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Julia was everything that Magnus had ever wanted. He’d had nothing, and he was nothing. He knew he felt comfortable with a knife in his hands and his blade scraping along wood. He knew he felt an indescribable sense of comfort from the scent of wood shavings, found himself brought to tears at any melody coming from a violin, and always felt a little bit seasick when he laid down for bed at night, as if the ground were supposed to be moving underneath him.
He couldn’t explain these feelings, and he couldn’t answer Steven’s questions about himself when he was taken in. He had his childhood, and his adolescence, and he knew that for some period of time he’d had great aspirations to do… something.
But the memory of that something was gone, and there was very little Magnus was certain about.
His name was Magnus Burnsides. He was twenty years old. He liked to carve wood, and he didn’t mind hard work. He knew that when he looked at Julia, he felt all the peace and joy in the world, feelings he didn’t know he was capable of feeling. As they became friends, and then lovers, and as they led the revolution, Magnus was certain he’d never been as close to anyone as he was to Julia, and that he never would be again.
As they lead the battle that saved their home, Magnus came to realize that fighting was in his blood. He’d always been one for brawls, but he took to combat as if he’d mastered it in a past life. He felt it sing alive in his blood and set him on fire, and between that and Julia, he was sure he’d never again be so complete.
Julia had been everything that Magnus wanted.
The Bureau of Balance was fine. It was nice . But it wasn’t a home, and Magnus knew a few things. He knew that he’d had a home, and he’d failed to protect it. He didn’t deserve a new one, and the moon base was as good as he could hope for anyways. Magnus had met Taako and Merle, and he’d always been personable, so it didn’t take him long to decide he liked them. But they weren’t Julia. They weren’t family. He cared about them, and he’d protect them, but they didn’t know anything about him. They didn’t get to. Magnus didn’t give parts of himself away that lightly.
He gave away other things quite easily, however. Magnus knew his place-- he was a tank, a brawler, a human shield. Elves and Dwarves outlived Humans by centuries, so what great grief was it if he beefed it so the rest of his team could live? Those two could go on to capture thousands of relics, or whatever, without him. Get a new meat shield and head back out there. Magnus knew what he was good for.
He was certain about several things:
His name was Magnus Burnsides. He was thirty-one years old. Ten years ago he’d met the love of his life, met his family, and found his place in the world. Eight years ago he’d led a battle to defend that place he’d carved, five years ago he’d married the love of his life, and two years ago he lost her. Magnus knew that the list of things he’d lost that day greatly outweighed the list of things he had left. His wife, his family, the respect of his home, and the right to call it that at all.
Magnus was fine with his place in the Bureau of Balance because he was expendable. If Magnus died, well… maybe it was all for the better. He had a hard time thinking of a reason to keep living, anyways.
Julia had wanted a family.
After the battle had settled down and they’d had their years of peace as they worked side-by-side in Steven’s shop and forged their relationship like welding Tungsten-- slow and gentle and painstaking and so, so strong.
They talked a lot in their time together, spending endless nights on the roof of the shop because it just felt right for Magnus to be off the ground, about what they wanted and imagined. Julia wanted children, and Magnus was enthusiastic over the idea under logic he couldn’t discern. He hadn’t ever thought about it before, hadn’t had any sort of paternal instincts. He’d never really wanted to… to care for something, to raise something, to do the whole ‘Dad reading stories at bedtime’ routine. But the more he thought about it, the more he loosened up to the concept, until he found himself wanting that too. Found himself yearning for it, missing something that he couldn’t place and couldn’t understand. He found himself eager for it.
But Julia was gone, and none of that mattered anymore. Even if they’d gotten around to their goals, to a family and a house of their own and children , Magnus wouldn’t have been able to save them anyways. He would have lost them to Kalen the way he lost everything else that mattered to him. The world was too dangerous to bring children into.
Which was why seeing Angus, knee-high to a grasshopper and squinting at them through coke bottle glasses and in far more danger than a little boy should ever be able to find himself in, Magnus felt like he’d been stabbed through the gut.
