Chapter Text
It starts when Jim wakes up a lot earlier than usual.
The day is a sunny October, if the feeling of humidity in the air flowing into his room from his open window means anything. Toby wages (to himself) that the canals’ll be bone-dry when they bike past - assuming Jim takes the path down, at least, dragging his unfortunate ass along for the ride.
Adventurous, yeah, that’s what Jim is. That spark, that determination to find excitement in every little thing, in his eyes - that’s his best friend, all right. Though it’s buried beneath a crapton of anxiety, which is suitably ironic.
Because he’s got his mom and his future to worry about, Toby thinks. Guy’s a mess - it’s only thanks to years of being by his side that Toby knows what’s underneath.
He’s only just out the door of his house, waving Nana goodbye, when he notices Jim sitting on the stairs of his porch. That’s...unusual, so his face scrunches up and he squints at him, trying to pick out if something’s up or whatever.
And there is, because he’s got eyebags as deep as the ocean and his posture screams exhausted-with-life. His fingers are twitching, too, like he’s grabbing at something. Jim is so busy staring down at them that he doesn’t notice his approach, despite the sound of Toby’s bike’s whirring.
“Dude,” Toby starts when he reaches him, waving a hand in front of his face, “did you get, like, any sleep last night?”
Jim startles, blinking rapidly at him. His lips part, hands grabbing at the patio, then- “Tobes? Uh, hi. No. I don’t…”
“Don’t what?”
“Don’t think I. Got much,” he chuckles. “I think I woke up at 2, and couldn’t… get myself to go back to sleep. Sorry.”
“Jim,” he says, exasperated. Palming his face lightly, he sighs into his hand. “Something up?”
His best friend sits there, hands locked together. His knee bounces as he doesn’t look at him, definitely thinking of something to say. Concern and worry buries itself into Toby’s chest.
“...stress,” he says after a few seconds. “F-from - mom’s shifts have been getting longer. Then there’s the - money, and I, uh, had this pretty bad nightmare…”
Jim trails off, looking off into space. The air around them shifts, and Toby understands. He bounches on the balls of his feet for a bit, thinking of what to do, gravity tickling at his soles between each miniature jump like playful, grabby hands.
Eventually he lets himself fall into the space beside Jim with a thump, and nudges his shoulder.
“Wanna talk about it?”
Because it’s good to talk about your feelings, no matter what stupid shit people like Palchuk or Johnson likes to spout when they’re trying to insult their victims. Jim, like the self-sacrificing idiot he is, has a slightly different problem - in that he bottles it all up while trying to make his mom and Toby happy. He’s been there for all those breakdowns, those quiet days and moments where Jim’s anxiety is too much and he starts coasting through school with a plastered-on smile.
He’s not about to stop being his best friend now, even if it feels...like this is something different. So when Jim just shrugs, says “I’ll talk about it later?” with the wobbliest grin on his face, Toby holds him to that. They both get up, and their chatter changes to other things.
(Jim sounds like he’s practiced this conversation. It’s just a feeling, though. It’s not like you can prepare for a conversation that hasn’t happened yet with a complete script of how it goes, but it still feels like it.)
Taking it upon himself to continue his streak of being the number one cool dude this side of Arcadia Oaks’ cul-de-sacs, he positions himself by Jim’s side and rubs his arm against his. It’s worth the little smile that graces his face, lingering even when they pull apart and Jim gets on his bike.
But Jim forgetting to prepare their lunch is both a blow to Toby’s confidence... and their wallets. They both know the importance of frugality (the cafetaria lunches suck, in both quality and prices), especially after Barbara’s ill-advised online shopping spree a few years back.
Never again.
“Aww,” Toby groans, pretending to slump on his bike but not really because actually doing so would get him crashing into the nearest trash bin. Cool wind breezes past and kisses his neck and limbs, relieving the tension in his pumping legs. “I really don’t want to buy that goop today, Jimbo.”
The air carries Jim’s voice to him. “Sorry, Tobes,” he chuckles, then grimaces, twisting his expression and pulling at the lines etched under his eyes.
Guilt roils in Toby’s stomach, remembering Jim’s predicament. He laughs it off. “Eh, it’ll be just today, right? Nothing my iron gut can’t handle.”
His best friend smiles, easing a bit of that remorse. He really can’t blame Jim - he shouldn’t have said that, dammit—
Then Toby notices the winding, other path, leading down to the canals. An idea comes to mind. And if his instincts were right earlier, then it should be all dried out. Smirking, he turns his bike there.
“Toby?” Jim calls, and Toby laughs.
