Out Of The Shadows: A Solangelo Fanfiction Chapter 23: Halloween

   Nico was slightly sad it was Halloween. That meant that tomorrow he would have to wait a full year for it to come again. And Halloween was actually something that made him slightly happy.

   Nico understood what everybody else thought. Yeah, the emo son of Hades likes Halloween, that’s pretty believable. Almost stereotypical. But that wasn’t really the whole reason why Halloween was his favorite. At Halloween, Nico felt like he could fit in. Everybody was either dressed up or wearing Halloween themed clothing. People were telling scary stories and just having a lot of fun being scared. Nico wore dark clothes everyday. He spent a lot of time with ghosts. He spent a lot of time in the Underworld. Even his powers were pretty Halloween-ish. Everyday there were people who looked at him funny. Thought about how weird he was. He felt like he could fit in on Halloween. Well, fit in as much as he could, under the circumstances…

   Nico noticed Will running towards him.

   “Hey, I’m about to change into my costume. You should, too!” Will exclaimed, excitedly.

   “Alright, alright, I will. Jeez.”

   So Nico walked into his cabin and pulled Will’s clothes that were bought in his size from his drawer.

   Once he was done, he looked in the mirror and almost screamed. He looked so out of the ordinary, he almost looked like a different person. He had on a khaki colored pair of cargo shorts, a bright orange camp shirt with Will’s bead necklace, a blue checkered flannel over the shirt, a pair of flip flops, and a med kit pouch attached to the side of his shorts.

   “How did Will convince me to do this.” Nico muttered under his breath.

   Nico walked outside where Will was already waiting, and what he saw stopped him in his tracks. Will was wearing ripped black skinny jeans with a belt chain, black sneakers, a skull shirt, and an aviator’s jacket (even though Nico’s got destroyed while transporting the Athena Parthenos). Will also had on Nico’s skull ring which he borrowed from Nico, and he was wearing some kind of eye shadow underneath his eyes.

   Once the son of Apollo noticed him, he grinned and came running over.

   “Will.”

   “Hmm?”

   “Why are you wearing eyeshadow underneath your eyes?”

   “Oh! That’s because it kind of looks like the unhealthy eye bags underneath your eyes.”

   Nico sighed. “Whatever.”

   “So I’m thinking next year I could be Luke Skywalker and you could be Han Solo.”

   Nico looked at him blankly. “Who?”

   “You know, from Star Wars?”

   “What is ‘Star Wars’?”

   “Oh my gods, you don’t know what Star Wars is? We’re going to have to have a marathon!”

   “…..”

   “It’s the best movie series in the world! We can talk more about it later, but you’re gonna watch it with me.”

   “So anyways, trick or treating is going to start at 8, and right now it’s 4. What do you want to do right now, death boy? We could bob for apples, or dance to spooky music, or do some of the fun Halloween activities.” Will explained.

   “Are you going to hang out with me the whole night? What about Cecil? Or your siblings?”

   “I am going to hang out with you the whole night! Don’t worry about all those guys, they’re fine.”

   “Okay, Solace. I guess I’m just going to eat right now. I’m pretty hungry.”

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   Once the time hit 8, everyone started trick or treating at each cabin and at the big house. Each cabin was managed by one person except for the empty cabins and Nico’s. Nico’s cabin could be managed by itself.

   Each cabin that housed campers were decorated. None of them were scary, though. But Nico expected that. That was why he put a lot of work into his cabin.

   As Will and Nico went from house to house, there were multiple people who came up to them to compliment their costumes. Whenever they were around somebody, Will tried to do a bad impression of Nico.

   “Go away. I am forever alone. My name is Nico di Angelo and I am the prince of darkness and I’m very emo.” Will said when Cecil stopped by to say hi.

   Nico elbowed Will. “I do not talk like that!”

   Cecil and Will just laughed.

   “Dressed as a robber, huh Cecil? That’s very suiting.”

   “What are you trying to say, di Angelo?”

   “I’m saying it’s a suiting thing for you to dress up as since the Hermes cabin are known to be pranksters and stealers.”

   “Hey! We’re not all like that! It’s just a stereotype! I for one haven’t stolen anything.”

   Nico raised an eyebrow while Will laughed.

   “Fine! I steal occasionally.”

   “Still hiding.” Will said.

   Nico stumbled. He remembered those words. “Still hiding. You are weak.” Eros’s words. Croatia.

   “Nico! Are you okay?” Will said, steading Nico’s shoulder.

   “Yeah, I’m fine. I just tripped because of these annoying sandals. I’ve never worn flip flop’s before today.

   There was a pained look in Will’s eyes, like he could see right through Nico’s eyes. “Are you sure you’re alright?”

   “I’m sure.”

   Will removed his hand. “Okay. Let’s go to the next cabin, then.”

   “Okay.”

   “Bye, guys!” Cecil yelled as he ran off.

   After the 2 finished 2 more houses, Brooke, Kayla, and Austin all came over. Austin looked like he was dressed up as some kind of jazz musician, Kayla like a famous archer, and Brooke was dressed in a white dress with two buns on the side of her head.

   “So I see you dressed up as Princess Leia.” Will said. Then he turned to Nico. “She’s a character from Star Wars. Brooke is my Star Wars buddy.”

   “Oh.”

   “Oh.My.Gods. You actually went through with it?!” Brooke squealed.

   “What is she talking about, Solace?”

   Will scratched his head. He was blushing. “Well, I told Brooke we were doing a clothes swap for Halloween, and she didn’t believe that you were gonna go through with it.”

   “Okay.” Nico felt the sudden need to hide in a corner. He had felt that all night, but it was most prominent then.

