was correct: what Will was doing was downright painful.

Promptly following Will waking up from Apollo's advice, he aggressively rubbed his eyes to correct his blurry vision, and raced out of the Hypnos cabin. In his peripheral view he noticed Clovis snoring loudly in his cabin bed.

Daylight shone as he ran across the archery targets towards the infirmary. For the first time in his life, he wished the sky was darker, as if it would spare him more time that he missed while dreaming. He tried not to panic over the possibility that he may be too late.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Will stroked Nico's dark tufts of hair, which were softer than they appeared to be. Instinct was overcoming him at the moment, and his mind urged him to hold his friend's hand. So he did, closing his eyes. And concentrating... focusing... hoping upon hope that this would work...

After a flash of darkness, he finds himself in a dank room that smelled musty, with ancient columns surrounding him. Will seemed to be underground, but had no idea where. Suddenly, across the vast room, a wall collapses, bricks of limestone crumbling to the ground. That's when he sees a teenager in a torn purple shirt rolling away, whom he soon recognized as Jason Grace. But what was he doing here?

"Stop it!" a familiar voice yelled. "It's me you want. Leave him alone!"

Nico emerged from the swirling dust from the crumbling infrastructure. He looked murderous and Will wasn't sure who that was aimed at, though certainly not the son of Zeus. Unusually, behind those pitch-black eyes of Nico's, Will noticed a slight hint of fear. He had never known Nico DiAngelo to be scared of anything.

Then, the source of the destruction, as Will logically deducted, spoke. Poor Nico DiAngelo. He could see no face, but gathering from the authoritative tone, he could guess it was a god. Do you know what you want, much less what I want? My beloved Psyche risked everything in the name of Love. It was the only way to atone for her lack of faith. And you- what have you risked in my name?

The name Psyche sounded vaguely familiar to Will, but he couldn't make the connection between her and the mystery god.

"I've been to Tartarus and back. You don't scare me." Nico's voice came out to outweigh his appearance in terms of anger. Still, part of him sounded like he was hanging at the edge of a cliff.

I scare you very, very much. Face me. Be honest.

Will noticed Nico's hands were trembling like wave frequencies, and the stone ground surrounding him was beginning to crack.

"Give us Diocletian's scepter. We don't have time for games."

An invisible force knocked Nico into a granite pedestal. Will wanted to rush towards him, but was unable to move his feet. He then remembered with a twinge of helplessness this was just a memory of the past, and he couldn't change anything that was going to happen next.

Games? Love is no game! It is no flowery softness! It is hard work- a quest that never ends. It demands everything from you- especially the truth. Only then does it yield reward.

Well it was clear now. After mentioning love twice now, Will felt positive this mystery god was Cupid.

"Nico," Jason suddenly asked. "What does this guy want from you?"

Will couldn't see Cupid, but he imagined his ugly handsome face was smirking at Nico's sensitivity towards a subject about love. He wanted to punch the god for it; he knew exactly how furious that would make him feel.

Tell him, Nico DiAngelo. Tell him you are a coward, afraid of yourself and you feelings. Tell him the real reason you ran from Camp Half Blood, and why you are always alone.

At this, Will clenched his fists. He knew exactly the reason for Nico's leave from the Greek camp, and to Camp Jupiter instead. Though Will never wanted to so much as run away from the place he called home, he did understand the terrifying feelings that came along with love.

Nico screamed a horrible scream just then, and Will felt a cold shiver up his spine, feeling as if the dead had been unleashed. Turns out it had. The stones beneath Nico cracked open to a chasm now, releasing an army of teeth-chattering skeleton soldiers.

Will you hide among the dead, as you always do? Cupid taunted, and Will was this close to grabbing the air with his hands, a body part he could move, and attempting a chokehold on air, hoping it was the cruel god.

