Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

1. Broken Bone x
2. Wounds x
3. Bleeding Out c
4. Impaled
5. Anxiety
6. Starving
7. Death
8. Freezing
9. Overheated
10. Touch
11. Forgotten
12. Hopeless
13. Pain
14. Fatigue
15. “Fuck you” *alt
16. Scrape
17. Thirst
18. Hell
19. Weather
20. Disaster
21. Case
22. Lost
23. Confused
24. Delirium
25. Sick
26. Embarrassment
27. Run
28. Trip
29. Trapped
30. Nausea
31. Suffering

Chapter Text

Ok Nico didn’t MEAN to always give Will heart attacks but he makes it too easy. Always worrying about him, (which Nico does the same but that’s not the point!), to a very annoying point at times.

They were in the middle of one of the rare Capture the Flag games where the Apollo and Hades cabins were on opposite sides. Even Rarer Nico was the captain, leading the campers he’s reluctantly been getting to know.

Since they were not on the same team, Nico didn’t have anyone on his shoulder stopping him from using his powers. He summoned a few skeletons to boost their chances.

Hearing the young Ares kids scream in terror, despite trying to act tough, is just an added bonus.

Ares cabin is the other team captain and they always hide their flag in a tree so Nico has this in the bag.

So there Nico was minding his own dam business marching on the edge of the game boundary being as quiet as he could be with an army of the undead.

He wasn’t quiet enough apparently because he was pinned in the head with a rock thrown by one of the new Ares kids, who happened to sneak up on him.

That would be enough to send Will into a tailspin with his mild concussion but because he was on the boundary Nico was right by a drop off.

The rock made him lose his balance and after a very galant effort, or at least that is what Nico thinks, he succumbed to gravity and fell off the cliff.

And so this brings us to his current situation. Lying in pain, at the bottom of the ravine all alone.

The skeletons that he summoned are all disappearing, or just dropping to the ground in a heap of bones, with his loss of focus due to the rock. And also due to that fucking rock he couldn’t summon any more or even shadow travel because he felt like passing out!

“Fucking Ares campers…” he slurred as he tried again in vain to move from his lying position. His leg is bent at an unnatural angle.

“Gods look at this, you survive two wars just to be taken out by a rock. Pathetic…” Nico all but whispered these words with what little strength he had. The small footsteps he heard coming from the child had long disappeared. Nico greatly doubted they stuck around long enough to see what happened to him.

That gremlin probably thought he could easily take it. For the first time Nico silently cursed his reputation. Not that he would ever admit that out loud.

Even if he could scream (which he wouldn’t ‘cause he’s not scared shut up Will!) no one would hear him out here.

Maybe Will was right it’d be nice to have a phone right now.

But in general those tiny computers are very hard to understand.

Nico glanced over a long stick about 5 feet away from him. Sighing and biting down on his tongue he prepares to reach over.

——————————————————————

Will was having a great time. Sure he wasn’t the best at combat so he could charge with the Ares campers or be back up with most of the others but, he was pretty good at sneaking around.

Plus he knows his boyfriend very well so he chooses to sneak in the brush going straight to the spot Nico would hide his flag.

His distraction, in the form of a very loud band of Ares and Hermes, was just on time pulling away the Circe camper guarding the flag.

It feels oddly easy as he lifts the rock and takes the flag from under it. He half expects Nico or one of his skeletons to jump out and tackle him.

But as he runs into the shadows he finds it weird that nothing happens to him. Winning the game is nice but he can’t shake the feeling that something is wrong.

The game is called to an end and everyone cleans up to make it over to the campfire. But Will can’t see his boyfriend anywhere. It’s usually normal for Nico to avoid the large crowd but he ALWAYS checks in with him.

Will walks up to the Circe camper who was guarding the Flag, “Hey have you seen Nico? I haven’t seen him since the start of the game.”

The Circe camper, Mira, thinks for a second before replying, “Last I saw he was walking the boundary with a few skeletons for a sneak attack. Did he not show up? I was pretty confident he would make it.”

Will felt his heart stop at this reply. Now sure that something was wrong. At a small noise to his left he looked over to see a very guilty looking young child staring at him.

“I’m sorry,” the child starts, “I thought he’d be fine!”

Before Will can even get a word in, the child continues, “I think he fell I hit him with a rock. But I thought he’d be fine! I didn’t know!”

Will doesn’t hit children but right now might be the time he changes his morals.

Not trusting his mouth enough to say much he gets straight to the point, “Where.”

“East by a big Willow tree on a cliff.”

The kid barely got through the word cliff before Will was running. He would like to call himself a thoroughly rational person but sometimes that is all thrown out the window and he jumps into situations head first.

He probably should have told someone, anyone where he was going but he wasn't thinking. Getting to the area by the willow tree Will can see a small puddle of blood covering a fairly large rock.

“Shit. NICO WHERE ARE YOU!?” Will runs towards the edge and is able to see his boyfriend lying down with a splint on his leg banging a rock on the edge to catch Will’s attention.

“My gods are you ok Nico?” Will half shouts as he starts to make his way down.