   “Anyways, I’ll leave you two alone.” Brooke said. All three of them yelled their goodbyes and walked off.

   “What was all that about?” Nico demanded.

   “She was just excited that you agreed to it. The Apollo cabin and Cecil were taking bets.”

   Nico felt himself blushing.

   “So should we go to your cabin now?”

   Nico slightly grinned. “Sure thing.”

   As they approached his cabin, one of the Ares kids stumbled away shaking, his eyes wide.

   “Nico, what did you do?” Will asked.

   “You’ll see.”

   Nico and Will walked forward, and they walked into an entrance of a structure that was quickly put together. It was very wide and long. As soon as they walked inside, they were completely devoured by the fog that Nico had made with a fog machine.

   As they walked forward it was really hard to see, and there were distant sounds of wailing and crying. They were from the ghosts Nico had commanded. Suddenly on one side of them, they noticed a swing set with a little girl on it. She was singing ‘ring around the rosies,’ creepily as she swung back and forth. She was wearing a typical white dress and had long flowy dark brown hair. As soon as she got to “Ashes, ashes, we all fall-” Her voice changed into a scream and she disappeared. She was just another ghost doing what Nico commanded her to do.

   At the point where she screamed, Will jumped and latched his arm onto Nico’s. Nico didn’t stop him.

   The 2 kept trudging forward, when all of a sudden something red dripped from the sky and landed on Will’s face. It was fake blood, but Will freaked. He grabbed the side of Nico’s leg to grab something out of his med kit. He pulled out a pair of gloves and wiped the blood off of his face. More and more kept falling, and Will started to wipe it away more frantically. “What if it’s infected?! What if it has HIV in it?”

   “What’s HIV?”

   “We’ll talk about it later!”

   “Will, it’s fine. It’s fake, okay?”

   He relaxed a bit, but still latched on to Nico’s arm.

   Once they moved forward, the fake blood stopped dripping. But there was something else waiting for them. It was a sound like 2 objects clanking together.

   “What’s that noise?” Will asked, his voice shaking.

   Suddenly, something tapped Will’s shoulder. He jumped. He turned around, now face to face with a skeleton. As Will was screaming, another figure approached them. It was a ghost with no face, carrying a bloody knife.

   Will started running, dragging Nico along. He was still screaming and Nico was laughing.

   Next they reached a graveyard. Will stopped to catch his breath, but seconds later skeletons started coming up out of the ground and started chasing Will again.

   As Will ran again screaming, they came to the last stop. It seemed harmless, nothing was around. But then, Will jumped when he heard a deafening roar. The monster then growled at them, but they couldn’t see where it was or what it was, but Nico knew. It was just Mrs. O’Leary.

   Will’s face was pale, and his eyes were wide. Nico felt him shaking. “Come on, Will. It won’t attack. We’re almost out and to the candy.”

   He nodded slightly, and this time Nico was the one to pull him forward.

   They finally walked out of the building, and the fog cleared. In front of them was a bowl full of candy. They both took a few pieces.

   Will was still holding onto Nico’s arm after they were long gone from the Hades cabin. Nico knew other people would be able to see them now, but Nico couldn’t bring himself to pull away. Even though it was chilly out, Will was warm. Plus Will was terrified, so he needed someone.

   “So did you like it?” Asked Nico.

   “Gods, Nico. It was the most terrifying haunted house I’ve ever been in. But yeah it was good. I never would have made it without you, though.” Will said, looking into Nico’s eyes.

   Nico looked back. His eyes were such a pretty blue. They stared a little too long, and Nico looked away.

   “Jeez, I’m going to have to go change and wash these clothes. There’s fake blood all over! I should probably take a shower, too. Not only is their fake blood all over me, but I think I may have pissed myself.”

   Nico laughed.

   “You can go change out of your clothes, too. Meet back here in half an hour?”

   “Sure.”

——————————————————————————————————-

   30 minutes later, they met back up in their normal clothes. Nico felt relieved to be back in his usual outfit.

   The trick or treating was ending, and everybody was heading to the campfire where treats and drinks were set up. Music was playing, people were eating and dancing and playing games.

   “I take it you won’t be dancing?” Will said.

   “Nope.” Nico replied as he shoved a piece of food in his mouth from the food table.

   “Then you can watch me!” Will said as he started jamming out to ‘spooky scary skeletons.’ He was really terrible.

   “Looks like I need to give you some dancing lessons sometime, Solace.”

   “You can dance?”

   “Well I was raised in Italy in the ’30s.”

   “That’s cool!”

   “Not really.”

   As the night drew on, Will took a break from his awful dancing and stood next to Nico in the grass.

   “Hey, I want to show you something.” Will said.

   Nico raised an eyebrow. “What is it?”

   “Something Brooke showed me last year on Halloween. Come on!” Will held out a hand. Nico hesitated, but took it.

   Will pulled him across camp, back towards the cabins. They ran until they stopped at Hestia’s Hearth in the middle of the 12 original cabins layed out.

   “Look! No one ever seems to notice because they’re so busy, but for a couple hours on the night of Halloween, the flames turn green and black.”

   Nico stared at the flames. Will was right. They were indeed black and green, like someone took greek fire and mixed it with fire that was dyed black. But it was beautiful.

   Nico turned to Will. “This is so amazing.”

   “It is, isn’t it?” Then Will did something Nico never expected. Will bent down and kissed him.

   Nico was shocked, but his lips quickly softened against Will’s. His lips were warm and soft. Nico felt warm inside, even though the world around him was cold. Everything else disappeared around him, all a blur. The only thing that mattered was this.

   Will quickly pulled away. His face was bright red. “I’m sorry. I-“

   Nico cut him off by kissing him back. It was Will’s turn to be shocked.