The voice of Aeneas, heavily accented, blared inside his brain.
"Good job, Nico, you're in. Your presence is powerful enough to coax him. All you have to do is witness the events that are the most important to Will. We won't be able to see what you're doing, but Hazel's spell is strong enough that he won't wake up until you get the prophecy out."
The voice rung out from somewhere beyond, and he opened his eyes. He seemed to be inside some sort of a room, with all the lights dimmed. All around him, he saw spheres: translucent, inside each a different clip, of the same boy, played on an endless loop. It was amazing.
He moved a foot, and gasped as he felt nothing below his feet. Looking down, he realized that the floor was solid, but his body was shimmering, almost translucent. Hesitating, he took another step. To him, it sort of felt like walking on the surface of water; the ground felt unsteady, and shivered underneath his feet.
He reached over to the bubble that had caught his eye, one near the center of the room. In it, he saw Will talking with a younger man – himself – on a grassy field. He moved his ghostly finger closer, then hesitated.
Did he really have to do this? His eyes narrowed, and he remembered his anger. Then, out of the corner of his eye, he caught a bubble showing Will, hanging above a gaping hole, suspended by a shadowy tendril. His body lay limp.
Yeah.
"What is wrong with you? Are you just going to stand there, silently, and smile at me?"
The world shifted, and in front of him, a young, dark-haired man paced back and forth on the grass, ranting loudly. Himself. Nico saw the younger him glare at Will, who looked exactly as he did in Elysium.
Finally, after what must've been twenty laps, Will stopped grinning stupidly and spoke.
"Aww, that's no way to speak to your 'ray of sunlight'." He smirked.
Ray of sunlight. That pulled at a memory, and for the first time, Nico was actually able to recall the rest. Maybe it was being in Will's mind, or something, but he remembered.
There was this journal, marbled black, that Nico used to have. Since he hadn't really been friends with anyone, and anyways he was sure no one would be stupid enough to go looking through his journal, he had kept the book relatively unsecured.
And then, during his infirmary visit, Percy had been sent to clean up his stuff and move him into the cabin. The cocky bastard was probably grinning as he handed it to Will when Nico was sleeping.
Young Nico blushed furiously, and swatted the air. "Stop, that wasn't for your eyes."
Will smiled, and Nico felt as if butterflies burst into life, tugging at his heart.
"It's okay. My eyes have moved onto something far more .. interesting."
Will moved in closer, and both Nico's froze.
He jumped when he felt a hand clamp down on his back, and he jumped back in shock. Standing in front of him, before the frozen scene, was Will, solid and looking worse for the wear. His eyes glinted dangerously.
"Nico. I warned you to stay away." His voice, cold, dug daggers into Nico's heart.
He moved a hand out to Will, but the blond jerked back, and before he could say a word, Will had blinked off. Nico blinked back tears, but he couldn't make out where Will was.
A sudden image of Will, drooling and limp, hanging over a hole rung in his mind. Right, that's where.
He stumbled over himself, mumbling and sniffling his nose, and moved to the next bubble. It seemed a few months after the previous bubble, where Will had kissed him for the first time. Nico's hair looked slightly longer in the clip, and they both looked unhappy.
Nico took a deep breath, and placed his palm on the bubble's surface.
He stood in the middle of a grassy pavilion. Beside him, the body of a girl lay in the grass, her characteristic blue eyes dull, face framed against blond hair.
"Please." Will was sobbing, tears spilling down his cheeks. "Ka-Kayla – you can bring her back. Nico, I know you can."
Young Nico stared down at the girl with a mixture of sympathy and sadness, but he shook his head, staying silent.
Will was screaming now, and Nico flinched as the blond leapt forward and smacked his boyfriend. "I thought you loved me."
Nico could feel his heart crumble, an echo of the past. In front of him, his younger self stared back at Will with emotionless eyes. "Will-"
The blond shrieked, his calm demeanor crumbling. "You liar. You sick, fucking liar. She was just a girl, she was just a kid, she was my goddamn sister. And you, I – I hate you." Will's eyes immediately opened wide as Young Nico flinched. "Wait, Nico," he called out weakly, but he had sunken into the ground, curled up in a tight ball.
The scene froze, and Nico sat down, leaned back on his arms, and stared at it- the pained expression in Will's eyes. He remembered that day all too well. A pair of drunken dracenae had wandered into camp during the early morning, when Kayla was taking a walk. She managed to slay them both, but the poison had gotten into her thigh, and Will couldn't heal her in time.
That was also the first morning Nico had woken up, warm and snuggled close to Will's body. Then, they heard the scream.
He heard a small shuffle behind him, and this time when he turned around, he wasn't at all surprised to see Will.
The blond shuffled, and Nico noticed that they were in the same position as before- Nico on the ground, Will standing tall, staring pleadingly at him.