He felt the immediate urge to protect him, keep him safe and get him to the adults who were supposed to be caring for him . And then he felt fury, at those failing adults and at himself for these feelings and at this child for lacking the wisdom to keep his nose clean to save his own hide.
So he sat back, and he lashed out, and hoped the kid got the message and ran off home.
But Angus McDonald moved onto the moon, and Magnus was certain of several things:
Magnus Burnsides was thirty-two years old, and that was old enough to know that children didn’t belong in war. Magnus carved ducks, for fun, for comfort, and felt compelled to hand them out to people as some kind of token. Rustic hospitality, maybe. It was polite to give gifts after all. Magnus knew that he’d never had a little brother, nor did he want one, but if he had to have any he figured that Taako and Angus were as good as any. Magnus knew that he was still ready to die, ready to give up this shitty world and go find Julia, but now he worried about what would happen after.
About Taako and Merle and their mission, about the friends he’d made and the Director, and mostly about Angus, who didn’t seem to have anyone keeping an eye on him at all. Not that Magnus could fill that role. Not that he had any idea what he was doing.
Julia had always loved to wrestle.
Conveniently enough, so did Magnus. The two of them spent their free time chasing each other around the fields and tackling each other into mud as often as they spent it entwined in each other’s arms and running errands for Steven. Julia was strong, and clever, and tough as nails, and once she’d hauled Magnus up into a fireman’s carry over both shoulders and tried to dump him in the pond off the end of the dock, losing her balance as she did so and sending them both splashing into the murky water.
Magnus didn’t have romantic feelings for Carry, but he could appreciate a friend to fight with.
It was different, the Dragonborn swift instead of barreling, strong without being heavy, and somehow still able to floor him. She taught him grabs and throws and joint locks that came to him easily as if through muscle memory, though Magnus was certain he’d never learned them before. As she wrenched his shoulder back painfully, wrist caught in her grasp and elbow locked straight from the pressure, he had several vivid memories.
He thought of Julia, sitting on his back and rubbing dirt into his hair as he laughed so hard he got grass up his nose and tears in his eyes. He also thought of something else, of a pressure so heavy he was sure he’d break under it, of fiery pain in his arm, of a lesson well learned and of… of someone’s arm warm and heavy around his shoulders, of pride and hardwork….
And there was nowhere for that memory to slot in properly. Not in this lifetime, anyways. The harder he chased it, the more his head pounded, until it was gone and Magnus was left with the feelings and nothing else as Carry hauled him back off the ground and socked him in the arm and leapt onto his back.
Magnus…. Wasn’t certain about what he knew anymore, not after the death of his wife and the secret organization and the new and frightening memories, and that unease only grew as his knowledge expanded, in Refuge and beyond. Still, Magnus kept a list to keep himself grounded, and he ticked off the things that he knew.
His name was Magnus Burnsides. He was thirty-two years old. He’d had a wife and he’d loved her more than anything else in the world and he’d lost her. He’d chosen not to go back and change that.
His heart ached and he focused on other things. He had friends, people he cared about, and there were more of them now than he could count on both his hands, which he supposed was a good thing. One of those people was an unsupervised child in a dangerous, secret society, and one of those people asked him to be the best man at their wedding, if she ever got around to proposing. One of those people snored in his sleep and made eyes at plants and would look at Magnus from time to time with a kind of gentleness that Magnus imagined his father would have had if he’d had a better father. One of those people sat up with him all night after returning from Refuge, silent and shaky, but relaxed enough after all these months to lean his weight into Magnus’s side and fall asleep on his shoulder, eventually.
Magnus knew a thing or two about Taako, and while he wasn’t certain about much these days, he’d bet real money that Taako hadn’t relaxed like that around anyone before. He was certain of it.
Julia was…. not his whole life.
Things moved so quickly that Magnus was in the middle of all of it before he could properly comprehend what was all going on. The Voidfish sent everything crashing back, and things that had confused him for so many years finally made sense.
The fighting-- of course he felt at home fighting, that’s all he’d ever wanted to do in his youth. He’d joined the militia at seventeen and landed himself a role on the Starblaster. Of course he felt at home in the sky, of course he slept soundly with the ground swaying underneath him. Of course he could master combat when he’d had a century to quite literally master combat. The power bear was his mentor. The violin was Lup’s violin. Magnus had had a rather lonely and rough childhood, but on the Starblaster he’d found a family.