“ ‘m fine justa few brok’n bones.” Nico has an audible slur in his voice as he deadpans and holds up the broken femur of one of his skeletons.

“Probable concussion” Will whispers to himself, chuckling despite the situation, going to Nico’s side to get a better look at his leg. “What am I gonna do with you?”

Chapter Text

Will liked to say that he was the smart and stable one in his relationship. In truth neither of them were very stable in the first place. Two literal child soldiers who both had siblings die, plus countless other family members. Not to mention the other literal children they had to kill in the name of the Gods.

When you think about it for any more than five seconds the whole thing is really fucked up.
But Will does like to uphold his outer persona as both the mentally and physically stable one. After the first war he had to take on the responsibility of healing and taking care of everyone in camp. Sure he had vast medical knowledge and some assorted healing powers but it could get to be a little much at times.

Due to this over the years he’s developed the unfortunate habit of concealing his injuries and not treating them. It’s not exactly that he wants to feel pain but on the list of Will’s priorities his own wellbeing often fell dead last.

Nico likes to point out that this makes him a hypocrite which is probably true. Another thing about his fake persona is that Nico is one of the few who truly sees through it and unfortunately will not hesitate to call him out on his bullshit.

——————————————————————

It was a particularly busy day in the infirmary. It was the day of a chariot race so he was expecting quite a lot of injuries. Luckily this event only happens about once a year so he’s not completely overwhelmed.

Then an Ares camper is carried in with a compound fracture with the bone puncturing the skin and he realizes he is absolutely overwhelmed.

Nico is cutting bandages and helping for minor wounds along with Austin and Kayla but anything major is left solely in the hands of Will.

After he sets the bone he has to use a pretty large blessing on the wound to get it to stop bleeding and close up. It leaves him fairly exhausted.

Glancing at the drawer full of medicinal flowers he notices it is almost completely empty.

“Hey I’m going to go refill the flower bin. I'll be back in a minute!”

Nico gives him a thumbs up before Will turns away and walks out the door over into the woods in search of the flowers.

He was able to find most of the flowers within a few minutes. The one giving him the most trouble is finding more bloodroot.

After about 25 minutes Will spots a small patch of the white flowers growing out of what looks like an abandoned Rabbit’s burrow. Reaching in the hole to grab a few bulbs he suddenly jerks his arm back at a sharp pain on his arm.

Looking at his arm to see a long thin scrape about eight inches spanning from his forearm to his elbow. Looking back down in the hole he see a scrap part of aluminum sticking out the side.

Taking a small roll of bandages out of his jean shorts (occupational hazard, always carrying first aid) he loosely bandages the wound to stop the bleeding and puts on the flannel around his waist to hide the bandage.

When he gets back to the others he thinks about telling the others to get it cleaned up but the two campers come in from a nasty fight and he promptly forgets all about his arm.

——————————————————————

Nico was fairly distracted doing very important jobs all around the building thank you very much. Demigods tend to attract injuries like flies to manure.

That’s probably why he didn’t immediately pick up on the fact that Will was acting weirder than normal. He didn’t think much of it till he tried to tough his right arm and he visibly winced.

“Ok that's enough.” Nico told Will as he used his left arm to pull the both into a separate room.

“Neeks come on…”

“No, what's wrong, did I do something? Or are you hurt?” Nico looked at his significant annoyance with a glare.

“No I’m f-” Will started to say before swaying and promptly passing out onto his boyfriend who catches him with ease.

——————————————————————

Finally blinking awake Will is slightly confused at waking up on a bed before seeing his angry boyfriend standing above him and remembering passing out.

Seeing him awake Nico began talking, borderline yelling, at him, “Severe dehydration and moderate blood loss. What Happened? What the fuck were you thinking!?!”

“Just a minor cut I got while getting flowers. It's fine, I didn't want to bother anyone. I’m sorry Neeks.”

Will feels a sharp pain on his face as Nico slaps him, not hard just a warning. “You’re an idiot, you scared me!”

Will is slightly lightheaded and too tired to think rationally so he just looks at him smiling, “Yeah but I’m your idiot.”

That earned him another slap.

Chapter Text

Nico’s life would have been fairly shot even if he were a mortal. Demigods hypothetically have a longer natural lifespan but in true practice with the amount of monsters in the world and the intrusion of meddling often malevolent gods shorten that lifespan a lot.

In another life Nico lives with his mother and Bianca in his own time. In this work Nico dies at 19. The reason is tragic yet unimportant. The point is Nico doesn’t expect to make it to 20.

So laying on the floor in an unknown house in an unknown room on an unknown floor slowly, painfully bleeding out, it’s nothing he hasn’t expected.

He expected to die to a monster, maybe in a cool heroic way. But it’s the end for him and it wasn’t cool. It was pathetic. He was shot by some regular human. A serial killer. A simple mortal caught him by surprise. Ending his surprisingly long career of monster hunting.

If he could laugh he would, hysterically, the dramatic irony of it all. His whole life bouncing between the over and underworld facing literal gods. Only to be killed by 2 measly bullets.