Time seemed to stop. Cupid stopped his derision. Jason had ceased to move; he was staring at a wall as if entranced by something. Nico looked terribly pained, he was intently staring at Jason with a fearful expression. It seemed to Will that Nico had given in to the love god, showing him the truth about the kind of people he loved. This infuriated Will, as he strongly believed Cupid should have respected Nico's privacy, not jeer at him until he let his secret spill out.

Jason stood frozen and speechless even after Nico glanced away from him, probably in shock. Well, Will did know that Jason was now one of Nico's closest friends, and smiled slightly at the thought of it. On the other hand, the skeleton soldiers were attacking an invisible barrier it seemed, but Will now knew where Cupid was standing.

Interesting! the god sounded humored. Do you have the strength, after all?

"I left Camp Half-Blood because of love. Annabeth... she-"

Still hiding, you do not have the strength. Even hidden, Cupid's voice was dissonantly unsympathetic and cruel, very unlike Aphrodite, although they were divine in the same field.

What bothered Will was the mention of Annabeth. That didn't make any sense to him. Unless Nico was really talking about Percy... could it be...?

"Nico," Jason finally spoke. "It's okay, I get it."

His friend's voice filled with bitterness and sorrow, and Will wanted to run up and hug him. "No you don't. There's no way you can understand."

And so you run away again. From your friends, from yourself.

"I don't have friends!" Nico lied unknowingly, and Will felt his aching heart wrench away from his body. "I left Camp Half-Blood because I don't belong! I'll never belong!"

The skeleton army was shaking, and Will concluded with an outrage that it was from Cupid's laughter as he was pinned by the dead.

Jason's face looked contorted as Will's. "Leave him alone, Cupid. This isn't..."

Fair, Will thought. Cupid was taking advantage of Nico's own insecurities and laughing at him for them, for gods sake.

Nico looked more vulnerable than Will had ever seen him; his pale face flushed white with misery and his voice shattering. "I- I wasn't in love with Annabeth." The puzzle pieces finally seemed to click themselves together. At this point, Will's hatred towards Cupid grew to its peak, and it took his mind's effort to keep himself from crying for Nico.

"You were jealous of her," Jason seemed to have realized, just as Will had. "That's why you didn't want to be around her. Especially why you didn't want to be around... him. It makes total sense."

Will hadn't expected there to be more to what Nico had told him a few days ago. But it did make sense to him now. It explained why he noticed some tension between Percy and Nico the day after the war. Nico must have confessed to him that day.

"I hated myself," Will let a tear trickle down his cheek. "I hated Percy Jackson."

Finally Cupid had found the means to turn visible. Although the god of love couldn't see him, Will was glaring at him with disdain. He wasn't surprised to see a cold-hearted smile plastered on Cupid's face.

Love was cruel, Will had learned long ago. It could twist through your mind like thorny vines and make you hate yourself for loving someone else.

"I had a crush on Percy," Nico was as bitter as that grape-flavored medicine Will despised as a kid. "That's the truth. That's the big secret. Happy now?"

At last, Cupid had become somewhat humane, and his expression softened a bit. Oh, I wouldn't say Love always makes you happy. Sometimes it makes you incredibly sad. But at least you've faced it now. That's the only way to conquer me.

And with that, Cupid vanished into thin air.

In this moment, Will knew what to do, how to extract Nico's pain from himself. He found himself able to walk again, so he moved towards Nico, who was now kneeling on the floor holding Diocletian's scepter. It had cost him his most hidden secret for just this ancient staff.

Nico glanced up, about to speak to Jason, who was looking back with kindness. But before Nico could speak, Will kneeled down, put both of his hands on each of Nico's soft but cool cheeks, and kissed him on the lips.

It felt like kissing a ghost, though he had no prior experience to confirm his comparison. It was nothing like how he imagined himself kissing a present-Nico, someone he knew had grown to appreciate his own self.

If there was anything worth learning from Aphrodite, it was that in order to love someone else whole-heartedly, you have to learn to love yourself first.

Alhough Will could never erase his painful memories away, he could take away Nico's pain. And for him, that was enough to make Will smile as he woke up from the flashback.