Chapter Text
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Amelia wakes up with back pain.
That’s nothing new, she thinks wryly. Late nights coil her shoulders and usually leave a disk of tension there that she has to knot out. Her operations tend to be high-risk. She likes it that way. The adrenaline is hell on her muscles the next morning. A sore back? Well, she has medicine for that. She pops a tablet in her mouth and chases it down the orange juice.
Mumei visits for breakfast, which is lovely. She gets to catch up on the happenings of her friends. Mumei has a shopping bag looped over her arm. She deposits blueberry muffins on the table, some strawberry jam, and gravy.
“Don’t look at the gravy,” Mumei says. “I forgot I had muffins. I thought I had pancakes.”
Amelia laughs, “Okay, Mumei.”
They sit on the couch, tea cradled warmly in their laps as they talk about the latest news. Mumei is thoughtful about a recent shirt trend. Amelia can’t stop giggling as she shows the guardian of civilization videos of people tearing apart said shirts.
Mumei huffs, “What a waste. Those are perfectly good shirts.”
“Shirts that say ‘Shit is greasy, booty is busy’?” Amelia giggle snorts. It sounds awful to say out loud. She rolls her eyes at the whole thing and the conversation moves on.
Her back doesn’t stop aching.
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It becomes painful. Amelia takes the day off to curl up in bed, a heating pad pressed against her back and medicine doing nothing to assuage the pain. She’d already done a check to make sure nothing was broken. As far as she could feel, it was all tense muscle.
Am I getting old? She laughs, amused at the old lady jokes that are surely going to be thrown her way if that’s the case.
Mumei visits again. She looks curious, but mostly she’s attentive. When she hears about the issue, she tilts her head from the doorway.
“I can give you a massage,” Mumei says.
Amelia wonders if that’ll do more harm than good. Her face feels a little hot at the idea, but her back hurts just enough that she mumbles, “Sure, just be gentle.”
This is where it grows differently. Mumei crawls up onto the bed with her and that’s when Amelia feels her cheeks burn. It felt intimate to have Mumei ask her to roll over, lay on your front. The command leaves her tummy warm. She obliges, burying her face in her arms. She feels Mumei settle on her legs and pin them against the bed. Tentative hands touch the edge of her shirt. A touch on her lower back, on her skin, makes her inhale.
“Oh.” Mumei murmurs, startled. “Did you want the shirt on?”
“Uh.” Amelia’s voice comes out four octaves higher than she wanted it to. “Just, uh, just roll it up if you have to.”
“You have a bra on, right?’
Oh god. Amelia wants to duck her arms down to cover her chest, even though the covers have done that already, “Uh. No.”
“Good,” Mumei says. Her voice grows squeaky as she tacks on, “For uh, more coverage. So I can touch you and not- never mind, I’m making it worse.”
Amelia laughs weakly, “Mumei, you’re already here. Just get on with it.”
“Okay. My hands might be cold, don’t freak out.”
Her hands aren’t that cold. It’s a nice touch, a breeze against her skin where the tension has made it warm with hurt. The first gentle kneed against her skin has Amelia sighing through her nose. It burns, a little, to have that tightly coiled muscle pressed on. Mumei seems to know what she’s doing. She gently works her way up Amelia’s spine. She pauses at the junction just below her shoulder blades. It’s where it hurts the most.
“Oh.” Mumei breathes. She sounds winded, bewildered almost. “Ame?”
“Mh?” She mumbles. The ministrations have tipped her over into a fluffy land where she’s dozing while awake.
Mumei laughs, “I found the problem.”
“What is it?”
“Uh.” Mumei presses on the space there. Amelia hisses, the pain scorching down her back. Mumei belts out fast, “Yeah, that’s definitely the problem.”
Feeling a little alarmed, Amelia asks, “What is?”
“Your back. It’s not your back. Well, it is your back, but-” Mumei snorts, like this whole situation was dumb, “Ame, you’re growing wings.”
Amelia blinks at her pillows. “Is that a metaphor for something?”
“Yeah,” Mumei says. “It’s a metaphor for growing wings.”
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Amelia sits on the stool in her bathroom. She has to crane her neck over her shoulder. Her back is facing her mirror. She’s cradling a blanket close to her chest because she’d all but abandoned a shirt at this point. Mumei had said that’s for the best. There, on her back, was a giant ass bruise. It was mottled so darkly she could see splotches of blood underneath the skin. It was scary to look at.
“Does that look healthy?” Amelia asks hysterically.
Mumei hovers beside her. Her fingers touch along the edge of it tenderly. Amelia feels her skin burn where she touches it. “It’s fine. The first time is always the toughest. You can fold them back whenever you’d like afterward. It just, ya know, needs to… be birthed?”
Amelia chokes.
Mumei says, “That’s probably not a good explanation.”
“Will it hurt?” Amelia asks. She reached over her shoulder to prod at it, but Mumei bats her hand away.
“Oh yeah,” Mumei says. “But I can help you.”
