Will honestly didn’t know what was worse: the battle he’d patched four campers up from yesterday or the goddamn infirmary supply closet today. And by “supply closet,” he meant the seventh circle of Hades disguised as a narrow, fluorescent-lit box of horror. Someone—probably a Hermes kid with the organizational skills of a damp sock—had just shoved everything wherever it fit. There was literally a box of IV bags sitting on top of the ambrosia stash. Criminal.

And of course, he was the one stuck fixing it. Again.

He didn’t mind healing. He didn’t even mind the paperwork, which was saying something. But this? This was war.

You were already there, bless you, sleeves rolled up and hair a mess, sorting gauze like it owed you money. He kind of loved that about you—how serious you got over the dumbest shit. Like if the medical tape wasn’t stacked in perfect rows, the world might actually collapse. He respected that. He also wanted to lie down on the floor and dramatically expire beside you.

Instead, he pulled on a pair of gloves, snapped them for dramatic effect, and immediately stabbed his finger on a loose syringe cap. “Fantastic,” he muttered, because that was how the day was going to go, apparently.

There were antiseptic bottles with missing labels, scalpels thrown into drawers like casual dinner knives, and three different bins labeled Bandages: Misc, which made him want to cry or scream—or both. Probably both. He rubbed his temples and started sorting everything into vague categories, like Things That Heal and Things That Hurt But Help. It was the best he could do right now.

Half an hour in, his hoodie sleeves were rolled to his elbows, and he was sweating through the back of his shirt. He looked like someone had dropped him into a very sterile war zone. There was lint stuck to his jeans from the cotton pad bag explosion, and he’d somehow managed to get a line of iodine across his forearm. Hot. Real hot.

You tossed a roll of gauze at his head and missed by like, half a mile. But you smirked like you’d won anyway. He gave you the finger, fondly.

Will moved to the cabinet under the sink, where everything seemed to go to die. He pulled out a crushed box of latex gloves, a jar of something that looked suspiciously like it had expired before the Titan War, and what he hoped was a spare stethoscope and not some kind of ancient monster appendage.

His back cracked as he stood up. He tried to stretch, then immediately gave up when he realized he still had about eighty things left to restock. It was endless. Infinite. Like a prophecy with no punchline.

And the noise—the weird, fluorescent buzzing overhead, the occasional clang from outside, the way your knee kept bumping the cabinet door every time you reached for something. It should’ve annoyed him. But somehow, it didn’t. Somehow, it felt weirdly right.

The kind of mess that made sense when it was with someone like you.

He caught himself watching you too long, again. You were sitting on the floor now, surrounded by opened packets of antiseptic wipes and staring at a chart like it had personally insulted your lineage. Your forehead was creased, your nose scrunched, and there was a single loose thread on your collar he had the actual physical urge to fix.

He looked away.

There was something about days like this—slow and gritty and exhausting in that quiet way—that reminded him why he didn’t totally hate being Apollo’s kid. Sure, the healing thing came with its fair share of trauma, but it also came with moments like this. Non-battle moments. Real, unglamorous shit. Cleaning out a broken thermometer drawer. Getting powder all over your hands. Stacking boxes while pretending you weren’t falling stupidly, irrevocably in love with the person next to you.

He didn’t say anything, just passed you a packet of gauze and sat beside you on the cold tile. His leg touched yours, just barely. He let it. Somewhere in the back corner, a box tipped over. He groaned. “We’re never getting out of here,” he muttered, voice dry.