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Gillion weighs less than you'd expect. Chip has made this discovery again and again, each time surprised by how easy it is to lift him.
Despite being laughably short, just about reaching Chip's shoulder, Gill with his wide shoulders and pecs and arms (that Chip definitely does not spend too much time staring at), and his tendency to walk with his head held high, looks solid. Like he should shake the ground with his footfall. And yet he is about as heavy as a bag of down.
For a while it was something Chip agonized over. He tried and failed to find books on Triton anatomy, asked Gill about it ("I don't know, Chip. Why are you so heavy?"), asked Drey about it ("He's a fish. Fish weigh nothin'."), and finally asked if Jay had any thoughts on the matter. She answered something about density and buoyancy and deep sea animals, but Chip only caught half of her academic waffling about.
What stuck in his brain was that apparently Gillion has hollow bones, and that was enough of an explanation for him.
And so, while being able to pick up the Chosen One like an unruly cat was originally a shocking discovery to Chip, by now Gill's weight has become just another one of many peculiarities that come with knowing the fish in question, alongside the wet skin and his tendency to throw valuables overboard.
Gillion weighs next to nothing and Chip knows that, and he tells himself this over and over, trying not to notice how right now, skin grey, eyes glazed over and unresponsive, Gill feels even lighter in his arms than usual.
Chip has his brows furrowed, eyes fixed on Jay's back as she leads the way from the docks up into Featherbrooke (don't look down, don't look at him), and is trying not to think about how not winded he is.
But of course, being Chip, he does think about it.
He's walking up a steep slope, carrying an entire person. A person that might weigh very little on a regular day, sure, but enough to make Chip have to take breaks to catch his breath nonetheless. Right now Chip feels fine. He's breathing freely and there's no annoying stinging in his side as he carries Gill into town.
Gillion definitely weighs significantly less than usual.
The thought alone is enough to bring back the sting of tears threatening to spill.
Chip picks up his pace until he's walking next to Jay instead of behind her. The sudden shift in the rhythm of his steps seems to startle Gill, who makes a small, high pitched noise somewhere between a whine and a growl in the back of his throat. It's a noise Chip hasn't heard from Gillion before and he swallows at how meek it sounds.
He holds Gill just a fraction closer to his chest.
Jay throws but a glance at him, but in that split second of eye contact Chip can see her worry clear as day. Whether it's aimed at him or Gill he doesn't know. He doesn't ask and Jay looks back down at her muddied boots.
"We're almost there." Her voice barely even shakes as she reassures Chip or Gillion or herself.
Chip's very much does as he dares a look down at Gillion - a mistake; his unfocused gaze and limp ear-fins send a piercing ache through Chip's heart - and murmurs "Hear that, buddy? Almost there."
Gill doesn't respond. He stays curled into Chips chest and keeps staring into nothing and Chip wonders if he even heard him. For a second the awful thought that he could be carrying a corpse makes its way out of Chips subconscious and to the front of his mind, constricting his breathing and making his palms go clammy, but he waves it away. In a similar fit of panic just a few minutes ago Chip had grabbed Gillion's wrist to check his pulse, and even after heaving a sigh of relief he had refused to let go of it.
He'd rather watch, unable to help as he feels the life leave his friend's body, than risk Gillion dying in his arms unnoticed.
But Gillion isn't dying. Chip can still feel the thumping of blood underneath his fingertips, weak and slow and unsteady as it may be. Gillion isn't dying.
Or so Chip keeps telling himself.
He knows of course that Gillion is very much dying. And that they need to hurry the fuck up lest they be too late to save him from Kenta's curse. He knows that Gillion - strong, powerful, indomitable Gillion Tidestrider, Champion of the Undersea, Hero of the Deep - might die. Actually, really die.
It's something of a shock to find that Chip has never been worried about Gill like this before, with how many fights he throws himself into with seemingly no regard for his own safety. It makes him feel like a terrible friend and an even worse captain, but then again, Gill has always walked away from a battle with his head held high. Not once has Chip ever doubted his co-captain's ability to survive anything fate could throw at him. He's Gillion after all.
But this is different. This is not something Gill can best by drawing his sword or donning his armor. This is no battle. This is no foe. This is a curse. One that is slowly eating away at his life.
Chip readjusts his grip on Gill's wrist to better feel his pulse. Gillion isn't dying.
It has become something of a mantra. Without it Chip wouldn't have made it two steps on dry land before crumbling to the ground in a miserable heap of tears and hiccups and grief. And he really can't afford that. Not when Gill needs him.
Not that Gill actually needs him. The little magic that Chip has managed to learn is not going to do them any favors here, and Jay could carry Gill to her mom's tavern just as well as Chip can, but-
Gillion has always been strong for him. Now it's Chip's turn.
So Chip blinks away the moisture in his eyes, straightens his back and fixes his gaze on the path ahead of him.
Gillion has always been this light and Gillion isn't dying and Chip doesn't cry and they keep moving up the hill, towards the village that harbors a cure.