*This chapter contains smut*

Under Pressure We're Cracking

Nico

The sound of a creaking door. Footsteps.

Nico, still half asleep, slowly blinks and turns his head, watching in the low light of the green torches. It has to be really early morning: the sky still dark and the rest of the camp, silent. Will closes the door and slumps against it, his shoulders stooped, his back bent as if it's too hard to hold his head upright. He heaves a sigh and pushes himself off the door.

Nico smiles to himself, half hidden by his pillow. Will pulls his shirt off, then swings his arms and twists his torso, working the stress out of his back.

Muscles. Nico thinks he could spend hours watching Will walk around shirtless. The difference from two years ago – Will had been strong then, but slender, lankier, and now – the sight makes Nico's breath catch in his throat. Will stops swinging his arms, his back to Nico, groaning softly, and Nico bites his lip to keep from making a sound. He watches Will move his arms, fascinated by the shadows his shoulderblades make in the low light.

Are you feeling up your own chest? Turn around so I can see!

The sound of Will's zipper is music to Nico's ears. He watches Will drop his jeans and briefs, leaving them on the floor, and then hums contentedly as he takes in Will's naked body, not even thinking about keeping quiet. Will turns and Nico meets his gaze. The expression on Will's face dials back Nico's arousal like pushing the button on a measuring tape. Will looks shattered. His eyes are wide and round, glassy with tears that won't fall. Nico tosses back the blankets and pats the bed, inviting Will in.

In an instant, Will climbs on top of Nico, burrowing his face into the crook of Nico's neck, straddling his legs and pushing Nico deeper into his pillow. Nico runs his hands over the muscled ridges and dips in Will's back, his skin hot against Nico's cool palm.

Will holds Nico's sides between his arms, pressing in with his elbows as if he's afraid to let go, and then rolls his hips, his breath hot against the skin of Nico's neck. Will's dick is rock hard, his hips moving as if on their own steam, bumping and grinding Nico's groin. He presses his balls against Nico's clothed erection, and then slides his own hard dick back and forth, up and down the underside of Nico's, teasing until Nico's boxers are unbearably tight.

Still, Nico tells himself he'll wait. He needs to find out what's going on before losing himself in sex. He trails his hands down Will's spine, and then stops him, gripping his hipbones and holding them in place so he can't grind. "What's the matter?" Nico asks. He sounds breathy and more than aroused, but there's nothing for it. He waits for Will to talk to him, to stop trying to find friction, to stop struggling against Nico's grip.

Finally, Will lifts his head, their faces an inch apart. He closes his eyes, wrinkling the corners though if with pain or grief or even frustration, Nico can't tell.

"Please," Will says, and opens his eyes again. "I need you, Nico. Please. I need to feel you inside me. I – I can't talk about it yet."

Nico takes in Will's wrecked face, succumbing as Will's hips wear down his handholds, and Nico allows the grinding to resume. He nods, answering Will's grateful kisses without restraint. He'll hear what's troubling Will when Will is good and ready to talk. Right now, Nico will offer whatever comfort Will wants to take from his body.

Will breaks the kiss, trailing messily across Nico's jaw line, and then tugging Nico's earlobe lightly with his teeth. Nico gasps, breathing harder, his heart racing. That's a new hotspot to him, but apparently Will knows it well. He pushes his frustration with losing two years of life experience down in favor of savoring 'right now'.

Will releases Nico's earlobe, then crawls backwards down Nico's body, tugging his boxers down to his calves. Then Will turns around, straddling Nico's thighs backwards, the crack of his ass right at the base of Nico's erection. Nico couldn't look away if he wanted to as Will bends over and pushes the boxers off Nico's feet.

Nico's sole focus is Will's perfect ass on display before him, ready for the taking. Nico shudders again as Will seeks out more hotspots on Nico's ankles and calves, pressing them with kisses and tracing them with his tongue. Nico runs his hands over his own chest, pinching his nipples, rubbing them into hard nubs.

And then Will arches his back, supported on his hands and knees. He rolls his hips so his erection brushes Nico's, pointed in opposite directions. And Nico has to hold himself back from the urge to take over, to stop the teasing, to push Will face down into the mattress and take what he wants. Fortunately, Will doesn't tease much longer. He backs up again, straddling Nico's stomach, and pulling Nico's cock up against his own, wrapping his hands around them together.

The friction is so good, but more than that, the sight of Will's butt flexing as he works their cocks in his fist has Nico enthralled. A moment later, Will grabs something from the bunched up blanket, and Nico understands it's lube when he watches Will reach around and slick his own hole with his fingers.

Gods, Nico understands. Fucking himself backwards on Will's dick is pretty much the fastest way to an orgasm for him. He wonders how much Will likes it, how many times they've done it this way, how many missing memories he has. He halts his thoughts again, swallowing his resentment. He doesn't know who or even what is at fault for the time skip, doesn't know why he seems to be the only demigod to have noticed it, the only one to be missing pieces.

