Chapter Text
Fitzroy doesn't sleep.
His mattress becomes the victim of endless tossing and turning. If he twists the right way he can even see the sliver of candle light beneath Argo and the Firbolg’s joint bedroom. The light seeps into his quarters and reflects light onto his book bag and other belongings. It’s no doubt they were both fast asleep, and if he stilled long enough he could hear the easy whisper of the Firbolg’s snores.
But his thoughts wouldn’t still like theirs. In the dark he hears his full title spoken in the lilting voice of Sir Regenald:
Sir Fitzroy Maplecourt, Knight in Absentia of Goodcastle .
They were real . And they were here to help .
Fitzroy rolled over again, turning away from the light. Getting back into the castle hadn’t been an easy task, and for the moment, the brief seconds of reprieve Fitzroy got, he didn’t want to think about it. He just wanted to relish in the fact that he was right .
So, why wasn’t he happy?
_
He recalls the walk to their dormitory after banishing Order and Chaos. Behind them Fitzroy could hear the tottering of Sir Regenald’s horse following them. He was tempted to turn around and stare, to pinch himself, or have someone search his mind. Maybe he was being controlled or manipulated, maybe this was too good to be true.
It was always too good.
He felt the sudden urge to cry, but wasn’t sure why. Nothing came.
He tossed his covers to the side and stepped off of his bed. It creaked under his weight as he moved, a reminder of how much he had grown, how much stronger he was now. No longer just a boy, but not quite a man.
He gently pushed forward Argo and the Firbolg’s door. The Firbolg lay on the floor, one arm slung across his eyes and the other sprawled on the ground, unsurprisingly asleep. However, Argo sat upright in his bed, a candle resting by the foot and an open book on his lap.
Fitzroy leans on the door frame, “can’t sleep?”
Argo blinks, surprised. “You too?” He answers with a question.
Fitzroy shakes his head as he walks into the room properly to sit next to Argo. He doesn’t say anything and Argo doesn’t force him to. He’s silently glad they’ve come to that point in their friendship, where they can just enjoy their presence.
The apparently not asleep Firbolg lets out an annoyed groan, “It is late, is it not?” He mumbles into his arm.
Fitzroy and Argo laugh at the same time. “We can leave if ya need your beauty sleep,” Argo teases.
The Firbolg must resign himself to their company, because he removes his arm to squint at them and eventually pulls himself upright.
He notices Fitzroy’s subtle turmoil instantly - ever the empath, Fitzroy thinks.
“What troubles you?” He’s tired enough that his T’s sound more like D’s and it makes Fitzroy grin shallowly despite himself.
He pauses to gather his thoughts, but instead of a complete sentence he utters what he’s been thinking the whole time.
“They’re real .”
Argo nudges him with his elbow and a smile. “Well, of course, was that ever in question?”
“Are you kidding me?” Fitzroy scoffs, “I was a joke at Knight School when I introduced myself. Like the kids were in on some sick joke that I didn’t get.”
The weight of his statement sits on them like stale and heavy air. Fitzroy rarely spoke openly about his time at Clyde’s Night Knight School, and never so bluntly. It was always smothered in between a hollow self congratulatory statement and an insult. Argo remembers suddenly the boy that he walked into on their first day of class. Smaller and less confident, ready to defend himself before any shots were fired.
“Vell, what vill you do?” The Firbolg finally asks.
Fitzroy sighs, brings a hand up to rub his face.
“I don’t know. I don’t know if that’s who I am anymore.”
For once Argo doesn’t know how to comfort him. So far he’s been the balance of the trio, somehow able to be a voice of reason and humility for them all. But he’s always known who he was, what he was going to do, it’s never been a question for him.
The same can’t be said about the Firbolg.
“You do not have to be… anybody.” He starts, “You don’t need to, um, decide who you are, because you already have.”
Fitzroy stares at him. No one has ever told him that, not in those words, anyway. Growing up in less than ideal circumstances led him to believe that you needed to decide. If you didn't, someone would decide for you and they didn’t always have your best interests at heart.
All he ever wanted to be was good.
He takes a shuddering breath, the words are out before he can stop them.
“But if I’m not a magician and I’m not a knight, who am I?”
The Firbolg pauses to consider him. As if taking apart every component that composes him and designating them a position. If anyone can figure out who he is, surely it is the Firbolg. Never has Fitzroy met someone who knows themselves like the Firbolg.
What the Firbolg says instead surprises him.
“Vere I am from, my people collect only vat is necessary. Ve prepare only for what ve know, without question of what could happen. Not long before ve met I asked vat could happen, and found the answers frightening.”
The Firbolg paused to think.
“Ve vould starve. So I prepared for what I did not know, and was sent away.”
He leans forward to address Fitzroy directly, “I tell you this to say that I know who I am, because of vat I did not first know. To become who I am now I had to be someone I vas not.”
For a moment there’s silence.
“Thank you. You don’t know how much that means,” Fitzroy finally says, voice quiet and considerate. He clears it as if to dispel his own emotions, “can I still be a knight, even after-” he waves his hand to encompass all of the shitshow that is their lives.
The Firbolg smiles and shrugs as if to say “ Who knows?”
It’s Argo’s turn and he smiles as he tells Fitzroy, “No matter what ya choose, if you ever don’t know who you are, just look to your friends. They’re a reflection of you.”
“And you are a reflection of me… this does not trouble me. You are a good person,” the Firbolg comments.
A second passes as Fitzroy takes this in, nodding his head to himself as if trying to ingrain it into memory.
“You’re also CEO of Thundermen Inc,” Argo whispers with barely contained laughter.
The Firbolg jumps to his feet “Ah! But then ve are all the CEO!”
They spend the rest of their night laughing as if a war isn’t outside their window.