Earlier that day he was lured into a suburban looking house by the sound of growls, as he was tracking a missing hellhound. So, he assumed that was it. It wasn’t. Waiting for him in the house was an enlightened mortal who used this knowledge to target and murder demigods.

The door was barely closed before Nico was hit by two consecutive bullets to his right shoulder and lower stomach.

He managed to shadow travel himself to this house but with the blood loss he can’t possibly do it again. He also no longer knows where he is. He’ll die alone here, but at least he’ll die in peace.

Life half flashing before his eyes Nico wonders how Will and his sister will take it. He hopes they’ll be sad and past him would have said they wouldn’t. But now Nico truly believes that he is loved.

As his senses slowly start to go he can hear muffled voices coming from the blood.

‘Huh didn’t think Iris could do that’ he thought as his eyelids started getting heavy. Contemplating life and death and what Nico WANTS the outcome to be.

As Nico slipped into unconsciousness he hears a door being broken down as he realizes either way this turns out, he’ll be safe.

Chapter Text

The day of their deaths was an ordinary one. Both husbands are well into their thirties. Together they had a small log cabin, that Nico had his skeletons built for them, in the remote woods.

The day of their deaths was a dreary one. The clouds are black and blue. The sky was spitting something that wasn’t quite a downpour but was close. The mud of the garden was watery and deep. Nico wakes up before his husband, (without the sun he was more tired than usual).

The day of their deaths was a peaceful one. Nico made himself a cup of coffee that was half sugar and a black one for Will. The Hell hound that they had adopted, Mira, was chasing raindrops outside. The house was silent except for the raindrops on the roof. Having both dropped off the grid; the men had also dropped off from monster radars. Until today.

Will wakes up half past noon to find his husband. Momentarily distracted by his coffee he gives Nico a kiss as he heads outside where the rain had mostly cleared up. He sits on the stoop and enjoys what is inadvertently his last meal.

Nothing is too out of the ordinary. Nico comes out to sit beside him as they watch the birds and other animals move around them. A small buzzing can be heard in the background that neither notice.

If only they heard the buzzing maybe things could have been different.

Hours pass like this. Their days are often like this. After more than enough stress and trauma for their lifetimes they both decided to have a retirement of sorts.

Will stares out at the trees and nods to Nico when he hears him mumble something about a walk. Will sets his mug to the side and lays back onto the deck, putting his arms above his head and closing his eyes sighing. He slowly starts to drift off into a deep sleep under the warm afternoon sun.

Will wakes us to a raindrop on his cheek. Blinking deliriously into the now dark world trying to get the sleep off his eyes will looks over to his side surprised to see Nico missing.

He should have been more concerned but after decades of peace he no longer expected threats to show up at his door.

Sitting up and grabbing his mug Will walks inside still not seeing his husband. Turning the corner to peek in the bedroom door he sees the bed empty and made, like they left it that morning.

Setting the cup on the table he looks briefly into the bathroom to find the door open and the room empty.

This isn’t right, Will thinks. They no longer had phones and so they never strayed too far from each other for very long.

As his memories come back Will realizes the last time he saw him Nico was going on a walk.

He tries very hard not to panic but instincts that had been buried under years of a peaceful existence kick in. Pouring a glass of water on the floor he runs into their bedroom to his nightstand taking out a bag from the top drawer.

Sprinting back to the puddle he opens the bag and pulls out a single gold Drachma and whispers a small prayer to the goddess Iris begging to see the location of Nico Di Angelo.

Will gets a view from a floor staring right at the love of his life beaten and bloody on the flood chest barely rising. His paleness and dark aura a testament to his attempts to fight back. Will can barely stop himself from sobbing and he strains his necks and gets a good look at the cave and the foliage surrounding it.

The man runs out into the woods in the general direction he thinks Nico is being held. Blinded by fear and love he doesn’t even grab a significant weapon. Just a small dagger and his med pack.

Approaching the cave with gashes on his feet at an alarming speed he spits the son on Hades laying in the middle of the cave surrounded by water and his own blood.

“Ok it’s gonna be ok I’ve got you Neeks,” Will softly says, cradling his husband's head in his arms as he checks the gashes all over his body. It's bad. Really bad.

“Will. No. It’s a trap. Go!” Nico whispers to Will desperately pushing the son of Apollo off of him.

That’s when Will looks down and notices that what he thought was water was actually drool. A lot of it.

Before he has time to process this he hears a loud roar behind him. Turning around he comes face to face with a manticore. He desperately throws his dagger as a last resort but it simply bounces off the creature.

As it prepares a spike to shoot out he closes his eyes. He feels the pain. Right through his stomach. But it was better than he was expecting. Opening his eyes he saw the slight smile of Nico who had taken the brunt on it.

Will screams as his heart is ripped in two. A bright light is coming from his whole body and he cradles the other man in his arms. The manticore disintegrates before him but it doesn’t matter.

Nico pulls him into a kiss, his tears mixing with Will’s own.

They lay like that till the light runs out of the previously light pair. A somber smile on each of them as they left this plane together.