“Hey! Let’s go this way today, make it a race! First one across the canal’s a golden egg, and the last one’s the deadbeat goose dad—”
“Or paying for both our lunches?”
Toby grins. “It’s on,” he huffs, and the two of them are off like bullets. Terror and elation war in his stomach as trees fly past on the dirt road, their bikes jumping every few seconds from the uneven terrain. But it’s worth it, because Jim is laughing, the loudest, happiest noise he’s heard from in ages, and in that moment he’s breathless.
Suddenly, his senses fall away, and all he can focus on is his best friend’s face. Heat rushes into his face and chest, and it’s not from the exhilaration or that jolt of rushing adrenaline. The curve of Jim’s jaw, that awkward but lively way his cheeks puff out as he grins, the swaying streak of hair, the golden brown shade of his skin, those brilliant blue eyes gleaming as they look at him, recognize him—
Then the two of them roar, whooping, as their bikes hit the edge of the canal, leaving them flying into the open, blue sky. But while Jim looks down below to Earth, Toby looks up into the horizon and past that. The wind is so much stronger here, seconds passing by infinitely. And the air hugs him, filling him with a long-lost joy that he’s only ever known once before, greeting him like it’s known him all his life and is saying, “it’s so nice to see you again”, a mother reuniting with her child—
But of course, time waits for no one, and the two of them drop back down eventually, gravity pulling them back to Earth. There’s a whisper of a complaint rising in his throat, and that’s odd, because it doesn’t leave his throat. Instead, it goes somewhere else into something...that he expected to be there, but isn’t. It’s almost instinctual, like muscle memory.
Maybe it did do something, though, as there’s this momentary weightlessness right before he hits the ground, and that’s - weird -
Too wrapped up in confusion about whatever that was, he fails to stop himself from steering clumsily right into Jim, and the two of them fall into a tangle of metal and limbs.
“C’mon Tobes, really?” Jim groans, but there’s no real heat behind his voice. The smile in his words is pretty obvious.
“Sorry, sorry! That was just - so fun, and I got a little dizzy at the end there.” He rubs at his sides, which are a little sore. Obviously, that’s not all there is to it, because he was thinking of…
...what was he thinking of again? Toby’s mind pauses, trying to retrace its steps, but at that moment something calls Jim’s name in an unearthly ethereal voice from below the bridge, and all thoughts of who’s paying for lunch and what got his mind stalling mid-biking get put on the backburner, because now there’s a talking magical amulet.
And Jim’s happy mood immediately disappears like it had never been there at all.
Searching up “talking magical amulets that know your name” leads Toby down a road of shady looking eBay products, some weird conspiracy forum that looks like Eli’s been hovering around (...arcadiaXxXppJack? Okay, that’s definitely Eli), and at least three separate Chosen One Fantasy story webnovels. The last one stands out to him because it’s both an isekai and a furry urban fantasy and has glowing reviews from several Twitter accounts, but ultimately it offers him little information on the glowing blue amulet Jim has stored away in his jacket pocket.
He bookmarks it to his email for later perusal (the protagonist is gay, okay? That’s the good thing about furry content, and that’s that they’re almost always never not some level of queer) and turns away from the school-provided laptops.
“Jimbo,” Toby whispers low and casual, controlled enough that Strickler won’t notice and their seatmates won’t give the two of them disdainful looks. He frowns at the lack of a reply. “Jim.”
Jim, who’s spent the last three minutes glaring holes into the projector screen… or Strickler, maybe, weird, finally shifts to face Toby and silently acknowledges him with a raised brow.
Toby shifts his laptop, showing the shady eBay products. “Got nothing, sorry. You?”
He frowns, eyes narrowing at the preview of the weird heart-shaped toy amulet that’s beating rhythmically and also bleeding literal sparkles. While also actually bleeding.
“Uhh...I think the carvings are Welsh, if that helps.” He taps his pen on his chin, and looks down at his notepad.
Leaning over, Toby sees scrawlings of said carvings, carefully copied onto the paper. He blinks at how well they’ve been drawn, and then notices what seems to be a translation a few lines below with some comments, though it’s tiny and somewhat covered up by Jim’s arm. He can only read some of it.
it’s still FOR THE GLORY OF MER ...
“...okay, when the heck’d you learn Welsh?” Toby asks, boggled, and Jim looks at him with surprise, jolting in his seat. Blue eyes dart between Toby’s and the paper, and he bites his lip.
