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Magni wants the warmth of this bed infused into his bloodstream.
In fact, he wants to become one with this bed right now. Smack his soul right into this bad boy. It’s his bed and he’s lying in it and the comfy-dumfy metrics are off the charts, like hello people, are we all seeing this? Magni’s just discovered prime nap conditions beyond human comprehension. He feels like a god.
When was the last time he slept? Irrelevant.
It’s so cozy he never wants to get out.
His nights are long and cold and unforgiving, and they’ve been that way for a very excruciating length of time. Not enough hours in the day to work, so he toils until even the moon no longer wants to watch him, and when the sun takes the morning shift, it shines upon him in disgust.
Magni Dezmond is a creature that is no longer human, but he has the heart of one, and loathes it.
A genius of forbidden arts should not be chained by limitations such as a body that needs rest and care, and he’s long past the point of wishing for extra arms because he has them, and they’re still not working at the pace he desires. Alchemy should be the answer to all wish-granting, but maybe he’s such a needy fuck that even science and magic can’t keep up. Sucks to suck, he supposes. It’s still his profession — his specialty and self-proclaimed expertise.
It’s just that he never seems to be able to work fast enough. Not enough hours in the day. He dreams of societal collapse to rewrite hours, minutes and seconds to last longer, just for him to get more things done. That’s right, he blames society before he blames himself.
Magni Dezmond is a genius.
It’s the world that’s too slow for him.
Always has been.
His mind constantly whirs at a high density of thoughts per second, possibly more than the average genius if he’s honest and even though he’s easily distracted, he tries his darn best to keep his attention sharp as an arrow, focused and true.
But then Altare’s palm had rested on his shoulder.
Such a silly, minuscule gesture.
Light enough not to startle. It was deliberately careful. He’d given a gentle squeeze as a greeting, and Magni wanted to bite his hand. Not because he doesn’t like being touched, but because he likes it too much. His focus had gotten shot immediately, and he had half a mind to strangle Altare for not letting him overwork again.
Then, Altare had asked, with a voice ever soft and sweet — in the way one might describe a delicate marshmallow, but Magni’s not a delicate marshmallow kind of guy, so he’d probably call it more of a slice of sponge cake, fluffy and decadent and weird to be putting in your ear — for Magni to please go the heck to sleep.
Which Magni would have loved to refuse.
He would have.
He hates folding for authority and Altare’s not allowed to tell him what to do, leader or not. Had it been any other night, he might have just done so. Just hissed and spat and run in the other direction, Altare’s stupid puppy eyes be damned.
The problem was that he had forgotten to give himself permission to sleep, and it had been a very unwelcome relief to be finally given an excuse to.
So, whatever. Fine. Peachy. He lets it happen.
Ignores the kind laughter and the way Altare slips into bed behind him, wrapping his strong arms around his waist. He’s so effortlessly casual about it. It’s like he’s made for hugs, sometimes, with the ease he’ll hug anyone. With his soft clothes and solid chest.
It feels lovely. Magni can’t deny that. Even so, he still pretends to struggle to get out — channeling a floppy fish as he makes a last ditch attempt to flail around. He knows it will make Altare hold him tighter, and he is somehow okay with that.
“Gotta keep you from escaping somehow,” his leader teases, tone playful.
“Help!” Magni chitters fretfully. “Help!”
“It’s too late, Magni Dezmond. Your fate is sealed.”
“Oh, no! No, please! Someone help me!”
Altare giggles anyway.
Magni considers that a job well done, and proceeds to lay limp. The sweet embrace of temporary death is calling, and who is he to refuse it? Sleep sounds nice. Real nice.
Gosh, he doesn’t remember the last time he had sunk into this mattress. It clearly misses him, the plushness enveloping his aching bones almost as warmly as the firm line of Altare’s chest against his back.
This could be weird, but it isn’t.
Magni has had to snuggle with his guild leader before. All business-related cuddle sessions mind you, with circumstances such as being on missions too cold not to cling to the nearest warm body, or Magni’s shitty eyesight playing up again and not noticing he’s helping Altare parse quest info while practically sitting in his lap.
