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The first time Will saw Nico di Angelo, he was ten and hiding behind his older brother.
Nico di Angelo had come to camp a few days prior with his sister, Bianca, and the two had been quickly settled in Cabin Eleven. The boy didn’t talk much, always hanging around his older sister (Michael explained that they were all each other had left, Will thought that was sad), but he smiled a lot, and looked happy. Even though Will never actually introduced himself to him, Will thought Nico di Angelo was interesting.
Even when he threatened to swallow up the entire dining pavilion in a fit of rage. Will remembered the night well. Percy Jackson returning from a quest, Thalia and the hunters in tow. Most of the hunters, anyway. One was missing, and Will could tell the moment he saw them.
Nico, normally composed and smiling, had tears in his eyes as Percy told him what happened. He screamed in Jackson’s face, swatting something out of his hands. When the skeletons came, Will hid behind Michael, who had his bow out and notched already. Will wasn’t scared though, not of Nico. Not when he saw how terrified Nico was. Nico yelled at the skeletons to go away, and a massive crack split the pavilion in half, knocking over tables and swallowing the skeletons whole.
Nico ran into the forest, and Will didn’t see him again for a long time. The world stayed monochrome.
The second time Will saw Nico, he looked vastly different than he had before. The boy’s skin had lost its depth, no longer looking as rich as it had. His eyes were darker, more sunken and sad, and even without color Will could see how sickly the boy looked. Will bet he could wrap his hand around his wrist and still overlap his fingers.
But still, Nico kept the same powerful aura he’d always had, commanding Will’s attention whenever he was near by. Nico never approached Will, Will never approached Nico. They never met, and Nico disappeared into the shadows just as quickly as he’d shown up.
Will’s world remained colorless.
The third time, it was the battle of Manhattan. Nico was at the head of an army of the undead, Stygian sword hoisted above his head, only to be brought down upon the skull of an unlucky empousa’s head.
Had Will not been busy patching up his fellow campers as they fought for their lives, he would have been starstruck. He and a bunch of other campers his age had been kept from the brunt of the fighting, but Nico didn’t fight for the camp. Will couldn’t help but wonder what, or who, Nico was fighting for.
Nico disappeared right after the battle, with nary a word said to anyone else. Will wouldn’t see color for longer still.
The first time Will Solace meets Nico di Angelo, it’s because Nico is half dead from using his powers too much and there’s a battle brewing in mere hours. The second Will reaches out and grabs Nico before he hits the ground, Will’s vision explodes into an array of color. He’s stunned silent and stares at Nico, who’s staring back in bewilderment. His friends and looking between them in confusion. Will shakes his head, hoisting Nico up onto his feet and getting into the head space of Camp Halfblood’s head physician.
“C’mon, di Angelo, we got Roman’s to sabotage.”
The battle is surprisingly shorter than what Will expects, but there’s still many casualties. He doesn’t see Nico so much for the first couple of days while Nico is giving funeral rites and Will is healing those he can. He’d managed to restitch the werewolf scratches covering his arms like scattered constellations, and gives him strict orders for as much sunlight as he can stand to prevent fading. Will made Nico swear to get his three days of infirmary time, Doctors Orders.
Nico tries to run twice, the first time he was caught by Jason, and couldn’t put up much of a fight. Apparently, Jason had extracted a similar process from the teen. The second time it’s in the infirmary, during his three days of recovery. Will threatens to cuff him to the headboard if he tries again, and they finally have their first conversation.
Will learns that he forgave Percy for Bianca, that his still likes Mythomagic and regrets burning his cards, that his favorite color appears to be blue and not because of Percy. He learns that Nico had wished Percy had been his soulmate for a long time, and resented Annabeth for having what he couldn’t, but he’s over it now. It hurts Will a little, but they hardly know anything about each other, so they start to learn. Will tells him about his mother, about the beach in the summer, about how he thinks he really likes the color red.
They fight sometimes, and bicker constantly, but they become good friends, then lovers. Nico tells Will that his eyes are the most beautiful shade of blue he’s ever seen, and the first, too. Will nearly cries when they trade “I love you”s the first time, two years later.
It’s not perfect, and sometimes it’s hard, but Will thinks it’s worth it, the way Nico’s cheeks turn cherry when he’s happy, or how his eyes are so dark they’re still black when he’s not in the sun. He thinks they’re perfect in their imperfection, and maybe fourteen years of monochrome is worth the beauty of it.