“Ah, uh, no? I was using a translator-”
“Jim, you’re a terrible liar.” The guy’s nervous tic of biting his lip is way too obvious. He crosses his arms and gestures at Jim’s laptop. “And you haven’t even touched your browser since the start of this class, there’s only like one tab you’ve got open. Also, what’s with you trying to laser-eyes Mr. Strickler-”
“Tobias Domzalski,” Strickler’s voice cuts through their bubble. Toby chokes up, finally noticing all his classmates staring at him. (Except for Claire Nuñez a seat over from them, who seems to be drawing flower-crown-wearing skulls into the margins of her notes?) “Is there something you would like to share with the class?”
“Uh.” Static. His brain is just static. Mortification crawls into his legs. “No?”
“Hm. Well, perhaps, then, you can answer this: What tactics did Napoleon Bonaparte typically employ for his battles?”
Toby gulps, trying to find his voice, and tries to recall something from the past lectures. Jim nervously sends him a thumbs-up - thanks, Jimbo - and he glares at him.
“The…” Toby wracks his brain for something, anything. “Winning…?”
Then, with a weird sense of perfect clarity, he remembers his grandmother talking to him about his dad’s obsession with war heroes, and—
“Actually, wait. He liked to isolate his enemies, right? Flank them, separate the army, cut their methods of - resupply and retreat. Since a lot of the time he was facing numbers that, uh, completely overwhelmed his, so he had to do all…that. Then he’d gather his and take each of them out, one-by-one. Easy pickings, you know.”
The classroom is silent. Strickler stares at him like Biden’s just announced that he’s marrying Trump. Jim, for some reason, chuckles , and Claire motherfreakin’ Nuñez is giving him an impressed look.
Where did that...come from?
“I, uh. I mean, it’s like that one saying, right? United we stand-”
“-divided we fall, yes,” his history teacher coughs into his fist, regaining his bearings. “I would - go into a play-by-play of the recorded events and commands that Bonaparte issued, since really that’s an oversimplification, and the history books can only know so much,” he says, like he’s been there. He’s such a history buff. “But-”
The bell rings. Toby sees Jim shoot Strickler a look, which, once again, weird. The standstill that his classmates were at releases, and everyone starts to pack up their bags. At that, Strickler announces class is over. But for some reason, Claire stays a moment to consider Toby (him!) before leaving, a smile on her face.
Relieved, he stands up and shoulder-checks Jim. “Dude, I don’t know how I did that, but I don’t think I’m getting any sleep tonight and - oh god, what if Steve hears about this-”
But before Jim can reply, Strickler interrupts for the second time that day.
“Ah, Young Atlas? Would you mind staying for a bit? I’d like to talk to you about something.” The man gives Toby a glance. It was only for a single second, but it’s still a second too long for comfort.
There’s hesitation on Jim’s face, but it’s replaced by an eerie steelly expression. Something twinges in Toby’s gut, and his fests clench of their own accord.
“Hey, uh, I’ll see you later.” He pats Toby’s shoulder, pulling him towards the door.
“I, uh. Right.” He looks between Strickler and Jim. He blows a raspberry, choosing to question Jim’s weirdness with his favorite teacher later. “Don’t take too long!”
His best friend snorts, waving him off as he leaves.
“It won’t.” Toby doesn’t miss the sharpness in his eyes as Strickler moves towards him. “Trust me.”
He closes the door behind him.
After school at Jim’s house, Toby places his half-eaten pizza slice on the plate. He blinks. Blinks again, then rubs his eyes.
“It’s an activation phrase.”
“Yep,” Jim replies, sounding tired.
“A magical activation phrase. Which has you declaring yourself to be some sort of magical champion, wielding literal Daylight for the supposedly fictional wizard, Merlin. That summons glowing blue spirit lights, which then manifest an entire set of magical armor into reality and shoves you into it.”
“Less shoving and more...wrapping?”
Toby rubs his temples. “...you’re a goddamn magical girl.”
“Boy.”
“No, no, it’s the principle of the thing.”
“I...guess?”
“Yes.”
Jim shrugs and gestures at - everything. You know, the shining armor with glowing blue-etched lines, presumably runes.
Magic hums and travels in the room, creating this pressure around Jim’s general area. It’s like the coolness of the blue sky, but also a giant screen, except you’re not really looking at either at all. It’s a combination of both, making it out to be an energy that’s beyond understanding.
Like it’s swallowing while feeding the light around him, reflecting and absorbing in a way that’s never existed outside of this before.
A supernatural phenomenon, sunlight thrumming in the plates of this earthly concept of armor - trapped in the metal, made to be a weapon, the very air itself warping and moving excitedly like the day itself is here in Jim’s living room at 8 in the evening.