As the leader’s right-hand man, surprisingly not self-proclaimed, he’s had his fair share of spending copious amounts of time with Altare — and neither of them have come to mind.
He gets comfortable with the position, nestling his body into Altare’s, feeling his exhale tickle his neck. The touch, and all the ease of his embrace, feels good enough to drown in. Magni feels the stiffness in his body eroding, his outer shell of stress crumbling as his very inner being melts into a gooey puddle.
Dramatic? Yes.
Incorrect? Not entirely so.
It just feels so freaking nice. Big cozy. Huge cozy. Like he’s sinking into warm clouds, which sounds extremely weird if taken literally, but Magni is tired and done thinking for the day and just wants to be held like this forever.
He’s missed creature comforts, and just like any overworked fool does, it seems that he forgets how wonderful it feels until he’s right in the midst of it.
“Dude,” Magni says, unprompted. “Just take me out now. I’m ready to die.”
“What?” Altare asks. Magni can feel the startled laughter reverberate in his chest. “I’m not here to kill you.”
“Well, that’s new. Thought that was your whole thing. Thought that was your mission in life.”
“Eh? Killing you?”
“Absolutely destroying me. Taking everything I have.”
“Nah, that’s only for when you misbehave.”
“Oh? So I just need to misbehave, do I? That can be arranged.”
“Pfft— shut up, Dez.” He sounds disgustingly fond, either way. His hair brushes Magni’s nape as he shakes his head. “Why are you suddenly ready to be killed? I thought that was the opposite of what you wanted.”
“Are you ever like— do you ever—” Magni doesn’t know what he’s trying to say. “Do you ever feel something so good that you know you’re never going to feel it again, so you wanna stay like that? Like, having a happy memory that you want to live in forever. You get me?”
His leader mulls over the words, a low hum to his voice. “That’s pretty dramatic. Are you saying you want to die in my arms?”
“No.” Magni says, before he contemplates this. He doesn’t really want to die, and absolutely not in Altare’s arms, but he can’t deny he’s feeling a high that no ordinary person should be feeling from the mere weight of an embrace. He must’ve gotten too used to not being touched, because now he’s going to melt on Altare like wax to candlelight, like ice cream to hot pavement. “Not really. I’m just– this is nice. Real nice. I don’t know. Maybe I’m tired.”
“Maybe you need more sleep.” Altare suggests sympathetically.
“I mean, probably, but that’s not gonna happen.”
“I would tell you off for that, dude, but I’m pretty much the same. Sleep? Don’t know her.”
“We work too hard.” Magni muses.
“Maybe we do.” Altare replies, pressing in as close as he can, giving the alchemist a firm squeeze which makes practically all of Magni feel like jelly.
He now knows why Altare is surrounded by slimes. They’ve probably been condensed by him into a gelatinous substance a bajillion gazillion times, and made soft and squishy, just like this. Magni thinks he feels the ghost of a kiss brush his nape, but he’s not quite sure. He’s tired and Altare is warm. He sinks into that warmth and feels his eyes drift closed.
Altare’s voice is a whisper. A pretty, fluffy slice of sponge cake. Sometimes, it’s the sweetest thing Magni has ever heard.
“So you deserve this nap, okay? Give yourself a break. You’ve been working hard for a long time now. Just rest.”
For a little while, the world falls away.
It’s not quite sleeping, but it’s not being awake, either. Magni exists in this middle ground, where he wants to pass out and forget everything, and yet he also wants to absorb this moment like a microfiber cloth, etching every inch of contact into his waking memory, in hopes that he will never forget anything again.
His body feels strange. Like he’s a drowning man that’s just been pulled from the ocean. Like he’s finally experiencing light after being trapped in an endless dark. Like he should know exactly how Altare’s arms should feel around him, but his embrace is both familiar and also entirely unknown.
