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It was quiet at the Institute, silent and still in a way that felt like the whole building was holding its breath. The demon was dead, it’s spawn eradicated and corpses littering the hallways that were usually cleaned to such an extreme degree. There was still the issue of how it had gotten past the wards, how it had made its way onto the holy ground of the Institute, but Magnus found that at that moment he did not care at all. He barely cared that his shoulder was still smouldering, and the jacket he was wearing was very expensive. “It’s always on date night,” he curses under his breath.
“Magnus?” Turning his head he sees Jace standing at the end of the hall. “Thank the angel.”
“Jace, are you alright?” He scans the shadowhunter’s body for any visible wounds but he appears to be unscathed.
“Yeah,” he’s walking towards him now, “I’m alright. Have you seen Alec?”
“No,” Magnus admits, “We got separated in all the mess. I have no clue where he went.”
“Damn it,” Jace curses, “Alright let’s look for him then, I can’t find him either, I checked the Ops centre, the infirmary and even the dorms.”
Magnus wondered too, as Jace lists every place Magnus himself would look to first. “Alright, yes, let’s find him then.”
They search what feels like the whole of the Institute, running into many shadowhunters cleaning the floors and walls, rounding up weapons and helping the injured. “I don’t understand how it got past the wards.” Jace said, speaking Magnus’ exact thoughts.
“I don’t know,” Magnus looked at the demon's corpse near him, “But I will investigate after we deal with everything.”
The institute truly looks to be in a weird limbo of peace. Now that the demons are dead and gone, and the ichor is being cleaned away, people seem to be generally getting back to normal work, some lingering around the infirmary to help aid the few wounded. It really looked like a battlefield, but the injuries seem to be minimal compared to the mess that was made. It was strange, and it made Magnus feel uneasy. “Right back to work I suppose,” he aims for levity but Jace just casts him an unreadable glance.
“Yeah, most of how things work here is about the station. And attacks like this, people will want answers, but they won’t start to ask for them for a couple of days. It’s kind of a ‘not my problem, not my concern’ culture.” Jace shrugs, his leather jacket making an awful squelch sound from the ichor, “Just how it is.”
“Well,” Magnus looks around at the now cleaned screens, the small groups talking amongst themselves, “That certainly seems better than the angry mob alternative.”
“Better for everyone that way,” Jace agrees, “Plus it gives the higher ups like Alec the chance to actually try and figure out what went wrong. Leaders like Izzy and I can organize the masses, it hasn’t always worked that way, Alec used to work himself into the ground.”
“He doesn’t anymore?” Magnus lets out a breathy laugh, “I don’t see him for days sometimes.”
“Yeah sometimes he still does,” Jace agreed again, “But not like he did before. I think having some place to go away from work really helped him. And, I mean,” Jace coughs awkwardly, “Obviously having you in his life helped change it more than anything.”
Magnus smiled at that, nodding his head, “Same for me.”
“Now if only we could find Mr. Lover boy,” Jace rolls his shoulder and sighs, I’m tempted to use a tracking rune, and it’s only the confines of the Institute so it wouldn’t even help that much.”
“He’s around here somewhere,” Magnus assured his love’s parabatai, “We’ll find him.”
When they do find Alec, he’s in his office, which they had both thought was locked and unoccupied. However, Alec is there, sitting against the wall and panting, seraph blade in his grasp covered in ichor. “Alexander,” Magnus kneels next to him, taking his head in his hands and tilting his face up to the light to see it better. “Are you okay?”
“I don’t know,” Alec gulps air down as he speaks, “I killed one of them and then it all stopped and I got dizzy and ended up here.”
Magnus exchanges a look with Jace that he hopes communicates what he wants to say without words. Jace nods before talking, “Maybe you should let Magnus take you home and look you over, I’ll find Izzy and we can cover for the night. People are actually pretty organized out there, I’ll tell them you needed to see about the wards, if anyone asks, although I doubt they will. Go home man, get some rest.”
Magnus would admit that Jace’s argument was both sound and compelling, but normally Alec would at least put up some of a fight, but now Alec just nods immediately. “Yeah,” he agrees, “Yeah let’s go home.”
