Work Text:
TICK TOCK TICK TOCK TICK TOCK
The sound was driving her mad. As quiet as it may have been, the sound coming from every clock in Fog's office is all Julia could hear. Every ticket only serving as a slow reminder of how useless she felt. She could only sit by and watch as Fog lead a group of faculty and students in continuing to reinforce the Incorporate Bond that held the monsters sealed. If they stopped for even a second, it would jeopardize the link that empowered the cooperative magic, it would jeopardize everything. She hated this. She hated it before, and now that the stakes were so high she hated it more than anything. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath only to open them to a flood of memories.
Two kids playing together. Just a boy and a girl escaping the reality of everyday life, and hiding away in their fantasy world. She remembers it all too well, her and Q always together, always escaping to Fillory. She remembers spending hours tucked underneath that table. With Fillory mapped before their very eyes they'd talk about all the legends, all the magical creatures, and all the adventures they would embark upon one day. Then, they're kids no more. They're no longer than jubilant kids they once we're. They've experienced so much. They've lost so much. Yet in the face of everything, they still love magic. They still love each other. Brother and sister, just like the monsters.
She has no idea what's going. She has no clue as to how Q, Alice, and Penny are doing, but she feels it. There's a pit in her stomach and it's getting heavier.
“Julia.”
She hears a whisper and turns her head from side to side trying to discern where it's coming from.
“Julia.”
She hears it again for a split second before the ticking of the clocks take over. They're deafening now, so loud, yet no one else seems to hear them. She opens her mouth prepared to shout when the ticking begins to slow until suddenly they stop altogether, and suddenly she knows.
“Q.” The name slips past her lips, it's barely a whisper, but it's enough to nearly distract Fog, who does his best not to take his eyes off his hands.
As he continues to cast, with confidence in what he's doing, Fog spares a split second to look over to where Julia had been sitting. She's gone. She had been there only second ago, he knows it. He heard her. Now, she's vanished.
~~~~
“NOOOOOOOO!” Alice cries out as Penny drags her away.
The moment she saw the look in Quentin's eyes, she knew what he was going to do. She could feel it in her bones.
After everything they've been through, after everything they talked about before going on this mission, he was still willing to sacrifice himself for them, for her.
Quentin had done it. He had fixed the doorway to the seam and in doing so, caused the backfire of magic that now spread across the room. Everything seemed to have come to a crawling motion as the backfire spread. Like streams from a sparkler on a hot night on the 4the of July, the white and orange streaks of magic spread across from the edge of the mirror, right where the magic had concluded. In slow motion they moved so fluidly, like water, yet at the same time they moved with purpose, as if seeking something to touch, to destroy. Alice had caught a glimpse of how the engulfed Everett, how he had been disintegrated, and now she cried for Quentin. She reached for him. She fought against Penny's grasp as she watched Quentin ready to suffer the same fate.
Alice cried out, she shouted for him, and Quentin could see the anguish in her face. The look in her eyes, he knew that she loved him. He felt it. This all happened so fast. He knew what was about to happen. This was it for him and yet, he would have done it all over again if it meant that his friends were safe, if it meant that Alice was safe. He closed his eye and thought of what he told her before they came here.
Listen, I know we agreed to do this together, but…” He stuttered for a moment I am not for Alice to cut him off.
“No butt, Q.” She said. “I meant what I said before. I think we've both proven we're idiots without each other.”
Alice Quinn, always had to be right, always had to know everything. God did it piss him off, but fuck if he didn't love her all the more for it. He was so screwed up. He knew it, she knew it, and she still loved him. In the midst of all their tragedies they'd found each other, both broken in their own ways, and somehow managed to mend one another. She made him almost feel normal, if there was such a thing. He swallowed past the lump in his throat and accepted that this would be the last time he would see her. He tried to give her a smile, one that he hoped would tell her that this was okay, and then everything froze. Alice, Penny, even the backfire, it had all froze as if time had stopped.
“Q.” Julia suddenly stood before him.
“Julia?” He questioned as she grabbed him by his arm and unfroze him from where he stood, only centimeters away from the backfire.
“How...how are you doing this? I thought Penny had…”
“Fucking gods.” She quickly replied. “Nothing is ever straightforward with them is it?”
“Wait...so you're a…”
“Goddess.” She finished for him. “Yup.” She smiled.
“But how are you able to cast here?”
“Well, I guess god magic is not the same, not that we have time to figure that out, now come on, I can only hold it for so long, I'm not fully juiced.” She smirked and pulled him towards the others. She grabbed a hold of Alice and just like before in Fog's office, she along with the others vanished.
~~~
“What the f…” The words had slipped out of Penny's mouth on instinct. He's used to traveling. Being in one place one second, then another in the blink of an eye, but this was different. Not only that, it had been unexpected. One second he had been dragging Alice away. It was just as the other Penny had told him. He couldn't question what Quentin was going to do, he just knew he had to do what he told him. Now...now he stood in the infirmary at Break bills. “How?” He asked as he turned to Julia.
She simply shrugged her shoulders and walked over to Elliot's bedside. She placed her hands over his abdomen knowing exactly what she was doing, and healed him.
Elliot's eyes slowly fluttered open and light broke through, making him close them back again. He felt as if he'd been living underground for years, making his eyes feel as if seeing light for the first time in ages. Again he tried to open them, only much slower this time, and the first thing he saw, the first thing he was able to discern, was a familiar face. “Q.” He smiled.
Quentin smiled back and wrapped his arms around him.
“I take it we won?” Elliot chuckled as he held on tight. He held on as long as he could for fear that he was dreaming. Living inside the monster, inside himself, had been like a decade long nightmare. A decade long nightmare he never thought he'd wake up from. He breathed Quentin in and pulled back to get a look at him. Every bit of him wanting to say things to him, things he hadn't had the courage to say in the past, but then he saw the way Alice and Quentin looked at each other, the way he reached for her hand, and he stopped himself. As much as it hurt, he was still happy for him, he remembers how broken Quentin had been when Alice first died, or least when they thought she had died. He couldn't deny there was something there. Maybe they were meant to be, Quentin and Alice. Maybe they weren't. Either way it wasn't his place to make that call. All he could do was wait. Wait until it didn't or wait until he felt there was a chance for him, a chance for him to fight for him.
“Is everyone alright?” Elliot asked. “We didn't lose anyone, did we?” He followed up. “And most importantly, what the fuck am I wearing?” He asked as he looked down at himself.
The group couldn't help but laugh. They had managed to pull it all off. They had had stopped the monsters and Everett along the way, perhaps the library all together, and most important of all, they had managed to save Elliot.