Altare is a quiet sleeper, but a clingy one. Magni doesn’t remember if this is something he’s always been aware of, or if he’s just realizing it in this state of half-consciousness while being compressed like a hug pillow, but either way, he isn’t complaining.
The closer Altare presses into him, the more he realizes how foreign it feels — his skin feels alight, like it’s the first time he’s ever felt the warmth of human touch, and he’s not just being dramatic about it.
He stirs into waking like that, startling himself with a short gasp.
Altare still has his arms around him, and Magni doesn’t know if he’s on the verge of a panic attack or if he’s about to do something drastic like ask for time to stop so he can just lie here, just like this, forever and ever and ever.
He trembles and shakes. He hopes Altare doesn’t wake up to find him quivering like a baby seal. He doesn’t know what he’d say to him if he did.
Magni is overly conscious of how every part of their bodies connect. Like it brands him, marking him anew. He doesn’t understand why.
All else aside, he’s been overreacting since he got into bed. Blamed the sleep-deprivation at first, but that doesn’t explain why he genuinely wants to ask Altare to crush him hard enough to fuse his errant soul back into his body, because where light touches make him tingly, Magni wants to be squeezed like a stress ball. He might do anything just to be held a little tighter.
A thought strikes Magni, unbidden.
Maybe this really is the first time I’ve been hugged like this.
What a ridiculous thought.
He tries to shake it off.
His body doesn’t want anything shaken off.
He wants Altare to squeeze him really hard again. He wants it so badly, so violently, all of a sudden, that a rampant, frustrated tear escapes his eye.
He knows he’s not gonna ask for it.
He won’t, because that feels like weakness — feels like admitting he needs somebody, when the Great Magni Dezmond has only ever relied on himself.
So no, he won’t ask to be viscerally enveloped by the feeling. To become one with it. He won’t ask to be squeezed tighter and tighter, won’t ask for Altare to promise not to let go until his every atom has absorbed his touch.
Won’t ask, because Magni has his pride, and that’s already being ruined by the fact that he’s pathetically shedding a tear over being fucking held.
What’s wrong with me? Ain’t the first time, can’t be the first time. He thinks, before his chest pangs, aching at the very thought. It hasn’t been that long, has it? So why does it feel like…
Another tear falls and he blinks frantically, pleading at himself to stop. Now he feels really pathetic.
He’s a grown man, experienced a whole lot of crazy shit in his life, ingests weird substances on the daily for the sake of his profession, and he’s now crying because someone is holding him. What a mess.
Had he never been held before? That’s impossible.
He knows he has. He can’t go so many years living without being held. That’s ridiculous. But the thought lingers, as he racks his brain for the memories, only to find them distant and faded.
The last time it had been Altare too, but Magni had been ill back then, and didn’t quite have the capacity to enjoy it so much.
Maybe I’ve never been held.
For some reason, no matter how ridiculous or absurdly stupid it sounds, he feels like it’s true.
“Dez…?” Altare asks softly, his voice rough with sleep as he drags Magni from his train of thought. Damn it all. He must have woken him up. “You’re shaking. Is something wrong?”
“Oh— oh, nah. No no no,” Magni responds, airy and light, trying to swallow the strange feeling that this is the first time in his life that he’s felt arms wrapped around him. “Nah. Just thinking.”
“Can’t sleep?”
“It continues to evade me.” Magni admits, his voice coming out smaller than he intends. “Go back to sleep, Altare. Sorry if I woke you.”
“S’okay…” Altare yawns, snuggling against him, burying his face into Magni’s sweater without shame. Muffled, he says, “Lemme know if you need anything, I’m your guy…”
Magni challenges this stupidly heroic statement.
“What if I asked you to go collect spring water from outside for me right now? In the cold? And get me a three-course meal while you’re at it.”
“Goodnight, Dez.”
“Hey.” Magni huffs fondly, too exhausted to manage a proper laugh. “You said anything.”
“Mm,” Altare manages a soft hum before he yawns again, shaking his head. “Not… outside. Outside cold. Unless you really, really, really need it. Then maybe I’ll go outside.”