“For the glory of Merlin, Daylight is mine to command,” he repeats to Toby, dull. “Here’s the sword. Cool, right?” Jim takes the sword off his back (how is it attached there, there aren’t any visible holsters or scabbards or baldrics or whatever, is it magnetism or is there just a hole) and stabs it into the floor.
The floor of his house, that is. Jim realizes his mistake a second later, except once again, he barely reacts like he should, simply just sighing like he broke a plate.
Toby has so many questions, but the first one that’s the most important is this:
“Jimbo, what the fuck? ”
Then suddenly there are two honest-to-fucking-god stone creatures knocking down the kitchen door while Strickler walks in from the front, and everyone freezes.
“...should I have come in later, Young Atlas?”
“Just get in,” Jim groans. The two giant rock men, who introduce themselves as Blinky Galadrigal and Aaarrgghh!!! (yes, with the exclamation marks) proceed to cheerily make themselves at home after politely walking over the remnants of Jim’s back door.
As it turns out, Toby wasn’t the first to find out. It was Strickler - after he had recognized the amulet, Jim met up with him in his office after he and Toby were done eating lunch.
“Strickler’s a what, now?”
“A - Changeling, young Tobias. Master Jim, they’re untrustworthy, I need to repeat! They WILL stab you in the back! By Deya’s Grace, the very fact that there is one standing right in this room means danger for the entire magical world, and multiple implications that I cannot get into right now! Why are you consorting with-”
“Blinky, I hate racism. And exploitation of minorities. In principle, it’s horrible, so I’d really like to help whoever I can if it means fixing the problems of this world and fulfilling my new contra- er, responsibility as the Trollhunter. Magical racism isn’t really all that different. Kinda. I mean, I get that Strickler here sort of killed a lot of people and is one of the heads of a global shapeshifter organization, but that’s just him specifically, really, and all of them are doing it under duress-”
“HE’S A COMMANDANT OF THE JANUS ORDER?”
“Please stop shouting,” Dr. Lake sighs, who arrived an hour earlier to the scene of Strickler in Changeling form hiding behind Jim while he tried to convince Aaarrrgghh not to beat the man to death. (Turns out, the big guy’s a pacifist. It was just going to be a very, very strong hug.)
The breakdown and screaming match she had then was entirely justified, but she’s handling it well now, apparently?
She takes another careful sip from her mug. Which… Toby squints, and sniffs. Oh, that’s wine. Nevermind.
And, you know, Toby hates (loves) everything about this entire situation, and would really, really love to question why Jim just sounds so fucking done instead of having a slowly drawn out panic attack like Toby is, but with him being half-black and with Jim being Fil-American, he can actually understand Jim’s reaction there. Both sides, really, but still.
“We can put him on trial later, mister Galadrigal.”
“Y-Young Atlas-” Strickler sputters, justifiably alarmed.
“Master Jim, please refrain from calling me that. I prefer Blinky. And, well, all right. You are the current chosen of the Amulet, so that is entirely your decision to make now, even if the rest of Trollmarket would not see it as such…oh, and as a human, that gives you many opportunities to bridge the human and magical world, although we’ll have to provide you with the sufficient training...”
Jim leans against a wall and hands Aaarrrgghh another VHS tape. Yet another valiant sacrifice has been made to the living bara troll god.
“Diplomatically, or in terms of combat? Because this sword definitely means I have to cut some people up.”
Blinky, well, blinks.
“...I hadn’t considered the former, but yes. Trolls tend to be a violent sort, and not just your enemies, but even those that you are sworn to protect. We wouldn’t want you getting your limbs rendered off your body and your flesh shaved off your bones now, would we?”
“I really wouldn’t, yeah.”
Barbara looks like she’s about to scream again, but instead she takes a deep breath. “...you know what, Walter? Just give me the entire damn bottle.”
“Er...of course.”
(It’s...worrying, that Jim acts as if this, all of this, isn’t something to be freaking out over.
He’ll ask him later. Because he doesn’t sound just tired, he sounds tired-tired, and Toby - needs to fix that. To be there for him, to help him, and most of all, he needs to understand why.
There’s a niggling suspicion in the back of his head, and it should be unbelievable. But Toby is genre-savvy, and he knows Jim like the back of his hand. Or, should. Because that’s the question: is this…still the Jim he knows?
What happened to you, Jimbo? Toby wants to ask, to shake him by the shoulders, cry and hold and hug and clutch him to his chest forever, because death is just around the corner, with what they’ve found out these past few hours. How can I help you? Please, just let me help you.
But...yeah, maybe not now.)