"Ohhhhh," he grunts, slipping into Will's tight heat, effectively shutting down all lines of thought.

Will's channel ripples around him, relaxing and gripping in turn until Nico's in all the way and Will pauses, taking loud, shuddering breaths. Then he starts to move, his ass going from soft and round, to hard and angular with every flex. Nico stares, drinking in the sight, watching his dick disappearing inside Will's body, lost in the slick heat, somehow different than before, somehow more. He finds himself intoxicated, entirely at the mercy of Will's whims and fine with it. Will lifts and lowers himself with his thighs, his right arm making jerking motions and the sweetest whimpers and moans escaping his lips.

Nico holds onto Will's hipbones, not trying to take control, just feeling how Will's body responds to Nico's presence inside it. Will jerks faster, rolling his hips, then shifting so he's actually supporting himself on his feet in a crouch, fucking himself on Nico, and it's all Nico can do to not interrupt. Will's cries grow more desperate, taking his breaths in gasps.

The firm muscles in Will's ass flex, his butt bouncing … Nico can't stop himself. He smacks Will's ass cheek, not hard, but the way Will tightens around him in response, the way he rolls his hips even more, tells Nico Will likes it. He does it again, and Will jerks himself into a frenzy, a litany of "oh, oh, oh," spilling from his mouth.

Will moves, lying back on top of Nico's chest. He turns his face, his lips parted, plump, and needy for kisses. Nico closes the distance separating them, kissing and licking until Will arches his neck, crying out, pressing his head back onto Nico's shoulder.

It's all Nico can do to hold onto Will's hips, balancing him while he fucks down on Nico's dick. Will stokes himself faster, his moans higher-pitched, his body going mad with sexual frenzy. He rolls his hips side to side, his legs shifting from either side of Nico's knees to between them and back, as if he just can't find the right angle. Finally, Nico rolls him onto his side, unable to keep him steady any longer.

Will moves his hand off his cock, gripping the sheet with his fist, and turning back, twisting himself so he can kiss Nico over his shoulder.

Nico's need to take control overrides all else, his balls aching with the need to come, the pleasure throbbing and building in his gut. He digs his fingertips into the skin above Will's hipbones, owning Will's mouth with his tongue as he owns his ass with his cock, and Will cries out again. Nico glances down in time to catch Will's cock spurting without a hand on it, come pumped out from the force of Nico's dick against his prostate, and it's all over for Nico right then. Nico knows from experience how good Will's feeling right now, and even if Will wants him to last longer, it's impossible. He pumps into Will with a few forceful grunts, spilling inside him, his mind blown.

Still hard, Will works the head of his cock with his left hand, his right, holding Nico's hip in place, preventing him from pulling out. Nico watches Will's face as he comes again, finding the release he'd been seeking, the stress lines fading from around his eyes. His jaw relaxes until his cheeks are smooth, and the satisfied smile on his lips is about the most beautiful sight in Nico's living memory. Will starts to laugh, the slippery heat around Nico's cock, pushing him out in a mess of come and Nico realizes why sex felt so different this time. Will hadn't put a condom on him first.

Nico's mind whirls, going over all of their past discussions about why they use condoms, why Nico needs to just accept it – about health risks and leading by example. Has Will changed so much in two years that he'd abandoned his ideals? Something isn't right with Will. Nico knows it deep down, but looking into Will's face, at how he glows with absolute contentment, the trust and love in his eyes, it feels like the wrong time to bring reality crashing back down. He keeps quiet.

They lie together, wrapped loosely in each other's arms, savoring the afterglow in their shared gaze. Will is the first to speak. He still sounds wrecked, like he's using the endorphin rush from sex to cover how lost he feels and failing at it. "I love you, Nico. So much. You know that."

Nico shifts, his stomach twitching on the edge of sinking.

"Yeah?" Unease creeps through Nico's veins, his nerves frayed.

"Yeah," Will says and closes his eyes. He's still smiling, but Nico can't help wondering if it, too is a an attempt at covering up something darker, something broken.

Unsure how to bring up his concerns, Nico turns his attention to their physical state. Dealing with what he can fix without fear is easier to deal with than deep talk about emotions. Emotions are dangerous and with his powers newly sapped, Nico thinks he's a little too exposed to dive into them without having the option to shadow-travel away available.

"Will?"

"Hmm?" Will mumbles, half asleep.

"We are a mess and the sheets need changing."

Will opens his eyes and giggles, and damn it if that isn't the cutest he's ever looked. Nico's heart feels like it's expanding, warming his chest.

"Shower then?" Will asks, lifting a lazy eyebrow. "Shower and sheets, then sleep?"

Nico nods and smiles back at him. Keeping it simple, doing the things that need doing and can be done without much effort. Yeah. That's what they'll do for now. The rest of it, the deeper things, can wait.