“You seem awfully calm.”
“Well, I’ve grown my wings before.”
“That’s you.” Amelia rubs her face tiredly. “I’m me. I’m not supposed to grow wings.”
“I mean, neither was I,” Mumei says. “I was human before I was a guardian, just like all guardians.”
Amelia blinks. It’d never occurred to her that there’d be more than one guardian. Mumei had fit the bill of that. She looks at the owl quizzically. Mumei hasn’t taken her eyes off her back.
“There hasn’t been one for a while.” Mumei muses quietly. “I think I know why you’re going through it though.”
“Why?” Amelia asks.
Mumei glances at her with a knowing smile.
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When her wings do grow in, it feels like a bone is snapping. Amelia gasps heavily, her hands fisted into Mumei’s shirt. Mumei soothes her with gentle little noises. One hand cradles the back of Amelia’s head. Her fingers scratch along there, soothing little things that ground Amelia. Her other hand is reaching over her shoulder to touch her back.
Amelia can feel them. They’re tiny, barely the size of her palm, but she can feel them, like an extra hand that suddenly appeared from her spine. Mumei coaxes them. Her fingers brush feathers down. She has a washcloth she uses to get rid of the blood. The whole process takes no more than an hour. When the pain dulls down to an ache. Amelia has all but sagged against Mumei.
“Well,” Mumei says. “That went well.”
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Her back looks like a murder scene. It’s bruised all the way down to her lower back, but Mumei says that’s just normal bruises. They’ll heal. Her wings are growing. They’re tiny, baby-feathered little things. She can’t reach them, but Mumei can. She feels her face grow warm, affection awash in her chest as Mumei dutifully cleans at her feathers. Her hand is gentle with a washcloth. Her fingers are on the skin around them.
Each day, those fingers grow a little more adventurous. Without a shirt on, Amelia feels like her head is smoking. Mumei traces her shoulders and the boney ridge of her spine. She follows her rib bones. She journeys back up to her wings and brushes her fingers over the feathers. Amelia can feel that. Her nerves are on fire.
“Does that feel good?” Mumei asks, a shy note in her voice.
Amelia nearly squeaks out, “Yeah.”
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Her wings grow some more. Eventually, they’re the length of her arm. It’s not so easy to just hide them in her shirt now. The feathers poke out from the bottom of her shirt. Their tawny color of them is starting to fade. Now, though, she has to deal with her baby feathers shedding off. Everywhere she goes she finds she's accidentally left a gift in the form of a fluffy feather. When Mumei finds one on the couch, Amelia groans.
“I’m sorry, I’m trying to keep the house clean.” Amelia mumbles. “These little bastards just keep showing up.”
Mumei is giving the feather a mystified look. Amelia startles, not expecting the tenderness Mumei holds for it. She’s not expecting Mumei to bring the feather up to her lips. She’s not expecting the owl to hold eye contact as she does.
Her heart is a volcano. It erupts out of her mouth in a mess of, “That’s not sanitary, Mumei, what the hell.”
“Oh probably,” Mumei says, cheer in her voice. “I’m just happy.”
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Her feathers are mostly black, but they have long streaks of yellow through them. When folded against her back, it almost looks like a bee. Mumei seems to like them. Even when they’re long enough Amelia can finally reach them and take care of them herself, Mumei does it anyway. They are sleek and small. Amelia notes that Mumei’s feathers are thick, brawny, and have an extra layer of fluffiness to them. Amelia’s are thin and shiny.
“Little goldtreader,” Mumei whispers.
Amelia feels like her breath has been stolen.
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Her first flight makes her want to throw up. She gets motion sickness quickly. Her wings are small, which means they’re built to go fast. No matter how slow she tries to go, one flap from her wings nearly sends her spiraling miles away. Mumei guides her, her hands clasped with Amelia’s as she leads her up above the trees.
“Easy now,” Mumei whispers, a fond grin on her face. “You’ll have to angle your wings. Do you feel that? Try and angle them so you’re hovering. You’re trying too hard.”
“It’s not that easy,” Amelia complains. She attempts again and goes forward instead. She ends up with her face against Mumei’s shoulder. Mumei laughs. Amelia is embarrassed, but with the way Mumei embraces her and kisses the top of her head, she feels like a champion.
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Mumei watches Amelia touch the sky. She’s doing it all on her own. Mumei doesn’t have to help her with that anymore. She watches the detective soar and loop through the clouds. The wildflower field kisses her knees.
We are guardians, Mumei thinks, you probably already know this, maybe without knowing. Kronii is the warden of time, but you’re the guardian of it. You are the revelry of it, the parade, the conductor, the manager, you’re everything for it and about it. It’s your passion. It’s my passion too.
Just like the ticking of a clock, you adore the sound of it. Mumei smiles as Amelia dips low, her wings fanning out into a hover. Blue eyes shine brightly at her as she leans down to press her forehead against Mumei’s. Amelia laughs and Mumei sighs, I adore the sound of it too.
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