“Okay,” Magnus gets up and grabs the seraph from Alec’s grip, the light going out once the blade was in Magnus’ grip. Jace stepped in and grabbed the blade from him, the two exchanging a nod that was both a thank you and a take care of eachother. “Alright my love let’s get you up.”
“Get some rest man,” Jace says as he’s leaving, “I will check in with you tomorrow, but if I see you before noon I will be very upset.”
Alec lets out a breath that was close enough to a laugh, “Thanks Jace.”
Once they are alone, Magnus bends over to reach for Alec’s arms, helping him get up and stay balanced. Alec sways a little once standing but other than that he manages it well enough. “Do you need my strength for the portal?” Alec sounds like he is about to fall asleep on his feet, but the earnest way he asks Magnus makes his heart swell.
“No it’s alright love,” he replies, “I didn’t really use that much of my energy.”
Before Alec can even reply, Magnus has already summoned the portal, and is guiding the two of them through it and into their living room. He takes Alec to the couch and sits him down. “Okay love let’s see.” He uses magic to scan Alec’s body for injuries, and his back is what lights up. “Did you get hit in the back?”
“I think so,” Alec says, voice still betraying his pain.
“Okay I need your shirt off,” Magnus tells him, “Do you want to take it off or should I just use magic?”
Alec closes his eyes for a moment and swallows before saying, “Magic. Please.”
“Alright,” Magnus waves a hand and Alec’s shirt is gone. There is some bruising on his torso, but when he turns around Magnus can see the gash running across Alec’s back. It’s blackened around the edges, which is probably why he felt so dizzy and ill. “Okay there’s some venom in the wound, I will need to make a salve quickly to deal with that first before I heal it. It also might leave a scar, but hopefully if I work fast enough that won’t happen.”
“I thought you said they were hot,” Alec jokes, trying to get a look at his own back and failing.
“Ha ha,” Magnus feigned laughter, “Only when I don’t know the cause of them, tough guy. Now come on, I need you to come sit in the apothecary with me.”
Alec stood up too quickly and winced, bracing himself against the spike of pain. “Carefully,” Magnus told him, grabbing ahold of his arm to help steady him. “Carefully,” he repeated, helping steady Alec as they moved across the loft to the apothecary. “There,” he sat Alec in a chair backwards so he had access to his back.
“Is it in my bloodstream?” Alec asked, head pillowed on his folded arms.
“Not much of it yet I don’t think,” Magnus told him as he gathered supplies, “It’s a slow moving and thick looking venom thankfully, but the little but that is, is making you feel like that.”
“Mmm,” Alec hummed against what Magnus knew was a wave of either pain or nausea or maybe both.
“If you need to throw up just try and give me a warning, okay?” Magnus was mixing the ingredients together now, looking up at Alec every few seconds to make sure he was still alright.
“Okay,” he agreed, biting down on a piece of his sleeve and squeezing his eyes shut.
Magnus hated seeing his boyfriend in such pain, he knew it came with the territory of his life and profession, but it never got any easier. Routine, Alec had taught him, didn’t make the difficult things any better or easier. “I’m almost done,” Magnus told him, stirring the salve as fast as he could without ruining it. Magic was sometimes a very fickle thing, which was extremely irritating in moments like this.
“I think I might be sick,” Alec spoke just loud enough for Magnus to hear him.
“Okay, that’s okay,” Magnus didn’t know which of them he was reassuring, “Could you hold out your hands for me? Like you’re holding something between them?”
Alec nods and does as Magnus asks, and in seconds a plastic trash can is in between his outstretched hands. “Just take some breaths,” Magnus tells him, trying to be soothing and also finish his work. He ached to touch Alec then, run a hand through his strands of hair and hold him upright, but he needed to finish this salve first.
Magnus keeps his eyes on the pot in front of him as the last steps are the most important, so all he can do is listen as Alec gags, throwing up into the same plastic trash can. Magnus knows his boyfriend well enough though to know he’s probably relieved that Magnus can’t look at him right now, vulnerable and sick, even though Magnus himself hates it. “I’m alright,” Alec speaks after several minutes of gagging, “Just nauseous but not actually sick.”
Magnus turns the flame off of the salve and turns quickly, “Alright, that’s good,” he agrees, even though it probably means there’s nothing in Alec’s stomach for him to throw up, “Here, I have the salve ready. It’s going to sting but it shouldn’t be too bad. If it gets to be too much, tell me, alright?”
