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Apparently, when you lose copious amounts of blood, others tend to become concerned.
Nico figured this out quickly through observation in the infirmary, even helping out a few times when the Apollo cabin was low on healers. He'd grown accustomed to witnessing rivers of red draining from people's bodies, feeling their life force waning just as quickly. Now he'd barely bat an eye at the gruesome sight, and it looked like the Apollo cabin had followed his peculiar habit.
Will specifically, he had realised was just like him in that sense. Every time he had seen him work, no matter how disgusting the injury or how dire the state of the patient not once had the sixteen-year-old boy ever wavered. In that situation he would always grab his gloves and snap them on in record time, barking orders at the others while grabbing the necessary tools to keep them alive, all while not a hint of fear broke through his face. Nico admired him for that.
Even in everyday life for mortals, blood loss seemed to be an everyday occurrence. Some experienced it occasionally, and others willingly donated their blood. He could understand why, it saved lives that way, though the concept sounded a bit strange. However, he's seen much stranger and so chooses not to question it.
That's why when he started to lose blood more and more often he thought nothing of it. In his (albeit unwilling) field of work, it was normal.
The first indicator was that this wasn't a common thing that happened. Will had dragged him out of his cabin against his will at the crack of dawn (8 a.m.) and forced him to join him at his cabin's table to eat a disgustingly delicious meal.
As a sign of protest and to simply be insufferable, Nico plopped onto the edge of the bench and promptly placed his head on the table. Will ignored his and slid between him and Kayla, who held her drink steady so that it wouldn't spill when Nico sat down. She shifted a bit to allow will enough space to sit and continued drinking her juice through a swirly straw, the bright pulp of the orange complimenting the roots of her hair.
"What's with him?" she spoke with the straw in between her teeth.
Will lifted his hand and started playing with the onyx tresses of Nico's hair. Through the table he hid his muffled hum of contentment with the comforting feeling, he was still mad that he got dragged outside.
"I woke him up and took him here to get something to eat before breakfast ended, he's mad cause I took his vampire highness out into the sun."
Out of the corner of his eye, Will saw Nico's head move slightly so that his eyes peeked through, glaring at him blearily with the tiredness still glazed over. Huffing, he put his head back down on the table, and Will could hear the grumbling from under the table.
At that moment Austin slid into the space across from the three, struggling to balance the three plates in his hands. Quickly he slid two to his older brother and set his own before him. Without a word said he immediately dug in, only nodding in response to Will's thanks.
Prodding Nico's messy head with a finger will push his plate towards him. Nico niched himself into a proper sitting position and started at the plate. Grabbing the nearest utensil he could see he scraped most of the contents of the plate onto his boyfriend's and slowly began eating the rest. Will looked at him, his lips set in a thin line and Nico already knew what he was about to say.
"Nico-"
"No."
"Just an apple."
"No."
He felt his hand being stopped by the other boy's. He stared at the freckled hand, and back at the one it belonged to. It felt so warm compared to his, and he held back the urge to hold it and try to absorb all the warmth it held. His hands were always so cold, it was almost unnatural. That was the first indicator.
Will's eyes held his, filled with a silent question. Nico sighed and shovelled what was left on his plate into his mouth. He looked around the table for something else to satisfy Will. He wasn't going to eat fruit, that took too much effort and he didn't feel like eating anything. He didn't see anything else though, so he reluctantly took an apple and bit into it. It was magically grown and should've been perfect. But to Nico, it just tasted bland, and he didn't feel any more satisfied.
He managed to finish half of it before giving up and stopping. Setting the apple on the table, he rubbed his eyes and looked around tiredly. The sun was decently high out now, and he still wanted to go back to sleep. He let his sleep overtake him despite still being at the dining table and buried his head in his folded arms.
The second indicator should've been the fact that he slept until the afternoon.
This was also normal, so he thought nothing of it. He was back in his cabin, the blackout curtains that had been pulled over the windows made it impossible to tell what time it was. Nico stumbled out of his bed and opened the door.