He remembered late nights and early mornings and tears and laughter and panic and battles and holding each other so tight at reset after cycles that had torn them apart. He remembered sharing a bed with Taako after Lup died, remembered the whole of them piling into the living room in a nest of blankets and pillows and body heat.
He remembered being eighteen for so long that the idea of it had stopped making sense, that even when they’d come to Faerun the idea of settling down was mind-boggling, because how could he return to the world and be a young man after everything .
He remembered forgetting. He remembered his family. He remembered loving them all so much, and having that thrum to survive resonating so loud in his chest that it was screaming at him.
He remembered a time before Julia, and he remembered a time before he was suicidal, and there was hope in that.
He also remembered the voidfish. He hadn’t felt it until that time, that powerful urge to protect something and soothe something and make sure that something was okay. They’d all grown a lot in their century lost to time, but Magnus had always been the crew’s baby brother. The voidfish gave him something to look after, a new sense of responsibility, and Magnus remembered thriving on that.
Julia had watered the soil, but she hadn’t planted the seed.
Magnus wasn’t certain they were going to live through this. There was, honestly, a 50% chance they were going to beef it for good. He did know a few things though. He knew that he loved his wife, and he mourned for her every day he was alive, but that he loved his family too. He knew that he had people depending on him, and that they had no choice but to survive this time. He knew that there were people he couldn’t leave behind, despite how tempting the option to run, yet again, may have seemed. He knew that despite all the respect and love he had for his captain, there was no way he could kill the voidfish, even with Davenport ordering him to. He knew that they were his family as much as the others.
He knew that children didn’t belong in war, that they shouldn’t have to be this brave, and strong, and fierce.
Magnus saw Angus fighting through blood and sweat and tears, and he saw himself, and something in his mind clicked into place.
He gave Angus his grandfather’s knife.
He prayed to every god they’d ever encountered that the kid lived long enough to give it back.
Julia had been drawing up plans to make a home.
They’d never gotten around to it, hadn’t been married long enough to actually accomplish that, but Magnus figured that ‘after the apocalypse’ was as good a time as any.
It was a lot harder than he’d thought it would be.
Magnus knew a few things. He knew how to build strong tables and chairs, and he was learning a thing or two about building strong walls. He knew that Raven’s Roost would be okay again, and that he had big plans for it, and that he could find a way to merge both of his lives together into something that felt whole.
He knew that he missed Fisher, and of course Junior, but that their loss had gone towards something amazing, and that he had his family now to pick that slack up. He knew to expect reapers (and more often than that, actually, one particular wizard) poofing into his home at any hour of the night.
He didn’t know if his family was every going to be okay again, but he had faith that it would be. One hundred planes of gods couldn’t fail him. Not in this.
He knew Lucretia wasn’t okay, even if she pretended to be. He knew Davenport would be fine, even if he was out there sailing endlessly.
He knew what he was going to do for Carry and Killian’s guest room in his house, because he had all the time in the world to build, so of course his closest friends got a space of their own.
He knew that Angus was still living on the moon.
He didn’t know if Angus would take his offer, didn’t know if he’d be interested at all. He knew Angus loved cities and mysteries and dreamt of attending either Taako’s or Lucas’s magic schools, depending on which got built first. He didn’t know to expect Angus to jump on the offer, jumping quite literally into Magnus’s arms as he gushed that of course he’d come live in Raven’s Roost, if you really mean it, sir, that’s amazing, I won’t be a bother at all, I swear.
Julia had been everything that Magnus had ever wanted, but as he slipped Angus’s glasses off his face and draped a blanket over him where he’d fallen asleep on the couch, he figured he’d found something just as well in her absence. He’d join her again, one day, of course he would. Death would still be a welcomed comfort. But life was a comfort too now. The comfort in having family, in sharing love, in knowing he belonged somewhere. He pushed Angus’s unruly curls off his forehead and sighed with a grin, and he felt the comfort of fatherhood too.