I Turn, Um... Uh... Sixteen? For The Tenth? Time???? [open post]

[summerdude]

It's Magnus's birthday and he is a man with a surplus of plans. And many, many plastic recorders.

He's still a little overstimulated from the birthday party Galahad got Claudius to throw for the two of them — he loves all his friends, but that was a lot of people in one space, most of whom were also feeling many, many things about their visitors — and so it's been a quiet few days. Sunny is still a little subdued, so they've been having muted hangouts in the mornings; Galahad, also overstimulated from their birthday party, has fortunately been on Magnus's wavelength about just sailing around aimlessly on the Big Banana with many snacks and very little conversation during their daily hangs for the past few days. He drags himself to sword practice with Lancelot once or twice, has his weekly dinner at Hanguang-jun's, spends a great solo afternoon cleaning out Little John's cave in case anyone else wants to use it at some point, and lets Alex tease him into wrestling and, um, other stuff after dinner basically every night.

But on this, the twenty-sixth anniversary of Magnus's actual birth, most of his energy has returned to him. He's made birthday dinner plans with just his immediate family (and also Alex and Hanguang-jun) at their house for the evening. He's had his liveliest morning of the week. And with his newly regained energy he's found critical supplies for his afternoon: a roll of duct tape, several trash bags, eight recorders, a handful of hollow pens, and a dream. He's sitting cross-legged in the middle of the Mansion's lawn, a look of grave concentration on his face, as he makes little holes in a bag, duct tapes two recorders and one pen here and there, and then seals it all up.

And then he takes a deep breath, fits his mouth to the hollow pen, and blows the bag up. When he places it under his arm and squeezes, he's gratified to find that his makeshift bagpipes work perfectly. And he still has supplies for a couple more!



I know everyone is still busy with visitor's day so feel free to take your time on this one... but I would love to ultimately have a ton of Chaos Thread Opportunities.

Comments

[lightbearinglord]

"Everyone does. Yours is very warm."

[summerdude]

"What's Galahad's aura?" Magnus wants to know. "What's Sunny's? What's yours?"

[lightbearinglord]

"Galahad's was stronger before his god took his power, but it is still there and it is still strong." He considers. "Sunny's is unusually powerful for someone so young." Here, his expression turns almost bemused. "Mine is... mine. I can't say how to describe it."

[summerdude]

"Do they have feelings? Colors? New-agey people in my time say they have, like, colors. Or is it just, like, a like... signature of, like, um, qi?"

[lightbearinglord]

"A signature of qi," Lan Wangji decides, upon having been asked this question for the first time in his life.

[summerdude]

"Shen Yuan always says that I have, like, insane summer qi."

[lightbearinglord]

"Insane summer qi," Lan Wangji repeats, a little instinctively distasteful regarding the source of the phrase. "Why is it insane?"

[summerdude]

"I mean that he means that I have a lot of it?"

[lightbearinglord]

"Another colloquialism," Lan Wangji surmises. "You do have a lot."

[summerdude]

"Yeah, he's not, like, saying that it's actually literally crazy. It's, ummm... euphemistic."

[lightbearinglord]

"Mn." Lan Wangji makes his best conscious effort at setting aside his irritation at thinking of Shen Yuan, and of how Shen Yuan was not a true cultivator in the first place. "A colloquialism. As I said."

[summerdude]

"Yeah. Yeah. Is that what colloquialism means?"

[lightbearinglord]

"I believe so." He makes a mildly rueful face. "But we are at the mercy of the invisible translator."

[summerdude]

"Oh," says Magnus, who often forgets that the entire translator thing exists. "Right."

[lightbearinglord]

Ruefulness gives way to fondness. "I don't speak English."

[summerdude]

"I knew that," Magnus hastens to say. "I just... forgot."

[lightbearinglord]

"If it fails us again, I will be better-equipped to communicate with you."

[summerdude]

Magnus grins and sets the trashbagpipes aside so he can sign I know you will!

[lightbearinglord]

Lan Wangji's eyes soften in an approximation of a smile. Thank you, he signs easily in return. "What little English I know is because of this sign language," he adds aloud.

[summerdude]

"Really? Why?" Magnus asks, and then blinks. "Oh. Finger-spelling?"

[lightbearinglord]

"Mn. I had to look up the English alphabet."

[summerdude]

"Hanguang-jun! I could have helped you!"

[lightbearinglord]

"I know." He gives Magnus a fond little look. "But the library is expansive."

[summerdude]

"Yeah, but so am I, Hanguang-jun. I'm vast. I contain multitudes."

[lightbearinglord]

"Are you vast?" This look is more illustratively skeptical.