors, and one of the first rules doctors learned was that you can't save everyone.

Tani saw it once, when the life of a stranger slipped through her very own fingers. He had slit his wrists, and had bleed out in Tani's arms.

Tani still remembers it as it was yesterday.

She was eight.

And she vowed to never let it happen again.)

oOo

When Nico opened his eyes, he was greeted by the too-white, very obvious walls of the Infirmary, and most noticeably not his dim lit cabin.

Huh. The cut wasn't too deep after all.

Nico immediately shut his eyes again.

Ugh. Bright. Way too bright.

Not to mention, Nico really didn't want to deal with the fallout of whatever happened (because there's always a fallout to deal with, whether you like it or not—).

So, back to pretending he was still dead-to-the-world it was.

After what felt like an eternity, Nico cracked open his eyelids and tried to best the blinding lights. Because it was either the way-too-bright lights or the mind numbing boredom. And what do you get when you bestow insane amounts of boredom on a demigod with ADHD? Disaster!

Blinking rapidly to get his eyesight in somewhat of a working order, Nico pulled himself into a sitting position and took in his surroundings.

The most obvious thing was the fact he was in the infirmary. How he got here, he didn't know. (Someone found you, someone saw—)

The curtains were thankfully drawn closed. Nico was thankful to whoever did that.

A quick glance out the window told Nico it was just past dinner, if the sun was any indication.

So, he thought. I slept from morning to dinner. That's better than most of my track record.

Judging form the bandages wrapped around his wrist and the absence of the telltale sting of fresh wounds, as well as the fact he was (still) donned in only his sleepwear, (a loose t-shirt and sweatpants) his best guess was that someone found him after he passed out and had brought him here for healing.

He wondered if they had seen his scars. (Who was he kidding? Of course they had!)

At that moment, Nico's stomach lurched. Not from hunger, no. But form the newfound knowledge of that soon, the entire camp would know, and those eyes of pity would follow him again, and he would be even more of a freak than he already was, and, and—

Commotion behind the curtains made Nico snap out of his panicked thoughts.

"—fine, Tani. Don't worry—"

"Will, you—"

But then the curtains were pushed open, interrupting the conversation. And to Nico's shock, it revealed a very pale, very tired looking son of Apollo. (Oh, and his sister beside him, but that was beside the point.)

"Will?" Nico blurted out before he could stop himself.

Will's eyes instantly snapped towards Nico's face, then widened.

"You're awake!"

Then, as if someone had dropped a bomb into the room, Nico's entire demeanor became much, much more guarded. He flinched, as if struck, and shrank into himself. Setting his jaw, Nico averted his gaze.

Will, receiving the message of 'leave-me-alone-I-am-death,' narrowed his eyes and stood his ground.

(What else did you expect? This was Will Solace, he's not like other people. That stubbornness he so strongly displays will get him killed one day, just like all the other people you hold dear—)

Silently gesturing for his sister to leave, which she did so reluctantly, the blonde gave his full attention to the son of Hades.

Instead of lecturing him on the dangers of self harm and blood and blah blah blah (It's not like he understands—) as Nico thought he would, he only sighed and said:

"Get up, Nico. Let's take a walk."

oOo

Will had taken him to the far edge of the creek, a clearing where campers rarely ventured and on the borderline of Camp's boundaries.

Nico didn't even know the place existed.

There was a small cliff some distance forwards, a front row seat of the setting sun.

Will looked completely at home, and for a second, Nico wondered if he was. If this was his safe place, that is.

The golden haired boy in question was sprawled out on the grass, facing the sun, seemingly without a care in the world.

Nico suddenly felt very awkward. Like he wasn't supposed to be there, or as if he was intruding. Which, by the way, was impossible, because there was currently nothing to intrude.

As if reading his thoughts, Will turned to face him and smiled a smile. (More like a grimace, but still.)

Nico didn't return his smile.

Tilting his head, completely disregarding the vibe of I-don't-want-to-be-here Nico was immiting, he patted the spot next to him with his right hand, gesturing Nico to sit.

Nico didn't want to sit. Nico didn't even want to be here.

But he sat anyway.

"Where is this place?" Nico asked, unable to stand the silence any longer.

Will, in turn only closed his eyes and breathed in a deep breath.

"Well?"

A breath out.

"Safe."

Oh.

"Oh," He voiced.

They fell silent once again.

And once again, when Nico couldn't stand the silence anymore, he bursted out another question. Maybe it was because he knew what was coming, or because he was nervous to the point of hysterics, (not that it showed) or maybe because his biggest secret was just revealed and he had no idea how to handle the aftermath. (Will he tell the other campers? Will everybody soon know? Will—)

"Did you bring me here to tell me to stop cutting?"

At the sound of his question, Nico immediately jammed his mouth shut. Great, now he only made another mess…

And now, Nico thought, is where the doctor goes into an hour long lecture of the dangers of self harm, and he'll shout and announce it to the world. He'll get mad and angry and I'll get mad and angry and this'll end in tears and a shouting match, and nothing good will come out of this, and—

Will only made a non-committal sound at the back of his throat.