The sun had begun to set, and all around campers were seen grabbing weapons and strapping on armour. One quick glance at the Ares cabin told him that it captured the flag day. Suddenly awake, Nico rushed back inside to grab his sword and ran to the meeting area.
Thankfully he wasn't the last one to arrive, but he was pretty close. the campers had already separated into groups, he would need to ask which one he was in. Spotting a familiar mop of blond hair in the distance, Nico walked to where he stood.
Will was hunched over, searching for something in his first aid kit. He didn't seem to notice that Nico was behind him. Thinking he should be kind enough to alert him of his presence, Nico politely flicked the side of his head with his pingers.
Startled, Will turned his head, his eyes softening realising who had been beside him. "Oh hey, you almost missed the game. They're going to start soon."
"What team am I on?" Nico looked around at the large mass of campers, which had been divided into two distinct groups. Among it, he spotted a few recognisable faces, but none in which he could pinpoint which cabin was where.
Closing his first aid kit, Will reached for a sheet of paper that lay near an aphrodite girl's feet. Glancing at the paper for a moment before handing it to Nico, "That's the list there."
Nico scanned the list quickly before finding his cabin. "I'm with the Athena and Hephaestus kids. that's good."
He looked through the other cabin names on the list before spotting two that caught his attention.
"Who put the Nemesis and Nike kids on the same team?"
The paper was out of his hands, Will already scanning over the paper. Sensing that he may need more supplies than usual, he called Drew who had been sitting on a rock nearby talking with a Demeter girl.
"I need to run back and get some more supplies," Will told him, glancing back at his friend, who was tapping her feet impatiently for him to hurry up, "They're going to start soon, so be careful and do not do anything that could get you severely injured."
"Yeah yeah." Nico waved him off, "Go get your supplies, I'm fine."
Will looked at him again before turning to catch up with drew, who had started walking off without him.
Nico quickly found Malcolm among the other Athena children. They had barely any time for him to explain Nico's role in strategy before the horn sounded. The campers dashed in several directions, eager to win the game. Nico held back for several moments before shadow travelled away with the flag that Malcolm had given him.
Nico stumbled out of the tree, giving himself a few moments to breathe before walking again. He'd been told that his job was to hide the flag in a designated location and then retrieve the one that belonged to the other team. Hiding the flag had been easy enough, placing it in between a thick brush and intertwined trees before he travelled to the area where Malcolm had suspected the other team would have placed theirs.
Of course, Malcolm had been right. Near the edge of the forest stood the crimson flag, guarded by four campers. Nico didn't sense any other campers around, and taking out four would be easy enough if the campers in question weren't Nike's children. The bloodthirsty victory seekers stood around the flag in a tight formation, and Nico had no doubt that should he attempt to get the flag, which would have been a cakewalk had it been anyone else, he wouldn't leave the area without at least one malicious gift in return.
Readying himself, Nico estimated at least a thirty-second opening before he would be in trouble. He's been in much worse circumstances before, a simple game like this was nothing.
One girl shifted, and he moved.
Materialising behind them, Nico grabbed the flag and vanished again. He reappeared not too far away, definitely not as far as he wanted. he could feel himself getting tired from shadow travelling three times in a row without a recharge, but he was close to where he needed to place the flag. He had no choice but to run, and the Nike children were quickly catching up behind.
One appeared in the corner of his eye, and he tripped her before she could slash at him with her sword. She tumbled on the forest floor, groaning as she pushed herself upright.
Two other boys flanked him from either side, and Nico used most of the energy he had left to summon skeleton hands to hold their feet in place. Surprised, both boys tripped and dropped their daggers. It didn't hold them for long as they yanked free from the bone clutches, till the bones were swiftly replaced with thick vines as a Demeter boy dragged them back down.
