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Maui-the-smaller seemed to understand Moana’s people better than Maui did. He knew how to look like he was listening, and how to be loved by them. Maui tried to listen, and he was a good teacher for the youngsters learning to sail, but he wasn’t human and he wasn’t as good at pretending to be like them as Maui-the-smaller.
Maui-the-smaller was more beloved by Moana’s people. The children liked poking him, running around and between Maui’s legs, to follow Maui-the-smaller as he slid from tattoo to tattoo, following the lines from thigh to calf to foot, before climbing up the pattern to get back to his preferred position on Maui’s pectoral, looking down at the kids who were trying to climb up Maui’s thick legs to catch him. When Maui transformed, into an Eagle or a Shark or even a beetle, they were far more interested in finding where Maui-the-smaller had been relocated to, than glorying in Maui’s own skill and power, or even sending him into the water or the air to prove what he could do.
Maui was not jealous of his own tattoo. He refused. That was absurd.
Moana loved Maui-the-smaller as well. She’d tell a joke, and wait for Maui-the-smaller to back her up, against him, like they were collaborating against Maui.
“My people love you too,” she’d say. “Chin up,” which was an absurd thing to say, since his chin was always high. And since she couldn’t reach Maui’s face, she’d nudge Maui-the-smaller’s chin with one finger, flicking against his pec or bicep or forearm.
The elders barely tolerated him. They muttered when he passed, the one with the curling snake tattoo looking like he wanted to bite. Maui thought it was because he was the one who was teaching the young people how to sail, even if Moana was the one leading the ships on the water. But the elders were the holders of stories, and apparently there were a lot of bad stories about him.
They trusted Moana, and her father, but they didn’t trust Maui.
No matter how much good he did for humans. No matter the crops he cultivated, or the lengths he went to, making the seas fertile for them, or the long days he dragged into existence, they still didn’t trust him. One of them chased him away from her coconut grove when he suggested fertilising them with eel guts, and that just hurt.
Maui slipped into his winged form and flew to his favourite spot on the island, where none of the humans could reach him, a ledge most of the way up the side of the mountain. It was a nice place to watch the sunset over the ocean, and the colours dancing off the waves in a way which Tamatoa would envy, it was so beautiful.
“You steal one heart, and years of banishment isn’t enough punishment,” Maui spoke into the wind, “you come back and get the silent treatment from a few dozen humans as well, because they say they’re old enough to know better.”
He wasn’t sulking. He was just relaxing, alone, where no one who wasn’t a demigod could reach him.
“I stole the heart for them,” he muttered to Maui-the-smaller. “The least they could do would remember my intention. Even if it messed up. I fixed it. Well, Moana fixed it. Moana made me fix it. It’s fixed.”
Maui-the-smaller made a heart shape with his hands, pulse pulse pulse, and then closed it onto his own chest so it appeared as a tattoo upon his own pec.
“Yeah, okay, I wanted them to love me.”
Maui-the-smaller called a crowd of cheering humans to his feet, looking up at his tattooed face with awe, cheering and clapping.
“Adoration is—That’s love too, right?”
Maui-the-smaller wandered through the crowd until they were images of humans caring for each other, and playing with their children, and then kissing each other, mouth to mouth, with tender hands on cheeks.”
“Ew. No.”
Maui-the-smaller laughed, and then slid a curtain in front of the kissing people.
“Better.”
Maui relaxed into the curve of the rock ledge, and ignored Maui-the-smaller who was trying to explain something about humans. Again.
Maui ignored him, because there was a shoal of fish coming in from the west, and if he transformed into an Eagle he could go fishing. It was nice up here, barely able to see the villagers, only a few sails coming in late.
And then he heard Moana angrily kicking at rocks and yelling at the air. She clambered over the rocks to his ledge, panting and obviously angry.
Apparently he needed a new relaxation spot, since she got here without wings. Or Moana counted as a demigod after her quest for the Ocean, since he hadn’t thought anyone human could get here.
“Better Than A Princess, hello. Were you looking for me”
Moana glared at him, her hair falling over her eyes before she pushed it back with one short movement.
“No, I was looking for no one. What are you doing here?”
Maui magicked a cocktail glass into his hand, complete with tiny umbrella. Maui-the-smaller conjured a whole beachside party, complete with a silent band playing.