Somehow, that only made it worse.

"I'm not going to," Nico babbled on, trying to fill the suffocating silence. "I won't do it too deeply. I never have, I'm still alive, aren't I? And you can't stop me. You can tell me useless things all you want, but who says I'll listen to you? You're only one person, you don't hold any authority over me—"

"I know," came the soft answer, a stark contrast to Nico's uncontrolled, panic and anger filled rant.

Cut off, Nico eyed the blonde boy carefully.

"I'm fine," Nico spat out. "I've always looked after myself, and I still can. I don't need some kind of babysitter."

Will didn't say anything, only started off into the distance.

Nico narrowed his eyes further. "Look, Solace. If you didn't bring me here to ask about my habits, why did you?"

Nico in all honestly wasn't expecting an answer from the strangely stoic blonde. He was prepared to stomp off after he said his piece.

But he got an answer anyways.

"To ask you why you were doing it."

Nico didn't expect this. At all.

His first thought was filled with shock.

Why in Hades name would Will be using this approach? It didn't make sense.

His second thought was filled with anger. (The anger you don't know why you feel but it's there anyways and it makes you not think straight and entirely consumes you in it's frustrations and grabs hold of you and doesn't let go-)

How dare he? He didn't know, didn't understand his reasons and mindset, how could he? (And Nico didn't want others to go through what he went through because no one should. And Will was a friend; however he would deny it. He was important to him, he was too—too good to experience what he did, no matter what he said.)

"I have my reasons," Nico snapped, cold as a blade of ice.

(A double edged blade, they say.)

The clearing was flooded with silence, tension overriding Nico's very being.

Will, Nico noted, looked completely unbothered.

He didn't understand, Nico thought. How could he? He, the goody-two shoes golden boy, would never in a million years—

"You're right," Will Solace stated calmly, (too calmly) eyes downcast. "I don't understand what you've gone through."

This startled Nico out of his thoughts. What was he playing at?

"And I don't think I ever will," He continued. "Because I haven't been through hell, I've never seen the horrors of the horrors. I'll never understand what you've been though, Nico."

Will raised his face to meet Nico's death glare straight on, not flinching the slightest.

"But I think I know why you do it. Cut, I mean."

"How would you know? It's not like you—"

"Nico."

For the first time since entering the clearing, Nico looked into Will's eyes. Not just looking, but really looked into Will's eyes. Underneath the underneath.

With a jolt, he realized the usual bright, cheery, sky blue was gone, and in its place … perhaps that was the most haunting part. The fact that Nico immediately recognized the eyes Will was blandly showing him right at that moment. Those were the same eyes, (much, much, much too familiar—) the exact same he saw every day. In fact, he saw them whenever he looked into a mirror.

They spoke of sadness and longing, bitterness and self hate, helplessness and gods-I-should-have-done-more and—and … and that insane bit of suicide, and depression.

"Nico," he repeated, his eyes still those dim, shadowed blue. " I think I understand why you did it."

But then, did he—no. No, it can't be.

(But what if?)

"It's either an escape, or a reminder. Knowing you, it's probably both. Am I right?"

That … that was exactly right. How—

"I am, aren't I? It hurts so bad you can't bear to face it, yet on the other hand, you don't want it to ever happen again. You can't let it happen again."

Nico was shocked silent. How did he—Will, it was almost as if he could read his mind—but if that, no, no. No.

Sneaking a glance at Will's face, Nico was surprised to find a small sad smile in place of the bright-as-the-sun-itself facade.

(And that's what it was. A facade. Then what exactly was Will Solace hiding?)

The next words Will uttered out, ever so soft and gentle, shook Nico up so bad his mental barriers came completely crashing down.

"It takes one to know one, right?"

Instantly, without permission, Nico's eyes flashed downwards to Will's wrists.

"I know what you're probably thinking," he continued, completely ignoring Nico's not so subtle reactions. "I'm a doctor. A healer. I lecture people on the dangers of self-harm constantly."

Will, ever so slowly, pulled off the many friendships and strings and all kinds of bracelets he wore around his wrists. "Yeah, I know. Real hypocritical of me," Will said, letting out a humorless chuckle. "But I'm also a demigod. A half-blood. And I've lost more than my fair share of people."

For the first time, Nico was Will's exposed wrists. It was smart of him, in a twisted way. When he covered up his arms with the aviator jackets he refused to take off, Will went for the much simpler approach. Bracelets. And besides. Less people thought twice about numerous bracelets in the middle of the summer, as opposed to a bulky aviator's jacket worn all summer long.