“Yeah? Maybe I do really, really, really need it.”
“No, you don’t.”
“You don’t get to decide that.”
“I’m not letting go of you.” Altare says, simply. He’s clearly trying to fight off another wave of sleepiness and losing, because even his threat sounds half-assed. “If you want me to go outside, you’re coming with me.”
He is endearing, Magni thinks. Trying to help, even when he can’t keep his eyes open — that’s the Hero of Elysium for ya.
“Damn. Never mind, then.” Magni replies, clicking his tongue. “Worth a shot.”
He’s met with a soft snore in response, which makes him smile, unfortunately.
“You wouldn’t have been able to take a step out that door, would you, sleepyhead?” He murmurs under his breath. “You’re all talk.”
Ironically, the thought alone brings an end to the existential fear about being held. That Altare would even entertain the idea of going outside when he’d much rather be tucked in and cozy, and that he’d go simply because Magni asked for it.
Stupid heroism has always been something the alchemist could never understand, yet it always felt comforting somehow. That if his world fell apart, someone would be there to pick up the pieces. That if he destroyed everything one day, someone would be there to put it back together again.
Not that he needs it, but still. Failsafes never hurt.
“Altare?”
There’s a groan as the guild leader stirs. “Mm?”
“… thanks.”
“You’re very welcome,” Altare nuzzles his face into his back. “You know I’m here for you, Dez. Now go to sleep or I’m going to get you.”
Magni snorts. “Sure you are.”
Altare squeezes him again. Magni feels weird, for a second, but nice. Weird, but nice.
“Go to sleep, Dez.” Altare’s hug is crushing for a moment, but that’s what Magni wants. His body warms, soothed by the pressure, and it takes every muscle in him to stop from turning around to squeeze Altare back. Might be nice, also. But he won’t. “You hear me? That’s an order.”
“Alright, alright,” he closes his eyes, then puts on a robotic voice. “Initiating sleep mode.”
Altare knees him.
“What the heck—! How am I supposed to go to sleep if you keep attacking me? Maybe I should just get up and sleep somewhere else.”
Altare doesn’t reply to that, only wraps himself around Magni like a pretzel, and Magni sighs. He wishes it was exasperated, but he’s enjoying it too much. Altare has always been physically affectionate but it’s rare that he becomes this level of clingy.
It makes Magni feel— what’s the word— wanted? Cared for? Cared about?
His breath catches when he realizes.
He feels… important.
Treasured.
Like he’s something cherishable, that can’t be lost or replaced.
In that instant, he forgets what he had been so worried about. Altare has that effect on him.
And really, what would it matter if Magni had or hadn’t been held? He’s being held now.
In such an all-consuming embrace, no less. Altare holds him tight but his body is soft, like a gentle anchor to reality, grounding him from his scatter of strange thoughts.
How silly.
Magni’s smile is faint. An involuntary quirk of his lips.
What would it matter if it was the first time? Or the second or the third? Or the hundredth time, even?
The only thing that really matters is that it’s not the last.
“Goodnight, Altare.” He whispers.
There’s that ghost of a kiss again, a bare, fleeting press of lips against his nape. Magni almost asks about it. Almost reaches through the night and asks if it’s his imagination or if it’s because he misses someone else too much, or if it’s really Altare and not just some trick of his mind — but he doesn’t.
This is already more than enough to ask of this one stupid hero.
(Some small, small part of Magni doesn’t want to admit that the thought is as comforting as it is terrifying. If anyone could— save— him—)
Magni needs to go to sleep. His body understands.
(—it would be the Hero of Elysium, wouldn’t it—?)
Everything in him settles, and calms.
(But the Great Magni Dezmond— doesn’t rely on anyone— but himself—)
He drifts off to the rhythm of Altare’s breathing, the steady rise and fall of his chest.
(—could that change?)
A part of him, too sentimental to squash, curls up closer to his guild leader and when he slips into the realm of dreams, he has the nicest sleep he can remember having for a long time.