Me and My Best Friend Put On A Show That Would Make Freya Totally Jealous [closed post]

[summerdude]

Magnus wakes up, normal again except for how he's in an unfamiliar room. Not Galahad's old room, either. A nondescript one that, as far as he can tell, just has a bunch of clothes and stuff. Also he's wearing silky pajamas he'd never pick out automatically on his own?

It doesn't take long for him to feel like the walls are closing in on him. It's out of respect for Aornis that he stumbles out of her room through the door (barefoot and in the silky pajamas) and goes outside the normal way. Once outside, he flops into the snow, calling summer and feeling the way the snow steams against his skin as it melts.

He's not feeling totally regular again when he sits bolt upright, remembering that Drosera is probably in Galahad's old room with two people that aren't Magnus or Galahad. Existential crisis over, there's a child to retrieve! And hopefully, he'll run into Galahad in the halls.

Comments

[onthewillowsthere]

Galahad hasn't moved. He's perfectly still, waiting for Magnus like a vigil. His gaze flicks from Magnus' face down to his toe. "You did it."

[summerdude]

"I think something's up with Alex," Magnus says, and then blinks, registering Galahad's words. "Yeah! I'm re-toed!." He wiggles it again. "That's probably enough, right? I don't think I'm going to try with my hand." It would make logical sense to -- after all, hands are a lot more complicated than toes -- but he really doesn't want to know what that one feels like even though it would probably be good practice.

[onthewillowsthere]

"Don't do your hand," firmly (he isn't trying to, but he says it in his commanding voice, the one that brooks absolutely no argument. Even though he still believes this was a well-reasoned decision on Magnus' part, it was deeply unpleasant to be part of, and he doesn't think they need to test it. Magnus can reattach parts of the body, but it taxes him, and Galahad is confident they don't need any more taxing in the absence of a real emergency). "Drink." He takes the Dixie cup and presses it into Magnus' hand.

[summerdude]

"I wasn't going to," Magnus says, but his spine is straightening despite himself. He takes the water and drinks it.

[onthewillowsthere]

"How do you feel?"

[summerdude]

"Honestly? Fine now," Magnus says. Okay, he's a little shaky, but that's probably the adrenaline. He sits up and makes a face: that's a lot of blood. Hey, at least he's in a tub, though! It's easy enough to turn the faucet on and let it run over his leg.

[onthewillowsthere]

Without really thinking about it, Galahad reaches for the bar of soap that's been left neatly on the far edge of the tub, and begins washing Magnus' leg to get the blood off.

[summerdude]

"Thanks," says Magnus, grateful. "Dude, that bled almost as much as a head wound."

[onthewillowsthere]

"Feet and heads both bleed heavily," quietly, as he sluices warm water over Magnus' skin. "It doesn't hurt now?"

[summerdude]

"Nope," Magnus says. He wiggles it again. Yeah -- "It's like nothing happened. I mean, there's the memory of the pain. Dude, I forgot how much hurting hurts."

[onthewillowsthere]

Galahad nods -- it is easy to forget. When pain is absent, it might as well not exist; it's hard even to remember what the sensation would feel like when looking at someone else's wound. Once all the blood is washed away, he turns off the faucet and dries Magnus' foot with the towel.

[summerdude]

"Thanks," Magnus says, and hauls himself up enough that he can pull Galahad into a big, tight hug over the lip of the tub. "Dude, I love you."

[onthewillowsthere]

He hugs back immediately, squeezing Magnus as tightly as he can. "I love you too."

[summerdude]

"I'm like..." Magnus laughs, a little wetly. "Really glad we're no longer Fight Guys. So many fewer injuries that way."

[onthewillowsthere]

He rubs Magnus' back a little, the way Shen Yuan does for him. "Me too."

[summerdude]

Magnus laughs then. "My boxers are getting wet in here," he says -- some of the water has spread -- pulling back so he can stand up. "I don't think we should tell Tally I can do this. I don't want to give her, like, ideas."

[onthewillowsthere]

Galahad nods. He can see that it's taken a lot out of Magnus and with all the people here who have some kind of magic it seems, as they discussed with Tresd earlier, better to wait for someone else who can do this more easily.

[summerdude]

Magnus grabs a towel and wraps it around his waist, then climbs out of the tub. He hovers for a moment, just, like, making sure he can still stand like normal -- he can -- and then slings an arm around Galahad's shoulders. "So you had a vision."

[onthewillowsthere]

"I had a vision of the Fisher King."

[summerdude]

It takes Magnus a moment to place the name with a memory. "The guy you needed to get the Grail for?"

[onthewillowsthere]

He nods again. When he casts his mind back to the vision it feels as though he's stepped out of his body, that he's watching himself from a distance -- watching himself kneel beside the coracle, as the Fisher King turns his chin side to side.

"He was pierced with a lance that unmanned him." His voice sounds distant in his ears. "The land became a waste."

[summerdude]

"What does that mean?"

[onthewillowsthere]

Hurt in his groin, he explains -- it's easier to say with his hands, although his hands don't feel like his right now; his movements feel floaty and faraway. Cut away his male organ. The land is tied to him. If he can't be fruitful it can't either.

[summerdude]

Thoughtfully, Magnus says, "Maybe instead of a Grail you could have just brought him to, like, an Intro to Gender Studies class." He'd taken Intro to Gender Studies to the Death in Valhalla (Alex had been sick of being called an argr by the other einherjar), once, and it had been very illuminating.

[onthewillowsthere]

The wound is deep. He can't ride or walk right. Sits in a boat and fishes only.