Seeing the home base, Nico kicked off and broke off into a faster run. A burst of pain bloomed from his side, and he pushed down the feeling and focused on the end goal. He could hear the sounds of yelling and cheering, but they sounded muffled and distant. Completely zeroed in on the spot, he threw the flag down at the same time his team cheered.
At the same moment, he noticed that he was bleeding profusely from his side.
His head whipped around to face the Nike girl who had chased him, her face was free of guilt. Smiling triumphantly despite losing, she held up her knife that had cut him and cheered. She couldn't have been older than twelve, yet she felt pride in significantly wounding another person. Nico wasn't surprised, she was a child of victory. It was in her nature to be like that, so he didn't blame her.
He tentatively touched his right side where she had sliced him. It didn't look fatal, but it still hurt. He'd felt worse, so he didn't think anything of it. Malcolm ran up to him, his grey eyes glinting with pride that his plan had worked. He patted Nico's shoulder and said something, but Nico couldn't make it out. The words sounded muffled and incoherent, the longer he stood there the more aware he was that his legs were about to give in. Malcolm paused, realising his unresponsiveness and noticed the wound that was rapidly starting to stain the rest of his clothes. He immediately called someone over, and the last thing Nico saw before he passed out was a freckled face calling out what sounded vaguely like his name.
The third indicator was that despite blood loss being a normal part of life, people somehow still tended to become concerned when it happened to him.
Nico immediately knew he was in the infirmary when he woke up. In the same bed that he always slept in when he inevitably found himself in there. He looked around, waiting for his vision to clear so that he could see properly. The infirmary seemed to have more injured than usual, no doubt courtesy of the Nemesis campers. At the other side of the infirmary, he could see Will tending to a camper with a broken arm. He looked busy, and Nico didn't feel the need to bother him since he was fine. He dropped his head back onto the pillow and stared up at the ceiling.
It didn't last for long when Drew walked past with a clipboard and another roll of bandages in her hand and spotted him. Immediately seeing what he was trying to do, she rolled her eyes and called Will over and made her way to assist another medic.
Immediately Will appeared next to him, checking his injured side that had been cleaned and bandaged. Sensing nothing wrong with the injury, he sighed and looked down at his exhausted boyfriend.
"Do you want to explain to me why I came back to the game to find Malcolm yelling at me to hurry and heal you?" Will handed him a bottle of nectar-infused water, "And why did I have to find out through healing you that you're anaemic."
Nico furrowed his brows in confusion, "What's that?"
Will stared at him for several moments. Sensing he wasn't joking, he signalled his sister over while he talked. "It's a condition in which blood lacks adequate healthy red blood cells, in your case, it's caused by a lack of sufficient iron."
Kayla rushed over and handed will a small bottle that rattled in the slightest movement. She waved at Nico before dashing off again.
"Symptoms include cold hands, fatigue and dizziness among other things, all of which you showed for a while now. It's honestly my fault for not realising sooner." Twisting open the bottle, he poured out two small red pills and showed them to Nico in an outstretched hand.
Nico sat up, and for a few seconds, the world went dark. As quickly as it came it went, and he was left staring at Will's hand again. "What's these."
"Stygian iron supplements." He handed Nico the bottle again so that he could drink them with the pills, "I usually just prescribe normal ones, but since you're a child of hades stygian iron shouldn't hurt you like it usually would with other demigods."
Ignoring the bottle completely, Nico took the pills and swallowed dry, startling Will enough to stop his explanation. He watched Nico in shocked silence, and Nico returned the look in confusion.
"What?"
"You...Nevermind." Will closed the bottle and put it in his satchel that he usually kept on him, "I'm keeping these because I know you'll forget to take them. You're staying here for another day so I can monitor your wound, so you can go back to sleep if you want. I'll stay with you when I'm done."
Nico didn't find it in himself to argue, he was still tired. lying back down on the cot, he fell asleep the second he got into a somewhat comfortable position. Will shook his head in exasperation and smiled, pushing the hair away from the other boy's face before going back to work.