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Ezekiel was waiting for Stone when he got back.
Not like in an obvious way. Not that that was hard, Stone wasn't really the most observant person Ezekiel had ever met, but still, it was a matter of professional pride. As far as Stone was concerned, Ezekiel just happened to be playing games on his phone at Colonel Baird's desk when Stone got back from dropping that reporter lady off at home.
"So what'd you go with?" he asked, once Stone seemed to have settled in and forgotten Ezekiel was even there. "Standard non-disclosure agreement? Mind-wiping spell?"
"What?" Stone looked up at Ezekiel, brows all furrowed, hands tight and on whatever new dusty book he was playing with. He always looked at Ezekiel like that. It was their Thing.
Ezekiel had never had a Thing with someone who wasn't family, before.
"That chipy from the camp. Don't tell me you just showed this place to her and let her wander off without making sure she wouldn't talk."
Stone glared down at this book. "I made sure."
"Really?" Ezekiel leaned forward. "What'd you do?"
"I told her not to tell."
Ezekiel made a show of waiting for the rest. When Stone didn't continue, he slammed a book down on Baird's desk (not he'd been reading the book or anything, he just needed to slam something and didn't want to hurt his phone) and stood.
"You brought a reporter to the secret magical stronghold she was disgraced for writing about, and you think she won't tell anyone because you told her not to?!"
"The hell do you care?" Stone growled. "You told your mom about this place and she stole the door."
"Yeah, but she's my mum." Ezekiel went over to put his hand on Stone's forehead. "I think that tree scrambled your brains, mate. Aren't you the one who doesn't trust anyone?"
Stone jerked away from Ezekiel's hand. "Yeah, well. Maybe I'm growin' as a person." He smirked. "Guess you could say I'm turning over a new leaf."
Ezekiel just stared disapprovingly until Stone's smile faded and he looked away. It was the only way to handle a pun like that.
Once he was sure Stone was thoroughly chastised, Ezekiel went on. "Seriously, mate. What the hell? I get that camp turned you all into morons, but we're not at camp anymore."
Stone shrugged, looking at anything but Ezekiel. "I dunno, man. I just — she found out about the Library all on her own. And DOSA. Half the people we work with don't even ever figure out what's going on in their own towns, and she uncovered the actual Library. I guess I thought — she's good at what she does. Maybe even Library good. That — should be rewarded."
"Mmhm." Ezekiel nodded, making out like he had tuned out halfway through that explanation (he hadn't, he listened to everything, but he liked to make sure the others didn't get any ideas about being as awesome as he was). "And you saw a pretty girl, and your brains went bye-bye."
Stone rolled his eyes, his jaw tight, and Ezekiel knew he'd nailed that one. "Was there somethin' you actually wanted, Jones?" Stone asked. "Or are you just here to harass me?"
"The second one," Ezekiel said cheerfully. "Though if you wanted to talk about, say, what it was like to be a tree and all. . . ."
Stone just kind of stared at him at that. Ezekiel couldn't quite tell what he was thinking, which was weird because he could always tell what Stone was thinking. (Mostly "I'm a giant grumpy country nerd, grr, argh!") Ezekiel was starting to think it was time to just cut his losses and go when Stone finally spoke up again.
"It was . . . still." Stone stared down at his hands, at the fading red mark where the splinter had been. "The kind of still you only get from trees, I guess. You and I . . . folks like us ain't been still in our whole lives, not really. The kind of timeline Grandfather — the trees have — they have to be so . . . patient."
Stone slowed down noticeably as he spoke. He'd always had a deliberate way of speaking when he wasn't freaking out at Ezekiel, like he had some kind of massive thesaurus that appeared in the air, the way Cassandra said her charts and math did, and he had to find just the right word. Now, his words stretched out, almost echoing the ponderous pace of the voice from the tree. For once he didn't fidget, either, didn't fuss with his sleeves or whack Ezekiel in the chest or hug himself and sway.
The tree really had done a number on him.
"Anyway, it was weird," Stone said, finally picking up the pace again. "You get swallowed by a damn tree, and yeah, some of your defences come down. Alright?" He shoved at his sleeves, like he was trying to physically wipe the moment away. He was wearing those long layers again, no matter what the weather, but Ezekiel still caught a glimpse of the edge of his magical tattoo before he tugged the fabric back down over it.
Ezekiel frowned. In a way, Stone was the one who'd been most altered by life as a Librarian. Cassandra had blossomed since joining up, her gift and her buoyancy expanding with every case, even the ones where they got left behind and Flynn had all the fun without them. And as for Ezekiel, other than the occasional lingering urge to play fetch, the magic had always just rewarded him for being himself, luck and roguish charm and all. But Stone. . . . The Library had sent Stone for training, had gotten him permanently marked by a spell linked directly to human souls. And now, with the tree thing — it was just shy of mind control, really, aka Ezekiel's least favorite thing. Stone had said it himself, he'd been swallowed up by the forest, turned to so much wood and moss so he could be their sound piece. Ezekiel had actually wondered if they'd lost him for good, seeing his face etched into the bark, and he knew he wasn't the only one. It'd hurt. He'd never say it out loud, not outside of some seriously magically extenuating circumstances, but he really liked Stone. Even looked up to him a little, especially after meeting Stone's father, and seeing how similar he was to Ezekiel's mum. Seeing him be used that way had left a foul taste in Ezekiel's mouth, but Stone himself didn't seem to notice how much it had affected them all.
"Jones," Stone said, and snapped his fingers in Ezekiel's face. "You there, man? What the hell?"
Ezekiel blinked the reverie aside and smirked. "Just thinking I should get you a thneed."
"A — what're you —" There it was. Stone might be the best at grounding Cassandra, but no one turned off Stone's inner thesaurus quite like Ezekiel did. "Thneed?!"
"You know, since you're the Lorax now."
Stone squeezed his eyes and fingers shut, gesturing like he was imagining throttling Ezekiel, but his lips still curled up at the edges. "So, what. That make you the Once-ler?"
"Nah, pretty sure that'd be Bender. And no way am I a bar-ba-loot, either."
Stone shook his head. "Cassandra."
"Yes! What even is a thneed, anyway?"
"'A Thneed's a Fine-Something-That-All-People-Need,'" Stone quoted, his chin tilted up and his hand pressed to his chest like he was reciting — not Shakespeare, after Prospero none of them quoted Shakespeare like that, but like, one of those stuffy British romantics or something. "Always looked like some kind of warped long-johns to me."
"Gross." Ezekiel wrinkled his nose and started towards the kitchen, knowing Stone would follow along as long as they were talking about poetry. (Seuss was totally poetry. It rhymed!) He planned to keep Stone around tonight as long as possible.
He clearly needed someone to keep an eye on him, after all.