Mortals meet Percabeth (and others)

Isolation

Isolation

NO MIST

The ball that Nico had been throwing for the last hour bounced back and he lazily caught it, before throwing it again and again and again repeating the action and he closed his eyes, memories of last night flooding to the forefront of his mind. Leaning on Will Solace's shoulder half asleep and bleary-eyed, a small smile on his face as the blonde Son of Apollo strummed on his guitar and listening to him singing softly as he falls asleep

It was when Will was actually carrying him back to his cabin, as Nico had refused to walk, his legs feeling like jelly and besides, he was sure that if he actually tried to walk on his own he would either fall over or walk into something and while people were starting to warm up to him, he was sure that would lead him back to square one

And besides, it seemed that his damn mouth was more than capable of getting him in trouble as during his sleepy haze he had no filter over what was actually coming out of his mouth and he had let slip that he had shadow travelled Percy and Annabeth to Paris for a date (His cousin had begged and begged him for weeks and he had only caved to get him to shut up)

Thus it lead him to be isolated in his cabin for three days

He had hoped his loose lips haven't spilt any secrets that he would've liked to keep under wraps like his affinity to certain blonde-haired Sons of Apollo. He didn't want to mention that, he didn't even want to think about it. Nico was just beginning to come to terms with what he had told Eros and Jason and even though Jason hadn't said anything -- to add another person to the equation would just be complicated 

The ball bouncing and hitting his hand broke him out of his thoughts and he caught it in his hand, before putting it in his lap. Nico sighed, three days just seemed so long and he had no one to keep him company, normally he wouldn't be bothered, but he had grown accustomed to Will's visits as of late and yet he hadn't been today

Did that make him pathetic? Yes

The fact that Nico was harbouring feelings for the son of Apollo and yet refused o say anything was driving him half-mad. Taking away the rest of the sanity that he had clung to since finding out he was a demigod. Why was everything so hard?

Ugh, sometimes he just wanted to give up 

The creaking of a door alerted Nico to a disturbance and Nico's hand shifted to the black as night blade that was holstered at his hip, and as quick as lightning (which was ironic as Nico hated lightning)  he was stood on his feet and had his sword at the intruder's throat

"Whoa. Whoa. You trying to kill me? You know you really are an angel of death"

The comment made Nico roll his eyes, but he relaxed at the voice of Will Solace and slumped against the wall with his arms crossed as he holstered his sword "What are you doing here Solace?" He glared at the blonde-haired son of Apollo's perfect face

Perfect? Where the hell did that come from?

This crush was making him weak, making him say things he didn't mean, made him want to open up even if he knew that it would only eventually leave him with a broken heart because everyone ended up leaving him eventually anyway

And he was a hell of a lot more affectionate towards Will than anyone else

"I wanted to see how you were doing, I know you often don't like being isolated to your cabin but it's for your own good. I don't want you to die. Seeing you melted into the shadow -- anyway I didn't want to have to go through that again, I didn't want to watch you die" Will says, swallowing thickly and it looked to Nico like he was trying to choke back tears

"Why?" Nico asked slowly "Why do you care about me?"

Will's face crumpled as he looked at Nico and he looked like he wanted to say something else but at the last second changed his mind "Because I'm your doctor, it's my job to care about you. Now I have a couple of hours and don't have anything to do so why don't we play a game?"

* * * 

A couple of hours and some anger issues later, Will had successfully beaten Nico in a game of Mythomagic, which the dark-haired demigod was not happy about and made it known by pouting and saying how unfair it was that Will had to be perfect at everything.

Will blushed a bright shade of red and Nico could've cursed himself for saying it out loud, why did he have such a loose tongue or why didn't he at least say it in Italian, but then he remembered that Will, being a son of Apollo the God of music, knew Italian anyway and he cursed himself for being even more stupid

He was losing more brain cells by the second

"I'm sorry!" Nico blurted out before his brain caught up with his mouth, even though he didn't really know what he was apologising for. It was just so awkward and Nico wanted to get out of this situation as quickly as possible. He could shadow travel...But then Will would have his head and he already hated being isolated from the rest of the Camp.

"Nic, why are you saying sorry?" 

"I-I don't know!" Nico exclaimed, utterly frustrated

"Okay take a breath as we talked about and speak to me"

Nico drew in a shallow breath "I don't know, okay? I just don't understand why you have to be so perfect at everything you do. Honestly, you're like a ray of sunshine in my life and you are just so kind and patient and I've never really had that ... and I just don't know how I'm supposed to compare to you, you have everything together and I'm just a mess, I have nothing going for me"

"Don't be ridiculous Nic" Will shook his head his blonde hair flopping over his eyes which made him look even better he took a step forward, gently grabbing ahold of Nico's hand and a tingling sensation went through them and Nico had half a mind to pull away, but kept them there knowing that Will would never hurt him "Listen to me, you are strong, I mean you have to be if you want to survive being who we are but you are stronger than most. You have been through so much and are still standing on the other side. That's a strong person I don't care about perfectionism, I care about human"

"And I'm barely even that--"

"Stop being yourself up, Di Angelo"

"Why do you care about me?"

"Why do you keep asking me about that?"

"Because no one has ever really cared about me before and you keep looking at me with those damn blue eyes and I don't know what to say. I want to tell you how my heart beats faster every time you look at me and I want to tell you how safe and good you make me feel when you look at me, but I can't because every time you look at me my throat closes and I can't speak to you" Nico let out, the words flowing out of his mouth before he can stop that and he doesn't even really know what he is saying, all he could picture was Will's face

The thing that clued Nico into the fact that he had even said anything, was Will's face and the way his jaw went slack and then he became the shade of a fire truck, as the words that Nico had said went through to his brain

And when the words that he said finally, finally, registered in his brain, he went as red as his counterpart and for a few minutes all they could do was blush while looking at each other and hold hands

Then realising this, they dropped their hands like they were on fire

After what felt like an eternity, Will found his voice and began to speak "Nico, is this how you really feel? Because I feel the same, I just didn't know how to tell you about it. I-I didn't want you to hate me"

"So what do we do now?"

"I don't know, whatever you want to do now"

"I mean what are we? Where do we stand?"

"Right now I'm standing in front of you"

Nico rolled his eyes at Will's attempt at the joke but it did put him more at ease and he felt better within himself as he looked into Will's eyes, his eyes kept flittering to his lips, they looked so soft and so kissable. Eventually, he moved in closer and Will got the hint, resting his hand on Nico's cheek and bending down a little to kiss him

This was the start of forever and it all started with a little bit of isolation