Moana flopped down beside him, close enough that she could poke Maui-the-smaller’s drum kit. He rattled and shook like the sound deafened him.
“I don’t believe you,” Moana said. “You like parties with people.”
“I’m an excellent party by myself,” Maui defended, but Moana was grinning at him, some of the anger already taken in the climb or the wind.
“What about you?” Maui asked, because Maui-the-smaller pulled an underarm hair until he asked.
“I’m just so—“ Moana let out a frustrated cry, kicking a rock so it rattled down the mountain. “The elders are getting on my nerves,“ she said.
“Oooh, mine too. All my nerves. Every single one of them has an elder dancing a jig on them, except for the one in my left forearm, which has someone poking it with their walking stick.”
Maui-the-smaller suited actions to words, and wandered down his forearm with an especially pointy walking stick.
Moana laughed, which was good, because at least she was less angry if she could laugh.
Maui wasn’t bad with all humans. He knew what to do with Moana to make her happy.
“Do you need me to distract them? I promise you, they hate me more. You never stole the heart of Te Fiti.”
“I think I did steal it a few times? From people who stole it from me first, but I definitely stole it back from the Kakamora.”
Maui laughed, and lowered a fist so she could bump it.
She flopped back beside him, so they could both look out at the ocean. Then she flicked her fingers against his forearm, and Maui-the-smaller took the opportunity to turn it into a jumping game, avoiding where her fingers were hitting.
“They want me to marry someone,” she said.
“Who’s the lucky boy? Girl? Squishy monster from the sea?”
“They don’t care who I marry. Just someone, and I just—I don’t want to.”
Maui-the-smaller sat against where her hand had stopped poking, and then dressed in a veil to offer himself as a bride.
“Yeah, they’d probably even take you,” she offered to him. “I’m the chief. We’re meant to marry, and have babies, and then the baby will be the next chief.”
“That’s how humans seem to do it,” Maui said, and he was so grateful that Maui-the-smaller knew what to do with Moana and humans.
“Why do I have to have a baby, or a husband, or a wife? Why can’t I just pick someone to be the next chief when I start feeling old, and train them up as leader? That seems like a much better idea. I didn’t want to be chief before we started exploring again. What if I had a baby who didn’t like the ocean? The job doesn’t suit someone just because they’re born into it.”
“That does seem like it might be the sensible option.”
“Less babies.”
“Definitely a more sensible option.” Maui had no idea what to do with babies, except hold still and do his best not to crush them, until their parents took them back.
Moana sighed, the one where even her hair started to look floppy and dejected.
“I thought that maybe, when I was older, I’d start to feel like everyone else.”
“Like everyone else?” Maui said, with scorn. “You’re much more interesting than everyone else.”
“I meant, I thought I’d start feeling the same way boring people feel about their life. The people who were happy on the island, without exploring. Happy to fish, or weave, or tell stories, or raise babies.”
Maui nodded. “You’re a better wayfinder than a weaver.”
Moana smiled at him, because she knew he meant it when he gave her praise, then she turned back to the ocean, and spoke to the wind.
“I thought I’d eventually feel like everyone else, the people who wanted to get close to boys, or girls, and snuck away to the beach to kiss.”
Maui’s face curled in disgust. “Why would you want to do that?”
Moana turned back to him, suddenly wide-eyed and relieved.
“Exactly,” Moana said. “That face. Why would I want to get all—It just seems a little gross. Or messy. I don’t get it.”
“Ooooooh,” Maui said, “humans feel like that too? I thought that was just a me-thing.”
“A you-thing?”
“A me-thing. I’m kind of amazingly unique, so I thought I wasn’t interested in doing all that because there weren’t many people to be interested in, if I can only look at demigods.” Moana nodded, because she remembered he wasn’t human, when most of her humans forgot. “I decided I preferred being me, and doing it amazingly, than being with someone else who might want to do something else.”
“You’ve got mini-Maui,” she said. “You’re not alone.”
“You’ve got Hei-Hei, and you’d probably be better alone.”
Moana poked him, and it was definitely him, not Maui-the-smaller she was poking. He beamed.
“We could be alone together?” she offered, looking out over the water as the light got deeper.
“Of course,” Maui offered. “You need me. How were you planning to get down off this mountain in the dark without me?”
“Are you going to drop me again if you fly me down?”
“Only if you’re a brat.”