Unlike his own skin, which had random crisscrosses and were a patchwork of old scars and fresh scars on a good day (and there were bad days, when his skin was so soaked in red he couldn't tell the difference of blood and skin, and Nico would just feel numb and force himself to ignore it-), Will's were lined up, side by side, all neat and orderly. They were tiny, no more than the width of his pinkie finger, but from the scarred tissue Nico could tell they were impossibly deep. What was strange about them was the further down his wrists, the fresher the scars and the redder the skin, almost as if a time lapse of sorts.

"Yeah," Will said. "They're different than yours."

"Why?" Nico asked, hesitant. His previous anger had been momentarily forgotten.

Will took his time replying, taking a deep breath of the calm, cool and letting it out slowly.

"Each cut," he began, eyes wandering over to the setting sun. "Every time I take up my blades is a reminder to myself. Every scar is, in fact. A reminder, that is. It's twisted, I guess, I know. I have 19 scars total. ...there's one for every patient I couldn't save."

Nico was silent. Will … he shouldn't have yelled at him earlier like that … hell, he shouldn't have assumed things in the first place.

"Each scar is a reminder, Nico. To work harder to save the next one, because messing up is incredibly easy. 19 patients under my care, and I failed them. Gods, Nico I have 19 lives on my hands.

"I'm Head Healer, so all the severe cases come to me. Nico, they trusted me. With everything and anything they had. And god dammit, I let them die."

Will was glaring at the ground now, fists clenched tight.

"You know, one of the first lessons as a healer are the words 'you can't save everybody'. All my siblings say I get too attached too easily. Maybe it's true. It probably is."

Will let out a breath Nico didn't know he was holding.

"I still remember their faces, their deaths, how they died; what went wrong during my healing... Hell, I even know what they're favorite colors were, and that's so random, but I do—"

Will was positively babbling now. A floodgate unlocked, a filter taken away, hysteria making its way free.

He's … scared. Nico realized. But of what?

Will, seemingly to have suddenly cut himself off from his train of thought, took a deep breath, (he does that a lot, Nico realized) and managed to find some semblance of level-headedness and continue onward with the messed up conversation they were sharing.

"Nico," Will stated, voice soft. "The reason I brought you here today was to ask you to please not bring that number up to 20. You're important to me, alright? Remember, Nico, we all have our scars."

Nico,, for the lack of better words, was speechless, as his brain sorted out what the other boy was bluntly implying. Important? Him dying? "I—"

"Just think about it, alright?" Will cut him off, abruptly standing up and stretching. "It's late, I'm heading back. You should, too."

Then, without another word, he started out of the clearing, leaving behind a stunned Son of Hades at his wake.

The golden haired boy had not taken more than four steps when his name was called out.

"Will!" Urgent.

Said blonde startled, almost jumping, and turned.

"Nico? What is it?"

Nico, that awkward child, had scrambled to his feet and ran after the older boy, despite him being only a few steps away.

"I—" Nico stuttered. (Gods above, I'm the Ghost King, when the hell do I stutter?) "I'm sorry!" He blurted out, flushing an impressive shade of red.

"I'm sorry I yelled at you earlier, I know I shouldn't have, but I was just so mad—that isn't an excuse, I know, And I'm sorry for making you worry, and I really, really didn't mean to—"

"Nico—"

"—and for what's it worth, I sorry for—"

He was suddenly cut off, for he was suddenly pulled into a tight hug, surprisingly strong arms wrapping around him.

"When I found you," Will whispered into Nico's hair, squeezing him tight as if afraid to let go. "I was so scared. You were lying in a pool of your own blood, Nico. I was—I was afraid I'd lose you too."

In that moment, Nico realized two things. One, was the extent of how exactly afraid Will had been.

And the second … was how perfectly his body fit against Will's.

Burying his face into Will's shoulder, all he could think was safe.

(Because that's what Will was to Nico, whether he knew it or not. He was his Home, he was his Safe, he was the sun he revolved around.)

This movement comforted Will, Nico could tell. As if Nico had wordlessly made him a promise, or accepted him, or something, Will had miniturely relaxed.

Eventually, the two found themselves back in the clearing, content to watch the setting sun dip below the horizon and a dark, inky sky take its place in peace.

Now, if anybody saw a certain Will Solace and Nico Di Angelo sneaking back to the cabins hand in hand early the next morning, nobody said anything.

Nothing needed to be said, nothing needed to be explained. They all had godly blood running through their veins, they all understood.

Because after all, we all have our scars.

-Fin-

AN: And here it is! Sorry for the wait, I have no excuse.

So, what did you guys think? Good ending, bad ending, anything written weirdly? Feedback, give pls.

Everybody remember to wash their hands, yeah? Stay safe, ch'all.

Yeah, this thing was written purely to fulfill my Solangelo needs. Ah well. It turned out pretty ok.

- Mei

Guest Reveiws:

- "Nei"

Here is le insight on 'schist' (insert french accent). Hope it reaches your expectations. And huh. Now you point it out, I do sound southern or Canadian. That's interesting, yeah? Thanks for reviewing :)

- aloe vera

Aiya, I knew I shouldn't have given you my account...