Alec simply nods but Magnus watches all the muscles in his back flex, straining against a threat not yet impacted. “Alright,” Magnus scoops the thick medicine with his hand, and uses his clean one to hold Alec’s arm, seeing as his hands were occupied. As soon as the salve hits Alec’s skin he winces, but doesn’t say anything, “It should get better after a moment.”
As if a puppet cut from a string, all of Alec's muscles relax after a minute, and Magnus watches as the blackened venom is cleared from his skin, returning it to just wounded and red. Magnus himself lets out a breath of relief, quickly replaces the salve with waves of healing magic, watching as the skin sews itself back together under Magnus’ guidance. “There,” Magnus sighs when it’s healed, “All better.”
Alec flexes his muscles and then slowly sits up straighter, putting the trash bin on the floor. “You might still feel a bit uneasy,” Magnus tells him, swiping his fingers and vanishing the trash bin, “But it will pass in a moment. Do you want to shower or eat anything?”
Alec shakes his head, “‘M tired,” he mumbles.
“Another side effect I’m afraid,” Magnus agrees, “Come get a shower with me and then we can go to bed, hmm?”
“Alright,” Alec gets up slowly, letting Magnus support his weight as he stumbles for a moment. “Woah, you weren’t kidding.”
“No,” Magnus agrees, “Unfortunately not. Come on.”
Once they are both out of their clothes and under the stream of the hot water, Alec lets out a groan of relief. “That’s better,” He sighs, “Feels nice.”
They wash one another and stand in the spray together. Alec stops them and pulls Magnus’ face to his, kissing him softly several times. “Thank you for coming today.”
“Of course,” Magnus smiles, “We’ll have to investigate tomorrow how the wards were broken through, people will want answers.”
“Yeah,” Alec sighs, “I want answers too. We’ll figure it out. Did I at least get a cool back scar out of this mess?”
“Hmm,” Magnus turns him slightly and looks at his skin, puckered a little with inflammation. “Maybe a little one, but not terribly large.”
“Damn,” Alec laughs, “Better luck next time I guess.”
“You’re going to give your boyfriend a heart attack,” Magnus swats his arm.
“Well good thing my boyfriend is a warlock who can heal his own ailments,” Alec points out as Magnus turns the water off behind him.
Once they are in bed, water warm skin beneath the covers, Magnus in his arms, he asks Alec, “Jace said something today, about the hierarchy in the institute.”
“Yeah?” Alec asks, glancing down at him.
“Yeah. I just wasn’t sure if that was some sort of new development or it’s just a New York thing. It’s just, I know that if this happened not even that long ago, they would have my head for that. Or at the very least there would be an angry mob demanding answers immediately.” Magnus shrugged, “No offense darling, shadowhunters just never seemed to have an abundance of patience.”
Alec is quiet for a moment, staring off into some mid-distance that told Magnus he was thinking it over before replying. “I think it’s new. Or maybe it is just a New York thing. I’m not totally sure to be honest. We obviously are still working on our downworld diplomacy issues, but it’s been getting better. It’s a mixture of that and running the institute in a way that allows people’s focus to remain on their own level of concern. There are still people who are probably fuming, probably will demand you to be fired, but it’s a quiet minority of people. And everyone knows not to question my decisions about our downworld relations. It’s a mixture of a lot of things.”
Magnus knew, logically, that things were changing, that even though it was molasses-slow sometimes it was still a forward movement. He just forgot sometimes how heavily Alec himself was spearheading that movement, in New York especially. He knew it wasn’t entirely personal, that even if they weren’t involved with one another that Alec would still care, would still fight, but it feels like a marvel to get to see behind the curtain of how Alec ran things. “You’re doing an amazing job,” Magnus told him, squeezing around his stomach.
“Even when I’m getting venom poisoning in my back?” Alec replies back wittily.
“Even then,” Magnus cranes his neck up to kiss Alec’s jaw, “But I would seriously prefer it if you didn’t do that.”
“I’ll try my best,” Alec laughed, “For you.”
And he knew it wasn’t personal, but sometimes he let himself believe that the reason Alec did what he did was for him, for the two of them together. He knew Alec would always fight for them.
“For us,” Magnus agreed, closing his eyes and letting sleep take him.