"I'm sorry for what I said earlier. I know why you're here."
Nico stared, blankly, the angry pounding slowly fading.
Will continued, taking a deep breath. "We haven't been completely honest with you. To get you into my head, to get your powers as such, we had to make sure that you believed I was truly in danger."
Anger exploded again. "You were all lying to me? You?"
"I'm, I'm sorry." Will said.
The expression in his eyes mirrored Young Nico's perfectly, and Nico couldn't help but lose his breath. Will looked so- helpless.
"I guess its okay. So why did you all go through so much trouble to get me here?" Nico asked.
"Because, although Aeneas was cruel," At his name, Nico flinched visibly, and Will frowned with sympathy. "He was correct. Your presence, well, it's strong enough to clean through my memories. But you're looking in the wrong place."
He held out his hand, and Nico hesitantly took it. Instantly, he felt his body begin to solidify, and a strange heat pulse through his body. He blushed violently, and for what seemed like the first time in forever, Will grinned at him.
They walked through the room, Nico holding his breath the entire time so he could hear everything. The beat of Will's heart, the soft breaths he made, the light footsteps.
Will led him over to a far corner of the room, in which three bubbles sat. Will smiled as he guided Nico's finger over to one, and they pressed it together, his shaking hand guided by Will's firm one.
Nico gasped audibly. They stood on what seemed to be a beach, but all around them, a tunnel of water rose towards the heavens. Occasionally, streamers of colored lightning crashed down from all the sides, and Nico looked up to find a grinning Jason and Percy.
And in front of him, a slightly older Will, in his early 20's, knelt down and pulled out a black box, opening it. Inside sat a small pendant, a sun with a shadow pointing on it. Nico felt his hand move instinctively over his chest, and feel the bare skin there.
"Will you marry me?" He saw Will's lips move, and Nico grinned broadly. He looked next to him at the real Will, who smiled fondly at his younger self.
They watched, together, as the water crashed down, and Jason and Percy descended from the sky. The two heroes walked over, placing an arm on either side of Will's slumped shoulders.
"Hey man, that was great!" Nico cringed slightly at Percy's voice; although it was all apparently a ruse, he still didn't trust the guy.
Jason grinned, then his lips tilted down. He glared at Percy to stop smiling.
"Hey man, what's wrong?"
Young Will looked up, eyes wary. "I don't know. We've been dating for years, yeah, but I don't know. What if he says no? What if Nico doesn't really love me as much as I do him?" Every word dug into Nico's chest, and he caught Will staring at him from the corner of his eye. He hastily looked away.
Percy squatted down in front of the blonde, tilting his chin up. "Hey man, there is no way in Tartarus that Nico will say no. Do you remember when you first asked him out?"
Young Will nodded, lips tilted up in a faint smile.
"He stayed in my cabin the night after your date, keeping me up until the morning. He was all, 'Oh Will's so hot, he held open the door for me'." Percy spoke in a weirdly high-pitched Italian accent, causing both Wills to giggle.
"He thinks you are literally a god. Like, you are so lucky you haven't heard Nico's love poems." Jason made a gagging noise, while Young Will blushed furiously.
The blonde smiled, and Nico smiled in relief.
The clip stopped there, and Nico's breath hitched as he turned to find Will staring straight at him. The blonde had a curious expression on his face, his eyes perked up and lips tilted in a smile.
"Do you still remember that night?" His voice was barely a whisper. "Close your eyes."
And Nico did, letting the darkness envelope his mind. Will had wanted to show him something down by the beach, apparently some cute hippo thing that Percy had found. He had tagged along reluctantly, grumbling the entire way.
He had almost fallen down in shock when the little cute green hippo, waddling in a tiny pool, suddenly morphed into Frank wearing a suit and tie. Then came the wall of water and lightning striking down on all sides. Then, apparently the girls had teamed up to make a magical, mechanical pegasus which broke through the walls of water, with Will on its back. And as if that wasn't enough, Hazel made a shower of jewels rain from the sky.
Nico smiled, as he remembered how he had almost had a heart attack with the sudden burst of energy. And yet, he had actually fallen over embarrassingly when Will leapt off the pegasus, knelt and produced the little black box.
He heard Will whisper in his ear, and he instinctively leaned back, feeling his head rest into the crook of Will's neck. "Remember what I said?"
The memory came back, clear as a ray of sunshine on a rainy day. Nico felt his lips shudder.
"Till death do us apart."
"Well, it seemed like I lied."
Nico smiled, and opened his eyes, to look into Will's eyes, an inch above his own. They really were beautiful, as if they were carved out of morning dew.
"I love you, Will."
And with that, the world turned blindingly bright.
A/N: Mmm that felt satisfying. I really hated making a lot of the characters seem like such douchebags, and now the actual storyline can begin. Next chapter- the prophecy, and quest!